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38,258 |
<p>I am currently deciding graduate school between several different groups in my school's engineering department. A few faculty in electronics, signal processing and control system has expressed interest in working with me.</p>
<p>When I talk to some of the current graduate students, I get a wide variety of opinions. What bothers me is that some graduate students tells me that a certain group is on "decline". They rarely clarify what this means, but to me it can mean several things.</p>
<ol>
<li>the output from the group is inconsistent</li>
<li>funding is lacking</li>
<li>output is not applicable to come up with a product</li>
<li>(follows from 3) work too theoretical and deviates from engineering goal </li>
</ol>
<p>If a group is on decline, then regardless of the reason, under normal circumstances I will not even consider joining. What surprises me is that this group which has been rumored to be on the decline is very keen on recruiting new graduates. In particular, I have experienced more of a "pull" from that particular group than any other group which has expressed interest. There are early admissions, talk about funding, offer of teaching assistance-ship. I am starting to wonder if they need me so to acquire more funding for their own research or if there are some other ulterior motives.</p>
<p>Can someone who works within academia clarify on what it could mean for a group to be on decline, so much that it is apparent to people who are outside of that group.</p>
<p>Also what interest me personally is what ulterior motive could a graduate unit have in recruiting new graduates aside from the expressed interest in publishing more beautiful papers.</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38259,
"author": "gerrit",
"author_id": 1033,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1033",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In the final year of my PhD, I made a tour of several places in the USA to try to establish contacts in the hope of finding hidden postdoc opportunities. I knew of those places because I frequently saw their papers. In some places, I have seen signs of decline:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>In one place, the main senior scientist had moved away some years ago. Since then, one by one, others had left. It appears nobody was replacing them. The people who were still there appeared to be the ones who were less successful at getting grants and writing papers, than the ones who had left.</li>\n<li>In another place, I didn't see any PhD students in a group, and only a handful of postdocs. Most people were above 50, with the head of the group being well above 70. Although certainly a great name to have as a support, I wouldn't recommend anyone starting a PhD project with someone who will turn 80 before the candidate is expected to get their PhD. </li>\n<li>I also overheard conversations from which it was clear that people were not very ambitious. I almost literally heard someone say, that they now had a permanent position so they didn't need to write a lot of papers anymore.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Those are some signs that a place might be in decline: Have more than two senior scientists left the place in the past five years? Is the median age above 60? Are some people happier to stay on their desk than to attract great PhD students and postdocs to produce some great science?</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38268,
"author": "sevensevens",
"author_id": 14754,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14754",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my American computer science program, a PhD student is not tied to an advisor, or narrow field of study in his first year. Usually you will be assigned a prof and a GRA/GTA position for your first year. Use your first year to determine which faculty members you work well with, and then get them to advise and fund your PhD.</p>\n\n<p>I would not be concerned about a lab \"in decline\" as if a lab is truly having difficulty bringing in money, they will not have any GRAs to offer. You should focus on finding a professor and group you work well with. You'll be judged by the quality of your research, not perceived prestige of the group by other students.</p>\n\n<p>Make a short list of advisors you would like, then begin researching if they can handle another student, or if they have funding issues that might derail your progress later. Focus on choosing a good advisor, not a good group.</p>\n\n<p><strong>EDIT to address comments</strong></p>\n\n<p>@OP - Can you find out if you are tied to one advisor for your entire degree? All the comments are arguing that point.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38273,
"author": "tpg2114",
"author_id": 3878,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/3878",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The other way to look at \"decline\" is the number of students who actually make it through to get a degree. Some won't finish because they can't, but others may leave early (for other schools or advisors) because of the atmosphere/work environment/etc. within the lab. A well funded lab with a miserable work environment that is driving away students could also be said to be \"in decline.\" </p>\n\n<p>If there is a wide gap in the time students have been in the lab, this could be a sign of such a problem. For instance, maybe there are 5-6 students all about to graduate and 10 students who are in their first or second year. If there's nobody between, you have to ask yourself (or the senior students) where they all went and why. </p>\n\n<p>Retention problems, independent of funding or publication output, could be a warning sign.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/04
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38258",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23380/"
] |
38,261 |
<p>I have noticed that it can be hard to figure out how old a paper is from the paper itself. It is not that it is impossible: most of the time it can be found by a Google search. But why is there usually no publication data on the first page of a paper?</p>
<p>Here is an example: <a href="http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~fritz/absps/imagenet.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~fritz/absps/imagenet.pdf</a></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38262,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would not agree that there is \"usually\" no date on the paper. Most <em>published</em> papers do carry a date. The one you link to was apparently <a href=\"http://papers.nips.cc/paper/4824-imagenet-classification-with-deep-convolutional-neural-networks\" rel=\"nofollow\">published in 2012</a>.</p>\n\n<p>Manuscripts can of course come without a date, or even without an author. After all, nobody forces a manuscript author to date his work. (I guess that is the answer to your question.)</p>\n\n<p>Style guides tell you how to cite an undated manuscript, typically as \"Foo & Bar (n.d.)\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38263,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>One thing that may be causing the phenomenon that you are seeing is that in fields like computer science, authors are frequently allowed to put preprints online on their website, but not the final \"official\" version. Such preprints often do not carry a date stamp, while the official version available from the publisher's website does.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38279,
"author": "Brian Borchers",
"author_id": 4453,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4453",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Many of the papers that you can find on the internet are what are called \"preprints\". A preprint is a manuscript prepared by the author (usually before the paper is submitted for publication, but it can sometimes also include corrections that were made during the review process, in which case it may be called a \"postprint.\") </p>\n\n<p>When a paper is eventually published in a journal or conference proceedings volume, the publisher will often reformat the paper and typically add headers or footers to the pages that list the journal, volume, page numbers, etc. These headers/footers also typically include a copyright notice from the publisher. These published versions of papers are often unavailable to the public and can only be read by people who have personal or institutional subscriptions to the journal or conference proceedings. </p>\n\n<p>Because of this problem of lack of access, many authors leave preprints up on their web sites so that anyone can read the paper. Thus you'll often find that a paper exists in a published version (with full citation information in the headers and footers) and a preprint version (usually without this information.) </p>\n\n<p>The particular example that you linked to is a paper that was published in the NIPS 2012 conference proceedings. The published version is also available from the NIPS web site. Surprisingly, NIPS didn't format the paper with information about its being from the NIPS 2012 conference proceedings- this is a bit unusual in my experience but not unheard of. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/04
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38261",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28931/"
] |
38,264 |
<p>I'm looking for a repository of journal data.
More specifically, a listing of every known journal name and various attributes such as ISSN, rankings, peer review, etc. I know Cabell's offers this information, but expressly forbids mass-downloading.
Is there a better source for Journal data?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38265,
"author": "gerrit",
"author_id": 1033,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1033",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>At the university where I did my PhD, we used the <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_Scientific_Index\" rel=\"nofollow\">Norwegian Scientific Index</a> to establish what journals were considered \"valid\" for an internal system of redistributing money based on scientific output. From Wikipedia:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>The index divides journals and publishers into \"level 1\" and \"level 2\", where \"level 2\" is reserved for the internationally[1] most prestigious journals and publishers within the discipline</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>(...)</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Currently, 2,144 academic journals and series are designated as Level 2, i.e. journals and series considered to be the most highly regarded</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>This is not a <em>complete</em> list, but a list that aims to contain the \"good\" journals within each discipline.</p>\n\n<p>I don't know about mass downloading — perhaps the folks at the <a href=\"http://opendata.stackexchange.com\">Open Data Stack Exchange</a> have a better take on that.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38275,
"author": "Cape Code",
"author_id": 10643,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10643",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The short answer is no. There is no comprehensive list of academic journals, and I doubt there ever will be. The major reason for it is there is no real need as publishing culture varies a lot by field and geography. Plus, in the recent explosion of scholarly publishing, there is probably a new journal every week or so. </p>\n\n<p>However there are curated databases of journals. For example, Thomson Reuters has a service called <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_of_Science\" rel=\"nofollow\">Web of Science</a> that provides libraries with a large list of journals (about 12'000 according to Wikipedia) and publication metrics, such as citation count, rank by discipline and impact factor. I used this service a few times to check the ranking of journals before submitting papers.</p>\n\n<p>Libraries often let affiliates download the full report as a spreadsheet that you can manipulate the way you want. Contact your local library, most institutions subscribe to this database.</p>\n\n<p>Also, <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_academic_databases_and_search_engines\" rel=\"nofollow\">this list</a> might be useful to you.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38277,
"author": "Jeromy Anglim",
"author_id": 62,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/62",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You might find the Australian ERA list useful. It has been used by the Australian government to evaluate university research performance.</p>\n\n<p>I'm not sure what is the most stable link. But <a href=\"https://www.google.com.au/search?espv=2&q=era+journal+database+xls&oq=era+journal+database+xls&gs_l=serp.3..33i21.1410.3291.0.3509.10.9.1.0.0.1.238.992.0j3j2.5.0.msedr...0...1c.1.61.serp..7.3.441.gxUSm-uWTbc\" rel=\"nofollow\">this search seems to get a few copies of it</a>.</p>\n\n<p>It appears to have around 22 thousand journals. It contains ISSN and discipline category information.</p>\n\n<p>See the list here:\n<a href=\"http://www.arc.gov.au/era-2015-submitted-journal-list\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.arc.gov.au/era-2015-submitted-journal-list</a></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 75766,
"author": "mnm",
"author_id": 60859,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/60859",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There is also the <a href=\"http://thomsonreuters.com/en/products-services/scholarly-scientific-research/research-management-and-evaluation/journal-citation-reports.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">Journal Citation Reports</a> list provided by Thompson Reuters. To access it you will need to ask your library.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 114694,
"author": "Nemo",
"author_id": 32575,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/32575",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you only want a list of \"good\" journals, <a href=\"https://doaj.org/\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">DOAJ</a> (Directory of Open Access Journals) is probably what you need. It contains about 12 thousand journals passing certain checks, of which over 1000 with further quality controls (DOAJ seal).</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://wikidata.org\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Wikidata</a> is <a href=\"https://opendefinition.org/\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">open data</a> and run by a non-profit, as well. It's participatory and general purpose and it has a lot of data on journals, partly thanks to a specific initiative called <a href=\"https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiCite\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">WikiCite</a>.</p>\n\n<p>You can rather easily query and download a <a href=\"https://query.wikidata.org/#SELECT%20%3Fitem%20%3FitemLabel%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%28MIN%28%3FpublisherLabel%29%20AS%20%3FpublisherLabel%29%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%28MIN%28%3Fissn%29%20AS%20%3Fissn%29%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%28MIN%28%3FlicenseLabel%29%20AS%20%3FlicenseLabel%29%0AWHERE%20%0A%7B%0A%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP31%2Fwdt%3AP279%2a%20wd%3AQ737498%20.%0A%20%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP236%20%3Fissn%20.%0A%20%20OPTIONAL%20%7B%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP123%20%3Fpublisher%20%7D%20.%0A%20%20OPTIONAL%20%7B%20%3Fitem%20wdt%3AP275%20%3Flicense%20%7D%20.%0A%20%20SERVICE%20wikibase%3Alabel%20%7B%20bd%3AserviceParam%20wikibase%3Alanguage%20%22%5BAUTO_LANGUAGE%5D%2Cen%22.%20%7D%0A%7D%0AGROUP%20BY%20%3Fitem%20%3FitemLabel\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">list of all academic journals</a> (and subclasses thereof). As of now I see about 50 thousands results, nearly all of them having ISSN and many also license and publisher information. See the <a href=\"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:SPARQL_query_service\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">SPARQL query service documentation</a> on how to tweak the query.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 162635,
"author": "anpami",
"author_id": 120630,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/120630",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The closest that comes to a master list of journals is the following:</p>\n<p>This <a href=\"https://github.com/andreaspacher/academic-publishers/blob/main/Output/alljournals-2021-02-05.csv\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">CSV-file on GitHub</a> containing ca. 25.000 journals belonging to 137 major* publishers. You can also browse through the same list on <a href=\"https://ooir.org/journals/\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">this website</a>.</p>\n<p>The catalogue stems from a project that scraped data based on (1) DOAJ, (2) Publons, (3) Scopus and (4) Sherpa Romeo.</p>\n<p>For details, see the pre-print <a href=\"https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/56b28\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">here</a>.</p>\n<hr />\n<p>* I.e., publishers that supposedly had at least 30 journals in their portfolio based on the journal counts in one of the four data samples (DOAJ, Publons, Scopus or Sherpa Romeo).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 162652,
"author": "GEdgar",
"author_id": 4484,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4484",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A place to start: <a href=\"https://portal.issn.org\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">the ISSN Portal</a>\nThis will include not only journals, but magazines, newspapers, periodicals, and other continuing resources.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/04
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38264",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28932/"
] |
38,269 |
<p>How would I address a professor with a Chinese name?
I am unsure whether I should use only the surname, or both forename and surname, because the order of mentioning forename and surname is reversed.
When my professor's name is <em>forename: Yi</em>, <em>surname: Zhang</em>, should I then address him with</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Dear Professor Zhang,</p>
</blockquote>
<p>or with</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Dear Professor Zhang Yi,</p>
</blockquote>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38281,
"author": "Psy",
"author_id": 28900,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28900",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Being an Asian myself, I'd use 'Dear Prof. Zhang.'</p>\n\n<p>In Chinese culture, it can be considered rude for a junior to address their senior by the full name, that's just the way we're brought up to address our seniors, well at least for me...</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38282,
"author": "R J",
"author_id": 19923,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19923",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you are sure that his surname is <code>Zhang</code>, I would address him as Prof. Zhang. Beware that some Chinese use <code>Last name</code> <code>First name</code> convention rather than the <code>First name</code> <code>Last name</code> convention common in the Western world.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38283,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In the United States, at least, one would typically use the same structure of address as with any other name, e.g., \"Prof. Zhang.\" To do otherwise marks the person as different in a way that may be inappropriate, particularly if (as with many Americans of Chinese heritage) they use a European name order. If the professor wishes to be addressed otherwise, it is up to them to make this clear. From my experiences with European colleagues, I would expect it is similar there as well. I cannot speak for proper courtesy in East Asia...</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38289,
"author": "Nobody",
"author_id": 546,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/546",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Rule #1, ask the professor if you are <strong>unsure</strong>. Ask him what name he prefers to be called. I am a Chinese and a native Chinese speaker. I myself always like Westerners to ask me this question before they call my name.</p>\n\n<p>In the example you provided, both <code>Zhang</code> and <code>Yi</code> can be used as English translation of Chinese surnames. <code>Zhang</code> is a popular Chinese surname and <code>Yi</code> happens to be one of my relative's surname. As you can see in this example, it's easy to make a mistake when calling Chinese names. Not to mention that the Chinese name convention is <em>Surname first and Forename last</em> (or <em>Last name first and First name last</em>).</p>\n\n<p>If you cannot ask him for whatever reason and you have strong reason to believe that his surname is <code>Zhang</code>, you should call him <code>Dr. Zhang</code>. This would be the most appropriate way.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38359,
"author": "PatW",
"author_id": 7357,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7357",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Being a Chinese professor isn't the real issue. I guess the cultural context is more important here.</p>\n\n<p>Is the professor in China? Then you probably should refer to him/her as Prof X, because that's what Chinese customs expect. On the contrary, is the professor in some other non-Asian country? Then ask for what he/she prefers.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/04
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38269",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28934/"
] |
38,271 |
<p>I am preparing to submit a paper with a friend who is working at a tech company. The company that he is working with is in no way associated with our research work. Is it appropriate to list his employer as his affiliated institution? Otherwise, I would leave his affiliated institution field <strong>blank</strong>. Or, should I list the institution where he graduated from 2 years ago?</p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> Thank you very much for all of your feedback, answers, comments, and suggestions. We really appreciate it. I discussed with my collaborator and we will likely be listing him as an "Independent Researcher". Although, we concluded that it wouldn't be unreasonable to list his employer purely as a personal affiliation (or point of contact) as long as he got approval from their HR department.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38284,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Speaking as a scientist who works and publishes frequently from my position at a tech company: his affiliated institution is his company, and it is entirely normal and appropriate to list it as such. It would be <em>incorrect</em> to list his affiliated institution as his alma mater, since he is no longer employed by them.</p>\n\n<p>Note: My answer assumes there is no objection from the company to being listed. If there is, then the answer from Sergey Dymchenko applies.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38294,
"author": "Sergii Dymchenko",
"author_id": 6626,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6626",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>The co-author of my recently accepted paper works at Microsoft. The paper has absolutely nothing to do with her job, so we specified her affiliation as \"Independent Researcher\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38306,
"author": "O. R. Mapper",
"author_id": 14017,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14017",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>On the legal side, the answer to this question is linked to an issue that I do not see mentioned in any of the answers yet. It depends on your friend's contract (and possibly your local legislation)</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>to what extent your friend's employer allows your friend to perform other \"work-like\" public activities outside of their paid working time (often, only directly competing activities are forbidden, and from the question I understand that the company is not related to the research activity, which implies that the research was entirely done in your friend's private spare time), and</li>\n<li>to what extent your friend's employer is legally allowed to indirectly take ownership of something they did not contribute to.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>On the ethical side, the answer hinges on the intended purpose of listing the affiliation:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Does the affiliation say \"This organization made the research possible.\"? In that case, listing an employer who had nothing to do with the research (and just happened to be your friend's employer at the time the research was done) would be deeply unethical, comparable to adding an author who did not contribute to the paper. <em>(Note that especially in this case, the solution of asking the employer for their preference might be counterproductive, as from a business perspective, the employer will not care about research ethics and go for the opportunity of placing an \"ad for free\".)</em></li>\n<li>Does the affiliation say \"This organization might be interested in building upon the presented work.\"? In this case, listing your friend's current employer might seem entirely appropriate <em>if</em> they <em>might</em> become associated with (future parts) of your research work (even though they didn't have any part in the current paper).</li>\n<li>Does the affiliation say \"This is where you, future reader, can contact author X.\"? In this case, the most appropriate \"affiliation\" might be either a personal affiliation (e.g. a personal website), or indeed the last affiliation that was actually involved in the research. We routinely do this, for example, for students who support us in writing a paper that involves topics from their graduation thesis (and thereby become co-authors) - who, due to their graduation, have already started working at some unrelated company at the time of writing the paper.</li>\n</ul>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/04
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38271",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28225/"
] |
38,290 |
<p>Are there any ethical guidelines that would prohibit the use of penalties against individuals who sign up for a research study but have not yet provided consent and are therefore not yet officially subjects?</p>
<p>Please provide references. </p>
<p><strong>Background</strong></p>
<p>In the psychology department, we have an online recruitment system, whereby every time a student signs up for a research study for extra (course) credit they occupy a 'seat' out of a limited number of seats. This limitation exists due to the fact that research credits are distributed fairly among researchers to ensure that everyone is able to recruit in proportion to their needs. </p>
<p>Online studies pose a particular challenge for the recruiter because the participant is afforded the opportunity to complete the study by the end of the semester and there is no guarantee that they will follow through. The problem is that many students do not have the courtesy to cancel before the deadline if they decide they no longer wish to participate, and in doing so they are preventing other students from participating. Not only is this behavior not fair to other students, but it also means a loss of potential subjects for the recruiter. Although this scenario applies to online studies, there are certainly other scenarios where careless behavior results in major inconveniences to the recruiter, for example people not showing up for appointments (i.e., in-person studies, experiments). </p>
<p>If those signed up for a study have not yet provided consent (i.e. are not yet officially subjects), what are they protected against? Specifically,</p>
<p>1) Is it admissible to issue penalties, such as, for instance, a loss of research credits?</p>
<p>2) Is it admissible to communicate a general warning to all individuals using the system that a failure to cancel their seat or to show up for appointments could involve unspecified penalties? (In this case, there would be no penalties but the warning would serve as a deterrent.) </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38291,
"author": "ff524",
"author_id": 11365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>From the US <a href=\"http://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/guidance/45cfr46.html\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Code of Federal Regulations (45 CFR 46)</a>, in the section on seeking consent:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>An investigator shall seek such consent only under circumstances that provide the prospective subject or the representative sufficient opportunity to consider whether or not to participate and that minimize the possibility of coercion or undue influence.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Note the use of the phrase \"prospective subject\" - this clause refers to the investigator's conduct towards potential subjects who have not yet given consent. Presumably a penalty or threat of a penalty would constitute \"coercion or undue influence.\"</p>\n\n<p>Specifically regarding research participation for credit, the <a href=\"http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/index.aspx?item=11#804\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">APA Code of Conduct Section 8.04</a> (a different section of which was mentioned by Stephan Kolassa in <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/38298/11365\">his answer</a>) says</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>(a) When psychologists conduct research with clients/patients, students or subordinates as participants, psychologists take steps to protect the prospective participants from adverse consequences of declining or withdrawing from participation.</p>\n \n <p>(b) When research participation is a course requirement or an opportunity for extra credit, the prospective participant is given the choice of equitable alternative activities.</p>\n</blockquote>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38300,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Our students are required to be a participant for 10 hours of psychology studies or to complete an alternative assignment. We use an online system to administer the subject recruitment and allocation. The recruitment protocol for studies simply say that the online system will be used. Since the IRB is very familiar with the system, no more details are needed. This is the same as if we the Mechanical Turk is used, but if a less well known system is used, the IRB will want lots of details.</p>\n\n<p>The way the online system works is when a subject gives consent, meets all the inclusion criteria, does not meet any of the exclusion criteria, completes the study, and is debriefed, the experimenter ticks a box on the online system. This gives the student credit. If the box is not ticked, the student does not get credit. The students are only allowed to register for the 10 required hours. If for some reason a student does not get credit for some of the hours they registered for (e.g., because they did not show up, refused to consent, or did not meet the requirements), then they can write a 1000 word pass/fail paper related to the experiment. This way they are not directly penalised for not showing up. The alternative assignment and its marking were negotiated with the IRB. The IRB also requires we notify them every time a submitted alternative assignment is given a failing grade.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38303,
"author": "BrenBarn",
"author_id": 9041,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/9041",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Your question title is about consent, but the situation you describe seems somewhat more specific: you're saying that the person signed up for an experiment, and then, not only did they not consent, they didn't show up for the session at all.</p>\n\n<p>I don't believe it would be unethical to deny students participation credit for not showing up to the experiment session they signed up for. If they show up but then decide, based on the information they receive there, that they don't want to do it, that would be a different story and it would be hard to deny them credit.</p>\n\n<p>I found several examples of departments doing basically just what you describe. Here is <a href=\"https://www.psych.ucsb.edu/sites/www.psych.ucsb.edu/files/docs/psy1_req_s14.pdf\">a PDF</a> describing the research participation requirements for the Pysch 1 class at UC Santa Barbara. This includes a reference to the sort of \"unspecified penalties\" you mention:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>As a participant, if you chronically fail to show up for experiments, the repercussions may include, but are not be limited to, removal from the research participation pool.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p><a href=\"http://www.hunter.cuny.edu/psychology/undergraduate-studies/psychology-100-research-requirement\">A similar page</a> at Hunter College says:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>The first time you fail to notify the researcher of your expected absence and do not show up, your name will be submitted to the administrators of the pool. The second time you fail to fulfill your responsibility to notify the researcher, you will lose the option of participating in research for the remainder of the semester, and will be required to read the articles and take the quizzes. If you do not cancel or show up for the studies, you will be penalized by having to participate in an additional hour of research (or do an additional article and quiz) for each additional appointment missed.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p><a href=\"http://psychology.columbian.gwu.edu/Students-Research-Guide\">Yet another page</a> at George Washington University says:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you don’t show up on time for a study, and you have not cleared this in advance with the subject pool administrator, you will lose one point of credit. In other words, if you don't show up on time for one study, you will have to earn one additional point of credit to make up for what you lost.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Googling for <code>psych \"research requirement\" \"receive credit\" \"show up\"</code> and variations thereof will lead you to pages at more schools.</p>\n\n<p>Most of these policies appear to allow some leeway in that they suggest students won't be penalized for a single no-show, but only after multiple no-shows. No doubt you should discuss this with your school's IRB. However, the above examples make it pretty clear that there are reputable institutions that do penalize students who don't show up for experiments they said they would do.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38290",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28940/"
] |
38,301 |
<p>I submitted a paper recently and one of the major revisions that they ask for was this: "The references in general are not current."</p>
<p>What does the reviewer mean by this?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38304,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Your references apparently refer to literature that is too old, and probably superseded by more recent research.</p>\n\n<p>Look for more recent work pertinent to your topic and include it in your paper.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38337,
"author": "Aru Ray",
"author_id": 948,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/948",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In mathematics, papers are often cited when they are preprints (usually on the arxiv). </p>\n\n<p>If your references cite the preprint version of a paper when it has already appeared in a journal, they are not current. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38301",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/17830/"
] |
38,309 |
<p>This is a very tough question to ask because there are so many advisors on this forum so I am expecting most inputs from the current grads. This question largely stemmed from a post I read online about <a href="http://theprofessorisin.com/2014/02/23/the-5-top-traits-of-the-worst-advisors/" rel="noreferrer">picking advisors</a>.</p>
<p>The top recommendation offered on a list of things about picking supervisor is to never pick someone who is nice, friendly and available. Specific examples being "nice associate professor ladies" and "prof emeritus". </p>
<p>This quote caught my attention the most</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your advisor, something is amiss.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>But this is just one person's opinion. So my question is to what extent does this idea actually hold in academia? Is there any truth to nice profs are less capable than mean profs in producing good students?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38310,
"author": "ff524",
"author_id": 11365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365",
"pm_score": 8,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>That advice from the blog says to avoid an advisor who</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p><strong>1. Is nice, and friendly, and available.</strong></p>\n \n <p>And never gives you the fierce criticism and the tough pushback that forces you to confront your weaknesses, take risks, stop whining, cut the excuses, get over your fears, and make hard decisions about reputation, money, and jobs.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>It's the part beginning with \"and never\" that describes a problematic advisor, not the \"nice, friendly, and available\" part.</p>\n\n<p>An advisor who is unwilling to criticize a student and share harsh truths when necessary is certainly problematic for many students. But I wouldn't necessarily conflate that with being \"nice.\" For most students, an advisor who is genuinely nice is a good thing.</p>\n\n<p>As for</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your advisor, something is amiss.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Doing a PhD is <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2219/how-should-i-deal-with-discouragement-as-a-graduate-student\">difficult and sometimes discouraging</a> for most people. My advisor is one of the nicest people I know, and I've walked out of his office on one or two occasions and gone off somewhere to cry. Not because he isn't nice, but because what I'm doing is difficult, and sometimes we have to have some very difficult and/or discouraging conversations.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38314,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There's a grain of truth in this blog post, but generally I wouldn't consider this advise a \"truisim\", as it is pretty simplified:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Not all students are the same. Some need deadline pressure, some need a \"no bullshit\" advisor who keeps them down to earth, some mostly need encouragement, and some students really just need an advisor that gets out of their way. Assuming that everybody needs a strict, no-bullshit guy as advisor to become the best researcher (s)he can be does not correlate with my personal experience.</li>\n<li>Being \"nice\" isn't the same as not providing helpful feedback. Giving harsh feedback isn't the same as giving helpful feedback. You don't want an advisor who holds back criticism to spare your feelings, but you <em>certainly</em> also don't want an advisor who puts you down even if your work is good. Most importantly, an advisor that criticises without suggesting ways to improve your work isn't overly helpful.</li>\n<li>The job title (associate professor or emeritus) or the gender (\"lady professor\") have next to nothing to do with whether a professor is more of the supporting or of the tough love type. However, the career phase may be relevant - the pressure to have each student perform is usually much higher for a tenure-track professor than for an emeritus, which may of course influence how they act.</li>\n<li>Seeing \"unavailability\" as a good thing is downright <em>awful</em> advice. I can understand that the line of thinking is that good profs. are necessarily busy, but I am questioning what you as a student profit from a prof. who never has time for you. Better to look for somebody who is good <em>and</em> has time to teach you (yes, those people exist).</li>\n</ol>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your advisor, something is amiss.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I have never cried before, during, or after a meeting, but I have definitely advised fellow students to get the hell out of their research group when they told me that this regularly happens to them.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you don't believe me just go on ratemyprof dot com and see the comments for profs who are rated at the top and those at the bottom.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Don't infer how PhD student - advisor relationships work based on one-course ratings of undergraduate students. Frankly, undergrads look for pretty different things in their teachers than PhD students in their advisors.</p>\n\n<p><strong>What I suggest you really do is look at the track record of potential advisors. How many students finish? What do they publish during their PhD? What do those that finish do afterwards? This is, I think, the only metric that really counts.</strong></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38332,
"author": "Aru Ray",
"author_id": 948,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/948",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The list that you link to is misleading. I hope we can all agree that students should try to stay away from '5. Steals your ideas' and '4. Is crazy-making inconsistent', but 3,2,1 are contradictory. 3. says to stay away from abusive, negative and undermining advisors, and then 1. turns around and says you should find an advisor who is sort of an asshole to 'prepare you for the REAL assholes' in the world; 2. says stay away from advisors who are never around, and then at the very end of the post we are told to stay away from advisors who do have time for you. 2. also says to stay away from the big guns -- since they are never around -- and then 1. condemns such students as 'wussy'. What is a student (or an advisor) to do! </p>\n\n<p>While I understand what the list is trying to do -- pointing out that advisors who might seem safe, friendly, and comforting might not be the best advisor for you in the long run -- I don't think this has been done particularly well. In particular, students and recent graduates who are in fact nice friendly people will possibly take away from this list that they are 'just not meant to be in academia'; <strong>this is utter BS</strong>. </p>\n\n<p>(For the last, consider the many advisors that you point out use this site. They are spending their time giving careful insightful advice to strangers on the internet - simply because they are sincere strangers genuinely interested in understanding things about academia. That's pretty nice of them. Look up some of their CVs. They're doing pretty well for themselves.)</p>\n\n<p>Re: `nice' professors, the author of the list seems to be think that someone who is 'nice' must also be incapable of telling their students hard truths when needed. This is false. The author also seems to think that if an advisor has a lot of time for their students they are a bad advisor. This is also false. The author seems convinced that an advisor must make you cry to be a good advisor. Oh, for crying out loud! </p>\n\n<p>Advisors, like all else in life, are not one size fits all. When choosing advisors, it's important not just to try and understand their advising style, but also to understand your own learning style. And to do so <strong>honestly</strong>. Ask yourself how you work. What motivates you? What keeps you going on the bad days? In short, what sort of advisor do you need to succeed? </p>\n\n<p>For me, my biggest barrier was my self-confidence. I had plenty of previous success, but I just didn't see it, or discounted it easily as luck. I realized I needed someone whose judgment I could count on, who I could trust to tell me when I was screwing up, and so when they didn't say such a thing, I could infer that I wasn't. I needed someone who believed that I could succeed, and so on the bad days, they kept me going. This advisor turned out to be someone who remembered my birthday, and who gave me tons of support in every which way, but this did not detract from the fact that he would tell me when I was wrong - and I often was. Graduate school made me cry on occasion. It was challenging and progress was rarely quantifiable (see my previous question <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2219/how-should-i-deal-with-discouragement-as-a-graduate-student\">here</a>), but my advisor was the type of person you go to when you need to cry, who helped you deal with the many issues of graduate school, as opposed to being one of the issues themselves. Am I successful? Well, I graduated with my PhD (in mathematics) last May in 5 years with 5 papers with two more on the way and am currently a postdoc in a pretty good place for me. Empirically speaking, I've been doing well so far, although who knows what the future holds. </p>\n\n<p>On the other hand, perhaps you are truly independent. Can you get by with minimal supervision? Are you truly a superlative researcher already and all you need is a problem to work on and someone to eventually sign a thesis (such individuals do exist) ? Can you say this with complete conviction with much evidence to back you up? Then most likely you will succeed with any advisor whatsoever. Find the person who looks best on paper that is willing to take you and go nuts. </p>\n\n<p>Others work best when being constantly challenged. There probably are individuals who would thrive with an intense advisor who pushes them constantly and think of them purely as a publication-producing machine. Again, this depends on <strong>you</strong>. Personally, I would say No Thank You, but that's just me. </p>\n\n<p>It is worth noting that a particular faculty member might also employ different advising strategies for different students. They too understand that not all students are the same, that some need well-defined parameters and boundaries, while others need freedom to explore, and so on. On the other hand, students do need to manage their advisors somewhat as well (this at least is something that is mentioned in the original list that was linked to on the question). If you know that your advisor is a rambler, make sure to bring a list of questions you want to ask them to every meeting (I used to do that, because my advisor and I were both talkers). If you are worried that your advisor changes their mind very often (see 4. on the list), make sure to send written summaries of your meetings to your advisor. If you need deadlines to get yourself to do things, but your advisor does not set them for you, ask them! Advisors are not mind-readers. If they won't set deadlines, set them for yourselves. </p>\n\n<p>Advising is a two-way street. Each person has a role to play. In my experience students get to choose their advisors much more so than advisors get to choose their students (although I accept that my experience may be non-standard). Figure out which advisor is best <strong>for you</strong>. This is possibly different from the advisor who is best for your roommate, your siblings, and the rest of your cohort in graduate school. And when you have an advisor, figure out how to make that relationship work for you. In the end, while the advisor has a huge role in a student's success, there is only so much an advisor can do, and ultimately, it is all about the student. </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>For what it's worth in the comments to the link posted by the OP, in response to a comment to her original post (from 2012), the author writes </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>This was an early post, one of my first (possibly my very first–i have\n to check!) written when I had basically a nonexistent readership. I\n would not write “nice always loses” now because I’m much more aware of\n the degree to which people read this blog as “truth.” Indeed, I am\n somewhat more careful with nuance now, although yes, hyperbole remains\n part of my schtick, in blogging and in life, as my friends and family\n know all too well.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Of course, she did choose to repost it 2 years later without rewriting it in any way, so take the author's comment as you will. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38351,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Other people have already said essentially the same thing, but if I record it as an answer people can vote accordingly, so:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your advisor, something is amiss.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>It is just silly to take this as a piece of advice. The \"cry test\" makes no sense, because when exposed to identical circumstances, different people may or may not cry (and when two different people cry in response to the same thing, the meaning of it may be profoundly different). Look, not everyone cries on the job, period. The one time I can remember tearing up in a professional context is when I got a telephone call from a colleague of mine telling me that his department was going to offer a(n excllent) job to my (excellent) PhD student, just in time for me to look his (well, certainly very nice!) parents in the eye on graduation day. In other words: tears of joy and relief, not tears of \"someone was not nice to me\". I have had five PhD students, and the number of them who have cried before, during or after an appointment with me is....I have no idea. (During: zero.) In order to guess the answer I would have to try to probe the emotional architecture of these adult professionals with whom I have an adult, professional relationship...so I won't. </p>\n\n<p>To say it in a slightly different way: the nice/mean thing is some fingerpaint approximation to what students should actually be taking into account. I am, for my weight class, a relatively ambitious and demanding thesis advisor. I think most students would describe me as \"professionally intense\". But I am most certainly \"nice\" to my students...in fact, nicer than you might expect from watching my interactions on this site. I view being nice to students as <strong>part of my job</strong>. I have <em>never</em> yelled at a student, not once. Earlier today I returned my cable box, and I got heated with the woman there in a way that I absolutely never would with a student. (And it turned out that she was right, I was wrong, and I went back in to apologize.) This is not really about me at all: the point is that nice/mean is a poor approximation to what one is really looking for an advisor, and an advisor who was <em>actually</em> not nice would be a terrible person to work with professionally. So please don't choose \"mean\" people to work with....obviously.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38356,
"author": "cbeleites unhappy with SX",
"author_id": 725,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/725",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I don't see how nice and friendly exclude being being open and honest. Note that \"nice\" and \"friendly\" are primarily emotional wheras honest criticism deals with a factual level. To me the problem with the opinion of the blog post is that the factual level is unnecessarily and unduely mixed with the emotional level, and in particular - in my opinion - aiming at the wrong emotions. </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>IMHO difficulties should be treated in an profesional and appropriate way. Which IMHO is rather factual. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your advisor, something is amiss.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>(I should say that crying students are extremely rare over here and would generally be considered a rather alarming sign.)</p>\n\n<p>What is amiss here IMHO is that while emotions are a good indicator of how well the emotional level is or isn't, they are no (good) indicator for the factual level. <strong>Suggesting to <em>seeingly</em> choose an advisor whom you expect to treat you in a way that makes you cry is not only nonsense but seriously bad advise.</strong> You'll head for an emotional trap without having any kind indication that this would help with the factual level of critique.<br>\nYou may <em>tolerate</em> a certain lack of professionalism on the emotional level <em>iff</em> you know that the factual judgment is extremely good. But this is an implication, a logical one-way. If a supervisor not able or willing to handle things professionally on the emotional level, why should one trust them to deliver a fair judgment on the factual level? </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>I hold that a symptom of great character is that great people make/help/let the people around them <em>grow</em> (as opposed to: break them as in \"make cry\"). </li>\n<li><p>There will be enough situations to excercise your frustration tolerance also with a nice and friendly supervisor. </p></li>\n<li><p>If you decide to play with danger, fair enough. But IMHO doing this in a thesis situation is not the most intelligent choice: theses are exam situations where you are expected to show top performance. That is, performance in your subject area, <em>not</em> as a dompteur of difficult supervisors. </p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><em>Disclaimer:</em> I've never cried before, during or after a meeting with a supervisor. I get angry instead. Which isn't better for the factual critique anyways. </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>The emotionally harsher encounters I've had were with people who had no problem in telling me that I did wrong - but where the \"wrongs\" were arbitrary to me. Arbitrary ranging from \n<ul>\n<li>arbitraty as in the most plausible explanation I have is that everyone had lots of external pressure so emotions spilled over<br>\n(<em>in other words: if there was a factual level, I completely missed it</em>), </li>\n<li>to situations where I perfectly agree that the supervisor has the right to ask what they asked (factual level) - but where I also insist that this does not constitute the right to get mad (emotionally) instead of calmly stating the factual requirement.<br>\nIn other words: situations where I put in the effort to sort out how far I accept the critique - and where unreasonable requests (here: correctly guessing non-standard expected behaviour) start which could only be delivered under the cover of emotional pressure as there were no convincing factual arguments. </li>\n</ul></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Some more anecdata: </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>I've seen (and also comforted) students who did cry after meeting a supervisor/professor - but so far it was never an encounter with someone whom I'd consider a good and thoroughly professional supervisor. </p></li>\n<li><p>I've met professors who were talking about other professors as \"too nice\" - though in every single instance the ones commenting were professors which I had already marked on my personal blacklist of people I'll be wary of or had even been warned about. </p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<hr>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>there are profs who are more on the intense, no nonsense side, and then there are the profs who are more easy going.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Personally, some of the most intense research \"sprints\" that I had took place under an easy going supervisor. And I tend to think that this is no accident. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>go on ratemyprof dot com and see the comments for profs who are rated at the top and those at the bottom.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Another contradicting point of anecdata. Poll for the most favourite (school) teacher. Bets were on the funny and easy-going sports teacher who also had the \"easy subject\" bias in favor. But it turned out to be the very demanding, but thoroughly clear, honest and fair maths teacher. Sports teacher \"only\" made the 2nd place.<br>\nTeachers who pretended (tried?) to be \"nice and friendly\" <em>at the expense of fairness</em> were clearly despised. </p>\n\n<p>This coincides quite well with what I hear from students now (with an additional keen judgment of who knows what they're talking about and who doesn't).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38524,
"author": "Aba",
"author_id": 29086,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29086",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my experience as a physics PhD student finishing his work, a nice advisor isn't necessarily a bad advisor. Quite the contrary, IMO, you must feel comfortable with your advisor because if you are going to go through hell (and you will, have no doubts about that), you better go with a leader that you like and respect.</p>\n\n<p>My advisor is a nice person and treats you with respect and is fairly understanding of the problems that will arise during your work and I still have high-stress-related health problems. So, don't worry about not having hardships, you will get plenty.</p>\n\n<p>What you need is an advisor that is honest with your results, have a down-to-earth approach and keeps in mind that you have a deadline.\nAn honest advisor will tell you that what you are doing is wrong. That is important. There should also be room for flexibility so you can develop your ideas.</p>\n\n<p>Finally, if you are supposed to graduate in 3-4 years and you have people from that group graduating in 5-6 years, that is not a good sign. Life does not end after the PhD degree, after all: it is just the beginning of your career.</p>\n\n<p>I haven't finished so I can't say whether I will be a high-quality or low-quality student, but the other students who have graduated under him are doing very well (everyone who wanted to continue in academia got postdoc positions. The one that didn't continue went to the private sector for a ton of money).</p>\n\n<p>About crying, as others pointed out, it depends on each individual. Allowing myself to be more judgmental, the one who said/wrote that quote simply has a liking for the dramatic. </p>\n\n<p>Nice, friendly and available? Nice and friendly is useful to keep your sanity (the physical, emotional and mental stress is bad enough even with a nice and friendly advisor like mine), and also useful when you need to ask questions. But available is important since you will need to get advice time to time, even if you are very independent.\nAs someone else pointed out, if you are independent, you will need less \"advisor-time\", but it is still necessary. If you are extremely dependent... you shouldn't really be doing a PhD (After all, it is a title acknowledging the ability to do \"independent research\").</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38565,
"author": "padawan",
"author_id": 15949,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/15949",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have read all the five items and I honestly believe four out of five of them are <em>very much</em> misleading.</p>\n\n<p>Here are my opinions about those five items:</p>\n\n<p><strong>5. Steals your work.</strong></p>\n\n<p>True, but too obvious to state. This is not only true for advisors but for all mankind. And I assume that someone with an average intelligence would intuitively aviod any kind of person who steals.</p>\n\n<p><strong>4. Is crazy-making inconsistent.</strong></p>\n\n<p>I think science itslef is crazy-making inconsistent.\nOn the contrary, if someone is obsessive about one path of action, then how can he or she improve any scientific study?</p>\n\n<p>Suppose that John works on subject <strong>A</strong> and conducted experiments titled E1.\nThe advisor might say that the experiments are inconsistent and throw them out and conduct E2 type of experiments.\nHowever, after one week, another related subject <strong>B</strong> may be included into the publication and E1 type of experiments would right-to-the-point to settle the relationship between <strong>A</strong> and <strong>B</strong>.</p>\n\n<p>Guess what, \"How could you write this chapter about <strong>B</strong> without mentioning E1 type of experiments??\"</p>\n\n<p><strong>3. Is abusive, negative and undermining.</strong></p>\n\n<p>If the student is either lazy or ignoring the comments from advisor, then the advisor <em>must</em> be negative and undermining.\nWhat is the role of an advisor if his/her advises are ignored or undermined?</p>\n\n<p>The writer also mentioned about the advisor <em>backing off</em>. \nWell, this must be a huge loss for the advisor!!</p>\n\n<p><strong>2. Is never around.</strong></p>\n\n<p>No one on the surface of the earth has the right to judge a professor's working hours but the employer. \nMoreover, calling an advisor <em>bad</em> just because of his/her adacemic activities is nothing but pure ignorance.\nOr it might be envy, I don't know.</p>\n\n<p><strong>1. Is nice, and friendly, and available.</strong></p>\n\n<p>This is the funniest claim I have ever come across.\nBy the same reasoning, a good medical doctor should always reprehend the patient, the best teacher never smiles.</p>\n\n<p>We, of course, should always remember that once a person's mood is set, then by no means it can change. Therefore, if one is nice, he/she is nice forever.\nOtherwise, we are dealing with an intense person.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Summary</strong></p>\n\n<p>I do not think the <em>goodness</em> of an advisor can be measured.</p>\n\n<p>The writer is</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Holier than thou. It can be clearly understood when you read the writer's vita</li>\n</ol>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I have trained numerous Ph.D. students, now <strong>gainfully</strong> employed in\n academia, and handled a number of <strong>successful</strong> tenure cases as\n Department Head.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<ol start=\"2\">\n<li>Despises a lot of professors.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p><strong>tl;dr</strong></p>\n\n<p>In my opinion, you should nevermind the corresponding blog post.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38671,
"author": "Rabbit",
"author_id": 29223,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29223",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I haven't read enough about what other people answered to your question, but I really cannot help to share my story with you now.</p>\n\n<p>I think it really depends on what you want, and your attitude. I switched adviser in my third year of my PhD, from a professor who was \"very nice\" to someone who everyone gossiped about how pushy he is. You might think I'm crazy, but right now I am very happy with my decision.</p>\n\n<p>The adviser I was working with was unbelievably nice to me when we first started working together. She never got mad and always sent me some interesting article, and told me to \"take your time and learn slowly.\" Well, I thought I the luckiest PhD student I could've ever imagined, but then everything changed when one day for some reason she just flipped out. She called me on the phone and insulted me saying I'm useless, work so slow, not productive, and very \"spoiled\". She said she put in so much effort in me but received nothing. She said she kept trying to \"be nice\" to me, and I just took it for granted. I was extremely shock, since no one ever in my life insulted me that way, not to even expect it would be from someone who treated me so nicely before.</p>\n\n<p>After about a week of thinking I decided to switch adviser, and of course, she completely lost it. She said I used her, and she felt very betrayed (it sounds crazy but I'm really not making things up...) My new adviser felt very awkward and was still trying to be polite with her, but she kind of insulted him back... He didn't bother to fight with her and started working on research very intensively with me right away. He never tell me to take my time, instead he is very demanding, and keeps coming in the office to check my progress. But he is reasonable. Because I work hard, he never gets disappointed at me even I cannot meet the deadlines we target. I am very happy with him right now, even though I know a lot of students left him because he is so demanding.</p>\n\n<p>On the other hand, the professor I worked with before stole my work. She took my work, which I proposed and worked on it for almost 2 years, and sent to some journalist and published news. In the article, her name was mentioned everywhere, while my name was just mentioned as a \"programmer\", when the truth is I proposed the idea, collected all the data, did all the analysis and wrote all the words for our papers. At the same time, she was telling everyone that she \"fired\" me, and she's gonna sign some ridiculous paper on preventing me from doing anything slightly related to what I worked on before. I've never disrespected a person so much in my life before. Who cares how successful she is in academia and how she puts on a show to trick people into thinking she's a nice person.</p>\n\n<p>I know my case is a bit extreme... But what I want to tell you is, don't judge by how \"nice\" an adviser is. Those things are not real. An adviser that you can really work closely with, and communicate with, is the most important. They can be the harshest people in the world, but as long as they are reasonable and thinking good for you, they're good choices. Sorry for the super long story, just don't want anyone to repeat my horrible past. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38681,
"author": "Ken Zein",
"author_id": 29213,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29213",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I can tell you a few things from my own experience doing independent studies and summer/winter research projects as an undergrad in computer engineering (with aspirations of continuing to grad school, though I decided not to in the end).</p>\n\n<p>1) You need a professor who will push to and motivate you to work and be productive. <strong>Not mean, but firm.</strong> Since you often have your own hours it's very easy to slack off and procrastinate, so it's helpful to have someone who's making sure that you're producing. Especially if you hit a snag, some helpful suggestions can ease you over the hump and you'll start being productive again.</p>\n\n<p>2) They need to give you constructive advice, which often needs to be focused. This can include what do do or how to do it. It must be specific enough for you to understand what they want, not just a vague \"look into this\". One of my best professors would mention ideas and topics, and say stuff like \"figure out how to do x, then see if you can y\", and each step was helpful in either improving my skills or deepening my understanding. He didn't give answers or spoon feed anything, and demanded good work. But his <strong>guidance and direction</strong> was focused and thorough enough to allow me to rise to the challenge and produce the quality work he expected. Other professors who were \"nicer\" in the sense that they accepted less may have been easier but didn't push me to accomplish as much.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 82842,
"author": "Fomite",
"author_id": 118,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/118",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <ol>\n <li>Is nice, and friendly, and available.</li>\n </ol>\n \n <p>And never gives you the fierce criticism and the tough pushback that\n forces you to confront your weaknesses, take risks, stop whining, cut\n the excuses, get over your fears, and make hard decisions about\n reputation, money, and jobs.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>As ff524 has pointed out there is an expanded context to the question of \"nice\", but I think the author of this blog, wrongly, has associated nice, friendly and available with a number of other traits. I have been mentored by \"nice\" professors, who were friendly, available, cared about me as a person, etc. On the other hand, these were also people who looked at my papers and said \"This part doesn't make any sense...\", pushed me to submit several papers to better venues than I thought they deserved, and taught me that until it's published, it doesn't count.</p>\n\n<p>Similarly, I'd seen people with \"fierce\", \"tough\" advisors who have done very little in terms of productivity, because they're too busy being torn down to build anything.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>the nice associate professor ladies (and the occasional man) in the\n department, the ones who remember their birthdays and sometimes bring\n in homemade bread.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I have had a mentor who remembered birthdays, had people over to her house for lab dinner, etc. She was also an academic badass. For that matter, \"the nice associate professor ladies\" both described a number of very formidable scientists in my departments, and are people who have thrived in a setting that is not always friendly to women. There might be a reason for that.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If you’ve never cried before, during, or after a meeting with your\n advisor, something is amiss.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I have never had an advisor make me cry. I have occasionally cried in the course of my career, or had a minor breakdown, but it's never been because my advisors weren't being nice.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Do not attach yourself to someone “nice.” Attach yourself to someone\n “intense.”</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>False dichotomy is false.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>They might not be all warm and fuzzy, but they’ll have you prepped to\n deal with the REAL assholes who are always circling out there, waiting\n to pounce.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>One of the things I was taught by the warm and fuzzy types was how to be both nurturing and to fend off the assholes.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Nice loses in academia. Not because you need to be mean, but because\n you need to be fierce.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Again, nice and fierce are not necessarily mutually contradictory. Generally, I found this whole section pretty off-putting - it fosters an absurd image of academic machismo that I think we could all stand to get away from, and shores up the same excuses many people use to be abusive to their students and junior colleagues. Which somewhat undermines #3 on their list.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38309",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23380/"
] |
38,315 |
<p>I'll base the scenario of this question on the PhD thesis defence committee recommendations in place in my university in Ireland. Similar may apply to other countries.</p>
<p>A PhD Defence/Viva committee in made up of a Chairperson, internal examiner and external examiner. The internal comes from within the university and the external from another institution (with some restrictions on affiliated universities). </p>
<p>Assuming for this question cost of travel is not an issue as it would be covered by your university and you/your supervisor agrees with choice of potential external examiner; is there any rule of thumb on how far you could reasonably expect a external examiner to travel to be on the committee?</p>
<p>One downside I can think of asking someone to travel a large distance is the possible time they have to take away from their work. Again taking Ireland as an example, an external examiner from Ireland/UK/EU could probably travel on the day or 2 max. If it was someone travelling from the US they may have to take a few days off. Areas with poor air connections may mean longer trips.</p>
<p>So the question is largely two fold. Should how far away a potential external examiner factor into the decision to ask them to be on the committee and how far you could reasonably expect a external examiner to travel to be on the committee?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38316,
"author": "Maarten Buis",
"author_id": 14471,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14471",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I would just ask the potential examiner in an open manner, giving them the opportunity to decline without feeling bad. There are many reasons why a long trip may not be a burden: One of my external examiner came from Hong Kong to the Netherlands, but he used that trip to also collaborate with my supervisor. Another came from the USA, but use the trip to also visit family. You cannot know this without asking them.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38317,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If your university is paying the expenses, then it's quite plausible for an examiner to come from arbitrarily far away. I myself have gone from the US to Europe to serve as an external examiner, and it was no more a burden than traveling to a foreign conference. You can also combine other things into the trip: for example, when I served, my colleague also asked me to give an invited seminar, and we took the opportunity to work on some collaborations as well.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38361,
"author": "Peter Jansson",
"author_id": 4394,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4394",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my department, we chose examiners based on their expertise. It will be up to the proposed examiner to decide whether the journey is worth it or not and decline the task if so desired. Being in Europe, we have had examiners from Australia, China, South Africa and Brazil as well as from north America and closer. Distance has not been an issue when selecting candidates for the job, we have simply looked for persons who can have good insight and reputation.</p>\n\n<p>One aspect, which is always present but not the primary reason for choices is also if they can be future connections for the faculty. Any examiner has to be free from conflicts of interest so for the most part they are new to the collaborative sphere of the faculty members but if they are of interest to widen the sphere, this is seen as a positive.</p>\n\n<p>There have been a few issues that have emerged and that concerns long-distance travel problems. If we chose someone from Europe (being in Europe) a cancelled or missed flight constitutes a small problem since there most often are numerous other flights to destinations within a day. This is usually not the case with very long distance travel and any problem can cause irreparable delays and possibly a cancelled defence. So if a long distance candidate is chosen, we make sure the person arrives at least a day early to the defence. Extra costs will also have to be carried by the research group within which the defending PhD student belongs. The latter is a local solution that probably cannot be translated to all other academic cultures. The bottom line is that there are \"dangers\" with long-distance visitors.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 54191,
"author": "I Like to Code",
"author_id": 8802,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8802",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>As @Alexandros mentioned in his comment,\nin this day and age, teleconferencing is a very viable option.</p>\n\n<p>To give a personal example:\nDuring the course of my PhD studies,\ntwo of the members of my PhD committee\nhad moved away from the city where my university was located.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>One of my committee members took a relatively short 4 hour train ride\nto be physically present for my PhD defense.</li>\n<li>The other committee member was at least a 7 hour plane ride away. This member decided not to travel, but joined my PhD defense via Skype (for video) and a conference call (for audio).</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Based on my experience observing my PhD classmates, it was not uncommon for external committee members to join via teleconference.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38315",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12454/"
] |
38,320 |
<p>I am an IT post graduate (with no thesis but project) from IT industry and I have practical experience of about 10 years in the industry. I want to carry a PhD research in a subject related to IT field. Practically and theoretically, I know the subject very well, but I don’t have any prior real research experience or any publications. But I have studied some theoretical subjects on research methodologies, statistics etc. during my university learning. But I found that most the universities have “research experience” as prerequisite or requirements to start or to be eligible for PhD research.</p>
<p>So, what can I do to fulfill that? (Off-course other than doing another research just to be eligible). Any ideas or suggestions?</p>
<p>Is there any chance of getting accepted without prior research experience? Should I keep on trying(esp in US and Australia)?</p>
<p>I have seen some doing PhD after their undergrad. I have master degree and I am confident that I will be able to manage things with in those 3-4 years as it’s not that I don’t research at all. It’s just that I don’t have something to show now.</p>
<p>Any suggestions?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38326,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p><strong><em>Yes, In the UK, you can get accepted to a Ph.D. based on Bs.c. or Msc diploma, with no publication records.</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p>I can answer this, because computer science is my field, and saw many people like you doing research here in the UK. </p>\n\n<p><strong>Background Work</strong> </p>\n\n<p>Ok so you want to do a Ph.D. with a postgraduate degree which is on the practical side of things. That is totally fine; however you need to do some work before finding a supervisor. In essence there are three types of supervisors in the field of computer science: </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Know it All</em></strong>: There are number of impressive supervisors, that know both the theoretical and practical side of computer science. These supervisors publications on both theory and practice (e.g., code generation, language design). This is the best kind of supervisors to have because they can bridge between theory and practice; and can navigate you through both theory and practice.</p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Theory-Oriented</em></strong>: They use Latex to create their papers/journals/books. They have no idea what so ever about the practical stuff. God forbid you ask them about JVM internals. They can still be useful, because you are covered the practical stuff; and they can help you through theory. However, they have no appreciation about how hard it is to make something work in practice. Also, they might not the best people to link between theory and practice.</p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Practical-Oriented</em></strong>: There are much fewer number of supervisors, that for example transferred from electronic engineering into computer science. They know very practical stuff (e.g., embedded system programming, active on developing Erlang application for telecommunication purposes); however for you these are the worst choice. Because, you have the practical background (so don't supervision on practical stuff), but because you need to introduce theory into your research they can't do much in helping you. So you end up wasting number of years just because for example your supervisor don't know game theory.</p>\n\n<p>So overall look for their publications and the track record. How much open-source software they produce. How much theory-oriented paper they publish. These are the things that you will curse yourself later on during Ph.D. if you didn't think it through. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38767,
"author": "Johnathan Clayborn",
"author_id": 29299,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29299",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This is also possible in the US as well, but it varies from school to school. It is fairly common for people to be accepted into a PhD program without research experience, provided that their previous academics were exceptional. Don't get too discouraged and keep looking. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38794,
"author": "Eric D. Brown D.Sc.",
"author_id": 29287,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29287",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This is quite common in the U.S. Most programs would ask you take some introductory courses in research areas to build up your research skills.</p>\n\n<p>When I started my doctorate program, I had no real research skills and learned everything I need to learn in the program.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 130429,
"author": "anon",
"author_id": 108641,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/108641",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Take a broad approach to what you define as \"research experience\". You can probably find a way of spinning/describing some facets of your \"practical experience\" in terms that demonstrate your suitability for a research programme. When talking about such experience in interview, reflect on how some of the work you have done constitutes a form of research, what you learned from it, and how it could have been developed in research terms if you had had the time (maybe, there is something which still has research potential). Finally, although peer-reviewed academic publications generally command the most esteem within the academy, there are other types of output (including \"practical\" outputs) that can embody and/or form the basis of serious academic research.</p>\n\n<p>Be positive about how your experience will equip you for a research programme, irrespective of whether it constitutes a so-called \"traditional\" background for a researcher in your field. Turn any weakness into a strength, by explaining that you are keen to acquire the new skills that a research programme has to offer.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38320",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/15389/"
] |
38,322 |
<p>In recent years there has been a drive to make science more open. This includes making the software used to perform research open source. The main argument in favour of this idea is that research should be reproducible, which has been addressed in other questions on this site.</p>
<p>I am more interested in the 'impact' that this produces. In particular, is there evidence that by publishing software alongside research papers means that more people use the methods described in the paper?</p>
<p>I am especially concerned with papers in applied mathematics but also more generally.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38360,
"author": "rfle500",
"author_id": 4503,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4503",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If a sample size of 1 counts as evidence, then yes, having open source software certainly has the potential for significant impact.</p>\n\n<p>However, there are some important points to note before that potential for impact becomes real impact. Firstly proper software is not typical academic code thrown together with few comments to solve a specific problem. Software should have a user interface, user manual, be reliable and provide significant functionality. In my case I included several simulation methods within a single piece of software and wrote a review article detailing their implementation with examples. Since being open sourced last year many researchers have started using the software which will likely lead to citations of the paper. If you can develop a widely used software package then any methods you implement are (slightly) more likely to be used over ones which you do not. However if someone develops a significantly better method then not implementing that feature in your software may lead to people using competing packages if they exist.</p>\n\n<p>I would say that if you want your method to be used or implemented, then including a sample code provides a much lower barrier to entry, for example popular random number generators always included source code. However, any code you write should be clearly licensed, and ideally as permissible as possible, eg BSD, so that it can be freely used in commercial and non-commercial software.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38375,
"author": "Neil Chue Hong",
"author_id": 28994,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28994",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>You ask \"In particular, is there evidence that by publishing software alongside research papers means that more people use the methods described in the paper?\"</p>\n\n<p>I am not aware of any large scale empirical studies that have assessed this for software at present [1] however there is anecdotal evidence and related studies looking at the impact of open data.</p>\n\n<p>One piece of related anecdotal evidence came from short survey I carried out in 2013 looking for people who had been \"scooped\" as a result of publishing their code openly (i.e. someone else had published a paper using that software to get to the same scientific results before the author of the software). Whilst there were very few examples of people getting scooped, there were many more examples of researchers who had gotten new collaborations, new citations, and new funding as a result of publishing their code openly. Many said that this was because others were more able to try out the methods because code was available.</p>\n\n<p>More convincingly, there have been several good studies looking at the effects on citations (a proxy for the sort of impact you mention) from making data openly accessible [2-6]. Many of the reasons for the data citation benefit discussed in [7] appear qualitatively to be true for software as well [8-9].</p>\n\n<p>Finally, in the area of Applied Mathematics, you might like to look at some of the outputs of the ICERM workshop on Reproducibility on Computational and Experimental Mathematics [10], as well as some of the publications of the participants. </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>[1] One of the reasons for this is that up until very recently, it was difficult to conduct such a study - it was difficult to link software to a publication, few authors were publishing code, and it was difficult to data mine journals to assess impact. This is changing, an I expect studies to start emerging based on tools like ContentMine and ScienceToolbox.</p>\n\n<p>[2] Piwowar, Day, Fridsma (2007). Sharing Detailed Research Data Is Associated with Increased Citation Rate. PLoS ONE.</p>\n\n<p>[3] Gleditsch NP, Metelits C, Strand H. 2003. Posting your data: will you be scooped or will you be famous? International Studies Perspectives 4(1):89-97</p>\n\n<p>[4] Pienta AM, Alter GC, Lyle JA. 2010. The enduring value of social science research: the use and reuse of primary research data. The Organisation, Economics and Policy of Scientific Research Workshop</p>\n\n<p>[5] Henneken EA, Accomazzi A. 2011. Linking to data - effect on citation rates in astronomy.</p>\n\n<p>[6] Dorch B. 2012. On the Citation Advantage of linking to data. hprints. </p>\n\n<p>[7] Piwowar H, Vision T. 2013. Data reuse and the open data citation advantage. PeerJ. PubMed 24109559</p>\n\n<p>[8] Howison J, Herbsleb, J. 2013. Incentives and Integration In Scientific Software Production. CSCW 2013.</p>\n\n<p>[9] Howison J, Bullard J. How is software visible in the scientific literature? Preprint available from <a href=\"https://github.com/jameshowison/softcite/blob/master/paper/HowisonBullard-SoftwareCitation-WorkingPaper.pdf?raw=true\">https://github.com/jameshowison/softcite/blob/master/paper/HowisonBullard-SoftwareCitation-WorkingPaper.pdf?raw=true</a></p>\n\n<p>[10] \"Setting the Default to Reproducible: Reproducibility in Computational and Experimental Mathematics,\" ICERM Workshop report, with D. Bailey, J. Borwein, R. LeVeque, W. Rider, and W. Stein. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38379,
"author": "Community",
"author_id": -1,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The <a href=\"http://www.jstatsoft.org/\" rel=\"nofollow\">Journal of Statistical Software</a> is one of the few journals that publishes software. Currently, it has one of the highest impact factors among all statistics journals. This can be viewed as evidence that publishing software alongside research papers leads to higher impact and in particular to more people using the methods described in the paper.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38380,
"author": "dvanic",
"author_id": 22372,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22372",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Your question can be interpreted in several different ways, and I'll try to address all of them.</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><strong>Is there evidence that by publishing software alongside research papers means that more people use the methods described in the paper?</strong></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>This is incredibly apparent in bioinformatics software. My google scholar skills are not helping me at the moment, so I can't find a full academic paper on this, but based on personal experience and networking in both my narrow (RNA-seq) and broad (genomics) field, if a study describes an algorithm it will be cited and used <em>only</em> by people who are developing algorithms to solve the same/similar problem. If a study provides usable software: standalone, python package, jar, R library - something, it is much, much more likely to be cited and used (especially if it (a) works and (b) doesn't have any ridiculous dependencies (phyloCSF, I'm looking at you)). </p>\n\n<p>I don't have time at the moment to do this analysis myself, but an easy pubmed scraping + text mining across several issues of the journal \"Bioinformatics\" should enable quantitative validation of this statement. </p>\n\n<ol start=\"2\">\n<li><strong>The main argument in favour of this idea is that research should be reproducible, which has been addressed in other questions on this site</strong></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>For many applied bioinformatics papers, including my own, we use other people's tools to do analyses, and write up the results. The code we usually use is \"hacky\" and not really \"software\", but is instead a script we ran that got us our results using our particular data and filesystem/server configuration. This code is - unfortunately - usually not published, and at the moment you are expected to write the detailed summary of what you did in the methods section of your paper. Unfortunately, all too frequently the people who are writing the paper (i.e. 1st author) is not the bioinformatician, and if the analyses were a small part of the work, the (usually biologist) 1st author tries to write up/summarize what the bioinformatician did based on his/her limited understanding (and the bioinformatician is not vested enough in the paper to care because he/she is 10th author) -- and if you don't get a bioinformatics-savvy reviewer the paper is published with the goobledygook in the methods, and no way to reproduce the analysis. I'd like to have a dollar for every time I've tried to understand/reproduce someone's methods, and not been able to because they were in a \"Biology\" journal and hence not described properly.</p>\n\n<p>Going forward, I think more and more journals will start asking for code - but with the caveat that it won't be code that you can download and run - on their data or on yours (the data is too big, and writing code that would work on all possible clusters is too much effort) - so it will be more as a supplementary thing from which I can elucidate your exact methods as opposed to rerun your complete analysis.</p>\n\n<p><strong>3. This includes making the software used to perform research open source.</strong>\nSome of the best aligners for sequencing data are non open-source. A pubmed search for novoalign (proprietary) results in 15 hits, 1200 google scholar records. BWA (open source) 142 pubmed, 9960 google scholar. These results speak for themselves.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38322",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7538/"
] |
38,324 |
<p>A free book publisher, Globe Edit, contacted me.</p>
<p>They offered to consider creating a book from my MSc thesis. They said that I wouldn’t have to pay for anything. After reading their website, it appears that they are trying to contact many if not all thesis writers (and other writers, too).</p>
<p>They want me to transfer exclusive rights to publishing my thesis as a book.</p>
<p>Here is their website, if you want to read the details: <a href="http://www.globeedit.com/authors_infos_pdf/se" rel="nofollow">Globe Edit</a>.</p>
<p>Are free publishers like this usually worthwhile? I don’t care about making money; I’m wondering whether this free publishing service is at all prestigious or just a waste of time (i.e., neutral or perhaps negative).</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38327,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>These types of publishers are often called vanity presses and as discussed in this <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/29881/is-there-any-value-in-self-publishing-a-book-as-an-academic\">question</a> they have limited value. The press you are referring to, and why I think your question is unique, is:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>They want me to transfer exclusive rights to publishing my thesis, as a book.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>That is a terrifying thought. That likely means you would be unable to (re)publish any aspect of your thesis as an article and may not even be able to use images in presentations. Your university and/or funder may also impose restrictions on giving away exclusive rights.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38336,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>I'm wondering if this free publishing service is at all prestigious</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>and:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>it appears that they are trying to contact many if not all Thesis writers (and other writers, too).</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I think you have answered your own question. At best, such publications are considered neutrally.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38324",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26573/"
] |
38,325 |
<p>I think my research interests and experience are perfectly aligned with a professor. And I plan on applying to the department when the admissions open. </p>
<p>But when is the right time to email the professor as a prospective PhD student? I don't want to shoot off an email and get ignored by being either too early or too late. </p>
<p>In this university (in the US) the admissions are granted by committees and not individual professors. Also I speak as an international student.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38331,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>For your current Ph.D. application and any further activity during your Ph.D. always ask for suggestion/help/support from your Ph.D. supervisor. </p>\n\n<p>You might be align with the activities of a supervisor; however thats one way thinking! It might be the case that he/she has many students and can't take any more regardless how much your previous work matches his/hers. So always ask, there are many nice supervisors that get excited to help their new/potential Ph.D. students. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 41231,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The worst time to contact faculty is when they are deliberating the current round of applications and while they are recruiting the accepted students. In the USA, this would be December through April.</p>\n\n<p>Conversely, best time would be May through October.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 42099,
"author": "gdp",
"author_id": 31290,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/31290",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>From my own experience, I would suggest getting in touch as early as possible, after the previous year's recruitment is out of the way. I had made my prospective advisor aware, and we were able to find time to discuss ideas and possible projects, and to even find several possible funding sources. </p>\n\n<p>Perhaps this differs in departments with a more formal application process, but I found that the actual approach to the advisor was the important part - after that point, they were glad to encourage me to apply, since our research were well-aligned. </p>\n\n<p>It does depend on the advisor though - some might not be able to even begin to think about next year... Others (perhaps more senior, and less daunted by thinking about funding someone that far ahead), may be hoping people get in touch. I suggest you find out how the intakes work - we have year-round applications and admissions, but generally people are concentrated around February or October. There's nothing to stop and application to start at another time, however, so obviously doing a bit of homework may help here (if it's not just annual admission in one group). </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38325",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28961/"
] |
38,330 |
<p>I recently finished a round of PhD applications.</p>
<p>I always knew I wanted to do research, but when I applied I didn't know what sub-field of Computer Science I wanted to do my research in. I was already out of school a year when I decided that I may never figure it out just by sitting around, so I just bit the bullet and applied to a PhD program with what I knew.</p>
<p>Naturally, a month or two after I applied, I realized that what I really wanted to go into was robotics, which I have very little experience in at the moment and which I didn't mention in my personal statement. </p>
<p>I'm pretty good at teaching myself things. Give me another few months and I'll probably be able to learn quite a bit about the subject, and I'd bet anything I could put together some decent projects that could make me impressive enough to get into a good robotics research track, but I've already applied to a bunch of schools and it's at the point where if I'm getting in, I'm not getting in for anything robotics related.</p>
<p>So, here are the options I see in front of me:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Turn down the offers I get, try again next year when I can be more focused and well-researched on which programs/professors I want. This feels like giving up, and I'm always nervous about putting things off, especially for a year.</p></li>
<li><p>One of the schools I got into happens to have a good program for robotics, but I doubt my application was on any of those professor's radar. I could contact professors from that school and ask if they'd want to work with me, but I don't know what I'd say with so little robotics knowledge. Another school I applied to but haven't heard back from has an even better program for it, so if I am emailing professors, there's still time to email professors from that school as well.</p></li>
<li><p>Go to a school I got into, and just hope I'll be able to switch programs. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>I know I ultimately have to decide for myself what to do, but any advice is greatly appreciated.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38333,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I saw this sort of thinking/discussion all the time. Something like, I'm a second year Ph.D. student but I want to start another one, because X is big and I'm excited about it. This is a <em>bad</em> way of thinking about a Ph.D. program. </p>\n\n<p>Here is the thing: </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>One of the main pitfall of PhD students is that they can't get their mind into one problem.</em></strong></p>\n\n<p>Here is another fact: </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>During Ph.D. you learn how to think and read/write as a researcher, regardless what you are working on.</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><em>Advice</em>: I say choose one among all the offers you get. Drop all, unless you have a pretty good damn reason for it (e.g., got a job at NASA). </p>\n\n<p>Answering 'what I want to do for research' always changes! Thats the nature of research. You can not keep up with <em>all</em> trends during Ph.D. First, you need to think, read, and write as a researcher; and you learn them during a Ph.D. Then, you can follow the trends as a postdoc or an academic. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38363,
"author": "Tim",
"author_id": 12703,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12703",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Unlike Dave Rose, I absolutely think you should pursue your interest in robotics if you find you truly enjoy it. You can (and should) figure that out <em>right now</em> by spending a long weekend with an arduino.</p>\n\n<p>However, I really don't see much need to reconsider your applications, unless any offers you receive are incredibly specific. Many CS PhD programs don't require (or allow) you to work in a particular group or with a particular prof until you've completed the first year or so of coursework, but if a program accepts you with the explicit understanding that you'll work with X on NOT_ROBOTICS, then you might want to decline.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 43033,
"author": "Alanna",
"author_id": 21875,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21875",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You've probably already made your decision, but in case anyone else stumbles upon this:</p>\n\n<p>I always knew I wanted to go into academia. I finally found something I loved (physical geography, specifically climatology), and jumped in. Some time in my 2nd year (& as an MS student, I only should've had 2 years), I realized that I'd been focusing on academia, but not what I actually enjoy. I got through; I learned a lot about my subject, critical thinking, networking, writing and myself. I'm so glad I went, but I could've done a better job if I was more aware of the options within my discipline (I'd only had 2 courses when I applied), and especially if I'd known the culture of my subject. </p>\n\n<p>What I'm trying to say is, if you know you can teach yourself pretty well and make some impressive projects, you're not \"just sitting around.\" You are exploring your field. In the meantime, you should research faculty, read some papers, and figure out what you want to dedicate your life to for 4+ years. Because a PhD program isn't just about building robots: You're learning the culture, writing papers, creating posters, networking, writing grants, applying for fellowships, teaching in the classroom and mentoring/teaching in your lab...If you love your subject and your projects, it will be worthwhile, though sometimes you will not think so. If you discover, once you really start digging in, that you don't actually want to sleep, eat, and breathe robotics, all the rest of being a PhD student can be miserable. </p>\n\n<p>That's just grad school in general. Specifically about your question:</p>\n\n<p>There are more things to consider than which school and which program. Grad programs usually accept only 5-20 students per year. In my experience, more than 10 is a big cohort. You may be one of the top applicants this year, but next year you may be outshone. So there is definitely some merit to accepting whatever you get. You never know - you may find something else in CS that you get really excited about. If you're certain you're interested in robotics, see if there is someone in engineering or physics or wherever the robotics people are, who will be your outside faculty member. They may even take on more of your project than your official PI/chair, they could even be a co-PI. </p>\n\n<p>Grad school isn't like undergrad (pretty much in every way except that you're on a campus) - if you want to change departments you have to reapply. If you have to change depts, go to the other dept's journal clubs, get into a lab & be their best student, make yourself invaluable. In your new letter, emphasize your interdisciplinary background and how that will benefit your studies and the department in general. Impress the PI of the lab you've been working in & they'll write a great letter of rec, appeal to the selection committee on your behalf, go to bat for you against admin. It's possible to change, but there are significant obstacles. </p>\n\n<p>Good luck! I'm curious to know what you went with, when you make your decision.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38330",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28965/"
] |
38,343 |
<p>Being that I am currently awaiting offers of admission/rejections for some of my PhD applications in the US, i regularly frequent the website <a href="http://thegradcafe.com">http://thegradcafe.com</a>, which, if you've never heard of it, has a forum where just about any subject relevant to graduate students is being discussed, and, most importantly, maintains a database of admission/rejection dates for various programs at various schools (see <a href="http://thegradcafe.com/survey/index.php">http://thegradcafe.com/survey/index.php</a>).</p>
<p>While discussing with other members of the forum and browsing through the database myself, I have noticed the following pattern: For many PhD programs, year after year, all the offers of admission (the ones added to the database, anyway) will be made on a single day, and then, some time later (often 2,3 weeks or even almost a month later), all the rejection notifications are made.</p>
<p>Of course, it should be said that this "data" is fairly unreliable, since it is all added anonymously and most likely very fragmentary, but assuming this is actually a trend, here is my question:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>What is the explanation for such a long delay between offers of admission and notifications of rejection in (some) US PhD admissions?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The possible explanations I have in mind are the following:</p>
<ol>
<li>The candidates that are assuredly admitted are sent offers as soon as possible, and then the admission committee takes a lot more time to choose a few more candidates within the (probably very large) sample of not-so-surely admitted students. (This could possibly not be reflected in the Grad Cafe's database, as very few candidates could be admitted this way)</li>
<li>Universities wait to see if some of the strong applicants will answer positively or negatively to their offers before deciding to reject other applicants (but then, why not waitlist them in the mean time).</li>
</ol>
<p>However, I would be very interested in hearing about anyone who has been in (or knows about) an admission committee that operates like this, and the reason behind this.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38344,
"author": "paul garrett",
"author_id": 980,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/980",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Both your reasons are in play, although the second far more so, in the math dept at my \"R1\" university in the U.S. That is, we make a certain number of offers to well-qualified people, expecting a certain approximate rate (perhaps 50 percent or more) of acceptance of our offers, with considerable variation. We cannot risk far too many acceptances, because of funding limits, but, at the same time, we need a fairly precise number of TAs for the following year. So after we receive some rejections from that clear-first-round bunch of offers, we can (and must) make the corresponding number of second-round offers. Inevitably the number of such is not zero, but is unpredictable, and the financial set-up is such that we do not want to risk over-committing... and under-committing for too long risks students already being informally (if not formally, since nothing is set until until April 15) committed elsewhere.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38350,
"author": "Ari Morcos",
"author_id": 28981,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28981",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>At most neuroscience (and other life sciences) Ph.D. programs, all of the offers to interview go out on one day, usually in late December. Rejections at my program don't go out until March. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38343",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] |
38,346 |
<p>Say you want to conduct a research study that observes people engaged in a generic activity. Rather than record this evidence oneself, would it be wise to try to gather recorded evidence that was part of other research studies? I am asking about gathering raw evidence, to re-analyze for the purposes of a new study, not leveraging/citing data/conclusions in other research studies. For example, if another research study recorded 1000 hours of people doing general enough activities, would I be able to ask the owner of that study to share their recorded evidence with me, so that I might use it for my own analysis?</p>
<p>In other words, what are some of the issues to consider when using <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_data" rel="nofollow">secondary data</a>?</p>
<p>If it isn't common, why not? What are the pitfalls of using evidence gathered from other studies, to drive my own research?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38344,
"author": "paul garrett",
"author_id": 980,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/980",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Both your reasons are in play, although the second far more so, in the math dept at my \"R1\" university in the U.S. That is, we make a certain number of offers to well-qualified people, expecting a certain approximate rate (perhaps 50 percent or more) of acceptance of our offers, with considerable variation. We cannot risk far too many acceptances, because of funding limits, but, at the same time, we need a fairly precise number of TAs for the following year. So after we receive some rejections from that clear-first-round bunch of offers, we can (and must) make the corresponding number of second-round offers. Inevitably the number of such is not zero, but is unpredictable, and the financial set-up is such that we do not want to risk over-committing... and under-committing for too long risks students already being informally (if not formally, since nothing is set until until April 15) committed elsewhere.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38350,
"author": "Ari Morcos",
"author_id": 28981,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28981",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>At most neuroscience (and other life sciences) Ph.D. programs, all of the offers to interview go out on one day, usually in late December. Rejections at my program don't go out until March. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/05
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38346",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6711/"
] |
38,364 |
<p>I was just wondering if I should include an edited expletive in an essay I have to write for a Software Development class. I'm currently writing a paper about debugging techniques and I wanted to talk about reading documentation to ensure the correct use of libraries and algorithms. This is commonly referred to as RTFM or "Read The Fucking Manual". So I was wondering if I should change it to "Read The [expletive] Manual", replace a couple letters with *'s, or scrap the idea entirely. </p>
<p>I just thought the teacher may enjoy a break from reading the same essay over 50 times that will include the exact same content (there are only so many debugging techniques). </p>
<p>I'm also thinking about including the "It's not a bug, it's a feature" with the following image while expanding on the line of thinking.</p>
<p>The reason why I think I can get away with this is because the teacher frequently cracks jokes during his lecture, and he has actually used the bug vs feature joke in class before.
<img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/CGeLD.gif" alt="enter image description here"> </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38365,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>I was wondering if I should change it to \"Read The [expletive] Manual\", replace a couple letters with *'s, or scrap the idea entirely.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I'll opt for \"scrap the idea entirely\". You are misinterpreting what the purpose of class essays is - this isn't supposed to be a witty, innovative text that entertains the lecturer, and the lecturer will likely not mind so much reading about the same debugging techniques over and over again. The purpose of this text is to explain what <strong>you</strong> know about said debugging techniques. A secondary purpose is that you show that you know how to write an academic text. Some semi-witty text is likely to fail the second test, and spending a lot of paper space on an unrelated joke is likely to at least be a bad indicator for the first test (that is, if I get a paper where the author spends a lot of time writing about semi-related nonsense, my initial impression is that the author didn't really know what to write about the actual topic).</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>The reason why I think I can get away with this is because the teacher frequently cracks jokes during his lecture</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>There's a place and a time to be humorous. Presentations and lectures can be a good time (because, if well done, jokes break the ice and keep the audience's attention), academic papers are notoriously a very bad time to crack jokes. That the lecturer cracks jokes in class does not necessarily mean that he wants to see them in your manuscript. <em>I</em> tend to crack the occasional bad joke in class, and as you may be able to tell, I am no fan of humour in student assignments.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>and he has actually used the bug vs feature joke in class before.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>So he won't even laugh because he already knows the joke :) at least come up with something new.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38367,
"author": "peter",
"author_id": 17246,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/17246",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>RTFM: Read The <em>Fine</em> Manual.</p>\n\n<p>The documentation in question is, naturally, an exquisite treatise about the product in question. It is well-written, indexed, cross-referenced and contains ample anecdotes and code samples. It has it's own series (complete with a new animal sketch) in the O'Reilly collection and will soon replace The Camel as the canonical example of how documentation should be written.</p>\n\n<p>That's the marketing version.</p>\n\n<p>The actual documentation is 3 pages of semi-illiterate spew that a 9th-grader would mark as bad grammar. It's barely useful in launching the software and contains enough errors to be dangerous. </p>\n\n<p>The user will replace \"Fine\" with the other word all by themselves.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38409,
"author": "Cort Ammon",
"author_id": 25234,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/25234",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Generally speaking, expletives are frowned upon in academic writing. You can give any rationale you feel justified, but here's my personal take:</p>\n\n<p>Expletives serve a purpose in language. They serve as an emotional utterance that provides additional emphasis to the reader, at the expense of clear reasoning. Creating a visual analogy for this, they act as a bright strobe-light emphasizing a detail. On a dance floor, with illicit drugs all around, use of a strobe-light is acceptable for emphasizing the beat of the music. In the viewing room of the Mona Lisa, it is decidedly less acceptable.</p>\n\n<p>If you were a curator for the Louvre, and recently came into possession of a piece of art which uses a strobe for artistic effect, that would be fine. However, you would choose not to put said piece of art in the same room as the Mona Lisa, so as not to disrupt the more academic viewers.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38423,
"author": "Shep",
"author_id": 789,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/789",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>When I was grading lots of lab reports I appreciated jokes, provided that:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>They were funny</li>\n<li>They didn't detract from the point of the paper (one sentence saying explaining RTFL is probably fine, figures with no relation to the assignment may be too much)</li>\n<li>The student doesn't think they could get away with lousy work by being chummy</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>The last point is probably the most important; if your instructor sees lousy work and jokes together he may think you're unable to take his class seriously. That makes his job more stressful.</p>\n\n<p>Personally I think expletives are cheap. If I were your instructor I'd probably chuckle, and then leave a comment \"Read the <s>Fucking</s>[friendly] Manual\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38427,
"author": "Him_Jalpert",
"author_id": 27857,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27857",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you make a point of making it clear that you're quoting from another source then it shouldn't matter too much. For example, 'As so and so says, this is called \"Read The Fucking Manual\"', or 'On x webpage/ x page of y book this is referred to as \"Read The Fucking Manual\"'.</p>\n\n<p>Saying that, I would use discretion when adding something like this into an essay, if you're 100% sure the professor will find it humourous then go for it, if not then avoid using the explicative and go for a ...softer or censored version of it.</p>\n\n<p>Like I said, it all depends on the prof, a friend of mine once gave an answer on a Java exam about a magical elf being responsible for one of the programming concepts and he still got full marks for the question because the prof had a sense of humour. Had it been another prof they'd just give him 0 for that question, all depends on the prof, plain and simple.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38431,
"author": "Joseph Orlando",
"author_id": 29025,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29025",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Totally disregarding the context of your work, like the previous answers have touched on. I am studying at a university, and thus am writing at a university level.</p>\n\n<p>If I were in a position where I had to choose whether or not to use an expletive, so long as there was a valid reason for it being there, I would totally go for it. This is not high school, where a repremand would be in order. In academia, one should not dilute one's thoughts, so long as the thoughts are on the right track. I would go for it, but like the previous answers have touched on, you may be totally out of context in using that kind of language. It may not be needed.. If it's not needed, definately don't do it, but if it is needed, don't second guess it.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38451,
"author": "Kate Gregory",
"author_id": 12693,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12693",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Whenever I've needed to explain RTFM, I just say it stands for Read The Manual. Inevitably the other person says \"but what does the F -- ? Oh.\" All by themselves. However, I would only use this in an academic context in someone else's mouth. Something like</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>When you don't get the results you're expecting, and the only technical support you can find is someone telling you to \"RTFM\" (Read The Manual), don't give up! Some simple debugging techniques can give you the ability to watch your program execute and understand why it's misbehaving.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Be careful though. A feature is not a bug in a suit even if you think it is, and debugging is rarely a substitute for reading documentation. Your efforts to liven up the essay may reveal errors of thought that end up costing you more than they gain.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38364",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28990/"
] |
38,366 |
<p>As an instructor, I have been fortunate to have had some great TAs, who went above and beyond what was expected of them, and put in a lot of effort to ensure students' learning.</p>
<p>I would really like to do more than just say "Thank you." How can I show my appreciation to them after the class ends?</p>
<p>(The situation may also be slightly complicated by the fact that some of the TAs I'm thinking of aren't physically located near me. I'm in the US, but I also teach as a "remote" instructor for a university in Europe, and I get TAs there. So I would like answers addressing both local and non-local TAs, if it matters.)</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38368,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>As stated in your comment providing your TAs with recommendation letter is not applicable to your case.</p>\n\n<p>In addition to saying \"Thank You\", you would have another option to show that you care about them and in case of need for academic consultation (about courses, research topics, papers and etc.) they can count on you (whether now or in the future) and this means that in addition to keeping your academic connections with your TAs alive furthermore they would get a valuable source of information, expertise and support.</p>\n\n<p>In case it is affordable and does not cost you so much money you can by them a number of small and not very expensive gifts; so that they would remember you and that semester as your TA whenever they see your gift!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38372,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>For TAs located physically close, the well-established way of showing appreciation around here is by inviting them to a joint informal dinner with good food and plenty of (alcoholic and non-alcoholic) beverages, usually with a joint pub crawl afterwards. This would typically happen at the end of the semester, optimally directly after finals, and provide a nice finishing mark on a semester of hard work and (maybe) some fun and camaraderie. These events would typically last to the early morning, leading to extremely empty offices the day after.</p>\n\n<p>I am lucky to work in an university which happily picks up the bill for such events, but in previous places we have had all instructors throw money into a hat to finance this. It is not a celebration if the TAs have to pay for themselves.</p>\n\n<p>Note that the celebrations are: (1) entirely voluntary (nobody needs to come, nobody needs to stay), and (2) as informal as possible.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Edit:</strong> that being said, I think the more interesting part about your question is how to show appreciation to remote TAs, and I have no good answer for this.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38387,
"author": "Ander Biguri",
"author_id": 16023,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/16023",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This is not a complete answer, but just sharing my experience as TA.</p>\n\n<p>I worked as a TA in Computer Graphics where 120 students were enrolled and each of them had to deliver 2 reports (20 pages) with their respective code. Me and the other TA helped marking the assignments, and it would have taken around a full week of work for our Professor to do it by himself. </p>\n\n<p>In the end, we meet and went to have dinner at a nice restaurant that he paid, in order to thank us for our effort. It was not about the money paid in the restaurant, but more about the gesture of going together somewhere to have dinner felt as a big \"Thank you\".</p>\n\n<p>Anyway, just leaving this here.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38393,
"author": "Patricia Shanahan",
"author_id": 10220,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10220",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have far more industry than academic experience, but I think this is one case where an idea from industry may be useful. It is quite common, in my experience, for e.g. a sales manager to write a letter of appreciation to an engineer who has helped with a sale, with a copy to the engineer's manager. I've had such things mentioned during performance appraisals, and they seemed to help with getting pay raises.</p>\n\n<p>The key currency in academic life is letters of recommendation rather than performance appraisals, but the same idea might work out. How about writing a letter or e-mail to each TA expressing your appreciation, with a copy to that TA's advisor? If you can say something specific about what that TA did, all the better. That is material the advisor can choose to use when it is time to write letters of recommendation, and they are searching for the right things to say about the former TA.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38398,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You can always spend money (either yours or your department's) and buy the TA's something they might like (e.g., dinner or a Starbucks gift card). I would limit the gift to 6 beers on <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/23884/is-it-ethical-to-accept-small-gifts-from-students\">my international beer scale</a>. This, however, is the easy solution. Most TA's, are not doing it solely for the money and while a dinner would be appreciated, it is not nearly as valuable to them as other things you might be able to provide.</p>\n\n<p>A great reference letter than speaks to both the TA's teaching and research abilities can be very valuable if there is enough difference in seniority between the instructor and TA. If there is not a big difference in seniority, you could still recommend the TA to whoever hired you to instruct the class. You could, for example, recommend they be given additional classes to TA or even to be an instructor.</p>\n\n<p>If you are not in a position to write a letter of reference, there are still other things that can be done that are more helpful than dinner. For long-distance TA relationships, inviting the TA to give a research seminar at your university can be a valuable networking tool. Ideally, this would be paid for, at least partially, by your department, but even an unfunded invitation for a PhD student can be useful. You could also arrange to meet at a conference and introduce them to your network. You could also volunteer to read some drafts of their thesis/articles or be a sounding board for proposals.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38366",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365/"
] |
38,369 |
<p>For my first time I submitted a manuscript to a journal special issue months ago. The special issue had a proposed schedule as follows: </p>
<ul>
<li>Submission deadline: 1st date</li>
<li>Papers reviewed: 2nd date</li>
<li>Revised papers reviewed and accepted : 3rd date</li>
<li>Notifications to authors: 4th date</li>
<li>Publication: Approximate date </li>
</ul>
<p>A- If it is supposed to send a revision on the (3rd date), does it mean that review comments/scores will be delivered at the (2nd date)? In my case I didn't get review comments even after many days of the (2nd date). </p>
<p>B- The (3th date) mentions "Revised papers reviewed and accepted". Does it mean papers are accepted for granted after the first review round and need only a revision? I thought that usually there are 2 review rounds before final decision. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38377,
"author": "Peter Jansson",
"author_id": 4394,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4394",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>What the different dates imply would seem to be the following.</p>\n\n<p><em>1st date</em>: you need to have your complete manuscript submitted by this date</p>\n\n<p><em>2nd date</em>: Reviewers must have provided their reviews by this date</p>\n\n<p><em>3rd date</em>: between the 2nd date and the third date you need to revise the paper and possibly have another round of reviews if necessary. This deadline thus includes work you the editor and you and possibly additional reviewers. The manuscript should be sent in so that an editor can evaluate it and possibly find it acceptable. This this deadline probably involves a lot less time for you than just the time difference from 2 to 3 implies.</p>\n\n<p><em>4th date</em>: You will hear about the fate of your paper by this date at the latest.</p>\n\n<p><em>5th date</em>: the publication is expected to be out in printed form or assembled on the web (depends on what is seen as the final product)</p>\n\n<p>So the time line may seem straight forwards but particularly date 3 is possibly preceded by a lot of work from more persons than you. I am sure an editor will want everyone to on the toes fo that stage so as not to unnecessarily delay the process.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38390,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Special issue production schedules are often very hazy and subject to slippage and change. The basic problem is that they are typically trying to combine two things that don't fit together neatly: a fixed production schedule and the unknown timings and iterations of a typical journal review process. Reviewers have to be recruited, reviews come back late, authors ask for extensions, more revisions are needed, etc. In my experience, if they stick to within a couple months of the intended schedule, they're doing quite well.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38369",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28993/"
] |
38,371 |
<p>I would like to know how graduate admission committees at US Universities look at alphabetical authorship publications in a CV (particularly in high energy physics). Since the convention in high energy physics is to have authors in alphabetical order, how do the committees determine the contribution of the applicant (I guess recommendation letters is one way)? Also, do the committees actually read the papers (mentioned on the CV) on arXiv or the journal website to check the quality of the papers?</p>
<p>I am applying to US universities for a Ph.D. in high energy physics. Because my surname starts with one of the ending letters in the English alphabet, however, my name on all of my publications is last in the sequence. Could this create confusion in committee members about my contributions?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 46891,
"author": "Matt Reece",
"author_id": 6108,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6108",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I can't speak to how every department does it, but in my department (and I think typically) your application would be read mostly by people working in a similar field who are aware of the conventions. You could always add a note to the CV pointing out the alphabetical author convention if you're concerned about it.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 46902,
"author": "Buzz",
"author_id": 27515,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27515",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you are talking about graduate admissions, having authored any paper will be a huge advantage for you, regardless of where your name appears in the author list. The faculty members reading your application are going to notice if the authors are listed in alphabetical order (unless it's only two or three authors), and they will take that into account.</p>\n\n<p>Really, the people reviewing your application are not going to judge your contribution based on where your name appears in the author list. You ought to have a strong letter of recommendation from whoever supervised your undergraduate research, and it is that letter that will explain your contribution and place it in context. (If you do not have a letter from the research supervisor, that would be a red flag.) The letter will explain what you did and how important it was to the publication. That will allow the admissions committee to get a good feel for your talents as a researcher.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 46913,
"author": "user2153903",
"author_id": 6330,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6330",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>You should definitely request one or more of your letters of recommendation from senior researchers, preferably tenured professors, who worked directly with you on this paper. You should request that the letter writer directly address your contribution to the project. Admission to graduate school is largely based on promise, and letters are crucially important. Even the best students may have only a publication or two to their name, and many do not yet have any. The letters help flesh out the applicant to the admission committee.</p>\n\n<p>The issue of scientific contribution is a challenging and subtle one that persists throughout the academic lifespan, from student to faculty member to Nobel Prize Winner. Committees may not grasp the full significance of the scientific work, nor your contribution to that effort. You will need to address the significance of the research and your contribution to it both in your statements, and in your letters of recommendation.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38371",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28874/"
] |
38,376 |
<p>I'm having an upcoming phone interview for a tenure-track position and I expect that I will be asked the usual "Why would you want to work here?" question. Apart from reasons relating to the research competency and culture of the university, a major reason for me would be that moving to that institution would essentially resolve an ongoing <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-body_problem_%28career%29">two body problem</a> - not entirely, as my spouse is not working at said institution, but at a place close to it. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Is it fine to mention this during the interview? </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Currently I reside in Europe, whereas the institution is in the US. My reasoning is that telling them should make it clear that I would indeed be serious to move there.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38378,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There are really two ways people can take this:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p>\"If we extend this person an offer, he will actually accept.\" This is what you are hoping for. This can be good, especially if you are \"too good\" for the place you are applying to, where people might wonder why exactly someone with better prospects would choose to apply at a lower rate institution. Then again, it can backfire - if the institution assumes you would accept their offer for unrelated reasons, they might be less generous in the package they offer (pay & perks).</p></li>\n<li><p>\"So... he only applies here because of his spouse?\" This would be bad, or at least suboptimal. People might wonder whether you are really <em>committed</em> to working there. If choosing between two candidates whose portfolios both match what the institution is looking for, people might lean more towards someone who doesn't \"need\" his spouse working close by to apply.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>I subjectively believe people will more often have reaction 1 than 2. So this argues for disclosing your motivation. Then again, note how this can reduce your possibilities in negotiation.</p>\n\n<p>To be honest, I'd try to wow people with your experience, portfolio and all-around wonderfulness and keep this aspect below wraps. Unless people ask point-blank: \"Would you really relocate from Europe to the US?\" But that would likely come up later in the application process than in the initial remote interview.</p>\n\n<p>I looked through <a href=\"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions\">Workplace</a> but didn't find anything related. You may want to think about flagging your question for migration there - after all, similar considerations would also pop up for non-academic job seekers.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38382,
"author": "Oswald Veblen",
"author_id": 16122,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/16122",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You may want to read the answers to the question <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/32369/when-during-the-application-process-should-a-candidate-mention-that-their-spouse\">When during the application process should a candidate mention that their spouse is also looking for a job</a> . In general, there are several positions on when to acknowledge a spouse, and none of them is clearly \"the best\" for everyone. The gender of the applicant, the type of school, and the particular two-body problem are all factors.</p>\n\n<p>You actually have the \"better\" kind of two-body problem, because your spouse is not looking for a job at the school. You would want to make that clear if you mention your spouse. There are two main concerns about the two-body problem: (1) the school may not have a second position already secured, and so letting them know you need two positions makes them less likely to offer you one; and (2) the general potential bias that claims \"someone who is married will be less dedicated to the institution\" (this is why some people don't wear their wedding ring to interviews). In your case, the main issue is how you feel about (2). </p>\n\n<p>But didn't you already indicate in your cover letter some reasons why you would be willing to relocate to their location? This is one of the things that a cover letter should always include: some reason why you not only want to be at their school, but also want to live in that area. For very prestigious schools this is less important, but for smaller schools they may take the question very seriously. If you didn't include anything like this in the cover letter, be sure that you have something to mention during the interview. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38402,
"author": "twihex",
"author_id": 29009,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29009",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think it's OK to mention this, but I would phrase the answer differently: \"At this point in my life, I'd really like to [return to/reside in] the US, so I did my research and decided that your institution would be a great fit for where I want to go with my career\". I think it's OK to mention your spouse if they press, as long as you have some other believable reasons for wanting to return (and if you don't, you may want to reconsider the move).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38414,
"author": "einpoklum",
"author_id": 7319,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7319",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>While it is <em>acceptable</em>, I'll say - why risk it? Don't tell them.</p>\n\n<p>You have a good enough reason; and if you _really_must_ say something vaguely recalling your 2-body problem, either say what @twihex suggested, or perhaps: \"Another reason for preferring [the university] is that I've talked about the potential universities with my family, and we feel that [name of city/town university is in] would be a nice place for us to live. [consider adding non-generic sentence about the mild climate / international atmosphere / amenities for children / etc.\"</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38376",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28850/"
] |
38,384 |
<p>This question has two intents. Firstly sharing an email I received, as an academician, with other academicians and also clarification on the contents of this email and the way it works.</p>
<p>I have received the following email.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Dear XYZ,</p>
<p>I am the editor-in-chief of <strong>Who's Who in the World®</strong> and I have received your name through a private nomination process. I'm writing to ask if you would provide us with information about your personal and professional accomplishments for possible inclusion in the forthcoming 33rd Edition.
Inclusion in Who's Who in the World is a sign of true success. The book is a global reference source relied upon by universities, libraries, corporations, and governments around the world.</p>
<p>Like LinkedIn, Wikipedia, and Facebook, it costs you nothing to be included in Who's Who in the World. But unlike those resources, our books only contain biographies that meet our rigorous selection criteria (see below). Also, our books are available both online and in print and are used by the world's most respected institutions. So among other things, Who's Who in the World provides all the benefits of high quality networking. Many people put this recognition on their résumés or CVs.</p>
<p>Please click this link to the Who's Who in the World Biography Submission Form and you will be taken to our password-protected site. The submission process takes only a few minutes, and the benefits of being included are significant.</p>
<p>Deadline: February 23, 2015 Congratulations on being nominated!</p>
<p>Sincerely,</p>
<p>Fred Marks
Editor-in-Chief, Who's Who in the World®</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I googled this message and found some other people are getting it. I further drilled down and found that my email is allegedly given to them by Thomson Reuters (from the Thomson connect website that is the sender of the above email). So, I assume I am not the only one and will not be the last. I assume many of you academician and researchers will receive the same email so I thought it is good to raise the concern here since I found no other discussion elsewhere. </p>
<p>The email is being sent from </p>
<p><strong>Who's Who Selection Committee </strong>
and the reply-to field shows <strong>Who's Who Selection Committee </strong></p>
<p>The email is Signed By <strong>"thomsonreuters-authorconnect.com"</strong> (suggests that my email is being given to them by Thomson Reuters).</p>
<p>The company behind this email is called</p>
<p><strong>Marquis Who is Who, Publisher of Who’s Who in America® since 1899</strong></p>
<p>Here are my concern:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>How much is this website credible? Does anyone (including academic employers) give credit to those listed there (email says, inclusion in Who's Who in the World is a sign of true success. The book is a global reference source relied upon by universities, libraries, corporations, and governments around the world). </p></li>
<li><p>Registering into the system needs to fill a form that contains almost every single piece of information about me, including my parents, education, work, wife, certification, political/social activities and many more which is quite scary to me. <strong>How can</strong> individuals rely on this particular website and share their information. Does inclusion in this particular website gives so much credit that people lose privacy?</p></li>
</ol>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38388,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>These things are essentially a <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who%27s_Who_scam\">vanity publishing scam</a>. Being included typically means that you have $100 to burn and poor consumer skills. Don't touch it with a 10 foot pole.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38389,
"author": "410 gone",
"author_id": 96,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/96",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>They are trying to sell their books and associated vanity products. They know that their primary market for it, is people included in it.</p>\n\n<p>Personally, I'd take an academic's inclusion in it to be a possible indication of gullibility.</p>\n\n<p>If you've got the time, <a href=\"http://www.forbes.com/forbes-life-magazine/1999/0308/063.html\">the Forbes article on the Marquis Who's Who series, \"Hall of Lame\", is worth a read.</a></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38391,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>How much is this website credible? Does anyone (including academic employers) give credit to those listed there (email says, inclusion in Who's Who in the World is a sign of true success. The book is a global reference source relied upon by universities, libraries, corporations, and governments around the world). </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I will restrict to \"academic employers\" -- that is the part of you question which is on-topic for this site. Answer: no academic employer I know will give you any credit for this. Having this \"distinction\" on your CV would, in the context of seeking an academic job, be only negative: not very negative, but it would make you look slightly naive. The gist of <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/26798/how-can-i-tell-if-an-honor-society-is-legitimate\">this prior answer of mine</a> (thanks to @xLeitix for calling attention to the question) certainly does apply here and explains this in more detail.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Registering into the system needs to fill a form that contains almost every single piece of information about me, including my parents, education, work, wife, certification, political/social activities and many more which is quite scary to me. How can individuals rely on this particular website and share their information. Does inclusion in this particular website gives so much credit that people lose privacy?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>To the best of my knowledge, this is <em>not</em> a phishing scam, as you seem to be worried about. What they want to do is print books, which have lots of names together with information about those names. The more information you provide, the more material for potential inclusion they have. Some people actually take the length of their entry in these books as a point of pride (I seem to recall, well over 20 years ago, Harlan Ellison boasting that his entry in one of these things was longer than Ronald Reagan's, or something like that). This is not a new millennium thing. Go back 30 or more years, before the days of prevalent identity theft, and look at their request with those more innocent eyes. None of the information you listed is <em>truly</em> sensitive or confidential; it's just very detailed biographical information. </p>\n\n<p>Of course, my answer to the first point renders the answer to the second point academic, but I wanted to be fair to them. One more thing: <strong>for academics</strong>, I disagree completely with what they say about wikipedia: it has quite stringent inclusion criteria, and wikipedia is a \"global reference\" source in the sense that organizations like this one have been dreaming about for the better part of a century but has never quite come to pass. It is also a <em>free reference source</em>, which is a key point that I hope that any academic would appreciate and value.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 60889,
"author": "Dave Broyles",
"author_id": 46741,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/46741",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This sounds to me like a scam. Check out the actual e-mail address. Does this correspond with Marquis' Who's Who? My bet is that it does not. Marquis could not care less who you are. I have been in Who's Who in America for the past five years. For the first four years, I received everything in writing via mail. Only this past year did I receive anything via e-mail. You have been scammed. As an academic, you should know to check your sources; in this case, the e-mail address.</p>\n\n<p>Forbes' critique of 1999 was accurate. Later, they reversed their evaluation after the company was sold to News Communications, Inc. When Forbes first set up their college rating system, 25% of their rating was based upon the high achievements of alumni, based upon WWiA listings. Today, Forbes compiles its own list of highest achievers. 32.5% of their rating is based upon this list. Shifting from WWiA to their own list has produced no significant change in relative ratings.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38384",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6393/"
] |
38,385 |
<p>My university uses <a href="http://turnitin.com/" rel="nofollow">TurnItIn</a> to check student's work for plagiarism and collusion. I think the underlying TurnItIn database includes both submitted work and material it has found by crawling the web, but not material behind pay walls. One major issue with TurnItIn, and presumably all plagiarism detection software, is that it can only compare submitted work to material which is in the database. This means that TurnItIn either misses when students copy from textbooks which are behind a pay wall or matches other sources which have plagiarised the textbook.</p>
<p>My department's academic misconduct committee is thinking about seeding the TurnItIn database with the textbook chapters that are most often used by the students by submitting a number of "assignments" that are copies of the textbook chapters. This would require an individual member(s) of staff to submit assignments that contained copied copyright material. Is it possible that this could get the staff member in trouble in the future? We were thinking about adding something like:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The following submission is intended to seed the TurnItIn database and is an exact copy of FULL REFERENCE.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Would this work, or would TurnItIn realize that it is being given copyrighted material and purge it from its database?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38386,
"author": "earthling",
"author_id": 2692,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/2692",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>This is a bit long for a comment, but I also acknowledge that only someone from TurnItIn could categorically answer this.</p>\n\n<p>Since TurnItIn does not provide access to source material (other than small sections which actually match the submitted paper), I do not see how it could be a copyright issue. I get matches all the time from papers submitted to other schools, yet, TurnItIn does not allow me to see that paper.</p>\n\n<p>Additionally, much of the content within TurnItIn is under copyright (blogs and others) and they do not purge it, further implying that they would not have a problem with your plan.</p>\n\n<p>All that said, unless the content is quite new, or changed regularly, as soon as one student includes content, any other student including that same content will trigger a flag for you.</p>\n\n<p>So, I do not believe your plan will have any problem but I am also not sure you need to worry about it unless you have a special set of texts you believe other students around the world will not have access to.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38470,
"author": "cbeleites unhappy with SX",
"author_id": 725,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/725",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My guesstimate is that this at least in Germany (where I some little knowledge about copyright) this would not be covered by any copyright exception. </p>\n\n<p>But, why not go the official way and ask the publisher? \nOr ask turnitin to ask the publisher?</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38477,
"author": "user6726",
"author_id": 28972,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28972",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Copyright refers to the right to make a copy, so your scheme violates US copyright law, and that's that as far as the ethical question is concerned. Whether the author / publisher could recover damages from you (or whoever the copier is) depends on strategic questions such as the depth of your pockets. Acting as an agent for a university, the pockets could be pretty deep. Making a profit is not part of the definition of copyright violation. It could also expose Turnitin to legal action by the copyright holder, which means they could have a cause of action against you. OTOH they may realize that it's unlikely that a publisher would actually bother. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38385",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929/"
] |
38,395 |
<p>As a new university professor, I have been informally tasked with making sure the MSc students in my program are prepared for their dissertations, by prepping them in my research methods course. My students are generally very motivated but they are from academically diverse backgrounds and, frankly, many are ill-prepared to undertake a dissertation and have been struggling with the material and assignments. </p>
<p>I have been trying to help them as much as possible, but it feels like the more helpful I am, the more they ask for help! </p>
<p>I have students who express extreme distress and confusion, which I try to allay with more explanation. Then they send me their work in progress, asking me if they are on the right track. </p>
<p>I want the students to do well, and to feel like they are progressing, but the constant emails and meetings are completely taking over my life. On the other hand, I can see that many of them are just not getting it, and that make me feel like they really do need help.</p>
<p>Is there, in any of your experience, a good point at which to tell students that I cannot help them further and do you have suggestions for wording this without seeming like a bad educator? I appreciate their motivation and I sympathize with their frustration, but at what point do I stop helping and how do I communicate this?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38396,
"author": "dionys",
"author_id": 22520,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22520",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A significant facet of being a professor, which is to say, a large part of your raison d'etre is to educate graduate students. So you should be prepared to make time to meet the needs of the students you are involved with.</p>\n\n<p>You should certainly exercise some judgment about when and in what form you provide help to your students, but you should really try to avoid this mindset where you tell yourself \"I cannot help them further.\" I can certainly sympathize with your sentiment about \"constant emails and meetings.\" I think it is perfectly reasonable (and necessary) to set limits on your availability so that you can fulfill your other obligations ... but that comes down to you setting some boundaries and managing your time more effectively.</p>\n\n<p>Part of the problem may stem from providing too much help, or help that is too specific, so the student is sheltered from the (often frustrating) trials of a learning process. Graduate students need to develop their ability to take initiative, try different approaches, and explore things. They need to be able to fail, to identify when things aren't working, and to seek help when they have exhausted their own efforts.</p>\n\n<p>Note that \"making demands\" is a two-way street. The students demand your time and attention ... for your part, you should be demanding that they apply themselves to these problems they need help with. This can also be used as a tool to moderate students that demand constant attention (a way to put on the brakes, so to speak). Just make sure your demands are helpful, and don't abuse it.</p>\n\n<p>The fact is that learning takes time and effort on the part of the student. An instructor can help, but you cannot learn something for someone else. What you want to do as an instructor/advisor is to enable your students. Keep them on track, and help them avoid getting stuck or distracted by unnecessary details. Warn them about pitfalls they're about to encounter, and point them at good resources. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38399,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First of all, tell them to take it easy and do their best of preparing their works while considering your instructions. </p>\n\n<p>I feel there is nothing wrong with both the lecturer and the students; however make them understand that you are going to teach them how to research and you are NOT going to do their researches for them. State that there is not just a single correct way of doing things; while following some basic rules every person has it's own way and style of doing researches.</p>\n\n<p>To sum up, there are some basics that you as the lecturer have to teach them and rest of the things primarily depends on the person himself/herself.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38406,
"author": "Peter K.",
"author_id": 3965,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/3965",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>When teaching graduate students, I've found that lowering the bar on the level of difficulty of a course tends to lower the amount of effort they are willing to put in. Conversely, raising the bar (lowering the amount of help I give) tends to increase the amount of effort they put in.</p>\n\n<p>The students appear to get better outcomes when their level of effort matches the level of effort required for the course material.</p>\n\n<p>Obviously the extremes of this don't work for anyone, but I'd suggest that you ease off on the amount you are doing to \"help\" them.</p>\n\n<p>Each student is different, and some will require different levels of support, in different areas. The best thing you can do for them is to help them identify and address their weaknesses. </p>\n\n<p>That doesn't mean <em>you</em> have to fix their weaknesses.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38407,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>One of the solutions for limiting / demarcating the time you spend on MA students is to set aside specific office hours for that purpose.</p>\n\n<p>For example, you could dedicate Fridays 1p - 5p for the purpose of answering MA questions on theses. If they have questions or if they want to show you revisions of their thesis, then they need to sign up and come to your office hours in person and you would be happy to walk them through things. You need to make clear that the only e-mails you will accept regarding the theses are for signups (or use an online signup system in your course management system), otherwise you'll defeat the purpose of this. </p>\n\n<p>This serves a dual purpose.</p>\n\n<p>First, it allows you to schedule your life (and balance your e-mail queue). </p>\n\n<p>Second, it sets up a small but perceptible cost to see you in the eyes of the students. If they know they only have a 15/30/50 minute slot once a week, they will see your time with them as a limited resource in contention with others and try to use it more efficiently by preparing their questions and materials to review ahead of time. In the process, they may answer their own questions.</p>\n\n<p>Of course, you'll want to select time/times that will work for you and your students, but when you chart out your week you should try to set a top limit for student contact hours (and e-mail hours) until you get tenure.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38473,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>As a new university professor, I have been informally tasked with making sure the MSc students in my program are prepared for their dissertations, by prepping them in my research methods course. </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>There is a lot going on in this first sentence! </p>\n\n<p>First of all I see that you are new, which makes things especially difficult for you: you don't really know how the department or the MSc program works yet, but you are trying to guide students through it. Trying to do everything exactly right the first time around seems unrealistic: I think you should concentrate on making a good effort and showing the students and your colleagues that you take the job seriously, bring a lot of skills to the table, but are also open to advice and adjustment in terms of this particular service situation. This may end up resulting in your spending more time and effort the first time around than you will in the long run, un/fortunately.</p>\n\n<p>(Let me also say that, based only on this sentence, I am not thrilled with your department for placing you in this situation. If the newest member of the pantheon is immediately signed up for something so critical and complex, one has to wonder how functional the pantheon was before the new arrival.)</p>\n\n<p>Second of all you mentioned an informal task but then also a formal task: you are teaching a research methods course. The latter sounds good to me, and you should certainly be having office hours in this course, and setting more as needed if the students seem to be struggling as a group. But the task of being single-handedly responsible for the preparedness of all the MSc students in your department for their dissertations sounds like a lot to hang on your head, if by that you mean much more than successfully teaching the research methods course. Expecting every student to be prepared to write a dissertation after completing one course doesn't sound very realistic to me. Also I hope that each student has, or will have, an advisor for their dissertation <em>other than you</em> (at least in most cases), and that these advisors will take on more of the responsibility of their preparedness/progress than you. You simply can't carry an entire master's program on your back in your first semester. So I would try to create a distinction between the amorphous informal task and the reasonable formal task, and set yourself up for success in the latter.</p>\n\n<p>In terms of helping the students more versus coming to a point where you can't help them: unfortunately the setting discussed above makes this an especially open-ended and intense version of that. I think the other answers have given you good advice nevertheless.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>You do need to limit your total amount of involvement: set aside a certain number of office hours per week, including extra office hours for drop-in appointments. You can help the students a great deal, but not infinitely, and not \"as much as they need\".</p></li>\n<li><p>If the students seem far from the mark, have an <strong>assessment meeting</strong> with each student (yes, this is very time-consuming...). At that meeting you can learn from the student their background, their progress and their current position, and then you can make an individualized plan to help the student move forward. It is not realistic for the goal for every student to be the same, but it is a reasonable (though still ambitious) goal to <em>help every student make clear forward progress</em> during the course of the semester.</p></li>\n<li><p>Make sure that your plans for the student give them plenty of things to do, and things that they can do: i.e., you want them to be doing most of the work, and you can help them with it at key moments. If you ask them to do something that they simply don't know how to do, then you're either going to fail them or spend way too much time doing it for them. But in a research methods class every student should be able to start somewhere. Make sure that the ground that they start on is relatively solid: I think that's much more important than how far they get by the end of the course.</p></li>\n</ul>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38395",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12347/"
] |
38,397 |
<p>My question is all about academic job offers. This is my first time on the job market post PhD, so I'm completely new to this. Here's my dilemma: </p>
<p>I was interviewed for an academic position last month at University A and they made me an offer today, but want me to decide within the next two weeks. The job at University A is ok, and actually pays very well (more than I expected) but is in a location both my spouse (a non-academic) and I greatly dislike. And I am not completely thrilled about the job itself. I think for the most part I'd enjoy it, but there's a lot more "managerial" aspects that I am not particularly interested in.</p>
<p>I found my dream academic job at University B and applied there a couple of weeks ago. University B is in a location that both my spouse and I love, but it would pay less than the job at University A. I am extremely qualified for the position at University B and am confident that my application will stand out. But, they are still taking applications for another week. The problem is that the timelines are really not matching up here. </p>
<p>If I had both offers in hand, I'd take University B, even for less money. I am that much more excited about the position and the location. The problem is, I don't know when University B will really make decisions. I'd like to email or call someone to try to speed things up, but don't really know the correct etiquette in academia. </p>
<p>I guess what I'm asking is this: what's the most appropriate way to call University B and say "I recently applied for this position, and I think I'd be a great fit, but I have another offer in hand. I'd much rather be a part of University B's project, however. When might you know what candidates you are interested in?" I don't want to be rude or sound arrogant, but really think I have a good chance if they can move fast enough. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38400,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>I recently applied for this position, and I think I'd be a great fit, but I have another offer in hand. I'd much rather be a part of University B's project, however. When might you know what candidates you are interested in?\" </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>That is almost perfect. Instead of asking when they will know, tell them when you need to know by. With two weeks notice it is not clear what they can do, but they probably could tell you if you are ridiculously strong (think an associate professor who is ready to be promoted to full professor applying for an assistant professor position), a reasonable candidate, or not in the running. You may want to talk to the university that made the offer and see if the deadline can be extended.</p>\n\n<p>For an extremely qualified candidate with an application that stands out, and I find that a dubious statement, a university could move you to the top of the short list, interview you, and make an offer in under a week. That said, it is extremely unlikely that a search committee would be so impressed that it decides to move that fast.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 101745,
"author": "einpoklum",
"author_id": 7319,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7319",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>this is my... time on the job market </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>... that says it all, really. Unfortunately, in the \"job market\" it's employers vs employees, manipulating each other to get the better of each other. In this capitalist world of ours, and with the dearth of tenured positions, this is almost unavoidable. So,</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Can I use one job offer to speed up another offer...?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Yes, and it's customary to do so.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I guess what I'm asking is this: what's the most appropriate way to call University B and say etc. etc.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I basically agree with @StrongBad here. I'd change your text to:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I recently applied for this position, I think I'd be a great fit and I would really like to join the faculty at University B. However, I have an outstanding offer from University A to which I must reply soon. Do you believe you / the university / person X would be able to indicate already at this point whether you are likely to make me the offer?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>That doesn't sound too arrogant IMHO. However, in many universities the hiring process is quite involved, long, and cannot be sped up much if at all; if that's the case at University B then, yes, you might come off as having an overly high opinion of yourself, so check before you ask.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38397",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29008/"
] |
38,401 |
<p>I recently finished a paper in which I received valuable feedback from two professors (neither supervisors nor coauthors) at some specific points, which ultimately leaded to localized significant improvements. I highly appreciated it and of course I added explicit mentions in the acknowledgements section stating their suggestions.</p>
<p>My question now is: I hardly will see again these professors for a long time. I thought about sending an email to them commenting on their inclusion on the acknowledgements... But then I thought that it should be something understood as obvious, without too much interest for them or even spammy. So, <strong>shall I communicate their inclusion in the acknowledgements section? If so, what will be the correct etiquette for such an email?</strong></p>
<p>EDIT: As @StephanKolassa comments, another important and highly related issue is <strong>what is the best timing for communication</strong>, if this is considered adequate:</p>
<ul>
<li>First submission</li>
<li>Acceptance</li>
<li>Publication (early access or traditional)</li>
</ul>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38410,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>IMHO, definitely before first submission. It would be a nice idea to send them a \"Thank You\" email and let them know that you've finished the paper and in order to show your appreciation you've included their names in the acknowledgements section. So If they do not feel comfortable with this they could tell you even before the paper is submitted.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38429,
"author": "Massimo Ortolano",
"author_id": 20058,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20058",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>shall I communicate their inclusion in the acknowledgements section?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Yes, why not? It helps at building connections and improving relationships. Besides, if the acknowledged people are from a different field than yours, they might never know you've acknowledged them otherwise. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>what will be the correct etiquette for such an email?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't think there is any need to be overly formal. Typically I would write something simple, along the lines of (names and facts have been changed to protect the innocent):</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Dear John,</p>\n \n <p>thank you very much for helping me with the problem of packing holes. I've included an\n acknowledgment in a paper I recently wrote on the topic.</p>\n \n <p>The paper is titled \"Packing the unpackable and stacking the\n unstackable\" and has been submitted to the Transactions on Painstaking\n Stacking. You can find a preprint of the paper at the address (link to, e.g.,\n arXiv).</p>\n \n <p>Kind regards/Sincerely/Cheers,</p>\n \n <p>Massimo</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>The above example is meant to be sent just after the first submission. In more critical cases, when I'm not sure whether the acknowledgment would be well-received or not, or if I think I might have written a wrong detail (e.g., the affiliation), I typically send a copy of the paper before the submission, asking for feedback. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38434,
"author": "Kimball",
"author_id": 19607,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19607",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In math at least, you do not usually explicitly inform people that you have included them in the acknowledgements. You should of course thank them for their help, and it is common to send them a copy of the paper when you have a more-or-less final version (often this is the version you submit--in math the refereeing process takes a long time, plus your acknowledge-ees (sp?) may have additional comments/suggestions), or notify them when you post it on the arXiv. (This is regardless of whether they have seen a preliminary version or not.)</p>\n\n<p>To add a little more on the question in the edit: sometimes I will send a pre-submission version if I really want to see if anyone has comments before I submit (students probably at least want to get comments from advisors before submitting), but usually I send out copies of the paper/post on the arXiv about the same time I submit. I don't typically actively notify acknowledge-ees when a paper has been accepted or published (though I will update the arXiv), unless the final version ends up being significantly different in a way that would be of interest to them. However, sometimes I see colleagues I have acknowledged, they will inquire about the status of the paper.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 121877,
"author": "guest",
"author_id": 102159,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/102159",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My advice (coming from physical science experience) is yes, you should. Massimo's format for the communication makes sense. In addition to the courtesy, there is also an aspect of letting them know their name is running around there. 99.9% of the time they will be happy but if they are not, at least you surface it. [Note, this is notification, not permission, though.] Also if there is any chance they are going to kerfuffle about wanting coauther status versus attaboy, at least it gives them a chance to say it earlier. Again, though this is just informational, not a permission.</p>\n\n<p>But in general, it will just make them happy. It may also open their eyes to some application of their work or apparatus or the like that they don't normally think of. For instance, if I acknowledged a physics prof for an insight in a chemistry paper, he would probably appreciate knowing that some ideas of his have meaning outside the tuff Bessel function loving world of physics and in the more applied materials space.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38401",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20897/"
] |
38,405 |
<p>Scientists not only need to discover new knowledge but also have to share the knowledge to others. For the former, we have things like universities, collaborate groups and journals to take charge. For the latter, we have various forms from teaching, developing and maintaining softwares to writing or translating books, writing and editing in Wikipedia, answering (and asking) in SE, joining an academic club, working on a academic-related project, blogging, etc.</p>
<p>Besides the first two have significant weight in academia, the others seem to be light weight (some even say that they have zero weight) (example for <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2621/value-of-contributions-to-wikipedia-when-applying-for-academic-jobs">Wikipedia</a>, <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/38321/14341">translating book</a>). Although I understand the worry that I may spread myself too thin, I think the important thing is scheduling time wisely. I don't think they are deserved to be bad effective. In fact some scholarships (like <a href="http://home.vef.gov/download/2016_VEF_Fellowship_Announcement_ENG.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">this one</a>) require me to describe "any examples of leadership and involvement in my university or home community". I have even seen some high rep users modestly proudly say that they are active users in SE in their websites. I see a conflict here. Can you explain why contribution to community is deprecated in academia?</p>
<p>A very interesting question from F'x: <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/4738/how-can-a-researcher-improve-his-contribution-to-society">How can a researcher improve his contribution to society?</a></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38408,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>Scientists not only need to discover new knowledge but also have to share the knowledge to others. For the former, we have things like universities, collaborate groups and journals to take charge. For the latter, we have various forms from teaching, developing and maintaining softwares to writing or translating books, writing and editing in Wikipedia, answering (and asking) in SE, joining an academic club, working on a academic-related project, blogging, etc.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I think this is not correct. Discovering new knowledge is the actual research (valued on all levels), \"sharing to others\" is writing publications (valued so much that the common criticism is rather that publications count <em>too much</em>).</p>\n\n<p>What you mean is a different type of knowledge dissemination, basically the education of the broader public. This is indeed currently <em>not</em> widely valued, but I am not convinced that this is a fault of the system. Essentially, when an university hires a researcher, they want a researcher. They are specifically looking for somebody that <em>generates new knowledge</em>, not somebody that is good at breaking down this new knowledge for the layman (this would be a science journalist, or somesuch), nor for somebody that mainly collects and summarizes the knowledge on Wikipedia or Stack Exchange. </p>\n\n<p>Hence, the answer to your question:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>When will contribution to community be valued?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>If you understand this as \"when will my contributions to community be comparatively valuable for applying to a research position as research results\", then the answer will likely be \"never\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38415,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Software is in a gray area right now. As more and more software is required for research, and as younger faculty who have numerous important software products join budget councils (tenure committees, etc.), then the respect for software artifacts will increase. Until people with little to no respect for software age off of these committees, it will be harder (or impossible) for software to contribute directly to tenure decisions at major research universities. </p>\n\n<p>Of course, that's not necessarily enough for software to gain prominence either. Theoretically, the (hand/spreadsheet) calculations, theorems, and experiments in an article are verified in some form through the peer-review process. To date, outside of the statistics-using literature (maybe) where some venues require the publication of programs and data, codes aren't peer-reviewed or published in a traditional way. This gives software an uphill battle for prominence in the minds of tenure reviewers. Until your million-line Fortran simulation code has been peer reviewed, it's likely to remain a lesser contribution to tenure cases (if it gets added at all). I know some committee members who are trying to get software to count, but I haven't been around for discussions of how it might be peer reviewed or what the expectations would be.</p>\n\n<p>The other things you mention (clubs, translations, SE, Wikipedia, etc.) are not classically peer reviewed and aren't creating new knowledge, so they aren't really relevant to tenure committees at research universities. You may find more interest in some of these other things at teaching-focused colleges and universities, but I have no experience with that.</p>\n\n<p>Maybe my focus on tenure here is misguided, but it seems to be the driving force in what matters in academia. Everything else seems to be secondary (Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals, perhaps, also contributing highly). Interestingly, some of the things you mention, especially open source and highly used software, may help more with grants from government agencies. Their priorities are different and do drive incentives for academics. Fortunately, along with research products (peer reviewed articles) and teaching, grants do factor strongly into tenure decisions. Some of the other things you mention (alternative dissemination, etc) might factor into what NSF considers \"broader impacts\", but unless the focus of your grant is on these things specifically, the \"intellectual merit\" of your proposal will have much more weight among the reviewers of your grants. </p>\n\n<p>I don't see much of this changing rapidly unless a department at a university makes a very public push to include some of these things in their tenure process and wins away some top-notch faculty doing it. If that were to happen (unlikely), other departments might be forced to follow along. The maverick department would have to have some tremendous steals and tremendous research wins over a sustained period to really have an effect, though.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38405",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14341/"
] |
38,413 |
<p>I'm about to receive a tenure-track offer and was already informed about the offered salary. Unfortunately, the salary is barely an increase over my current postdoc salary. (In fact, taking into account the tax differences at my current location vs the location of the tenure-track institution, it's going to be a net pay cut.)
Also, the salary is below the range that the department head indicated during my visit. I was very excited about the prospect of joining the institution, but now I'm wondering whether all the hard work during several years (which were very successful research-wise) of being a postdoc was in vain. </p>
<p>I do have another offer (but for a non-research based industry job) and a couple more interviews (for tenure-track jobs) scheduled. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>How do I best approach the situation without giving the impression as being someone who's overly demanding or gaming the system? </p>
</blockquote>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38416,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Did you check the <a href=\"http://chronicle.com/article/2013-14-AAUP-Faculty-Salary/145679#id=table\" rel=\"nofollow\">AAUP salary survey</a> for that institution and peer institutions? </p>\n\n<p>You can use that as the basis as a request for a reconsideration of the salary. Note that such a reconsideration is likely to only yield modest results ($5000 or so max) and carries with it the small but real risk of having the offer withdrawn (see <a href=\"https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/03/13/lost-faculty-job-offer-raises-questions-about-negotiation-strategy\" rel=\"nofollow\">horror story here)</a>.</p>\n\n<p>I've negotiated my salary and/or lab/startup packages up at all the institutions I've worked at using comparison data from other schools and/or the real needs of doing the work I do; but both were pre-recession.</p>\n\n<p>Be careful.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38417,
"author": "Brian Borchers",
"author_id": 4453,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4453",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Negotiating salary is a very common thing. You should explain that this offer is low in comparison with your current post doc salary or the salary available to you in industry and that you don't feel that you can accept the offer at the current salary. You might also bring up salary survey data to support an argument that the offered salary is low. They might respond by increasing the offered salary or they might not. </p>\n\n<p>There are several reasons why they might not be willing to negotiate on salary. It might be that the salary is determined by a union contract or some official pay policy of the institution. Even if the administration has the flexibility to offer a higher salary they may not want to do so if it would result in you getting higher pay than current faculty members. </p>\n\n<p>In my experience in the US it is often possible to negotiate a somewhat higher starting salary than your initial offer, but it is seldom possible to get a substantial increase (of say more than 10% above the initial offer.) Furthermore, you can reasonably expect that if you negotiate a higher starting salary you might receive lower pay raises than you would otherwise get in later years. </p>\n\n<p>I would encourage you to look at how long term faculty in the department are currently paid. If they seem underpaid to you, then you can reasonably expect to be in the same situation in a few years. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38418,
"author": "Ben Webster",
"author_id": 13,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/13",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think you tell the chair of the department some version of what you've told us: you're very excited about joining the institution (very important to say that first!), but you don't feel like the the salary is appropriate for the position, and you would find it much easier to accept the offer if the salary were increased. Negotiating over salaries is quite normal, not overly demanding or taking some kind of advantage. Of course you might well not be successful, but people often are.</p>\n\n<p>Negotiating is not fun (at least for me), but it doesn't have to be that hard, especially when you have some leverage. I would mention the fact that you feel the current offer is an effective pay cut from your present position (it's up to you whether to mention your current salary), and that you're very confused about the fact that offered salary is lower than the range the head himself mentioned. Mention the (presumably more lucrative) industry job and its salary, though you should probably make it clear that you don't expect to be matched (unless you won't come unless it will. Obviously, then you should say that). </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38436,
"author": "Kimball",
"author_id": 19607,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19607",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Let me add some thoughts to current answers. </p>\n\n<p>First, on why the salary offer is lower than you were led to believe: the department head, who cannot decide the details of the offers, was likely making a vague guess, possibly based on offers in previous years. (Hopefully s/he was not being intentionally deceptive.) I don't know how the department head indicated to you a salary range--perhaps if you directly asked they had to make a quick guess based on information they didn't have. Or maybe they made a reasonable guess that you misinterpreted. Or maybe the administration is being stingy (e.g., perhaps there have been recent budget cuts, or perhaps there has been a change in adminstration). </p>\n\n<p>Often the department head is on your side, and will be negotating for you so you can be frank with them (hopefully you have some idea of whether this is true or not from your discussions). You should ask why there is a difference between what you were led to believe and the initial offer. In addition to the comparison with your current salary and the industry offer, you should mention you have other academic interviews. Comparing industry salaries to academic salaries is apples and watermelons, so the administration may not be be that moved by your industry offer. However, if you have other interviews set up, it's possible the department head can convince the dean or whoever that you're highly desirable and will be likely to quickly accept if you can get a competitive offer (if this is true, make it clear to the department head). </p>\n\n<p>Otherwise, you should try to defer on making a decision until you have your other interviews. If you can get other academic offers (with a higher salary) before you have to make a decision, it is much easier to negotiate. Also sometime soon (depending on the deadline and time of interviews, maybe now, or maybe at the time of the other interviews) you should let the other interviewing schools know you have a decision with a deadline upcoming so they can try to speed up their decision process about you.</p>\n\n<p>However, given that the initial offer was low in your eyes, there's a good chance that the administration will not be willing to make an offer that is significantly higher, so prepare yourself in case you need to make a difficult decision.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38413",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28850/"
] |
38,419 |
<p>I applied to 10 schools and have heard formally from 3, 2 rejections, 1 admission. I just received an email from another school (a very good one) saying that they are seriously interested in me, but would like to know if I am still interested in them. While I am very interested in this program, which is in my top 4, since I have not heard from the other 6 schools, I am not ready to make a decision. Does saying yes now mean I am committed to accepting their offer?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38420,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If they are still \"seriously interested\" in you, then that is not an offer on their side.</p>\n\n<p>If you are still \"seriously interested\" in them, then that is not a firm commitment from your side.</p>\n\n<p>Decisions are not binding until the ink is dry.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38421,
"author": "Aru Ray",
"author_id": 948,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/948",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The department in question most likely just wants to make sure you haven't accepted an offer somewhere else - or received an offer you will definitely accept over them; saying that you are still interested is not a commitment from you at all. </p>\n\n<p>Some applicants will wait till the last moment to decline offers from departments, even ones that they know for sure they will not accept (e.g. if they have been accepted by a better department (in their estimation) already). The department is just trying to find out whether you are in that position. (To students in that position, don't do this! Decline offers as soon as you know you won't be accepting, your fellow applicants will thank you!)</p>\n\n<p>In your position I would write an email saying that you are still interested and also indicate that it is among your top choices (as you have said in your question). </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38422,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Now that you have an admission offer, it is reasonable to contact all (or at least most) of the other schools you have heard from. Any school that you would not attend, email them and say that you have an offer from X and are no longer interested. </p>\n\n<p>Email any school that you want to attend instead of X and tell them you have an offer at X, but would rather attend their school (give a good reason that is not simply their ranking). Tell them the deadline you need to let school X know by. If one of those schools Y gives you an offer and none of the other ones do, you tell X no and Y yes and there are no issues. If a couple of those schools Y and Z accept you, you tell Z yes and X no. You need to tell Y that since the offer you also got an offer from Z that is too good to pass up. This way they will see you were not wasting their time.</p>\n\n<p>The difficult case are the schools you are not sure about. If only school Y accepts you after you tell them about X, then turning them down for X is not ideal. So while it is not ideal, things happen, and no one will hold it against you for long.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38419",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26799/"
] |
38,424 |
<p>For sake of argument, let's say I obtain a bachelor's degree in physics, a master's degree in physics, and then a PhD in physical chemistry but from a department of chemistry. Can I then go on to be a physics professor? Or would I be confined to teaching chemistry? </p>
<p>One can imagine equivalent situations for other fields. Say, for example, a bachelor's in computer science, master's in computer science, and then a PhD in computational physics from a department of physics. Could that individual then become a computer science professor? </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38425,
"author": "Chris C",
"author_id": 7745,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7745",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It depends more on the aspect of your research. If you have a physical chemistry degree but do research more in the realm of physics, it is possible that you could be hired in physics or chemistry, even hold a joint position in both.</p>\n\n<p>The limiting factor that your PhD major will be in that it is the general area where you are more trained in, that is, you can probably teach courses in your major better than those in the other department. Sometimes hiring decisions do take this into account. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38428,
"author": "WetlabStudent",
"author_id": 8101,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8101",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The answer is very field specific. In many departments all that matters is your research. Does your dissertation and publications fit the department's vision for what it means to do research in field X, regardless of the field of your degree. </p>\n\n<p>However, in some fields it is really hard to get in the door without a degree in that field. The example I am thinking of is Mathematics. Theoretical biologists, economists, social scientists etc. with degrees in the field of application tend not to end up in math departments even if nearly 100% of their research is proving theorems. This isn't to say it can't be done, but it seems as though it is much easier to move in the opposite direction from a math department to a science department. For example if you work on pure problems in probability but your degree is in economics, it is hard to get a job in a math department.</p>\n\n<p>Disclaimer 1: it is unclear how much of this is due to selection bias by the job candidate vs. discrimination in the math department against people without math degrees. </p>\n\n<p>Disclaimer 2: this is based on anecdotal evidence and faculty listings on department websites that show where mathematicians from science departments end up after their degree. I have not sat on a hiring committee.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38424",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11251/"
] |
38,430 |
<p><em>Premise:</em> I originally asked this on MathOverflow, but it was pointed out to me that it could be better fit for Academia Stack Exchange.</p>
<p><em>Note:</em> I have received extremely varied advice on the following matter by various students slightly older than me, so I post the question here in the hope to get an objective 'technical take' from experienced researchers.</p>
<p>Assuming that there are several topics which are equally attractive to me and that the prospective advisors are all established researchers in their fields and "nice people", are there any objective circumstances that I should take into consideration when searching for a topic for an undergraduate research project
(clearly, this question naturally generalize to the choice of Ph.D. dissertation topics and general research advice, about which, if you please, you are free to elaborate) to maximize my chances of making an "optimal choice" (<em>e.g.</em>, in terms of mathematical results achieved, possibility of getting a good recommendation afterwards, personal growth, etc.)? Clearly, referring to research papers in mathematical education that partially support your remarks will be highly appreciated (although it is not necessary).</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Side note:</em> Just to clarify a little further: I've only said that the <em>mathematical aspects</em> and the <em>advisors</em> are equal to me, and what I'm asking is <em>what else</em> I should take into account when choosing a research area.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38425,
"author": "Chris C",
"author_id": 7745,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7745",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It depends more on the aspect of your research. If you have a physical chemistry degree but do research more in the realm of physics, it is possible that you could be hired in physics or chemistry, even hold a joint position in both.</p>\n\n<p>The limiting factor that your PhD major will be in that it is the general area where you are more trained in, that is, you can probably teach courses in your major better than those in the other department. Sometimes hiring decisions do take this into account. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38428,
"author": "WetlabStudent",
"author_id": 8101,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8101",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The answer is very field specific. In many departments all that matters is your research. Does your dissertation and publications fit the department's vision for what it means to do research in field X, regardless of the field of your degree. </p>\n\n<p>However, in some fields it is really hard to get in the door without a degree in that field. The example I am thinking of is Mathematics. Theoretical biologists, economists, social scientists etc. with degrees in the field of application tend not to end up in math departments even if nearly 100% of their research is proving theorems. This isn't to say it can't be done, but it seems as though it is much easier to move in the opposite direction from a math department to a science department. For example if you work on pure problems in probability but your degree is in economics, it is hard to get a job in a math department.</p>\n\n<p>Disclaimer 1: it is unclear how much of this is due to selection bias by the job candidate vs. discrimination in the math department against people without math degrees. </p>\n\n<p>Disclaimer 2: this is based on anecdotal evidence and faculty listings on department websites that show where mathematicians from science departments end up after their degree. I have not sat on a hiring committee.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/06
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38430",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] |
38,435 |
<p>I want to reply to the reviewer's comment (see below) on my paper, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>My concerns have been addressed satisfactorily and the paper is acceptable.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>My own reply would be like:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Your recognition of our work is much appreciated.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>or </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Your encouraging comment is greatly appreciated. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, it seems unnatural to read, How to give an more appropriate reply? </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38438,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>For this sort of reply, I personally like to keep it short and sweet:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Thank you!</p>\n</blockquote>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38440,
"author": "MurphysLab",
"author_id": 29031,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29031",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First, \"your recognition of our work\", although not intended as such, sounds slightly egotistical. Second, \"your encouraging comment\" seems to read too much into what is being stated: simply that your paper has met the necessary standard. While that may be encouraging to you (it would be to me), encouragement is not the purpose of the statement. </p>\n\n<p>If you wish to thank your reviewer, you shouldn't directly address your thanks to that specific comment itself, but rather address your appreciation directly to the whole of the effort and time that the reviewer provided to help you to improve your work. Here's one possible way of starting such a statement:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>We wish to express our appreciation for your in-depth comments, suggestions, and corrections, which have greatly improved the manuscript.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Ideally you should be specific in stating how you believe that the reviewer's comments have improved the paper: <em>e.g.</em> added clarity; technical accuracy; correction of specific errors; language; suggested analyses or experiments; etc...</p>\n\n<p>Giving such feedback tells a reviewer that their <em>anonymous</em> review is valued and that their time was well spent. Remember: the anonymous peer reviewer is doing this as a community service for which they receive no payment and little recognition, if any.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38447,
"author": "Peter Jansson",
"author_id": 4394,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4394",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>There are a few points that have to be considered here.</p>\n\n<p>First, a reviewer will usually not see an authors response to their review except if the reviewer has accepted to review also the (major) revision and the manuscript is not accepted after the revisions. This means such a response has no audience and editors will not typically convey such messages between author and reviewer.</p>\n\n<p>Second, All reviews and rebuttals pass an editor, with the explicit exception of an open review (visible online), which occurs in a few journals. So for the most part the response you provide should be directed to the editor. It is perfectly fine to tell the editor you really appreciate the reviewers comments but that will most likely not reach the reviewers as pointed out above.</p>\n\n<p>Third, most authors provide an acknowledgement in their published papers and it is in most, or at least many, circles considered polite to thank reviewers in the acknowledgement. A common phrase could be that \"the manuscript was improved by the [insightful] reviews by X and y [or: the anonymous reviewers]\" or something along those lines. The square parentheses indicate places where alternatives are necessary depending on ones view of the reviews. There is no need to involve very complicated thanks here as has also been pointed out in other replies. Simple and straight forward is better.</p>\n\n<p>As a final point, the quote you provide stating that \"My concerns have been addressed satisfactorily and the paper is acceptable.\" is not what I would consider an overwhelmingly positive response and your thanks should be written with this in consideration. If someone says the manuscript is just ok but publishable, a response glorifying the review and the effect of the review will certainly seem odd from all perspectives. So make sure there is a match between the \"verdict\" and your \"thanks\". Keeping it simple and non-convoluted is always a good reciepe.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 53939,
"author": "Rustum Giuliano Eduave",
"author_id": 40740,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/40740",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would suggest the following response to the reviewers:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>That's great to hear! Thank you for trusting us. Have an awesome day!</p>\n</blockquote>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/07
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38435",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29027/"
] |
38,449 |
<p>It is well-known that LinkedIn is used by scholars too, but I think that the business-friendly structure of your profile-page makes it markedly less suitable for academic purposes. Is there a specifically academic website that includes the same characteristics as LinkedIn plus the possibility to add some <em>more scholarly</em> elements in your profile?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38450,
"author": "Community",
"author_id": -1,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p><a href=\"http://researchgate.net\">ResearchGate</a> is more academic. It allows you to add your research publications, not just papers. It also has a stackexchange like section and a Jobs section, that features listings to research and advanced positions (PHD, Post-Doc) in academic institutions and in business.</p>\n\n<p>As @StephanKolassa noted you should scout Research Gate before joining (follow the link in his comment), as any other alternative.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 54610,
"author": "D.Salo",
"author_id": 12438,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12438",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You could look at the aggregator/identifier system <a href=\"http://orcid.org/\" rel=\"nofollow\">ORCID</a>. I strongly recommend ORCID if you apply for US federal grants, as the writing is on the wall regarding needing an ORCID to do so. A few journals are starting to require ORCIDs for authors as well.</p>\n\n<p>You could also consider a profile at an alternative-metrics aggregator such as <a href=\"http://impactstory.org/\" rel=\"nofollow\">ImpactStory</a>. </p>\n\n<p>(Disclaimer: I have an ORCID and an ImpactStory subscription, and consider one of the ImpactStory founders a friend. Nobody pays me to recommend either, however.)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 149901,
"author": "Collega",
"author_id": 124810,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/124810",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think Academia.edu has surpassed Researchgate in terms of uptake, but sometimes it seems more papers are uploaded to Researchgate.</p>\n\n<p>I would not overlook Linked In - a lot of academics us it.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/07
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38449",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] |
38,455 |
<p>I have gathered some fMRI and eye tracking data, from several subjects. I can process them using the server in our lab, but I would like to take advantage of my own cloud servers on Linode and DigitalOcean, even EC2.</p>
<p>Before these data were gathered, in the consent form we did not mention the possibilities that data might be processed/stored in the cloud.</p>
<p>Am I allowed to use cloud servers to process these data under current regulations? Does it makes any difference if these servers were purchased/rented under my lab's name?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38459,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>To some extent, the answer depends on location. In the US, IRBs tend to be concerned with <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_health_information\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Protected Health Information (PHI)</a>. There are 18 things that are considered PHI and generally these can be easily stripped from research data. For fMRI and eye tracking data, you need to be a little concerned about two components of PHI</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Biometric identifiers, including finger, retinal and voice prints</p>\n<p>Full face photographic images and any comparable images</p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>In the UK the term is <a href=\"https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protection/key-definitions/\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Personal Data</a> and the definition is:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Personal data means data which relate to a living individual who can be identified –</p>\n<p>(a) from those data, or</p>\n<p>(b) from those data and other information which is in the possession of, or is likely to come into the possession of, the data controller</p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>Most people provide a data storage and archiving plan that outlines how they protect PHI/Personal Data in their IRB ethics application. Most IRBs that I am familiar with do not consider fMRI to be comparable to a full face photograph or allow the individual to be identified. This is despite fMRI researchers often being able to recognize each other's brains. Most eye tracking data that I am familiar with do not include high resolution images of the retina and would not be classified at PHI/Personal Data. People publish pictures of fMRI slices and eye tracking traces all the time. Prior to uploading data onto the cloud, you will want to confirm with your IRB what they consider PHI/Personal Data.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38462,
"author": "user6726",
"author_id": 28972,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28972",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The applicable regulations don't directly apply to you as an individual, they apply to your institution. The institution in turn states what is and is not allowed. My former institution had a policy (stemming from FERPA) which required any email to or about a student to be encrypted, and could only be sent from a university-owned computer on-campus. This is well above the requirements actually imposed by FERPA -- it's erring on the side of caution.</p>\n\n<p>You may be able to determine that there is a policy prohibiting or allowing such data storage, and I would bet that it is prohibited. The university has to be certain that personal data is secure, so except for a monumental oversight on the university's part, they surely would be some policy. You need to trace through the policy documents and see if, for example, they say that restricted data can only be put out there via a university-sponsored Box account. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/07
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38455",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/9470/"
] |
38,457 |
<p>So I am finishing my MSc in Europe and it looks like I will be headed to the US for a PhD. Along the way I have collected a small set of textbooks that I find particularly useful. From my experience, most academics have a reasonable number of textbooks in their offices so I cannot be the only one in this situation. These books can be hard to find and are costly to replace. </p>
<p>However, textbooks are pretty awful to carry around. Even a modest number make any box very heavy. </p>
<p>So what I am asking is this. Is it worthwhile to transport books around the world? Is there a best way to do it? Since I an impecunious student I am hoping to do this cheaply. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38458,
"author": "Brian Borchers",
"author_id": 4453,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4453",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Have you considered using ebooks in situations where they're available and reasonably priced (and don't have Digital Rights Management)? </p>\n\n<p>A few years ago when I went to Los Angeles for a sabbatical leave, I made it a point to get electronic copies of as many of my frequently used books as possible. I bought a few, but mostly I was able to work with freely available copies. This dramatically reduced the number of printed books that I had to take with me.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38463,
"author": "DCTLib",
"author_id": 7390,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7390",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Whether it is worthwhile doing so is something that you need to decide yourself.</p>\n\n<p>As far as the best way is concerned, when the more senior people move to a different institution, they often transport lots of personal stuff with them (as they only have \"one home\", so all contents need to be moved). Adding a few books to the movers' workload does not cost much. Also, some books that are bought from the institution's money may actually have to stay at the institution and moves to its library, which reduces the volume of books to move.</p>\n\n<p>More junior people (e.g., Phd students) often only carry few books with them when they switch continents and temporarily store the rest with friends or parents. One way of doing so cheaply is to move them book-by-book by filling the checked luggage for flights up to the maximum allowable weight. Every time they travel \"home\", they would take a few more books. Obviously, this strategy can take years (depending on how full your luggage would normally be) even when doing 2-3 trips a year, but it is quite cheap (if you have a sturdy suitcase - if not, it may be quite expensive). Also, it avoids trouble or fees with the custom office, which can happen when sending parcels.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38465,
"author": "Dave Clarke",
"author_id": 643,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/643",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I moved from Australia to the Netherlands, then the Netherlands to Belgium, then Belgium to Sweden, all the while dragging hundreds of books along with me. \nIt's expensive. I don't even open many of them. I don't regret it.</p>\n\n<p>That said, it's often easier just to buy the books again when you decide that you really really need to own them. Otherwise, just borrow them from a library or get an electronic copy.</p>\n\n<p>That said, I'd drag them across the world again.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38481,
"author": "Mathieu K.",
"author_id": 29055,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29055",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I vote for freight (see <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27365/jamesqf\">jamesqf</a>'s answer-as-a-comment). I've got a friend who sometimes ships something like a cubic yard of stuff (maybe a third of which is books) from Canada to a land far, far away for about a hundred bucks. That's roughly US$80 or ~ €70.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/07
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38457",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28045/"
] |
38,467 |
<p>The journal editor accepted my paper and told me to ask his assistant about the next steps in the publication process. Four months ago I corrected some minor points and sent an updated manuscript to the assistant. Since then the editor's assistant remained silent. About two weeks ago I asked him about the status of the manuscript and next steps, but he hasn't replied yet. What should I do? Could the editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38471,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>You should write to the editor and tell him what you have told us. Really your concrete problem is that your correspondence has not been returned so you don't know what's going on. Maybe everything is proceeding as it should, maybe it isn't, but you need a reply. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Could editor reject my manuscript after acceptance?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Why do you even ask? Are you worried that the editor thought, \"No, hang on, I don't want to publish this paper after all. Let's not publish it, never contact the author again, and hope for the best\"?!? That's just totally loopy, unprofessional behavior. In this big, bad world of ours, anything <em>could</em> happen, but the chance of this happening to you -- provided only that you are dealing with a partway reputable, professional journal (essentially: not a journal that you learned about via a spammy, semi-literate email) -- is negligibly small.</p>\n\n<p>Just get back in contact with the editor ASAP and take it from there. Be polite, but be persistent. Give the editor a week or two to reply. I honestly expect that he will. If not, write to the editor-in-chief / managing editor / some other members of the editorial board. You'll hear back from someone. Again, don't assume that something has gone terribly wrong, and certainly don't worry that your polite, professional behavior will jeopardize the future of your paper.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38488,
"author": "Kakoli Majumder",
"author_id": 9920,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/9920",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You should write to the editor explaining that you have not received any further communication about the status of your manuscript for the last four months and that the assistant has not replied to your e-mail. I'm sure you will receive a reply from the editor. If you do not receive a reply from the editor within a couple of weeks, try to get hold of his number and call him. If that doesn't work, write to the editor-in-chief or managing editor of the journal. </p>\n\n<p>Regarding your second question, once a manuscript has been accepted, the decision cannot be reversed, unless a major ethical breach, such as duplicate publication, salami slicing, or undisclosed conflict of interest, has been detected. However, if your manuscript free from these problems, you need not worry: it will not be rejected. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/07
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38467",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29045/"
] |
38,476 |
<p>When I was an undergrad, I had instructors who did not tell students that there was more than one version of the exam until afterwards. I also had instructors who told students that there was more than one version, before the exam started. The question is: should an instructor tell his/her students before the exam that there are multiple versions of the exam. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38478,
"author": "Anonymous Mathematician",
"author_id": 612,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/612",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Why would knowing in advance matter to anyone except cheaters? This information will not help honest students prepare for the exam or change how they approach it, so for them announcing it afterwards seems just as good as in advance. One argument for announcing it in advance is that some potential cheaters might decide not to try to cheat (and spend more time studying or become a little more honest), but the counterargument is that it might just encourage them to find more effective methods of cheating. I don't consider either of these arguments especially compelling, and I'm not convinced it really matters much whether the announcement is before or after the exam. This issue tends to come up in large courses, which are often pretty standardized. I'd bet the students who care whether there are multiple versions of the exam can easily find out what this professor has done in other large classes, so there usually won't be much of an element of surprise.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38497,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think the answer is \"Yes\". This causes that low number of students considering cheating on the exam to forget it and put their time towards studying for the exam. </p>\n\n<p>And for other students it would make no difference whether there is only 1 or multiple versions of questions <strong>as long as the difficulty of the versions is fairly kept the same.</strong></p>\n\n<p>Update: Following comment of the author about keeping the same level of difficulty among different versions, I still believe that the students have the right to know that there are multiple versions of questions and as an added option you can even tell them that the only difference is on the order of question. That does not make any problem in my opinion.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38508,
"author": "Trevor Wilson",
"author_id": 8937,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8937",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>What I do is to make the versions of the exam different colors, but not say anything about it (as Kimball describes in a comment above.)</p>\n\n<p>Here are the main alternatives, as I see them:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p>Hide the fact that there are multiple versions of the exam.</p></li>\n<li><p>Mention in advance that there will be multiple versions of the exam.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Disadvantages of option 1 are: (1) it's hard to distinguish the different versions when handing them out and when grading them, (2) students might still try to copy from their neighbors' exams, which is distracting (although I suppose this is actually an advantage if you want to maximize the total number of students you catch cheating.)</p>\n\n<p>Disadvantages of option 2 are: (1) it is an unpleasant reminder of the possibility of cheating (as Anonymous Mathematician mentions in a comment,) and (2) students who were planning to cheat may adapt to some other method.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38476",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28653/"
] |
38,484 |
<p><a href="http://um.edu.my" rel="noreferrer">University of Malaya</a>, Malaysia's oldest public university has recently deployed a new system for issuing graduation certificate named <a href="https://graduand.um.edu.my" rel="noreferrer">e-scroll</a> (it seems be the 1st university in the world to deploy e-scroll system). Under this new system, university will not issue any hard copy scroll (graduation certificate or degree) and instead provides a website from which graduates can download their electronically signed and timestamped degree in pdf format which can be printed out.</p>
<p>According to one of the officials, UM aims to produce digital degree certificates or E-Scrolls for its graduates to avoid forgery of certificate and ease employment process.</p>
<p>Some parts of the above links are here:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>E-Scrolls now work exceptionally well for online applications or for employers who like to verify the authenticity of an applicant’s qualifications. When employers click on an E-Scroll, a PDF document containing the applicant’s degree certificate opens up. A verification tab will automatically pop up indicating that the digital certificate is verified and authentic. If information on the scroll has been modified, the verification tab will show up in red, indicating some form of tampering. They can also manually click on the digital signature panels to gain technical information on the certificate and signatories.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>“UM also provides an alternate method of verification for its graduates through the Registry of Graduates website that contains the list of graduates,</p>
<p>According other fellows in the above links</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The security of E-Scroll is based on a technology called Public Key Infrastructure. This is a proven technology that is widely used by governments worldwide to protect the e-passport, citizen identification cards, and by the financial institutions to secure transactions and online banking</p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="http://www.haynik.com/v3/index.php/universities-digitalised-scrolls-signed-sealed-delivered/" rel="noreferrer">Here</a> and <a href="http://www2.nst.com.my/channels/learning-curve/universities-digitalised-scrolls-signed-sealed-delivered-1.470505" rel="noreferrer">here</a> are some articles discussion in depth about e-scroll and technology behind it.</p>
<p><strong>Here is they problem:</strong>
UM will NOT issue any hard copy scroll anymore meaning that we are unable to present original degree that is printed on a thick paper, has 3d stamp, and has hologram. Instead they issue a pdf that has some note on it and provide access to a website to show its authenticity. </p>
<p>If UM had both of the certificates, it would be wonderful since it satisfies both concern; those who need original degree and those who want to verify authenticity of the degree.</p>
<p><strong>My question:</strong></p>
<ol>
<li>How easy would it be to convince officials to accept such a e-scroll?</li>
<li>Imagine a visa officer at port who wants to verify student's document before entry. If we tell him so, how likely is that he agrees? and he goes to his computer and opens the website? How can we say that the website is not fake? Manipulating university websites is not harder that forging a degree, I guess.</li>
<li>Even if people trust the website and agree on usefulness of this approach, how practical it is that we expect governments to change their employment, verification, or other policies?</li>
</ol>
<p>For instance, in my country, all degrees obtained from foreign countries must be take to the ministry of higher education for validation. Upon successful validation, the government party issue degree equivalency. Now here is the point that how easy is that for us to ask ministries to change their verification and validation process?</p>
<p>What is the best way to talk to University officials and ask them to issue both? </p>
<p><em>Do you know, <strong>as admission committee member or university administrates</strong>, what other problems new students graduated form UM will face in your university?</em> </p>
<p>Here is the sample e-scroll
<img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/BuW2T.jpg" alt="enter image description here"></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38501,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have never in my life used the hard copy of any of my degrees. If people wish to verify, they generally contact the university in any case. I thus anticipate no issue at all in a switch to electronic degree certificates.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38502,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Before getting to the answer, I want to recount a related story. As an undergraduate due to some bureaucratic issues I attended graduation even though I wasn't graduating. I should have been handed an empty diploma tube, but they screwed up. A week later I received a desperate phone call from the registrar's office. The conversation went something like this:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>RO: We need you to return your diploma since you did not graduate</p>\n<p>ME: No, I like having it and you are going to give it to me anyway at the end of the summer</p>\n<p>RO: It won't have the right date on it and when an employer asks to see the diploma it won't match your transcript and that will cause problems</p>\n<p>ME: Not a problem, I will just forge a diploma then</p>\n<p>RO: We really need it back</p>\n<p>ME: I don't have it any more. I gave it to my mother since she paid my tuition. You can try calling her and asking for it, but I don't think you will have much luck</p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>I still have not had to forge my diploma with the correct date on it or even show my diploma to anyone. Almost everything can be accomplished with either a non digitally signed pdf of my transcript, a unofficial printed version of my transcript, or an official transcript sent by the university directly to the individual that needs it. The only issue I can see with having only an e-transcript/diploma would be if the university stopped supporting the format. I would simply request a digital one at graduation and print it out for your records.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38484",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6393/"
] |
38,489 |
<p>Some papers have co-first authors, which are supposed to have contributed equally. However, there is still an order issue.</p>
<p>Imagine a paper co-authored by A, B, and C. The paper goes like:</p>
<pre><code> A Very Long Paper Title
A*, B*, and C
Our work is good.
-----
* A and B contributed equally to the work.
</code></pre>
<p>In this case, is it acceptable for B to cite this paper as follows in his/her CV?</p>
<blockquote>
<p>B*, A*, and C. A Very Long Paper Title. <em>Journal of Stack Exchange</em>.
Jan. 2015. (* indicates the co-first authorship)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Note the position swap.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38491,
"author": "yo'",
"author_id": 1471,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1471",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>One thing you can do (and some people do), is that you omit the names at the beginning of the references and include them in the end, like:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p><strong>List of Publications</strong></p>\n \n <p>Study of ABC in the context of DEF (with J. Doe and J. Soe). <em>Journal\n of ABCDEF</em> <strong>45</strong>(5):170, 2013.</p>\n \n <p>Note on DEF (with J. Doe and G. Surname). <em>Communications of FooBar</em>\n <strong>10</strong>(1):1, 2014.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>However, remember that this is more common in fields where the order of the authors is most usually alphabetic. In fields where First Author, Second Author and Last Author are significant, this would be really uncommon, and an academic committee of any type will likely consider it as that you credit work of others as yours.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38498,
"author": "Blair MacIntyre",
"author_id": 28128,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28128",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>No. The reference is the reference, changing it to move yourself higher could be misinterpreted as willful deceit.</p>\n\n<p>Add a parenthetical statement at the end of the references saying \"first n authors are co-first authors, listed in this order because...\"</p>\n\n<p>On my \"internal\" CV I have parentheticals after many papers, for example, listing contributions, nominations for best paper, etc.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38489",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8079/"
] |
38,494 |
<p>UPDATE:
So, am I to understand there is no such thing as a "verified research statement" besides an actual "recommendation" ? I already have a sense of the department(s) and professor's in the target phd proram know me from some elementary classes (but not that familiar with my academic background/research etc...)</p>
<p>ORIGINAL QUESTION:
I am planning on applying to graduate school (phd). However, before that I plan on talking with relevant professors at these schools, I would like to take a portfolio if research work I have done already. So, can I goto my current/previous professor to write/sign my research statement to PROVE/VALIDATE the contents of the research which I did under them. Although course description/syllabus will have general statements about research, specifics can only come from the professor. I do not want to wait till recommendations for application to mention my research experience. Questions are:</p>
<ol>
<li>Is this the norm ?</li>
<li>If not, what is the alternative way? </li>
</ol>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38496,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In case you don't have recommendation letters at hand already, then some the items that seem to be helpful would be like:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>mentioning any published research (conference papers, journal papers, etc.)</li>\n<li>Research projects that are already finished and the professor can check out the results and outcome of the research him/herself.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>However, note that a recommendation letter from your previous professor would be valuable.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38499,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you're just going to talk to professors ahead of the application, you don't need to bring a portfolio and certainly don't need to bring letters. That's just overkill. </p>\n\n<p>Just come prepared to talk about your work. If you have any publications that came out of it, you could bring those. Or even a brief summary sheet. </p>\n\n<p>Verification will come later when the letters of reference come in with your entire application package. </p>\n\n<p>Use your early visits to get a sense of the departments and the faculty who might be enthusiastic about your project and possibly serve as a PI. You'll impress them most by being enthusiastic about your work, being able to articulate its importance without having to fumble through your briefcase for external validation, and being able to express great interest in working in that particular discipline with that particular department and PI.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38494",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29064/"
] |
38,503 |
<p>This may be a very general and subjective question, I know. But, I have applied to some postdoc positions, and after 3 weeks I haven't received any response yet. I suppose this is normal, because many people should have applied to those positions, too. However, I don't know if it would be ok to write back to the professors or PI to know if they have already a response for my dossier. </p>
<p>Does anyone could tell me if it is fine to do so? should I just be more patient and wait more time? after how much time should I consider my application as rejected?. </p>
<p>I would be very glad to read your suggestions, and experiences. </p>
<p><strong>Update:</strong> In my experience I think that writing back is fine (there is nothing wrong about it), but it is likely no response will be received anyways. In general, they reply in two situations: 1) they are interested in your profile, 2) they have funding.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38504,
"author": "Kevin Maslanka",
"author_id": 29072,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29072",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Just like a job interview, take the first step. Call and check up. You want the position? Show them how interested you are :)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38505,
"author": "Alireza",
"author_id": 28811,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28811",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It may not be such a good idea to call and ask for an answer on your application. However, you can call or send and enquiry email to check whether they've received your application and docs in full and everything is okay with your application.</p>\n\n<p>When I was applying for MSc. I contacted them several times and they always said \"you have to wait\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38506,
"author": "TheWanderer",
"author_id": 11338,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11338",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my experience (UK-based applications), I have always been informed whenever I wasn't shortlisted by means of a sad \"we regret to inform you\" email. The only time I wasn't informed straight away was when I was shortlisted but didn't get the job so I had to call them. If you are at the pre-shortlist phase, I think it's safe to assume you will get an email either case. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38507,
"author": "yo'",
"author_id": 1471,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1471",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The standard thing is that all applicants are informed at the right time. Quite commonly the \"competition\" decision is delayed, so I wouldn't worry too much.</p>\n\n<p>Should you contact the committee? As other said, impatience may not be the best thing to do. On the other hand, I don't believe it will hurt you in any way.</p>\n\n<p>Can you do better? You probably have contacted someone in the department where you apply before, right? The easiest thing is to write to them: \"Please, the website says I should have been contacted by January 31st, did I miss something?\" (or course, use appropriate level of politeness).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38512,
"author": "Skunkness",
"author_id": 12347,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12347",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>During academic job applications, I did not hear back at all from at least two places (in the UK), so I would not assume you will hear back. On the other hand, there was also the situation where I had not heard back from one of my top choices so I contacted them and they told me that someone was supposed to have contacted me two weeks earlier but somehow didn't. It wasn't good news, but I had been stalling on agreeing to another position so ultimately it was helpful to just ask, politely obviously. I really don't think it would hurt your situation, and as others have mentioned, may even help it.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38523,
"author": "Greg",
"author_id": 14755,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14755",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I guess it depends on country and field, but my experience is that 80-90% of professors do no answer a post- doc application at all if it is not a positive answer. It is especially true if you try to cold call a top laboratory. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 48974,
"author": "Phil",
"author_id": 21815,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21815",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>From my experience, when applying for post-doc or professor job positions, most of the times, they will not answer if the answer is negative. Moreover, often, the decision will be delayed (sometimes, it may even be delayed by several months due to committees not agreeing on who to hire, professors being too busy, problem with funding, etc.). You can always send one polite e-mail to ask. But don't send many e-mails.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 55159,
"author": "Fábio Dias",
"author_id": 41208,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/41208",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>What I usually do in that situation is to call/mail them asking if everything is correct or if there is anything else <strong>I</strong> should do, also stating that I know that the process takes as long as it takes and that I'm not, in any way, pressuring or anything. Then, they usually reply with the current status/ETA.</p>\n\n<p>I'm aware I'm not fooling anyone, but, IMHO, it is a bit nicer :)</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38503",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22449/"
] |
38,509 |
<p>How is it received by the academia if someone thanks to his/her girlfriend/boyfriend in the acknowledgements of the thesis?</p>
<p>I have seen writers including his/her fiancee in the acknowledgements, however I don't know if including an informal relationship in the thesis will be received well.</p>
<p>If it is acceptable, how should I refer to my girlfriend?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38510,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 8,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>The acknowledgements section is really yours to do with as you wish. You can thank anybody who has been of help and support to you, no matter how formal or informal your relationship with them is. You can make the relationship explicit or not, however you prefer. Thus, for example, it is equally valid to write:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Thank you to Jane Smith, for all her love and support</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>or </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Thank you to my girlfriend Jane Smith, for all her love and support</p>\n</blockquote>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38529,
"author": "Daniel Wessel",
"author_id": 26614,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26614",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Adding to jakebeal (and keshlam's comment about offensive text), I think the only negative consequence is when you leave specific people out, e.g., you thank one supervisor but not the other. And that includes people who did support you during your thesis but were not part of the formal structures, e.g., your partner, or your parents, etc. Not to argue with comics, but PhDComics put it best: \"<a href=\"http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=870\">Acknowledgements</a>\" and \"<a href=\"http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=871\">To you I dedicate this thesis</a>\".</p>\n\n<p>To avoid forgetting someone, I found it useful to add a general thank you paragraph after the personalized acknowledgements for all those I did not mention explicitly (sums up other colleagues, extended family, etc.).</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38509",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/15949/"
] |
38,511 |
<p>I need to include some basic definitions, and simple proofs from a standard text book to my thesis. Those definitions and proofs are very basic, e.g. probability, entropy etc. Everybody knows they should be in some text books.</p>
<p>Consider, for example, <a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/a/6/f/a6fc9acc817b4fcf6dd4c8c89068905e.png">this proof from wiki</a>. My questions are:</p>
<ul>
<li>Is this plagiarism if I bring this whole proof word by word into my thesis?</li>
<li>If this is plagiarism, what is the method to "paraphrase" a proof? Since the derivation is straightforward, and it is very difficult to write it in a different way?</li>
</ul>
<p>Thank you.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38513,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>It is very common for theses in the mathematical sciences to spend a significant amount of time and space repeating known or even standard definitions and results. (In fact, up through the master's level, at least in many places one can write a perfectly acceptable thesis that <em>only</em> does this.) In fact this is generally viewed as a positive feature of the thesis: the candidate has taken the time and effort to synthesize a presentation which is complete and self-contained up to a certain point. It is also generally very helpful to do so in terms of readability: a math paper that repeated nothing that was already known would be well-nigh impenetrable except (perhaps) by a select coterie of insiders. </p>\n\n<p>Also the virtue of rewording is not as strong in this area. If you are going to give the definition of, say, entropy, in a thesis, then I would say the best thing to do is to close all your textbooks and write down what you think is a good wording of the definition. Once you've done that you check back with the sources to see that you've actually gotten the definition right, i.e., that it is mathematically equivalent to the one from the textbooks. But if your language is similar or identical to what you found in the textbooks: okay, fine. You don't need to change it for that purpose. There are a lot of ways to list the axioms for a group, and if you wanted to you could pull out fifty textbooks and make sure that your wording is different from all fifty of them. But this would be a big waste of time: it is not necessary to do so, <em>and</em> what do you bet that these fifty wordings capture most of those that are best in terms of efficiency, readability, and so forth?</p>\n\n<p>When it comes to copying entire proofs word for word, I would pay close attention to how often you are doing this. If you are simply copying multiple pages of proofs verbatim out of a single standard source, then you should start wondering about the value added in doing so (and, after a certain point, issues of <em>copyright</em> do emerge). There is a key word that I used in the first paragraph: <strong>synthesis</strong>. When you revisit old results, ideally you are synthesizing them: i.e., no one source has everything that you want, so you are combining multiple sources in a novel way. Too much copying and too little synthesizing does not necessarily put you at risk for plagiarism and copyright violation -- it would have to be quite extreme for that to be an issue -- but it does not sound like the path to a strong thesis. </p>\n\n<p>I hope that everyone who is writing an academic thesis has a thesis advisor. You should talk to her about this issue. To a certain degree, the right answer is what she thinks is best.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38534,
"author": "Chris H",
"author_id": 8494,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8494",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In questions of potential plagiarism, you can think about whether a reader will get the impression some work is yours. If they will, and it's not, you've got a problem. </p>\n\n<p>To apply this: I found I could \"follow\" the approach in a major text, abbreviating some sections of a derivation and expanding on others (mainly due to where in the text concepts were introduced). Partly as I was using a numeric citation style, a simple citation wasn't enough. If you put the derivation/proof in its own subsection and say \"following the approach given by Smith in reference 42 it is clear that...\" or something like that. A verbatim copy will often be unhelpful to the reader anyway - imagine reading \"using the result given on page 393\" in a 3-page paper (absurd, but you need to <em>integrate</em> the cross-referenced material, not just paste it in). </p>\n\n<p>(This was going to be a comment as I can't add much to Pete L. Clark's answer, but I did want to make a couple of points that wouldn't fit.)</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/08
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38511",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/15501/"
] |
38,514 |
<p>I found this on Page 34 of <a href="http://www.ieee.org/documents/style_manual.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">IEEE EDITORIAL STYLE MANUAL</a>, it's about how to edit the reference. I don't understand the following sentence: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>NOTE: The only exception to this rule is PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE, which never carried an acronym on the masthead</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Does it mean when cite a paper from <em>PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE</em>, do not cite it in an abbreviation form. If it is, why the following example ( Page 35 of <a href="http://www.ieee.org/documents/style_manual.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">IEEE EDITORIAL STYLE MANUAL</a>) gave an abbreviation form:</p>
<p><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/QC0V2.png" alt="enter image description here"></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38515,
"author": "o4tlulz",
"author_id": 6978,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6978",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>The part you quote does not refer to the name of the Journal but to the vol. ##, no. ## section of the citation and is applicable to those earlier than 1988. </p>\n\n<p>So the 1981 citation would be </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><em>IEEE Trans. Automat. Contr.,</em> <strong>vol. AC-26</strong>, no.1, pp. 1–34, Jan. 1981.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>while a citation from the same journal past 1988 would be</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><em>IEEE Trans. Automat. Contr.,</em> <strong>vol. 40</strong>, no.1, pp. 1–34, Jan. 1995.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>The exception to the Proc. of IEEE applies here, as it never had an abbreviation in the volume and it has always been:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><em>Proc. IEEE</em>, vol. 11, no. 3, pp. 1-11, Jan. 1978.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>The example they provide is correct. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38516,
"author": "Mad Jack",
"author_id": 11192,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11192",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>Does it mean when cite a paper from PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE, do not cite it in an abbreviation form.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>No. </p>\n\n<p>It means that, prior to 1988 (see the style guide you linked to in your question), the volume number for IEEE <em>Journals</em> and <em>Transactions</em> included an acronym for the particular journal, and this must be included when you cite sources falling into this category. The <em>Proceedings of the IEEE</em> has never had volume numbers listed with an acronym for the publication, so the above volume number citation rule does not apply.</p>\n\n<p>When citing a source published in the <em>Proceedings of the IEEE</em>, you would still list it in your IEEE manuscript bibliography as <em>Proc. IEEE</em>.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38514",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29027/"
] |
38,518 |
<p>No matter who you talk to, students or professors, they all say that the materials they once learned can be quickly forgotten without further experiences that utilizes or enhances on that prior experience. </p>
<p>I fondly remember a professor once telling me that his final year in undergrad was the happiest year in his life, at time when he felt he could do anything, from nuclear physics to parallel programming to electromicroscopy to constructing an audio amplifier...then one year later he has forgotten almost everything.</p>
<p>This is more noticeable in students, where it is often exaggerated to the cliched phrase "you never actually use anything you learn in school".</p>
<p>This is problematic for students who aspire for higher learning because much of the material or understanding is accumulative. It amazes me how people manage to get all the way to the top of the academic ladder (PhD, Post-Doc) without losing previously gained knowledge along the way. I'm sure there were important theorems, relations or techniques that I once learnt, maybe was even an expert in, the question is how do I unlock these memories so I can be more effective in tackling the problems I have today?</p>
<p>How do people deal with the inevitable loss of knowledge from years of disuse? Do you start from scratch? Can someone offer good ways for retention of class room materials?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38519,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think that there are two fundamentally different types of learned materials to think about here, one that really matters and one that does not matter so much:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>First, there is deep knowledge, which is the foundations of a subject, such as the principles of\nabstraction and recursion in programming, or asymptotic analysis in algorithms.</li>\n<li>Second, there is the more surface knowledge of formulas and methods, common facts, artifacts, and patterns by which the foundational core is put to use, such as particulars of Java programming or the difference between <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shellsort\">Shell sort</a> and <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radix_sort\">radix sort</a>.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>The second is rapidly lost, while once you have grasped the first, I think that it never really fades, just gets a bit rusty. Many students, however, never really grasp the deep knowledge of a subject while taking it. You can often even get an A in a class just by brute force in drilling yourself on the surface knowledge of the subject. Worse yet, many students are <em>encouraged</em> to do this by a primary and high school education that intentionally focuses on \"facts and dates\" rather than principles.</p>\n\n<p>I don't think that you need to worry about losing the surface knowledge of a subject. Surface knowledge is just the \"working set\" that you're currently most familiar with, and it changes all the time. More to the point, you can re-acquire lost surface knowledge quite quickly, <em>if you know where the gap in your knowledge is</em> (which deep knowledge will help you with). In fact, you should expect to lose surface knowledge quickly about anything you aren't actively using (one might think of it like <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cache_%28computing%29\">a computer's cache</a>).</p>\n\n<p>Acquiring deep knowledge, on the other hand, affects how you see the world. As long as you lead an active intellectual life of any sort, you will somewhat see the world through the filters of the deep knowledge that you have acquired, and in doing so you will keep exercising it and retaining it. For example: anybody who has ever really understood basic physics will always have conservation laws popping up in their head; anybody who has ever really understood basic chemistry will keep noticing things about crystal structures and states of matter. And it goes for more advanced subjects too: for example, anybody who has ever really understood computational image processing will be influenced in how they think about Facebook image tagging and their camera and generally the images they see.</p>\n\n<p>In short: don't worry about forgetting facts, and any subject that you truly completely forget is one that you never really understood in the first place.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38521,
"author": "Anonymous Mathematician",
"author_id": 612,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/612",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>This is problematic for students who aspire for higher learning because much of the material or understanding is accumulative.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Actually, that's precisely why it's not problematic. If you had to memorize random trivia, it would become more and more difficult as you had to remember more unrelated things, but academic studies work in the opposite way. Because it's accumulative, you are constantly practicing and applying what you learned before, which helps you solidify your understanding. Furthermore, the more you learn, the more connections you can see, and these relationships help you organize and retain knowledge. Of course you'll still forget some details, but you'll forget less than you expect and recover it more easily.</p>\n\n<p>My impression is that severe forgetfulness in students typically occurs when they are studying ideas in isolation and setting them aside as soon as the class is over. Instead, it's important to play with ideas constantly. How are they related to your past studies? To other interests of yours? Can you think of further applications or connections? This can help bridge the gaps between how you learned these ideas. This sort of exploration is almost essential if you want to do research, and it's a useful study technique in any case.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38522,
"author": "Moritz",
"author_id": 22893,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22893",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>1) By repetition</p>\n\n<p>If you really would like to keep the knowledge you have, you have to repeatedly apply,read or learn it. E.g. write small cards with a question on the one side and the answer on the other and store them on your toilet or use some apps to do so. If you put a poster on your toilet like this one describing a <a href=\"http://jcs.biologists.org/content/122/20/3589/F1.poster.jpg\">cell signaling pathway</a> and study it every day for about one or two years, you will remember it quite a long time.</p>\n\n<p>2) By emotions</p>\n\n<p>I can remember things pretty well, if I had some emotional moments while learning. Unfortunately that rarely happened with the stuff for university.</p>\n\n<p>3) How to deal with the loss of knowledge ? I know where to look it up. Once you got the concept of something you will remember where to find the details.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38530,
"author": "curiousdannii",
"author_id": 21773,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21773",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>One option would be to use a <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition\"><strong>spaced repetition</strong></a> system. This would mostly be useful for facts, but you might be able to use it for processes too if you can phrase it as a question and answer.</p>\n\n<p>Spaced repetition systems are essentially a computerised flash card database. These help you avoid the problem of a paper system: spending too much time on facts you remember easily and not enough on facts you forget, because <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacing_effect\">the process of recalling a memory actually impacts our memories</a>. To transfer data from the short term to long term memory you need to remember the data at a frequency somewhere between those extremes.</p>\n\n<p>The difference from paper flash cards is that a database can store information for each card, such as a difficulty level and the time of the last card review. Using some complex maths I haven't looked into, the system will predict when you will forget each card and only ask you to remember it at that time. For some cards that could be every couple of years, for others it will be every day. With regular use you can maintain a database of tens of thousands of facts with only 5-10 minutes of practice each day.</p>\n\n<p>One popular and free spaced repetition system is called <a href=\"http://ankisrs.net/\">Anki</a>. It allows you to use multimedia in your cards, which could be very helpful depending on which memories you want to retain.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38553,
"author": "mateoc",
"author_id": 29102,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29102",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I come from a programming background, so maybe my answer is not applicable here, but I think a very good way to retain knowledge is to teach it. I have started teaching some kids and older ones that were interested in the subject and I think it helped me a lot retaining the knowledge, plus they loved it!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38611,
"author": "MANEESH ROY",
"author_id": 29147,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29147",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There are many ways to reinforce what you have studied. Apply knowledge in different fields,like a person having studied JAVA can use that knowledge for developing softwares based on JAVA and softwares can be for Human Resource Management,Inventory Management,Data Mining etc. Teaching,helps to not only earn but also to find new avenues and new ways of expressing things. Revision at short intervals, this also reinforces learning. Sometimes people find their own unique of reinforcing knowledge like draw sketches,or use model language to prepare gist of what they have learned in such a manner that it takes only few hours to reinforce what they have learned over years. Software like Anki can also help if used regularly.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38518",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20070/"
] |
38,537 |
<p>I am considering including a glossary and a list of notations in my PhD thesis on mathematics. Is it a good idea to write them separately or combine them? </p>
<p>For example, a typical entry of the list of notation is:</p>
<p><strong>[a,b]</strong> <code>The commutator of a and b, defined by [a,b]=a^{-1}b^{-1}ab.</code></p>
<p>An entry of the glossary is:</p>
<p><strong>Commutator</strong> <code>The commutator of a and b is defined to be the product a^{-1}b^{-1}ab.</code></p>
<p>(Note: the definition of commutator is well-known to mathematicians, but since another definition aba^{-1}b^{-1} is also possible, I would like to add the definition to avoid any possible ambiguity.)</p>
<p>I have a strong feeling of combining these two entries together, maybe even combining the glossary and the list of notations together.</p>
<p><em>Is it a good idea to combine the glossary and the list of notations in a mathematical PhD thesis?</em></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 47816,
"author": "gented",
"author_id": 36339,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/36339",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Have your definitions in line rather than in a glossary, it improves the readability of the entire manuscript (whether or not those definitions are actually necessary). People rarely go through glossaries anyway, since it would involve spending twice the amount of time just to switch pages back and forth. Inline definitions, instead, help the reader to flow on without dismissing the attention on the context.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 53839,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Typically, a glossary defines <em>words</em> while a list of notations defines <em>symbols</em>. To my mind, at least, these tend to serve fundamentally different purposes in a document:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>A glossary is a refresher on standard vocabulary, to support reading by people with a broader set of backgrounds.</li>\n<li>A list of notations collects all of your special definitions in one place</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>To take the example in your question: most mathematicians will know what a commutator is, and thus won't need to re-read its definition, but it's nice to have it in a glossary for anybody who's feeling hazy on it. There are several conventions for how to notate commutators, though, and <em>lots</em> of meanings for square brackets, though, so pretty much <em>every</em> reader will appreciate a symbol table entry that says: </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>[a,b] The commutator of a and b</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>The reason is that words tend to be much more stable from document to document than symbols. Words have some differences in definition (and you should be clear which you're using), but symbols are expected to be variables that often change radically from paper to paper because there are simply too few symbols and symbol-structures relative to the number of distinct objects that need to be labelled by them.</p>\n\n<p>The important thing here is not the names of the sections, or even the distinction between single and multiple-character objects, it is the difference of purposes. Most readers should use a glossary rarely but a list of notations often: as such, if you create something that mixes the two purposes, then you're making it harder for the reader by swelling a critical section with things they usually won't be looking to read.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 53854,
"author": "vonbrand",
"author_id": 38135,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/38135",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my extensive experience reading all sorts of books, \"reader friendly\" in terms of definitions and notation is to place that into an early chapter, or introduce it as you go. A complete index is very useful, a glossary much less so. A <em>short</em> overview of notation (sometimes found at the back of the title page) can be useful, but no more than one or two pages. Footnotes are a distraction, endnotes just get ignored.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 91037,
"author": "einpoklum",
"author_id": 7319,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7319",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would say <strong>keep them separate</strong>, because you should:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Inline the bodies of definitions in the ``natural'' narrative progress of your thesis (interspersing them with comments, observations etc.)</li>\n<li>Have entries of the list of notations be very short and (always, or almost always) refer to terms in your glossary</li>\n<li>Have terms in your glossary either defined very briefly or undefined at all, but always make a reference to the full inline definition.</li>\n</ul>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38537",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24832/"
] |
38,550 |
<p>If you apply to a university to be enrolled as an undergraduate, and are rejected, and then apply to the same university's graduate program, will they look at and/or take into consideration your undergraduate application? Or is it considered irrelevant?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38552,
"author": "Ramrod",
"author_id": 28310,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28310",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would imagine that they would consider it irrelevant. If you went to a different institution and received a degree, then I think they would be more interested in that. A person can change/mature a lot during their undergraduate degree.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38554,
"author": "Anonymous",
"author_id": 11565,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11565",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Irrelevant. </p>\n\n<p>Indeed, I suspect that in most or all graduate programs, those reading your graduate application do not have access to your undergraduate application, won't know that you applied to their undergraduate program, and would not care even if they knew.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38550",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29101/"
] |
38,566 |
<p>I had an amazing research professor I conducted research under for my last two semesters of undergrad. I graduated in December and am currently waiting to hear back from graduate programs. This professor wrote me a letter of recommendation and I sent him a thank you email. However, I wanted to send him a hand written thank you letter for the letter of recommendation, all I learned while researching under him, and to see how several projects are going since I've graduated and left his lab. </p>
<p>Is it too late or "awkward" to send him a handwritten thank you note now that it's been about one and a half months since I've last contacted him?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38567,
"author": "Compass",
"author_id": 22013,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22013",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n<p>Is it too late or "awkward" to send him a handwritten thank you note now that it's been about two months since I've last contacted him?</p>\n</blockquote>\n<h1>Nope.</h1>\n<p>Two months is not so long in the academic sense at all. Whether or not it's handwritten shouldn't matter as much, either. Typing it up is perfectly acceptable, readable, and much easier to correct if you make an error.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38578,
"author": "Ellen Spertus",
"author_id": 269,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/269",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In addition to Compass' excellent response, I'll suggest a few other things you can do:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Make a small donation to the college in honor of the professor. He will be notified.</li>\n<li>Cc the letter about how helpful he was to his department head and/or Provost.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>FWIW, I'm a professor and save all such letters and emails.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38592,
"author": "einpoklum",
"author_id": 7319,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7319",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The timing would be even better if you wrote him <strong>upon getting accepted into a graduate program</strong> - then you would also be informing him on the news. Of course, @espertus' suggestion are quite relevant (and no less relevant when you get accepted somewhere).</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38566",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29112/"
] |
38,571 |
<p>"Underwater basket weaving" is often used as a placeholder for "irrelevant, useless university course." (Despite the fact that it's an <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0cn8iUOc5k" rel="noreferrer">actual thing</a>.)</p>
<p>More generally, "Basket weaving" and related courses (e.g. "quantitative basket weaving") are often used as a placeholder for "some university course."</p>
<p>This phrase appears several times <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/search?q=%22basket+weaving%22">on Academia.SE</a>. It has also been used in official university documents (e.g., <a href="http://academics.boisestate.edu/facultysenate/files/2013/09/UCC-Curricuum-Examples.pdf" rel="noreferrer">this sample curriculum change request</a>, <a href="https://www.american.edu/provost/assessment/upload/basket_weaving_example-1.pdf" rel="noreferrer">this sample assessment plan</a>, <a href="http://www.unr.edu/Documents/provost/honors/Title-SignaturePagesExample.pdf" rel="noreferrer">this sample thesis title page</a>, <a href="http://qcpages.qc.cuny.edu/academicsenate/UCC/GuideToCurriculumChanges.PDF" rel="noreferrer">this guide to curriculum changes</a>).</p>
<p>What is the origin of this usage? When/by who was it first used this way?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38576,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The best history of the phrase that I know of is <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater_basket_weaving\">the one given in Wikipedia</a>, which traces it to a letter in the LA Times in 1956. Whether that's actually the ultimate origin or not, I don't know if anybody has actually tried to track down further...</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38588,
"author": "ff524",
"author_id": 11365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365",
"pm_score": 8,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>The earliest reference known to Wikipedia (as <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/38576/11365\">shared by jakebeal</a>) is from 1956, but I found a few that were earlier.</p>\n<p>First, perhaps a hint as to how this usage evolved, here's a mildly sarcastic 1919 reference about universities that have abandoned the ways of the Ivory Tower to offer such "practical" courses as plumbing and basket weaving (which presumably was a useful vocational skill in those days):</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Higher education is becoming very practical indeed. It includes everything nowadays - excepting, of course, Greek and Latin - from plumbing to basket-weaving.</p>\n<p><em>Source: "Studying National Parks," The watchman and southron. (Sumter, S.C.), August 06, 1919. <a href=\"http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn93067846/1919-08-06/ed-1/seq-4.pdf\" rel=\"noreferrer\">link</a></em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>The earliest usage I found that was specifically for "<em>underwater</em> basket weaving" is from 1953. It's in an article about slang used by the "younger generation" (implying that the usage is new, or at least new again):</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Any snap course in school is "underwater basket weaving."</p>\n<p><em>Source: "In a Hepster's Lingo, the Girl Who Likes to Neck is a Giraffe," Boston Globe, Oct 4, 1953, pg. A50</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>Throughout the 1950s, there are many references to "basket weaving" in the context of easy courses taken by student athletes.</p>\n<p>Here's one such reference from 1952:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>These may include courses in life-insurance salesmanship, bee culture, square-dancing, traffic direction, first aid, or basketweaving.</p>\n<p><em>Source: "Magna cum nonsense," New York Times, March 16, 1952, SM68.</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>Here's a reference <em>in a quote from one of these athletes</em>, from 1953:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>A varsity baseball player said he had received offers from San Francisco University guaranteeing him passing grades.</p>\n<p>"I hardly would have had to go to classes," he said. "They told me I could major in basket weaving if I wanted to."</p>\n<p><em>Source: "Other Schools Made Bids, Spartan Athletes Content," Newsday, March 3, 1953, pg. 50</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>The 1956 reference with "underwater basket weaving" that Wikipedia cites:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Why should he be given a better deal than those students who are attending college in order to get a "real" education ... majoring in underwater basket weaving, or the preparation and serving of smorgasbord, or particularly at Berkeley, the combined course of anatomy and panty-raiding?</p>\n<p><em>Source: "College 'Pro' Football Hit," Los Angeles Times, June 4, 1956, pg A4</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>There's also many about plain "basket weaving" that year. For example:</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Several schools screamed to high heaven about the fact that these so-called students, or at least the majority of them, couldn't pass the basket weaving examination and that their grade transcripts resembled those of the village idiot.</p>\n<p><em>Source: "Cronin's Corner," Los Angeles Times, May 26, 1956, pg. B3</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<p>and</p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>It was explained rather superciliously that they had a stiff struggle to get minimum passing grades in basket-weaving, musical appreciation or Loaf and Sleep (Letters and Science) courses.</p>\n<p><em>Source: "Sports of the World," Atlanta Daily World, Nov 13, 1956, pg 5</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n<hr />\n<p><sup>I found these by searching ProQuest databases, the results unfortunately don't seem to include permanent links. Hence the lack of links.</sup></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38571",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365/"
] |
38,575 |
<p>If one is intending on leaving a graduate program before completing their PhD, is there value in obtaining candidacy status before leaving? </p>
<p>Does it depend on where they are leaving to? If so, consider the cases where the candidate is either leaving for industry or leaving for another PhD position. (And say they are contractually obligated to not leave immediately, so they would have time to reach candidacy.) </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38596,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>For some departments, reaching the candidacy stage means you have earned a degree (often an MPhil, but it varies). If your department gives a degree when you reach candidacy, then it provides a nice break point to leave. Industry might be fooled by it, but PhD programs often know the difference between degrees that you were intending on getting and those that signify a departure from original plans. A degree might have some value Thor industry and PhD admissions, but in general, people are interested in what you have done and can do, and not in pieces of paper. If there is no degree, then reaching candidacy, doesn't really matter for industry or PhD admissions.</p>\n\n<p>While it might not help for getting a job or another PhD, reaching candidacy might give you a sense of closure and/or accomplishment. The value of that is deeply personal, but a lot of people describe themselves as being ABD even if they have no intention of finishing. You need to weight the value of being ABD against the cost of getting there. Often reaching candidacy means taking qualifying exams. Quals can be really hard and if you are not 100% committed you could fail! which might be worse for your psyche. I am not sure anyone goes into quals thinking, I am going to pass and then quit. Did I mention quals are painful. I have since forgotten all my coursework scars, but my qualifying exam scar I think is with me for life.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 43656,
"author": "agentplaid",
"author_id": 31792,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/31792",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you are committed to leaving your current program, then candidacy is very likely irrelevant. It has varying meanings even inside academia (as noted by @JeffE in comments above), it will not matter to industry employers, and it is unlikely to sway other Ph.D. admissions committees. You should focus on getting the Master's degree, if you do not already have one - if achieving candidacy is in the critical path to that, fine, but otherwise I would ignore it.</p>\n\n<p>I agree with @StrongBad that closure is important, especially after going through the trying process of making the decision to leave your Ph.D. program. I would suggest trying to find that from an achievement that will help you (a Master's degree) much more than candidacy will. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/09
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38575",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11251/"
] |
38,580 |
<p>I was talking to some colleagues at work and they strongly advised me to contact people that I know at the universities I applied and let them know that I submitted my application and have interest in joining their departments.</p>
<p>I thought about writing a message but I struggle on what I should ask them specifically. I don’t want to look as I am asking for a favor or being inappropriate. Any 'example' or comment on this will be very valuable.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38582,
"author": "Corvus",
"author_id": 27900,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27900",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It is a good idea to reach out to your connections at the places you apply. You want to </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>let them know that you are applying, </li>\n<li>express your enthusiasm about the place, </li>\n<li>remind them briefly about your research, </li>\n<li>ask them to bring the application to the attention of their colleagues on the search committee. </li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>For example:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Dear Susan [or Dr. Williams, if you are not on a first-name basis],</p>\n \n <p>I was intrigued to see the recent advertisement for a faculty position in the area of cosmological neuroeconomics in your department. While I have a year left on my postdoc, your program matches my interests so well that I did not want to pass up the opportunity to apply. Moreover, I've always loved New England and would leap at a chance to move back to the area.</p>\n \n <p>I know we had a chance to talk about my work on hypothetical ultimatum games in extraterrestrial populations at the San Francisco meeting last summer, but you may not know that I've started to move into the area of inflationary neuroimaging. I have [list a few findings or directions here]. As such, I feel that I would bring an important set of skills to your department that is already so strong in this area. </p>\n \n <p>If you think that I might be a good fit for your department, I'd be most grateful if you would bring my application to the attention of your colleagues on the search committee.</p>\n \n <p>Best wishes and see you at AACNE in Chicago next summer.</p>\n \n <p>Sincerely,</p>\n \n <p>John Smith</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>You are not asking for a special favor or doing anything inappropriate. Instead, you are doing your colleague a favor by letting her know that your application is in the pool, and you are doing their department a favor by helping them sort through the hundreds of applications that a department may receive.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38595,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In some ways you have waited too long. Having contacts in a department are most valuable before you apply when they can tell you things that let you tailor your applicant. They might have classes they need taught or may be looking to expand into a particular new research area or strengthen an existing area.</p>\n\n<p>You say you are not asking for a favour, but that really is what networking is about. It is not inappropriate to ask someone to put in a good word for you, and after the application is submitted, that is really all they can do. In order for the person to be able to out in a good word, they are going to need to know your research, or potentially teaching if it is a teaching heavy university. Sending them your research statement and CV would let them look it over and be able to make a comment about you to the search committee. Telling a search committee \"I know Marco from conferences and he seems like a nice guy\" is not as useful as \"I know Marco from conferences and while he hasn't used the technique we are really looking for, the techniques he used in his XXX paper are relevant and the work is really strong.\"</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/10
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38580",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29123/"
] |
38,591 |
<p>On the one hand, I want to warn students not to come to my program. On the other hand, I don't want to be "that one," and I also don't want to tarnish the reputation of the specific people I worked with (who I mostly like).</p>
<p>More specifically:</p>
<p>I want to warn students about lack of funding, administration being uncaring towards students, certain PhD requirements being a lot more onerous than they say they are, general departmental atmosphere and culture among the grad students, general culture of the school, poor location, etc etc.</p>
<p>Also my school is the only top school in my field that has a "rotation system" for picking advisors, and that is generally framed as a benefit, and a reason to choose the school. But I don't think students really realize how much rotations suck until after they've come here.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38598,
"author": "Piotr Migdal",
"author_id": 49,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/49",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": false,
"text": "<ul>\n<li>Focus on facts, rather than your emotional impressions.</li>\n<li>Don't try to overgeneralize. Say what didn't work for you, rather than imply that it does not work for everyone (unless everyone agrees) or it won't work for the prospective student (who knows...).</li>\n<li>You could say \"I would have chosen differently\" (ideally, adding the other possible options) or \"overall, I dislike this program\" rather than \"this program sucks\" or going into long rants.</li>\n</ul>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38604,
"author": "Matthew Leingang",
"author_id": 5701,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/5701",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You'll probably end up in conversations with the prospectives about the other schools they're considering. Then you can highlight differences between your school and the other school without making (too) overt judgements on which you consider to be better.</p>\n\n<p>For instance, with the rotating advisor feature, you could say, “Here advisors are assigned to students on a rotating basis, whereas at Other University you would have the option to choose an advisor that best meets your needs as a young scholar.” </p>\n\n<p>If you don't have information about Other University, you can suggest they research it. “You should look into how graduate students are supported at Other University. I know that here it's harder than it would seem.”</p>\n\n<p>Or if you want to contrast the locations, say, “I imagine the weather's a lot better near Other University.”</p>\n\n<p>In short, be subtle, and grown-up.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38605,
"author": "Anonymous",
"author_id": 11565,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11565",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>lack of funding, </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Here I think you can be straightforward. Probably the faculty are just as disappointed as you are.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>administration being uncaring towards students, </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't know exactly what this means; as a grad student I never tried to attract the attention of any administrator. If you have any specific problems you might bring them up.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>general departmental atmosphere and culture among the grad students, general culture of the school, </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>If you're talking with an old friend privately, sure, bring it up. If you're meeting students at some big admit weekend, then you would piss people off by saying anything, and indeed there's not much reason for you to: prospectives will get a chance to observe the atmosphere for themselves.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>poor location, etc etc.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Griping about this is pretty common. (Among faculty too!) I don't think it's especially frowned upon to complain about this, at least if your point of view is widely shared or if you are speaking to prospectives in private.</p>\n\n<p>Indeed, I remember one student at one school telling me: \"The only positive thing I have to say about the campus or the location is that there is adequate parking.\"</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Also my school is the only top school in my field that has a \"rotation system\" for picking advisors, and that is generally framed as a benefit, and a reason to choose the school. </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Tread a little bit more carefully here. \"In retrospect, I believe that I would have fared better without this system; my experience was blah-blah-blah. But this is a system that our school touts, so you might talk to other people too, to get a sense of what would be best for you.\"</p>\n\n<p>That said, if this were some kind of admit weekend, I'd consider inventing an excuse to be elsewhere for the day. If not many current grad students are willing to show up and talk to prospectives, that will itself serve as the warning you want to offer.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38615,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I personally do not think you can warn perspective students without ruining your reputation at a departmentally sponsored event. If your department asks you, or even just provides an opportunity, to meet with perspective students, the expectation is that you will represent the department in the best possible way, while being honest. That means you should not volunteer things that you do not like. if you are asked a question about something you do not like, you should of course answer it honestly. Using such an event to express your views about the short comings of the department, is unprofessional and I would think less of a student who behaved that way. If a potential student contacts you unofficially, then it is less inappropriate to, but still inappropriate in my opinion, to disparage your department.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38644,
"author": "user3326185",
"author_id": 29177,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29177",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It would be best to keep your bitterness and negativity to yourself. You won't succeed in convincing anyone, and the only person who will end up looking bad is you.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38661,
"author": "Daniel",
"author_id": 22062,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22062",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you have the opportunity to socialize with a few of them in a more private fashion, for instance by going out at night with a small group, then maybe you have a chance to do it inconspicuously.</p>\n\n<p>If you want to do it during <em>the day</em> then you might give an honest opinion about something you particularly dislike but without forcing it too much, otherwise they may start talking with each other and this will eventually reach the ears of colleagues of yours. Try doing it objectively and put in a few things you like as well, in other words mix it in.</p>\n\n<p><em>There are good and bad things. I feel the administrative staff could be a bit more helpful and the culture isn't what I expect it to be. I think the main thing I dislike is the rotation system to pick your adviser they use here because if you're unlucky you might end up with something which is not a good fit for you. On the other hand I'm lucky in that I'm doing something I enjoy and working with colleagues I like.</em></p>\n\n<p>Notice on how the paragraph finishes with the good stuff at the end, i.e. you like your work and some of your work colleagues. The part about the <em>rotation system</em> is in the middle of the sentence but I assure that's unlikely to leave their head; the prospect of being forced to work with people you don't like is not a good one. You can also add that <em>sure the university is quite isolated but whether someone likes it or not is a subjective matter.</em></p>\n\n<p>Now what I feel would be the better option is if you have access to a mailing list with all of them. Create an email account using <code>Tor</code> and send everyone a <strong>balanced</strong> email with your opinion (e.g. list format). Do not be rude or they'll discard your opinion right away. Be factual and let them draw their own conclusions.</p>\n\n<p><em>Culture</em> and <em>location</em> are subjective, I wouldn't mind doing a degree in the middle of a forest, in fact sounds like a fun experience (as long as there's proper accommodation, food, work infrastructure and Internet... so basically what I need to get work done).</p>\n\n<p>Finally, I leave you with a question. If it's that bad why are you still there?</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>Update: Although the anonymous email option leaves no digital trail if done properly, people that know you may still suspect that it was you, for instance because of your writing style. Such suspicion may negatively impact your reputation.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38666,
"author": "Leandro Lima",
"author_id": 29220,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29220",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Try to ask the opposite question: what characteristics does someone need to have not to hate this program?</p>\n\n<p>Different people value different things. So to be happy there someone must put a lot of value on the positive points and put little value on the negative points.</p>\n\n<p>You can tell them something along the lines: this place is awesome in X, Y and Z but doesn't work well in R, S, T. If you're gonna like it or not, depends on how much value you put in each of these factors.</p>\n\n<p>You can even factor in your opinion saying: I, for example, put a lot of value in R and the fact that it doesn't work well here really bothers me.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38667,
"author": "optimal control",
"author_id": 24694,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24694",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Try to make discover to students by themselves that program is not a good program. you can make this by asking them questions that transfer to them some signals which could guide them to another program.\nBy the way, are you sure that program in which you are actually is not a good program ? Maybe this negative point of view can be your own perspective and not reflect the reality ? \nI think, most appropriate way to evaluate if the program is not well established is to think about fundamental questions.</p>\n\n<p><strong>1)</strong> How about the impact factor of the research made in your program (especially the papers written by professors) ?</p>\n\n<p><strong>2)</strong> Which kind of academic events (seminars, workshops etc.) are organized and how often ?</p>\n\n<p><strong>3)</strong> Are professors open to interact with PhD students ?</p>\n\n<p>the list can be extended.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38669,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I may be going against the grain of other faculty, but I want incoming students to have <em>informed consent</em> about our program. Like every other place, we have areas that we are proud about and we have areas that we could do better. Students should weigh the pros and the cons of coming here and make a good choice.</p>\n\n<p>A student who believes they were fooled or conned into a program is not going to be a happy student. </p>\n\n<p>That being said, saying bad things about the program in front of your advisors is bad form. The appropriate venue is for all of the students (current and prospective) to go out for beers/coffee after the department event and for the current students to tell the prospies the <em>real</em> perspective there.</p>\n\n<p>We actively encourage our grad students to host incoming and prospective students in their homes precisely because we want them to have ample opportunity to get a good sense of what our department is like before they make the commitment.</p>\n\n<p>Finally, many places do want the current students to vent their frustrations about the program to us in appropriate and constructive ways. You should look into having ways that you can have more student feedback into department operations. Talk to your chair or your director of graduate studies about creating a student feedback committee or its equivalent.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38674,
"author": "Blaisorblade",
"author_id": 8966,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8966",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Imagine, as a thought experiment, making your points in an argumentative text—a paper*— that should pass peer review by your department (assuming intellectual honesty on their part) — so that you have to be careful that what you write is objective. You have to separate facts, beliefs, anecdotical evidence, etc. Then you have something you can pitch to people (in an informal context) while being professional and objective when describing facts, so it subsumes lots of other advice. (EDIT: lots of other things would be relevant to getting a paper accepted, but I only care about being careful with your opinion).</p>\n\n<p>Moreover, framing things this way might help you expose them to anybody else — from people on this forum, to your advisor, to people who might change things at your school. Many of them will be excellent at arguing their point this way, you have to be better than them to win.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>While this is a top school, it has several disadvantages in comparison to other top schools:</p>\n \n <ul>\n <li>funding is inferior to other schools.</li>\n <li>in my experience, dealing with the administration was frustrating [evidence]</li>\n <li>while other schools allow you to pick your advisor, here you get it assigned through a rotation system. While it has the advantage of ..., it prevents you from picking the advisor with which you'd work best (something that you probably want to read about if you didn't already).</li>\n <li>...</li>\n </ul>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>The above isn't very convincing or accurate. Also, I don't have citations appropriate for your field. But hopefully you get the drift.</p>\n\n<p>Also, as others said, if you can, give your opinion in an informal context (as recommended by others). The event should include moments for honest opinions.</p>\n\n<p>*I suspect some would debate to which extent a paper is an argumentative text, because this depends somewhat on the scientific community — at the very least, the importance of some results is not just a fact, but something that (in this information overload era) you need to argue for, if you want to get attention of your readers. In case you haven't been taught this already, somebody might be failing you more than you think.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38696,
"author": "Community",
"author_id": -1,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Just like with anything else in life, you need to represent your employer/department/whoever in a positive light while also being honest.</p>\n\n<p>When I am in a similar situation as this, I turn \"this sucks\" into \"this is challenging.\" It is all in the wording. Graduate school is not easy, that is no secret. What challenges did you have? What was frustrating? If you stick through it, what is the benefit?</p>\n\n<p>I would not fault anyone for saying \"X, Y, and Z are challenging, but in the end I will have a doctorate.\"</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/10
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38591",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29135/"
] |
38,613 |
<p>I am applying a position, which requires applicants to send cover letter and other materials by email. I think that in the application email I would present almost the same content in the cover letter: my interests in the job, my achievement, etc. So I am wondering that whether a cover letter as an attachment is still necessary or not. Any more information needed in the cover letter?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38614,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Write a traditional cover letter and attach it to your email. The committee reviewing your application may not get forwarded your original email. They will probably get a packet sent to them that's prepared by a staff member that aggregates all the submissions. Your email can be short and sweet: \"Dear Whoever, Here are my application materials for the position Professor of Blah Blah Blah as advertised at URL. Please see attached for all the requested documentation.\"</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38618,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A formal <strong>cover letter</strong> is necessary in some disciplines such as my own, where it serves as the short proxy for the research and teaching statement (i.e., you are expected in the space of 2 pages to summarize the significance of your research and if applying to a SLAC then the general focus of your teaching). There is great variance between disciplines though -- some require separate teaching and/or research statements. Ask your advisor what is appropriate for your field.</p>\n\n<p>In any case, the <strong>e-mail</strong> containing the application itself can be short -- as the e-mail will often get deleted or otherwise not included in your file:</p>\n\n<pre><code>To: <[email protected]>\nSubject: Application for the junior position in sociocultural anthro (job #987)\n\nDear Search Committee\n\nPlease find enclosed my application for the junior faculty \nposition in sociocultural anthropology at the University of \nthe Bermudas (job posting #987). The attachments (enumerated...) \nare included in Adobe PDF format. \n\nPlease let me know if any files are missing or cannot be opened.\n\nWarmly,\n\nJane Smith\n\n<attachments including cover letter, cv, etc.>\n</code></pre>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 67275,
"author": "Ivy Harris",
"author_id": 52749,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/52749",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I believe generally there isn't any big difference between a cover letter and an application email except the length. In the email you can simply state for which position you are applying and why you are applying but in a cover letter you give more information about yourself, your skills and achievements. Also, in the email you should mention why you are qualified for the position. Well, I guess the same should be mentioned in a cover letter. But as I mentioned above length is the difference so keep your mail short and to the point but write a compellingly interesting cover letter. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/10
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38613",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/3848/"
] |
38,619 |
<p>I can't help but notice that even in CS, professors' websites are almost always difficult to navigate, poorly-organized, and just generally hard to look at (poorly-tiled backgrounds, inconsistent fonts, etc.).</p>
<p>Why is this? Is it <em>expected</em> of academics? I'll be applying to graduate programs in the Fall and took a few hours to update my personal website, and was outright told by a professor that it was "too much". If I have a "fancy-looking" website, will this reflect negatively on me as an applicant?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38623,
"author": "Ketan Maheshwari",
"author_id": 6103,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6103",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Web technologies change rapidly and so does the criteria of a non-ugly webpage and standards of ease of navigation. Most professors are not so web savvy (even CS) as to keep up with the new developments. At best, they might update the contents but I think this simply not happen to be a priority. Web development is increasingly a highly skilled and specialized profession and takes quite a bit of dedication to do right in my opinion.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38624,
"author": "Thraupidae",
"author_id": 1106,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1106",
"pm_score": 7,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Not ALL professors' websites are terrible. As referenced in this <a href=\"http://www.nature.com/naturejobs/science/articles/10.1038/nj7142-347a\">nature commentary,</a> many academics acknowledge the potential benefits of having a good website. This article also links to a contest where <a href=\"https://pimm.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/how-does-a-good-laboratory-homepage-look-like-show-me-at-least-one/\">submissions for the 'best lab websites'</a> were solicited. Many of the links there are great examples of lab websites with elegant aesthetics and intuitive navigation.</p>\n\n<p>I think a lot of this boils down to the fact that many faculty are older or too busy; making a good website takes time and skills that most academics simply don't have. Some labs will hire web designers to help with design, but today's funding climate makes that impractical for most PIs.</p>\n\n<p>Having a good website for your own interests and professional development can only help you. I can't see any downside to this...</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38627,
"author": "Trevor Wilson",
"author_id": 8937,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8937",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think your premise may be incorrect. For example, looking at the websites of CS faculty at my institution (<a href=\"http://www.cs.uci.edu/faculty/index.php\">http://www.cs.uci.edu/faculty/index.php</a>) it looks like almost all are easy to navigate and well-organized. Almost all are either (1) pretty or (2) written in very basic HTML, and if (2) looks ugly then it should be considered the web browser's fault, not the author's fault (but I don't think it does look ugly.)</p>\n\n<p>As for your second question; if you make your website neither fancy nor ugly, then everyone can be happy. Fancy is not the opposite of ugly for websites.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38628,
"author": "Paul",
"author_id": 931,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/931",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I believe @BillBarth's comment says it all: It's a matter of Cost vs. Benefit! Why bother updating your website to meet users' quality expectations when:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>it bears no influence on your job peformance evaluation (i.e. tenure evaluation) and</li>\n<li>It takes too much time and effort to make websites look nice.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>The only exception to this rule is if you have a rather large laboratory and Public Relations is a necessary evil. Then, you might find professors hiring website developers/administrators. But never would you find a professor doing this all by themselves. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38629,
"author": "Cape Code",
"author_id": 10643,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10643",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p><strong>Because there is no need for them not to be.</strong></p>\n\n<p>Professors and academics, per their job descriptions or the scope of research grants, mainly have <em>research</em>, <em>teaching</em>, and <em>students supervision</em> duties, mitigated by administrative hurdles. None of these are addressed by polishing their website.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38632,
"author": "Bitwise",
"author_id": 6862,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6862",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There is another aspect that I have not seen mentioned in other answers.</p>\n\n<p>In some scientific fields/cultures, a stylish website could be viewed as unnecessary or even pompous. In this view, the textual content of a website is the only thing that matters, and if you \"need\" to make your website stylish perhaps it lacks real substance. This is the same line of thought that supports simplicity in presentation with minimal graphics. I have encountered this especially in math and theoretical CS.</p>\n\n<p>There might also be a prestige factor, along the lines of \"I am so important, my work is so well-known and I am so busy, that I don't need a website\".</p>\n\n<p>In many other cases I agree it is simply a lack of knowledge/time/benefit.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38633,
"author": "Siphon",
"author_id": 29161,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29161",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The thing people tend to overlook is the fact that CS professors do not always have experience in the areas needed to design good interfaces. Making something work well and making a good user interface are often completely different skills; a web programmer is not a web designer, and vice versa. In most cases, you need to take specific design courses in order to understand what it takes to design a good user interface.</p>\n\n<p>Ultimately, web design takes too much dedication of time for most busy people to consider investing their own resources even if they can build the website from scratch, and being able to build a website takes enough dedication already. It is also worth mentioning that being a professor of programming does not imply they know about web programming. For example, teaching data structures has no dependency on being able to use a database within the core of a website.</p>\n\n<p>That being said, a \"bad\" design to most might have been the \"best\" design to some people. This is called an opinion, and these have changed a lot since just the past two decades. Just be happy tiled animated gifs and auto-play midi files have lost popularity since then.</p>\n\n<p>And as for your site being too flashy, it depends on the situation and your personal preference. If you want it to be flashy, then go for it. However, the content of a personal site will have a bigger impact on more pragmatic people, which is common in the CS department. The most important aspect for a personal website is to provide a quality experience for the right situation in order to show you know your stuff. This will vary depending on what you need to accomplish.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38639,
"author": "Flounderer",
"author_id": 5842,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/5842",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I agree with @Bitwise. But I also want to mention that as a PhD student I had a site with colours etc. but when I got a bit older that began to look pretentious and like I had too much time on my hands, so I switched to a site with plain text and links to things I had done. This seems to be a typical pattern in mathematics. Having a spartan website sends the message that you are too busy doing research to bother with such trifles as CSS. </p>\n\n<p>Personally I also think the plain text looks nice. I saw the website of one mathematician who was (and I believe still is) a prominent media personality. To enter it you had to click on a picture of his head. You could click on the left or right half of the brain to access his mathematical articles or his artistic pursuits/newspaper articles. Amusingly, since his head was facing towards the viewer, the two sides of the brain were labelled the wrong way round.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38652,
"author": "jamesqf",
"author_id": 27365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27365",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Because to at least some people (I'm one, and I expect many professors are also) a \"pretty\" website can often be a horribly dysfunctional piece of crap. When I look at a web site, I don't want to look at your choice of fonts & colors or your distracting patterned backgrounds, and I especially don't want to be \"entertained\" like the web was an effing TV. I want information, with as little fuss as possible. And I especially don't want web sites that use gee-whiz features that are only supported by a few browsers, or sometimes only one.</p>\n\n<p>PS: I can think of any number of commercial web sites, starting with Amazon, where \"prettyness\" gets in the way of the site's primary function, which is selling me stuff. </p>\n\n<p>PPS: Seeing the comment about Tim Berners-Lee's web site above made me consider another reason that some professors might choose not to have 'pretty' web sites. It's the same reason I don't have a personal web site, or FTM a Facebook page: privacy. I've never really understood why some people feel the urge to tell the world all about their personal lives. If I had to have a web site for my academic work, it would be a lot like Berners-Lee's: Here are links to my published work, here are the homework assignments &c for the classes I teach, now go away.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38654,
"author": "DCTLib",
"author_id": 7390,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7390",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I'd like to throw in one more fact into the ring:</p>\n\n<p>Before a professor gets tenure, she often hops between several institutions (e.g., a PhD institution, two postdoc instutitions, one assistant professor institution, one institution to switch to after tenure, etc.). This means that the homepage has to move with them. Some institutions actually insist on using their design, and adapting an older page with lots of material to a new technology (the new institution may use a content management system) can easily take days that is probably better spent with doing research. So a simple copy&paste solution is often preferred. Obviously, that doesn't quite improve the visual quality of the page.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 90370,
"author": "Neil Meyer",
"author_id": 43106,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/43106",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You have to ask yourself what makes a website poorly designed or well designed? If a website executes its purpose is it then really poorly designed? You have an idea of what an academic website should be but what if the website in question's design philosophy was simply get the information out there as quickly and cheaply as possible, how bad was the design really?</p>\n\n<p>That being said I do think it is an error for any institution of learning to not have a website that is more in line with what you consider 'good design'.</p>\n\n<p>The website is the first source of information about an institution for many people, if this source looks poor then it simply reflects badly on the institution.</p>\n\n<p>If you have a job somewhere and you have a mullet and an earring do you really think that your employer is going to be all that happy about the impression you are leaving on his customers?</p>\n\n<p>That may not have any bearing on you as person or the work that you do but still that is not going to make your employer all that happy.</p>\n\n<p>First impressions rarely have any bearing on reality but that does not make them any less long-lasting.</p>\n\n<p>You would like to think that the type of things universities generally teach are of intellectuall standard higher than basic web design and that these places would put a premuim on good website design just for the mere fact of trying to give the impression that someone has mastered the type of skills the sysadmin mastered when he was 14. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 184407,
"author": "Aqualone",
"author_id": 128012,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/128012",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This was true when this question was first asked seven years ago, but in the last few years, the average quality of professor's and research group websites have improved remarkably. Nowadays many professors, especially younger professors, have very nice websites.</p>\n<p>Having a website is a good way to present one's research, and many postdocs and even graduate students are starting to make their own websites.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/10
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38619",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27690/"
] |
38,620 |
<p>In my compilers class assignment, we were asked to write some MIPS code. One of the problem involved implementing <code>fact()</code> function as a sub-problem. I wanted to implement the standard recursive version</p>
<pre><code>int fact ( int n )
{
if ( n == 0 || n == 1 ) return 1;
return n * fact(n-1);
}
</code></pre>
<p>As I am new to MIPS, I looked up <a href="http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~txa/g51csa/l10-hand.pdf" rel="nofollow">here</a> on how to implement recursive routines. Unfortunately, the link explained recursion using <code>fact()</code> function itself. As I didn't want to "copy" code, I just understood the concept of recursion and wrote the <code>fact</code> myself.</p>
<p>But my <code>fact</code> code seems very similar to the one I looked up to learn recursion in MIPS. Is it for the fact that I glanced at the code already or the fact that factorial is really a very simple function with hardly 10 lines in it? Am I guilty of plagiarism here?</p>
<p>Here is my code</p>
<pre><code>fact: addi $sp, $sp, -8 # decrement SP to make room for pushing input var and ret addr
sw $ra, 4($sp) # save $ra
sw $a0, 0($sp) # save input on stack
li $v0, 1 # Set v0 to 1 initially.
beq $a0, 0, fact_ret # if ( n == 0 ) return 1;
beq $a0, 1, fact_ret # if (n == 1) return 1;
addi $a0, $a0, -1
jal fact # Recursive call fact(n-1)
lw $a0, 0($sp)
mult $v0, $a0 # n * fact(n-1)
mflo $v0 # Save answer in v0
fact_ret:
lw $ra, 4($sp) # restore $ra
addi $sp, $sp, 8 # restore $sp
jr $ra # return from function
</code></pre>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38622,
"author": "Ketan Maheshwari",
"author_id": 6103,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6103",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think this is very subjective question and will depend on who the judge is. I would suggest you communicate exactly what you wrote in the question to your professor and let him be the judge. If he thinks yes, he might assign you some other relevant exercise to evaluate your learning.</p>\n\n<p>By actually being honest about your situation, you will likely be treated in a positive light.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38634,
"author": "mfs",
"author_id": 29162,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29162",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You are right to worry about it since it might be detected as plagiarism by scanning software. At my last university, there was what might best be called a plagiarism witch-hunt that was carried out upon students with very little common sense by some staff. As advised above, you might well want to insert a disclaimer in your submission. You also would be wise to cite all reference material used before and after writing the function.</p>\n\n<p>As advised above, your algorithm <em>should</em> be similar for something like this. If you haven't copied the function, then your comments should be significantly different from the original ones. You might even be advised to deliberately alter any comments that seem too similar to the published material or to 'tweak' the algorithm as a prophylactic against accusations of plagiarism. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38642,
"author": "MathAndCo",
"author_id": 28473,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28473",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The answers here are insane.</p>\n\n<p>This is less than nothing!!!\nYou are discussing implementation of extremely basic function as a small part of your homework where using the internet is probably not only allowed but also desired.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/10
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38620",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29155/"
] |
38,645 |
<p>So I am planning to apply to grad school sometime in the future and would need a letter of recommendation from an awesome professor who I took a time series class with. </p>
<p>I got an A- in the class, he liked my final project a lot and I know he remembers me but how do I maintain a good relationship with a professor after I've graduated?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38647,
"author": "Corvus",
"author_id": 27900,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27900",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you don't plan to work with or take courses from this professor in the future, I advocate getting a letter of recommendation now instead of waiting. Services such as Interfolio allow your letter writers to upload a letter now that you can send out to any recipient at any time. This way, the professor still remembers you well; I can tell you from experience that after a couple of years of teaching large (>100 student) classes, even my better students start to fade together in my memory. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38672,
"author": "Ellen Spertus",
"author_id": 269,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/269",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In addition to the good advice to request the letter now (or let the professor know now that you will request a letter later), I would recommend emailing the professor every year or so between now and then. In addition to letting him/her know what you're up to, say how valuable you've found what you learned in his/her class, if you can do so honestly, although don't overdo it. For example, you might say: \"What I learned about Scheme closures in your Programming Languages class turned out to be really useful when working with JavaScript on the job.\" or \"I found your handout on MVC so helpful that I've shared it with my co-workers, who also appreciated it\".</p>\n\n<p>I disagree with Farhan about meeting with a professor 2-3 times/year. Professors' time is very valuable, and I would find such a request demanding/awkward.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38775,
"author": "Ben Bitdiddle",
"author_id": 24384,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24384",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>One thing you could do is apply for something now, like a scholarship or award, and secure their letter of reference. Then when you ask for a letter in the future, chances are they'll send out a slightly modified version of the original letter. (Bonus points if you actually get the award.)</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38645",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29179/"
] |
38,648 |
<p>I was considering writing Emails to professors in US universities regarding PhD opportunities at their departments, however I noticed there is a formal PhD application with deadlines in December to follow. So what is the point in contacting professors for placements in their team when there is already an application process similar to undergraduate programmes? Thank you</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38649,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In many departments, when it comes to accepting students, it's good to have a professor put their hand up and say that they would want to work with you and put you on their funding. By the time it gets to accepting students, because there are so many good applicants, the pool has become mostly indistinguishable. Having someone advocating for you at these meetings can make all the difference in the world. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38766,
"author": "Johnathan Clayborn",
"author_id": 29299,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29299",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>From my experience, it depends on the type of school that you want to go to. If you are attending a physical school in person they tend to follow the traditional schedule and have deadlines. However, online universities (of which there are many), often have less stringent application deadlines, or they accept applications all year long. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38648",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29187/"
] |
38,650 |
<p>I have requested a teaching consultation from my university's Center for Teaching & Learning. First I'll meet with a couple of consultants, then they'll observe my regular class, and then they'll meet with me again to give me feedback on the classroom observation.</p>
<p>I'm not a very experienced teacher, I don't really know what I'm doing right or wrong, so I don't know what to ask the consultants to focus on. Except for one or two things related to <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/3210/how-to-teach-a-class-that-ive-never-taken">challenges I'm having</a> with the particular class I'm teaching right now, I don't have anything specific in mind to ask them about. </p>
<p>Does anyone have any suggestions for making the most of a teaching consultation? Anything specific I can ask them to focus on that might prove especially useful?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 40204,
"author": "icedtrees",
"author_id": 30608,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/30608",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Ideally you want to focus on teaching components that <strong>you would not ordinarily notice yourself</strong>.</p>\n\n<p>I do not have previous experience with teaching consultations, but I can suggest some facets of teaching that are difficult to improve without others' feedback. Especially when you are speaking, there are things you miss because you are focusing on choosing your words.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Body language and conveyed impressions</li>\n<li>Mannerisms, e.g. 'like...', 'um', 'ah'</li>\n<li>Volume and pace of speaking</li>\n<li>Eye direction (are you looking at the students, or do you look upwards when thinking?)</li>\n<li>Students' facial expressions and body language (what do they think of this specific class and why?) </li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Conversely, there are some facets of your teaching you will notice by yourself in time, and are not particularly benefited by feedback:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>The clarity of your material (diagrams, slideshows, images). It may be more worthwhile to review this in your own time.</li>\n<li>Which parts of your content are difficult for students</li>\n<li>Whether students feel confident to interact</li>\n<li>What lesson structures work better</li>\n<li>Students' <em>overall</em> feelings about the course (assuming you have course feedback forms)</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>I hope you make the most out of this opportunity!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 49259,
"author": "ff524",
"author_id": 11365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>As per <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38650/how-to-get-the-most-benefit-out-of-a-teaching-consultation#comment85910_38650\">Kimball's suggestion</a>, I collected midterm feedback from my students the week before the consultants' visit. (Specifically, I did the <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/37968/11365\">one-point raise</a> survey.)</p>\n\n<p>I scanned all the responses and emailed them to the consultants, and we discussed specific steps I could take to improve my effectiveness as a teacher <em>in this course</em>, given some valid points raised by the students. </p>\n\n<p>Then, during the classroom observation, they were able to make a note of whether it seemed we had successfully addressed those issues.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38650",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365/"
] |
38,655 |
<p>I am looking for a bit of advice on how to handle the workload in a PhD while juggling several collaborative projects plus family pressures.</p>
<p>I am in the final year of my PhD which, overall, has been fairly successful to date. I am currently collaborating on a number of projects with other academics - most of which have been going on for some time and are nearing completion - which along with other work I am doing independently will form my PhD thesis. When I took on the projects I was confident that I would have the time and knowledge to turn them around fairly quickly.</p>
<p>However, I recently had my first child with my partner a couple of months ago and I have found it almost impossible to get much meaningful work done since (and also in later stages of the pregnancy) due to the pressure of supporting her and my child - sleepless nights, caring for the baby and her along with the additional strains on our relationship. I am now under pressure from most of these collaborators to finish my parts of the projects and this has been causing me considerable stress, which in turn has made it even more difficult to focus on projects and get them completed. I have to add that on most of these projects I have done a considerable bulk of the work, while other collaborators have at times been slow with their turn around, which is one of the reasons I now have so many ongoing projects. But I get the feeling that several of them feel I am now stringing them along but giving repeated dates for completion that I do not meet.</p>
<p>I feel under huge pressure and strain from multiple directions. I often do not check my emails for days knowing that there will likely be another email asking about progress, my relationship is suffering and I do not properly enjoy spending time with my child - my work seems to pollute much of my life now. Funding is not an issue as I have sources of funding that will take me well beyond the time I need to complete my thesis, but I feel I am burning bridges with other academics in the the field, which is causing me considerable stress.</p>
<p>I think I probably know what I need to do, but can't bear to do it... I have two first authorships and a significant authorship and am writing up a further two first authored papers. These alone would be enough for my PhD and probably a decent postdoc position. I should inform my other collaborators that I won't be able to work on their projects any longer, or at least not within the forseeable future. It would pain me to do this as I have already invested considerable time in these, and without my further input some (most?) would be unlikely to be completed and published, or would be inferior publications to what they could have been, as well as seriously damaging my reputation with these academics.</p>
<p>I would appreciate thoughts of people on how I should approach this - especially from people who have been in similar situations or have dealt with very slow and unreliable collaborators.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38668,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I've been on both sides of your dilemma, both as the slow and unreliable collaborator and as the person dealing with a slow and unreliable collaborator, and I deeply understand your dilemma and your pain.</p>\n\n<p>The first thing to understand is that this is not an unusual situation, and you aren't a bad person for having it happen to you. In fact, this is a fairly normal situation of life for most people pursuing post-Ph.D. research careers. The basic problem is this: collaborations, grant proposals, professional service, and many other aspects of a scientific career all have long time horizons and high uncertainty associated with them. That means that you often have to make a time commitment without really knowing how large it will be or what it will be competing with six months, one year, three years down the line. What that means is that, no matter what approach you take to personal time management, you are likely to be frequently faced either with significant unfunded gaps, with majorly overloaded periods, or even both in oscillation.</p>\n\n<p>At the beginning of a Ph.D., most people do not have this problem, because they have precisely one research project, and they can work consistently on just that project and their courses (and maybe TAing). This situation sometimes persists to the end of a Ph.D. or through a postdoc. As a person moves towards independence of a researcher, however, they start to have more opportunities and more choices, and are faced with this dilemma of planning under long-term uncertainty.</p>\n\n<p>Unfortunately, under the current organization of academia at least, there seem to really be only two solutions to this problem:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Be low-ambition as a researcher, ensuring that you are never overcommitted but greatly decreasing your chances of obtaining a tenure-track position at a strong research institution, or of making tenure once you have one.</li>\n<li>Triage and honesty.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>The best advice that I have ever seen about the second path is in <a href=\"http://proflikesubstance.scientopia.org/2012/05/15/on-worklife-balance/\">this blog post</a>: \"The only \"balance\" is in choosing which ball you are going to let drop today and deciding not to drop the same ball repeatedly.\"</p>\n\n<p>Now, as to what to do: first, you need to be honest with your collaborators about the change in your life circumstances. Having a child radically changes your life and your available time: as a parent of a 2-year old, I have about 20 hours/week less for work than I used to, and that's despite making compromises I'm not entirely comfortable with in the amount of time I spend with my daughter. Science will expand to fill the time allotted to it, so the first thing you need to do is to decide how much time you are setting aside for family, and <strong>guard that time with your life.</strong> Practice saying things like, \"I'm sorry, I can't meet with you then, I have to be parenting then,\" and \"I'm sorry, but this weekend I have family commitments.\" and spend the time you need to spend with your partner and your child. Second, you also need to take care of yourself: if you aren't sleeping well and eating healthily, your research productivity will drop even as you spend more time working and your stress level rises.</p>\n\n<p>Now, if you do this, it means that you are not going to be able to follow through on all of your commitments to your collaborators. There simply aren't enough hours in the day. And that means you're going to have to triage. In my experience, the most important thing here is honesty. In my collaborations, I can plan how to manage a collaboration in which somebody tells me, \"I'm going to need to put this on the back burner for a couple months,\" or \"I'm going to be able to spend only 4 hours a week on this,\" but I can't plan how to manage a collaboration with somebody who tries to conceal their overcommitment or who repeatedly promises things that they cannot deliver.</p>\n\n<p>You need to figure out <em>your</em> priorities for investment on your projects, not for all time, but at least for a few months. You can reassess afterwards. Talk it over with your advisor, to make sure they're OK with it, and then let your other collaborators know that you've had to reassess your commitments and what they should expect from you. Be explicit about the fact that it is becoming a parent that is driving this change: any collaborator that is worth continuing to work with will understand and respect this fact and be willing to work with you on this. Anybody who doesn't is somebody that you want to be very cautious about continuing work with in any case.</p>\n\n<p>And make sure that you have enough space to <em>enjoy</em> time with both your child and your partner. Our time in life is far too short and precious as it is.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38706,
"author": "I Like to Code",
"author_id": 8802,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8802",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First, congratulations on the birth of your baby!\nIt is a wonderful and life-changing experience,\nbut also can stress your body, mind and relationships\nas you have experienced.</p>\n\n<p>I empathize with your situation,\nas I also had my first baby born during my PhD studies.</p>\n\n<p>In my opinion,\nyou are facing two different causes of stress:\nstress from external sources (pressure from your collaborators)\nand stress from within yourself (pressure that you give yourself).</p>\n\n<h3>External stress</h3>\n\n<p>To reduce stress from your collaborators,\nI would suggest that you periodically spend some time\nto <strong>make a high-level plan for the next few months of work</strong>.\nHow much time and energy do you have to work in the next few months?\nWhich projects are you going to tackle,\nand what outcomes will you be able to achieve?\nThe goal is to come up with a realistic plan that you can work towards.\nGiven that you feel that you currently have too many projects,\nas evidenced by not being able to complete tasks by deadlines you commit to,\nI would recommend putting some of your projects on the backburner.\nIf your collaborators are reasonable people,\nthey should be understanding when you explain your situation.</p>\n\n<h3>Internal stress</h3>\n\n<p>One of the things that helped me a lot\nwas <strong>regular meetings with a counselor</strong>.\nAt my institution, there was a mental health and counseling center\nas part of the student medical servies.\nI was able to talk to a counselor for free on campus\nabout once every one or two weeks.\nThis was helpful because it helped me to do a \"brain dump\"\nand forced me to explain to another person\nwhat I was experiencing and how I planned to move forward.\nI also received good suggestions\nabout habits that I could adopt in order to work more effectively.</p>\n\n<p>In particular, my counselor suggested that\nI needed to <strong>establish clear boundaries\nto separate my work life from my home life</strong>,\nbut only working in the office,\nand not bringing any work home.\nBy separating physically the spheres of work and family life,\nthis helped me to separate them emotionally as well.</p>\n\n<p>For the family dimension,\nI would recommend that you keep up communication with your partner,\nand also stay connected with your family and friends.\nAdditionally, you may want to consider marriage counseling.\nI was fortunate in that the mental health and counseling center at my institution\nwas also able to provide marriage counseling (also free!),\nand we both found it extremely helpful\nin terms of forcing us to communicate and talk deeply with each other.</p>\n\n<p>Finally: Don't give up.\nThings do settle down with the baby after the first few months.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38655",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29199/"
] |
38,656 |
<p>First a little bit of background.</p>
<p>I am a graduate student (Bachelor) who will finish the Master degree in June or July at most. I am working on my thesis at my university with a professor which I know quite well. I am getting a Master of Electronics Engineering, thus my thesis includes some practical work and I got to know a lot of people at the Information Engineering department. I think that the work they do here is great and valuable, and so is the people.</p>
<p>Meanwhile there's a friend of mine who works for a quite big company near my local university. They are hiring young graduates for open-ended positions and I am very likely to be hired if I do an interview. My friend was with me at the university for five years now, we did much work together and I'd love to work with him, plus he tells me that the work environment is great.</p>
<p>The problem is that I would love to teach. Some people think I am quite good at what I study and quite good at explaining things to people. I love the idea of spreading knowledge, helping students understand things and pretty much all what's involved in the teaching process. To achieve this I will need to apply (and hopefully win) for a PhD, that I thought I can do at my local university because of what stated in the first paragraph, and because my girlfriend is currently studying here too so moving is an option that I'd like to avoid for now.</p>
<p>What keeps me to just jump in the Academic world is the fact that in my country (Italy) things seems to be a little stagnant, there are great people in their forties that are still associate (or researchers!) while some old professors (very, very bad at teaching) hold more than one chair. And of course from the economic point of view there might be a gap as high as 10x between industry and academy, but happiness can't be bought of course.</p>
<p>My question then is: given the fact that I am <strong>sure</strong> I would love to become a professor but the road might be hard (too hard maybe) would you advise me to take a PhD (that's three years here) and at least try the academic path or leave it already and hit the job market head on? Are there many downsights in starting an industry career after a PhD?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38657,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First, we have <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/phd+industry\">26 questions tagged phd+industry</a>. Nothing that is a direct duplicate, but I'd still recommend you browse through them. <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/17253/what-post-phd-path-alternatives-are-there\">This question</a> and <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/11149/what-are-the-potential-pitfalls-of-having-a-phd\">this question</a> appear especially relevant.</p>\n\n<p>Second, it will be hard for us to really answer your question, because we simply are not in your position. Yes, staying in academia and getting tenure is <em>hard</em>, and most people drop out. Until you get tenure, you will work your backside off. <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/27638/4140\">If you <em>really</em> love it, you can take the risk, but be prepared for a long, hard slog.</a></p>\n\n<p>Third, that said, a couple of specific comments. You write that you love to teach. On the one hand, that raises a bit of a red flag to me, because teaching is not necessarily the top responsibility for a professor. Publications are <em>far</em> more important. If you want to become a professor, you will spend a decade writing papers and doing your teaching \"on the side\"... because you won't be able to get tenure based on your teaching alone. You can relax the research part and concentrate on teaching <em>after</em> getting tenure.</p>\n\n<p>I am not familiar with the system in Italy. Im Germany, there are <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocational_university\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">universities of applied sciences</a> (used to be called <em>Fachhochschule</em>, nowadays <em>Hochschule</em>). You'll apply for a professorship there if you have a Ph.D. and at least five years experience in industry. Then you will do <em>a lot</em> of teaching. Teaching load at <em>Hochschulen</em> is twice as high as at \"regular\" universities and <em>very</em> applied, and conversely, you are really not expected to do a lot of research. If something comparable exists in Italy, this may be a potential career route for you.</p>\n\n<p>Then again, if you just like to teach, you could try to go into industry and get a job as a trainer. You won't need a Ph.D. for that (in fact, you'd probably be overqualified with a Ph.D.). However, note that trainers are often on the road a lot.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38660,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There are many ways to teach besides being a university professor. You can teach in primary or secondary school, you can teach at trade schools or for associates/professional degrees, you can tutor, you can volunteer, you can get involved in educational NGOs, you can even just come hang out on Stack Exchange sites. If you aren't passionate about research, I would highly recommend one of these other routes rather than Ph.D. </p>\n\n<p>Note also that industry does not preclude Ph.D.: I know many people who have done a PH.D. after some time in industry, and they often do quite well, since they usually know much better <em>why</em> they want one than a fresh graduate for whom it is just \"the next step.\"</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38662,
"author": "Ken Zein",
"author_id": 29213,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29213",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have a bachelor's in computer engineering and I currently work in software (early in my career). When I was in college I was seriously considering doing a Ph.D. and I talked to students and professors about it. I also like teaching, and I believe I do it well; I've tutored high school students and classmates.</p>\n\n<p>I can't speak for your situation exactly, but for myself the main thing that deterred me was the salary difference and job availability. I wanted to have the potential to make more money, and have more options regarding the location of my job, whereas a professor can only teach in a university. (I also thought I'd enjoy both industry and academia, if that were not the case it's possible my decision would have been different.)</p>\n\n<p>I had also considered going for a PhD and going into industry, but from what people told me the job market for PhD's wasn't very good, since you'd be seen as overqualified for most positions. (Though that could be wrong, but that was the impression I got from people I spoke to.)</p>\n\n<p>The other thing was that I was unwilling to make a longtime commitment (5 years) to something with an uncertain outcome.</p>\n\n<p>I can also say that of my best professors, many were those with industry experience (though mostly they weren't full professors). So if you want to be the best teacher you can be (from a student's perspective), I'd say industry experience can help.</p>\n\n<p>Good luck!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38699,
"author": "Ben",
"author_id": 29238,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29238",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have a PhD and so feel that I can give you some pointed advice. Finishing your degree is all about your professor and publications to some extent. It is not a giving that you are going to finish. If you really love teaching, then doing a Phd and then teaching at a liberal arts college or non R1 universities might be a good option. Just know that the PhD road is not going to be easy if you don't like research, plus you are going to lose out on income. On the other hand, if you finish and are able to secure a teaching job, you get to be your own boss and not work during the summer if you choose to.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 115878,
"author": "Jan Hackenberg",
"author_id": 60248,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/60248",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You make assumptions about your choice where I see a danger of misjudgement of external peoples decision. You can get knowledge about if your judgement is true without doing a true decision. I talk about the assumption, that the industry interview is most likely a walk trough, while a potential project is more likely to be rejected. Get in closer contact instead with both sides, e.g. look actively for open research positions in your town and if not there make sharp first contact to good chairs at this university. Do the same with the company. You never get a immediate reply after you write an application, there is always time to write another one or two applications. You might meet a professor and might get invited for an interview in the company. It is your right in this case to go to both sides. See what they offer. In interviews you always learn so much anyway. It is also a good psychological effect that during an interview you have somehow present that there is a second option coming next days. Less pressure and you will perform better. I personally also do not consider it wise to assume you have a close to garateed positive feedback. </p>\n\n<p>You might also be able to teach people in a company. You will start there as a youngster, but you will get experience in your company and start sharing it to other youngsters. Dont forget about this point.</p>\n\n<p>You should not be afraid of negative side effects on your later life. If you join industry after a phd you should be able to ask for higher sallery. Phd first year sallery benefits are in general higher than master first year salleries. In your field though there might be not a plus over a fourth year master sallery, but it averages out somehow.</p>\n\n<p>You might have better choices to enter RD company parts with a phd, here it is benefitial. If you prefer non \"research\" part of industry, you can still reason for it in future during interviews. A PHD does not open you every door, but it also does not block you every job opportunities at master level. Your CV has to look interesting, but that does not mean linear.</p>\n\n<p>In the end you will have to decide on your own, here in forum you can only ask for missing point of views. I agree that going for the professorship is the harder choice. But there will still more than a decade time to leave science if you choose for other priorities in life expectedly. I assume a phd in your field will already be considered close as possible to industry work. one of the more practical phds. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38656",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29200/"
] |
38,675 |
<p>In addition to the main sessions, the workshops, and the special sessions, many conferences provide also some <strong>tutorials</strong>, usually the day before the beginning of the event or the day after the end of the event.</p>
<p>Computer science <a href="http://nips.cc/" rel="nofollow">NIPS conference</a>, for example, is one of these.</p>
<p>I've attended some of them, and I know what they are. But, if I talked with colleagues about tutorials, each of them would give a different definition of this conference aspects.</p>
<p><strong>What actually are tutorials in conferences?</strong></p>
<p>Are they specific lectures for young attendees of the conference?</p>
<p>Are they specific talks to give the guests the opportunity to explain and advertize a particular aspect of their research?</p>
<p>Or are they just a way to add one day to the conference schedule?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38678,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think this varies a lot from field to field. In High-performance Computing and Scientific Computing, tutorials are very likely to be a set of lectures and hands-on laboratory sessions giving attendees instruction in how to use a computer, API, or other software. This could include \"Programming for Intel Xeon Phi\", \"Introduction to Computing System X\", \"Python for HPC\", etc. (many of which I have personally been involved in teaching). These kinds of tutorials are typical of conferences like <em>Supercomputing</em> and <em>IEEE Cluster</em>. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38687,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>At the conferences I attend, the tutorials tend to be sort of an oral survey of a topic, introducing practitioners (young or old) to a coherent body of work likely to be of interest to them. For example, a person might give a detailed \"how to\" introduction to a new (or newly imported) set of methods that many people are interested in applying, or might present a coherent picture of important results within a subfield.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38675",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/379/"
] |
38,683 |
<p>I am a recent PhD student. My adviser is really a very nice, kind, and open-minded person. They are always open to discuss about subjects of my interest.
As I am almost at the half of my first year, my rhythm of working has evolved from making lectures to doing something concrete. So, I have started to contact my adviser more often in the last month. </p>
<p>How often a PhD student can see his supervisor? Is it really disturbing to send them some results to take their opinion every week? For the moment, my adviser does not seem to be disturbed but are there some "implicit" norms that have escaped me?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38686,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>The frequency that students and advisors meet depends a lot on the particular student and advisor, and also varies highly by time. In my experience, once a month is quite a bit on the low side, but not unusually so. A more typical pacing is once a week or once every two weeks. </p>\n\n<p>The reason for this frequency is not for the sake of \"norms\", but rather is a good spacing for giving enough time for the student to accomplish something but not so much so that the student is likely to end up wasting a lot of time or becoming very frustrated going down a bad path that the advisor might have been able to detect and help remedy.</p>\n\n<p>If your advisor is meeting with you once a month and happy with your progress, then perhaps you are simply doing very well at self-direction. It is quite reasonable, however, to ask for more frequent supervision if you think that you will benefit, and as a new Ph.D. student, I think that you likely should do so.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38759,
"author": "Massimo Ortolano",
"author_id": 20058,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20058",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Let me give you an answer from the \"high side\", just to remind you that <a href=\"https://academia.meta.stackexchange.com/a/1212/20058\">Academia varies more than you think it does</a>.</p>\n\n<p>I typically meet my PhD students from three times a week to once a day, at least for a short meeting (or just for a coffee or lunch). Among the many reasons for such high-frequency meetings, I wish to highlight the following:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>I see here on Academia.SE many PhD students asking questions, like yours, which really should be addressed to their own advisors. So, I make clear with my PhD students that questions pertaining our relationship and their activities should be first addressed to me, <em>whenever</em> the need arises, because it's my duty, as advisor, to answer them. Should I eschew from answering this kind of questions, they'd better call me \"unadvisor\".</li>\n<li>There are fields, especially among experimental sciences, where a PhD student cannot work independently on a research topic, but he or she are instead part of a group which works on a certain number of already ongoing experiments. Frequently, these experiments should follow a certain schedule, especially when devices and instruments should be built by other co-workers, or when there is an ongoing international collaboration (e.g. devices and instruments might need to be exchanged between institutes at certain dates). Therefore, I want to be sure that PhD students can complete the assigned tasks on time, and correctly.</li>\n<li>In certain experiments, mistakes are always around the corner and results need to be cross-checked between different people, even between senior researchers. Therefore, I want to cross-check the results from my PhD students as soon as the data are available.</li>\n<li>Personal issues can lower scientific productivity (see e.g. <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/38655/20058\">How to handle pressure from collaborators when life circumstances make it impossible to get work done?</a>): I think these kind of issues should be discussed as soon as possible with the advisor, and I ask my students to do so.</li>\n</ol>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38797,
"author": "James Palmer",
"author_id": 23409,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23409",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think the existing answers are quite comprehensive, but I want to reiterate that you should be asking your advisor what is expected. What I'd like to add is another example of how the relationship can vary. </p>\n\n<p>With my advisor, we would often meet informally several times a day. This was often while critical experiments were happening, or just to bounce ideas off of each other. As my advisor requested for everyone, our lab as a whole kept this culture, where we all were available in the lab for each other. We were also welcome to stop by our advisor's office whenever something needed to be discussed, as he kept an open door. I found this to be very positive and enabled faster progress on our projects.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38683",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24694/"
] |
38,693 |
<p>In my university department there is a professor who holds the position of Head of the department, and then there are also several Deputy Heads, who are in charge of different management areas —more precisely: Research, Teaching and Infrastructure. Notice that, in our case, the Head and the Deputy Heads are not necessarily 'senior professors' or 'full professors'; they can be also (young) 'associate professors'. They are in fact elected by popular vote within the teachers belonging to that department.</p>
<p>My question is just this: What is the right way to refer to the Deputy Head who is in charge for the Research matters of the department?</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Research Deputy Head?</p></li>
<li><p>Deputy Head for Research?</p></li>
<li><p>Deputy Head of Research?</p></li>
<li><p>...</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Actually, I am not sure whether the term 'Deputy Head' is right or not, in this context.</p>
<p>I would appreciate your feedback on this terminology question.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38695,
"author": "Colin Johnson",
"author_id": 22703,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22703",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>\"Deputy Head of Research\" is someone who deputises for the \"Head of Research\".</p>\n\n<p>By contrast, \"Deputy Head for Research\" (or, sometimes, \"Deputy Head (Research)\") is someone who deputises for some generic \"Head\" in the specific area of research.</p>\n\n<p>\"Research Deputy Head\" is unidiomatic and sounds like a command \"go and research the deputy head\" rather than a title. The \"research\" coming first somehow stresses it as a verb rather than a noun.</p>\n\n<p>Even more common than any of those constructions, at least in my part of the world, is the simpler \"Head of Research\".</p>\n\n<p>In practice, there will be a definitive answer to this question which you can only find out by asking within your university.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38714,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I am not sure Department Head is an honorific as much as a job description. I am confident that Head of Research is not an honorific. I would just go with Professor/Dr instead of using the job title. If you want to be informal, and it sounds like you do not, go with first names. The only positions that you might want to start using the job title as an honorific is Dean, Chancellors, and Presidents.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/11
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38693",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4132/"
] |
38,702 |
<p>I know that it is important to have dates on papers that you hand in to teachers. I usually put the date that I start the paper, but sometimes I change it to make it seem like I'm not procrastinating. I've also used the date the paper is due. No teacher has ever said anything to me or taken off points for how I have the date. </p>
<p>So my question <strong>What is the correct date to put on a paper?</strong></p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38703,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Regardless of whether it is homework or any other sort of technical document, the correct date to put on a technical document is the date of its most recent revision. If the history is important, other dates can be added as well (e.g. the submitted/revised/accepted dates on some journal papers). </p>\n\n<p>As for your professors never saying anything... they likely had no reason or even ability to discriminate between the different systems you used to date, and it likely did not matter for the purposes of the class. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 83354,
"author": "ggiaquin16",
"author_id": 50899,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/50899",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>To add to what Jakebeal stated, going with the date you LAST touched is important to get in the habit of from a work perspective too. If you are working on a document that helps write out the steps needed to be taken for a certain process, documenting when it was last touched is key for co-workers. This helps them to know if it has been updated or not any time recently. If it is older and they know the process has changed, they may ask for you to change it or go in and change it themselves. </p>\n\n<p>Say though that you put in the date you first started the document, but, due to doing other duties, takes you 3 months to document this process. Someone may think the document is not up-to-date or missing information that may have been provided after the date. So by always keeping the date of when you last touched it current, you help others know the validity of the information.</p>\n\n<p>If all else fails.... there is an option in word to allow for the date to be changed automatically to when you next open/edit I believe. I know there use to be not sure if it is still a feature.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38702",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29245/"
] |
38,715 |
<p>One of my classmates just got accepted into the graduate program I also applied for. We both are strong candidates but she is a stronger one, hence the earlier acceptance. </p>
<p>I was wondering if it hurts my chances for an admit if someone from my undergrad university already got accepted for the program I also applied for?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 39011,
"author": "Corvus",
"author_id": 27900,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27900",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I am unaware of any graduate program that makes an active effort to diversify with respect to the undergraduate institutions of their students. If our top 10 applicants were all from UC Berkeley, for example, we'd have no qualms about admitting them in exclusion of applicants from any other school. Thus in a direct causal sense, it shouldn't hurt you at all that another applicant from your school has been accepted (other than the fact that there is now one fewer slots available in their incoming class).</p>\n\n<p>However, knowing that a fellow student has been admitted already does change your conditional probability of being admitted, for the worse. Given that at least some acceptances have been sent out and you are not among them, it is now less likely than it was before that you will be accepted. But this logic applies equally well to any acceptance from any school; it is no more discouraging that the accepted student happens to be from your institution.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40032,
"author": "Anonymous Mathematician",
"author_id": 612,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/612",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I agree with the answer by Corvus that seeing anyone else get admitted before you is a bad sign, but it's unlikely that the admissions committee would deliberately hold it against you that there's another strong student at your university.</p>\n\n<p>The most plausible way this could be a problem is prejudice based on your department, if it doesn't send many students to graduate programs at this level. The admissions committee then has to decide whether there's an unusual cluster of strong applicants from your department this year. Occasionally people may take shortcuts and say things like \"Department X doesn't send many students to top programs, so it seems risky to take their second best student. Let's just go with their top student.\" This is lazy and unfair (the evaluation should be based on the applicant, not their pedigree), and I'd object if I heard another committee member say it. It's not inconceivable that someone could think that way, but in a properly run search committee it shouldn't carry any official weight.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38715",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29262/"
] |
38,717 |
<p>I have heard a few times that having single-author papers is good for your career. I suppose this is because it shows you are capable of producing research on your own. But I wonder if it is a double-edged sword. Say you are early in your career and have only solo papers. Does this also look bad because it suggests you are not good at collaborating?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38718,
"author": "Peter Jansson",
"author_id": 4394,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4394",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>EDIT: Just to make the perspective clear. Disciplines have varying authorship traditions. In many fields within the sciences, and where I come from, first name in an author list is first author (considered to have contributed most) and collaborative papers are the norm.</p>\n\n<p>Any article where you are first author is \"good\" for you. Single author articles have become increasingly rare, at least in fields with which I am familiar. The reason is of course that science is rarely done by single persons but rather in groups. Where single author articles are still relatively common are in the form of review articles where a single author can collate and critically assess the state of affairs in for example a subfield.</p>\n\n<p>Going back about 20-30 years, again in the afore mentioned for me familiar fields, single authorship was almost demanded from PhD students and older faculty would basically frown on co-authored articles. Now, single authorship almost carries something odd about it in the sense that one can wonder if the person does not know how to collaborate. The later is of course not a good view to express but it shows how much the views have turned.</p>\n\n<p>So to conclude, writing a well-referenced paper in a high impact journal as first author takes precedence over single or multiple authorship today. I doubt many would look at single authorship as much better than first authorship on a co-authored article today.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38719,
"author": "damian",
"author_id": 27812,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27812",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It highly depends on the discipline. In the humanities, single-authored papers are (still) often kind of the norm, in the \"hard\" sciences an exception, and social sciences being somewhere in between (if one can make such a broad generalization anyway). But as a general publication strategy, I think it is always good to aim for a bit of diversity: If most of your papers are probably multi-authored anyway, there is no need to fear that that two or three single-authored papers would give you a reputation of being unable to work in a team. So, if you have a good idea, and if you have the time and ressources to do it on your own, go ahead and write that solo paper. It can be fun, and in terms of reputation, I'd say it is a good chance to communicate: Hey, this is <em>really my</em> work and sth that I really care about, next to all the cool co-authored stuff.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38722,
"author": "Trylks",
"author_id": 7571,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7571",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Regardless of what it suggests. Having <strong>only</strong> solo papers is \"suspicious\", hiring such a person is therefore risky. When collaborating you are <em>probably</em> going to be able to write more and better papers and your statistics are <em>probably</em> going to look better (depending on how additional authors impact on them). Therefore, when competing for a position, <em>usually</em> collaboration pays off.</p>\n\n<p>At the same time, having <strong>some</strong> solo paper definitively proves your skills, assuming the quality of the papers is good, they are published in some good venues, etc. Some conferences give \"best paper awards\", having one of those in a solo paper would definitively prove you as a reliable researcher.</p>\n\n<p>Of course all this depends on the area and what is customary, but I think this summarizes the general idea. And from this you can infer the only point I want to make:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>This is not a double-edged sword by any means.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>The more papers, the better. In principle no paper is going to hurt you, unless it is wrong, shows no ethics, or similar <em>issues</em>. If you have <code>x</code> solo papers and <code>y</code> papers collaborating with other researchers, then having <code>x+z</code> and <code>y+u</code> is only going to be good (for <code>z</code> and <code>u</code> greater than 0).</p>\n\n<p>It's a single edged sword, don't worry about publishing, strive for quality and quantity and worry about not-publishing.</p>\n\n<p>So, to make it crisp clear. If you find yourself writing solo papers and publishing only solo papers, go ahead and do it, do it as much as you can and as well as you can. Then try to write some papers collaborating with more people <em>additionally</em> to that (not <em>instead of</em> that).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 88834,
"author": "Developer",
"author_id": 10062,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10062",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It is a <strong>good practice to have both solo papers and collaborative works</strong>. While the latter show your capability of <strong>team working</strong>, the former demonstrate your <strong>self-motivation</strong> and ability to publish on your own. Both are top remarks that hiring team would consider important.</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>If all papers are co-authored it would sound suspicious that you are heavily dependent on others; this is a bad mark.</li>\n<li>If all papers are solo-authored it would sound suspicious that you are incapable of working with colleagues.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Hence it is the best to have both in your CV.</p>\n\n<p>Beside all the above, in current date, hiring especially in academia does not solely depend on your publication, but on many other factors.</p>\n\n<p>To say that, you should not worry too much about your situation from this point of view.</p>\n\n<p>And it is quite easy to find someone to be added to your authorship list of your paper. Just look around, you will notice many are waiting or willing to do so.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38717",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/13119/"
] |
38,728 |
<p>I would like to know the main structure of this kind of thesis.</p>
<p>Although some guidelines can be taken from <a href="https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/149/what-is-a-sandwich-thesis">this post</a>, additional details would be appreciated.</p>
<p>When building the introduction, I feel quite collapsed trying to join and describe all the aspects of the 3 published articles I have. This will be also the same for the final discussion. In fact, it makes me feel that I'm repeating myself what I've already written in the papers. I like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_repeat_yourself" rel="nofollow noreferrer">DRY</a> principle.</p>
<p>Thanks! Here is a preliminary outline:</p>
<ul>
<li>TABLE OF CONTENTS</li>
<li>ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS</li>
<li>LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS USED</li>
<li><p>SUMMARY</p></li>
<li><p>INTRODUCTION</p></li>
<li><p>HYPOTHESIS AND OBJECTIVES</p></li>
<li><p>MATERIALS AND METHODS</p></li>
<li><p>RESULTS</p></li>
<li><p>Paper1</p></li>
<li><p>Paper2</p></li>
<li><p>Paper3</p></li>
<li><p>DISCUSSION</p></li>
<li><p>CONCLUSIONS</p></li>
<li><p>REFERENCES</p></li>
<li><p>ANNEXES</p></li>
</ul>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38730,
"author": "Davidmh",
"author_id": 12587,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12587",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Your introduction has to wrap the rest of the thesis, not replace it. So, DRY partially applies here too.</p>\n\n<p>A paper is directed towards other researchers working in your field, whereas a PhD thesis introduction usually is meant to be accessible by anyone in that discipline. Your aim is to write something that will allow your undergrad class mates to get up to speed and understand your papers. You should also give an overview of how all the pieces work together. For example,</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p><em>\"In paper I we showed that our new experimental technique works better than the previous ones, in Paper II we used it to solve a new problem that couldn't be tackled before, and in Paper III we combined it to improve another different technique\".</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>So, a paper that uses machine learning in Bioitechnology would say \"we used a SVM trained on this and that features over this dataset\". The introduction to the thesis will include a chapter introducing machine learning, and explaining what a SVM is. If it were relevant, you could consider adding another one explaining why these features are relevant.</p>\n\n<p>Discussion and conclusions are not a part of the sandwich thesis I am familiar with, because they would belong into the papers.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38731,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>This is the structure that worked for me and number of my friends throughout western European universities: </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Title</em></strong>: A title that reflects your contributions/publications. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Table of contents</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ABBREVIATIONS</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Abstract</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>INTRODUCTION</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong>Note on Introduction</strong>: Most important of all is to highlight what you want to answer in your research. Also the problem/motivation should be discussed here. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Paper1 ... PaperN</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong>Note On Paper-Based Chapters</strong>: The order of them are very important. Order them based on the content not the year of the publication. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Evaluation</em></strong>: In this chapter put both the <em>discussion</em> and <em>results</em>. Try to figure out the benefits and shortcomings of your research.</p>\n\n<p><strong><em>CONCLUSIONS and Future Work</em></strong>: conclude based on your contribution and highlight the future work. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>REFERENCES</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong>Note</strong>: Not so many students take time on organizing their references' style. Most of them just copy/paste the Bibtex code and don't look if all their references obey the same style rules. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ANNEXES</em></strong></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38728",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19880/"
] |
38,753 |
<p>I am writing my PhD research proposal. In "Research Aims / Questions" section, I have proposed two distinct research questions which are from the same sub-field but divert from each other a little bit. </p>
<p>Here is an example in my discipline, Computer Science, and subfield, Communications. The first research question involves analysis of router throughput with some specific algorithm. The second question involves a compression mechanism a router, and the compression mechanism is not related to its throughput.</p>
<p>Question: Can I be successful having two not-closely-related research questions? or should I write two separate research proposals?</p>
<p>Any help would be appreciated. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38730,
"author": "Davidmh",
"author_id": 12587,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12587",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Your introduction has to wrap the rest of the thesis, not replace it. So, DRY partially applies here too.</p>\n\n<p>A paper is directed towards other researchers working in your field, whereas a PhD thesis introduction usually is meant to be accessible by anyone in that discipline. Your aim is to write something that will allow your undergrad class mates to get up to speed and understand your papers. You should also give an overview of how all the pieces work together. For example,</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p><em>\"In paper I we showed that our new experimental technique works better than the previous ones, in Paper II we used it to solve a new problem that couldn't be tackled before, and in Paper III we combined it to improve another different technique\".</em></p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>So, a paper that uses machine learning in Bioitechnology would say \"we used a SVM trained on this and that features over this dataset\". The introduction to the thesis will include a chapter introducing machine learning, and explaining what a SVM is. If it were relevant, you could consider adding another one explaining why these features are relevant.</p>\n\n<p>Discussion and conclusions are not a part of the sandwich thesis I am familiar with, because they would belong into the papers.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38731,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>This is the structure that worked for me and number of my friends throughout western European universities: </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Title</em></strong>: A title that reflects your contributions/publications. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Table of contents</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ABBREVIATIONS</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Abstract</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>INTRODUCTION</em></strong> </p>\n\n<p><strong>Note on Introduction</strong>: Most important of all is to highlight what you want to answer in your research. Also the problem/motivation should be discussed here. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Paper1 ... PaperN</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong>Note On Paper-Based Chapters</strong>: The order of them are very important. Order them based on the content not the year of the publication. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>Evaluation</em></strong>: In this chapter put both the <em>discussion</em> and <em>results</em>. Try to figure out the benefits and shortcomings of your research.</p>\n\n<p><strong><em>CONCLUSIONS and Future Work</em></strong>: conclude based on your contribution and highlight the future work. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>REFERENCES</em></strong></p>\n\n<p><strong>Note</strong>: Not so many students take time on organizing their references' style. Most of them just copy/paste the Bibtex code and don't look if all their references obey the same style rules. </p>\n\n<p><strong><em>ANNEXES</em></strong></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38753",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20062/"
] |
38,769 |
<p>Recently in a presentation about networking the presenter mentioned that it is important to maintain a good relationship with your past academic supervisors and collaborates (teammates) because employers (industry employer, not academic employers) will go contact these people to gain information about you, especially you are a recent grad with net zero industry experience.</p>
<p>Is this a common practice? Does anyone know if employers will actually go out of their way to contact your supervisors even your teammates?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38772,
"author": "Jonathan Kenigson",
"author_id": 29239,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29239",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In general, your supervisor will more likely be contacted if your graduate fellowship is listed as employment experience. Background checkers will likely interpret your supervisor as a \"boss\" and contact them accordingly, not to tease out the minutia of your research but to ensure such qualities as dependability, integrity, and punctuality. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38778,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>How deeply they check you out entirely depends on what industry you are going into and what company. If you're going to be a coding slave at Oracle, they probably don't give a damn. If you're interviewing where I work, however, we'll most certainly check you out...</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38769",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23380/"
] |
38,770 |
<p>I have a couple of papers that are works in progress or in the submission process. Can I list under my publications list (and clarify they are not yet published but on the road to it)?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38771,
"author": "Jonathan Kenigson",
"author_id": 29239,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29239",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Yes, this is done routinely; provided, however, that these papers are clearly marked as \"currently under peer review\" or \"submitted for review\" and specify the journal. If the paper has passed peer review and us merely awaiting publication, it can be marked as \"to appear.\" If the paper has not passed peer review, it should not be labeled as \"to appear.\" </p>\n\n<p>Best regards and wishing a swift publication process.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38860,
"author": "yo'",
"author_id": 1471,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1471",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>There are 4 different stages of a paper:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p><strong>In preparation.</strong> In maths, this means: we know it's true and we're writing it down. In engineering it can be: measurements done. Etc.</p></li>\n<li><p><strong>Submitted.</strong> That's clear what it means. I'd just add: In general, you don't say to which you have submitted it, just in case it got rejected and you re-submit it elsewhere. However, for an application, I would include this information to show the level of journals or venues you aim at.</p></li>\n<li><p><strong>Accepted</strong> or <strong>To appear</strong> or <strong>In print.</strong> You've got a final \"ACCEPTED NOTIFICATION\" from the journal. Maybe the proofreading wasn't done or whatever, but now it's clear that the paper will be published (well, it need not, but that's a borderline thing). I personally prefer to write \"accepted\" since that's clear. Both \"to appear\" and \"in print\" may indicate that the volume and pages have been assigned, which need not be true.</p></li>\n<li><p><strong>Published.</strong> It's published.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>You can include papers in all 4 categories in your application. I would actually say that for 2,3,4 you <em>ought to include them</em>. For the ones in preparation, consider the significance of the paper, it can look like: The applicant hasn't done anything yet on it and is just blowing up his publication list. Of course, you have to say in which stage the paper is (well, not for stage 4 papers).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38873,
"author": "Massimo Ortolano",
"author_id": 20058,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20058",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Probably you'are asking for a PhD application in the US, but, just in case, let me give you an answer from a different country. In Italy, in general, unpublished papers don't count for an application, whatever the position you're applying to: PhD, researcher or professor. So, you can list them, but it's typically useless: they will be discarded by the application board. </p>\n\n<p>More specifically: accepted papers might count, typically not as much as published ones, but you have to attach the acceptance letter received from the journal's editor; submitted papers rarely count; and manuscripts in preparation never count.</p>\n\n<p>In any case, what counts and what doesn't count is specified in the announcement for the applicants.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/12
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38770",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29303/"
] |
38,773 |
<p>I am attending graduate school this fall and one thing that I still could not wrap around my head is that some of the papers are written by seemingly a group of authors (5 people or more). I am curious how this is usually done.</p>
<p>Are each person assigned a small chunk of work and the paper is put together when everyone is done? This raises so many questions such as what if a person doesn't finish his or her part? How do you piece together the paper so that it is coherent throughout (since people may have different perspectives or understanding).</p>
<p>And is there important differences between a paper written by two person and those written by five or more? </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38785,
"author": "user141592",
"author_id": 27327,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27327",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my field (math) one person is generally in charge of a specific section / result. They write the rough draft of the section they are responsible for, and then like Samuel pointed out in the comments, one person is usually more in charge. That person puts the pieces together in the correct order and writes the introduction and transitions (this is also sometimes simply the person who has the best English). After that, (in the papers I've worked on) the file is put on ShareTex and edited by everyone until everyone is happy with it.</p>\n\n<p>As for what happens if one person doesn't finish their part: the same thing you do in group project when one person doesn't do their share. That material is either cut from the paper, or someone else has to take on more work. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38824,
"author": "gerrit",
"author_id": 1033,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1033",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my field (Atmospheric Science) you will find papers with dozens of authors. That doesn't mean there are dozens of individuals who have all contributed equally. There may be one or two people leading the research, needing little bits of data from everyone. For example, one might describe a major intercomparison study between 10 datasets. Suppose that each dataset is prepared by a PhD student or postdoc; then for each dataset this person is a co-author, and perhaps also their supervisor. Their contribution is small but significant — provide data essential to the paper and assist in the discussion as to why/how their results are different from others. In this case, having 10–20 co-authors is not unusual at all. The actual <em>writing</em>, however, might come for 90%+ from the first author.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38853,
"author": "ResearchEnthusiast",
"author_id": 28389,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28389",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My field is theoretic Computer Science, and I don't want to speak in behalf of the whole field but personally (and this is probably a very individual) I like collaborations where a lot of the work is done while sitting together throwing ideas to the air and discussing them and then thinking (everyone together) later on solutions or new ideas for problems we encountered then calling everyone again for a followup meeting.</p>\n\n<p>(The writing is a different story, but who cares about it anyway?)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38958,
"author": "o4tlulz",
"author_id": 6978,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6978",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I think that <a href=\"https://theresearchwhisperer.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/co-writing/\">this article</a> from <a href=\"https://theresearchwhisperer.wordpress.com/\">the Research Whisperer</a> covers aspects of how multiple authors can collaborate to get a paper done. It is an interesting and quite brief read that I would recommend. </p>\n\n<p>TL;DR version: </p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>One leads the project and the initial drafting with others\ncontributing to an almost complete draft. </li>\n<li>The team splits the work into broad sections for each collaborator, which then draft, combine and revise.</li>\n<li>Decide on all the details and each writes its own section with minor final corrections. </li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>From my experience, the first one would be the most common with an almost final version making it to the very senior people in the article.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38962,
"author": "Peter Jansson",
"author_id": 4394,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4394",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Collaborative writing differs from article to article. First, it may be useful to say that in at least some cases, all authors may not be worthy of author or contributorship according to the Vancouver protocol (<a href=\"http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html\">here exemplified by ICMJE</a>). If we disregard such issues and assume all authors deserve authorship the following cases seems most likely. Since I reside in a community using the ordering of authors to signify importance/impact on the final product, the use of first author a co-authors should be seen from this perspective.</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p>All authors have contributed a significant part of the manuscript (MS). They are all specialists required for the research and provided vital input on their specific field of expertise. Typically, one person will take charge and make the first draft to which the others add their parts and comment on and add to the parts common to the MS. This case probably means all authors have similar intellectual input to the MS. Review and cross-disciplinary articles may be examples of types of articles written this way. Who will be first author could be a matter of who initiated the work, who took on the task of coordination or a matter of the alphabet.</p></li>\n<li><p>One or a subset of the authors have a more leading role and essentially write the MS on which the other authors provide specific input and comments. This is perhaps most common when contributions vary in importance and where a few have a major intellectual input on the science whereas the other authors provide smaller but crucial input on aspects of the MS. This is likely the most common case in most collaborative research involving groups of researchers. The first author will vary from publication to publication produced in such a group where all have provided sufficient input to fulfil the requirements for authorship/contributorship. Author order will be determined according to contribution.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Regardless of which way one goes, it is necessary for someone to take on the chore of being \"secretary\" and actually get common ideas into text. It is possible that a single authors can provide a section or two to the MS which is included verbatim but usually some editing is necessary to make the reading uniform throughout the MS and that would be the role of the \"first author\". It is therefore common that the \"secretary\" makes a first draft asking others to add both specific parts and commenting on the text from the others. The MS will be passed around until all are satisfied. So most multiple author articles have been produced in some fashion along these lines.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38973,
"author": "Jim Raynor",
"author_id": 14500,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14500",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p><img src=\"https://i.stack.imgur.com/uNgPC.png\" alt=\"Credit: PhDcomics.com\">\nImage credit: phdcomis.com</p>\n\n<p>For entertaining purpose. Don't take this cartoon as a serious answer or generalization, just however it resembles pretty much my experience, especially the last 3 positions: the second-to-last, the last, and the middle one. </p>\n\n<p>The first ones are not necessarily true. In my field (CS), the first name is still the most important one, normally a PhD student working on his own sub-problems towards his thesis; and having his name at the first place is important for his overall thesis evaluation.</p>\n\n<p>When I have to review paper, I often frown upon papers with many authors, especially short papers. One extreme was a 4.5-page paper with 8 authors (gosh...)</p>\n\n<p>To my experience of having read a lot of papers in the field, the most beautiful and important papers are normally the ones written by <strong>2 authors</strong>, then papers written by <strong>only one</strong> author. Never seen a great one with <em>7 authors</em>... ;)</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>Note: this experience may be different in other fields, for example my friend for once said that in his field (earth sciences), each part of the task is already a huge work (collecting 40GB of raw data (1 person), preprocessing it (1 person), sharing expertise on the configuration setting (1 person),...) and they all end up in the author list. For sure, anyone with contributions should be given credit, but in the case of my friend, perhaps an Appendix or Acknowledgement section seems more appropriate.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38999,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My publication history crosses disciplines and the multi-author papers range range everywhere from two to thirty-two authors. Across all of these publications, I have seen two main modes of multi-author paper-writing, which I will call \"collaborative\" and \"pedagogical.\"</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p><strong>Collaborative</strong> is the typical mode of writing that I have seen in scientific collaborations. Authors generally tend to fall into three rough categories:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><em>Primary authors</em> are one or more people who take responsibility for organizing the writing of the paper, and who produce the vast bulk of the text.</li>\n<li><em>Secondary authors</em> contribute specific pieces to the writing at the direction of the primary authors, most often figures, examples, and experimental methods.</li>\n<li><em>Tertiary authors</em> are people whose technical contributions rise to the standards of authorship for the field, but who are not needed to contribute any writing. This is highly field-specific. These range from common in experimental fields like biosciences or experimental physics to practically unheard of and possibly unethical in more theoretical and mathematical fields.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>In fields where author order matters, the category of author and their responsibilities tend to closely mirror their order in the paper, according to the customs of the field. In formulating the manuscript, the primary authors tend to form a writing plan, often dividing responsibility for sections, but sometimes having one do a first rough pass and then \"passing the token\" around for further refinement. Towards the end of the writing, when the secondary authors' pieces are integrated and the primary authors are satisfied, the paper will typically be sent out for commentary and feedback from all authors, and after a few further iterations there are no significant objections, the primary authors are satisfied with the paper, and they submit.</p></li>\n<li><p><strong>Pedagogical,</strong> on the other hand, is when you have a clear split between junior and senior authors, where the junior is a student or postdoc and the writing of the paper is also being used by the senior(s) as a part of their training. In this case, the text is typically generated primarily by the junior author (either one section at a time or all at once), and then submitted to the senior for feedback and instructions. This may go on for many iterations. Eventually, if there is a fixed deadline, or if things are dragging on too long, the seniors may seize control and \"finish\" the paper between themselves in collaborative mode.</p>\n\n<p>Occasionally, there may be more than one junior author, in which case the partition of their responsibilities are typically dictated by the senior. Likewise there may also be secondary and tertiary authors, just as in collaborative authorship.</p></li>\n</ul>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40311,
"author": "NotaGoodProgrammer",
"author_id": 30731,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/30731",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my view, the division of labor would be between the individuals involved, and cannot be answered as a industry standard. As for unfinished work, I doubt that the other authors who have contributed to a finished work would leave the unfinished portion incomplete. So either the contributing authors will finish the incomplete work (giving credit for what work the author of the unfinished work did) or they group would cut out the author who failed to meet the dead line by doing his work from scratch and simply not include him or her as a contributing author.</p>\n\n<p>As for coherence in thought and readability, I would believe this is solved during the editing process. Often times, one of the authors (the best skilled) would take the job of editing the work and working with the other authors to smooth over the rough edges.</p>\n\n<p>The only difference between papers written by one person and papers written by multiple authors is that the work and credit is shared by all who are involved. All the basic steps are still involved, their simply altered for the piece being done. Or so that is my understanding.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38773",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23380/"
] |
38,774 |
<p>Here is a situation that I have been in several times, but have only recently begun to give careful thought to. Suppose you are asked to teach a course that you have not taught before. A fairly common practice (at least where I teach) is to approach the colleague(s) who taught the course most recently and ask if you can adapt their syllabus (on the grounds that reinventing the wheel is in nobody's interest). In every case in my experience, the colleagues have freely given me not only their syllabi, but also their assignments, exam questions, and any other instructional materials that they used, and have given me permission to make use of them however I wish.</p>
<p>Of course being something of a control freak, I never use those materials without re-engineering them somewhat; like many (most?) academics, I feel the need to take ownership of the course by putting my own stamp on it. But I <em>do</em> usually take large chunks of those older course materials and incorporate them into my own. I suspect this is not uncommon (although maybe I am just wrong on this point).</p>
<p>It has only recently occurred to me that if one of my students did something comparable to what I do -- copy large blocks of text from somebody else's work and insert it into their own without attribution -- it would be a clear case of academic misconduct. And I would never dream of doing something like this in a work that was intended for publication. But somehow until now, doing this in a purely instructional context has always seemed innocuous.</p>
<p>So my questions:</p>
<ol>
<li>How common is this practice?</li>
<li>Is it generally viewed as a form of plagiarism (and have I just been oblivious to something that should have been obvious to me all along)?</li>
<li>If one does make use (with permission) of a colleague's course materials, is there an appropriate way to acknowledge that? For example, by putting an "Acknowledgement" note at the bottom of the first page of the syllabus? At the very least, doing something like that would model good behavior for one's students.</li>
</ol>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38911,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>This sort of practice is quite common, and documents of this type are often treated as the \"community property\" of a department. This is a lot like authorship on a community wiki, where there is no expectation that the document is the original work of any author and there is the expectation that further authors may freely modify and contribute more text. It is therefore not plagiarism to use your colleagues notes as a base, any more than it is plagiarism to contribute to a Wikipedia article.</p>\n\n<p>Often, these documents have no copyright or authorship markings, and are simply handled by custom and tradition. If you want to make the collective agreement more explicit and remove any doubt for those that come after you, then you should probably select a creative commons license (like <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/about/cc0\">CC0</a> or <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/\">CC-BY</a>) and put a small marking to that effect in the header or footer of the document. If you choose to formalize it in this way, however, you should explicitly get your colleague's consent as well, because you are moving the document beyond the informal method of relationship-based exchange in which it was given to you.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38921,
"author": "user1258240",
"author_id": 29406,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29406",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It is an extremely common and very accepted practice to copy other people's courses in their entirety or partially, with or even without asking for permission. At least in my field (computer science) people often put course material online with the intention of letting others use them freely. Unless explicitly written otherwise on a course website, I usually assume that it is ok to use any freely available material from there. Of course if someone actually gives you the material then there's no problem at all. </p>\n\n<p>There is a big difference between journal papers, the sole purpose of which is to present new knowledge, and courses, where the goal is to teach known material to students. In the first case there is always a claim of originality, and if you are copying other work you are therefore commiting plagiarism. In the latter case, as long as there is no implicit claim of originality there is no problem. </p>\n\n<p>People still like to be credited for their work, though. So for the sake of honesty and also giving credit, I usually tell my students where I got any significant part of the course material. If my course has a Web page, I state my sources there as well, and provide links to relevant notes or course Web pages when it's possible. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 153648,
"author": "paul garrett",
"author_id": 980,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/980",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think that even when one has permission to use the results of someone else's efforts, a word of thanks is always appropriate, and perhaps a reference to a URL or such. This also does set a good example for students.</p>\n<p>For that matter, even if "the facts" are 100+ years old, as often happens in mathematics, insightful presentations are not automatic... and deserve acknowledgement.</p>\n<p>Analogously, even though some disparage Wikipedia, if one has literally used Wikipedia to obtain useful links, keywords, bibliographic pointers, I strongly believe one should acknowledge this. Be honest! Not only to give credit where credit is due, but to avoid false pretenses (to students, et al) about how the enterprise actually works.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38774",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/17928/"
] |
38,777 |
<p>In the past I have included the following statement on my syllabus:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Office Hours: Mon 1-2pm, Weds 3-5pm, or by appointment</p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, I am beginning to get too many requests for appointments. Appointments are really inefficient. They waste both of our time trying to schedule them, and with multiple appointments per week in addition to office hours, even holding them takes a lot of time away from research. How do you accommodate students who can't make your office hours without devoting too much time to this task? </p>
<p>I thought about setting up a class message board where they can ask each other and answer each other's questions - anonymously if they wish - (I can also answer questions on the message board) and put on the syllabus "All content related questions should be posed in class, on the message board or in office hours. I do not reply to questions about content via email. Please schedule an appointment to meet with me if you are having difficulty getting a question answered after trying the above options" </p>
<p>Some Background: I'm a graduate student lecturer. I teach 2 sections of calculus, so about 60 students. Since classes are small (~30), there are about 10 lecturers (some are faculty and some are grad students with masters degrees) and we all have office hours. Mine tend to be very crowded, about 5-10 students showing up (some from other sections). I tell my students to go to other instructor's office hours, but they say they aren't as helpful. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38783,
"author": "Jeff",
"author_id": 1171,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1171",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>What an interesting problem to have. When I saw the title, I thought, \"This must be hypothetical, because this problem never, ever occurs.\" But I was wrong.</p>\n\n<p>Anyway, I don't know how to deal with having too many students try to schedule office hours, because I have never had that problem, even when teaching 60 students. </p>\n\n<p>I do, however, employ the message board tactic that you mentioned, which probably helps cut down on office hours (and dramatically reduces the number of emails I get). I suggest the free (and extremely slick) service <a href=\"http://www.piazza.com\">Piazza</a>. Students can collaboratively (wiki-style) answer each others' questions, and instructors can edit everything in sight, as well as create their own answers. When posting questions, students can also appear anonymous to their classmates, but not to the instructor, which eliminates any embarrassment they might feel. </p>\n\n<p>tl;dr: Try Piazza. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38787,
"author": "Patricia Shanahan",
"author_id": 10220,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10220",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I agree with the message board idea. This is in addition.</p>\n\n<p>If you have a lot of students not able to make your office hours, there might be an issue such as conflicts with other courses they are taking. </p>\n\n<p>Maybe begin any appointment scheduling with \"Why can't you get to my Monday or Wednesday hours?\". That encourages thinking of the appointment approach as an exception, and also collects potentially useful data. It may be possible that rescheduling the office hours to a popular time for appointments would improve the situation.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38796,
"author": "Geoff Hutchison",
"author_id": 21869,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21869",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I poll students at the beginning of the term. I pick 3-4 possible slots for office hours and then post a poll on Piazza (or your favorite course management system or by show of hands in class) for the preferred times.</p>\n\n<p>This gives students a sense of input into the schedule, but also maximizes overlap of office hours and student availability.</p>\n\n<p>Before I did this, I found many students might have conflicting classes (e.g., they take my class in chemistry, but take another class in the major or a math or physics class) at the same time as my arbitrarily-chosen hours.</p>\n\n<p><strong>Update</strong>:</p>\n\n<p>Also, for setting up ad-hoc meetings, I use <a href=\"http://doodle.com/\">doodle.com</a> which connects to my calendars and lets students suggest times that work for them <em>and</em> me. It will anonymize your schedule and just indicate \"busy\" blocks. Highly recommended.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38833,
"author": "blankip",
"author_id": 11420,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11420",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think adding more office hours based on student feedback is obvious.</p>\n\n<p>However that does not seem to cut into the real issue that you are having, which is - <strong>Why do your students need so much help outside of class?</strong></p>\n\n<p>I am not sure what kind of system is available to you but you need to find a message board clone that students can ask their initial questions. It is highly likely that you may not have been explaining either the \"homework\" or the topic clearly and the students are confused a bit. With a message board something is asked once, answered, commented/viewed by many. </p>\n\n<p>And I didn't mean the above to be a knock on your teaching style. We have all not explained something clearly and I have dealt with a barrage of phone calls from students when I did. When I switched to an online format (I have even used twitter) it was much easier to deal with. </p>\n\n<p>The only other time I have had the issue of too many appointments was when the female students believed that I was on the market. I then started dressing shabby and talked about my wife more. If this is your real problem, good luck.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 41181,
"author": "Community",
"author_id": -1,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Give them a strict time limit (e.g. 15 minutes or 10 minutes). Let them know that they must be well-prepared with their questions during the appointment. If it's a highly productive 15 minutes, I don't think you will mind too much either.</p>\n\n<p>Also, feel free to say no, especially to those who keep asking for appointments.</p>\n\n<p>You are probably not contractually obliged to have all these additional appointments. And if you are like most grad students, you are paid pretty poorly and so there is certainly no moral obligation either. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38777",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8101/"
] |
38,779 |
<p>For some reason I don't understand, Google Scholar thinks two of my papers are the same, despite different titles, co-authors, and publication years. When I click on one ("Resonant absorption as mode conversion?") it lists 27 versions, most of which are the completely different paper ("Three Dimensional MHD Wave Propagation and Conversion to Alfvén Waves near the Solar Surface. I"). It therefore combines the citations for the two. How can I split them? I even tried deleting both papers and adding them manually from scratch, but without success.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38799,
"author": "R J",
"author_id": 19923,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19923",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You can report the error at the following link:</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://support.google.com/scholar/contact/general\">https://support.google.com/scholar/contact/general</a></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 89583,
"author": "Ali Al Sawalmih",
"author_id": 73595,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/73595",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>\"unmerge\" in GoogleScholar is not possible.\nSOLUTION: delete the [merged articles] noted with *, then add them separately ;-)\nit worked for me.. \nGood luck!!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 98926,
"author": "strpeter",
"author_id": 10574,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10574",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>By now there is an option when editing the merged GoogleScholar article's version as shown in the example below. The option is called \"Unmerge this article and add it to my profile as a separate entry.\"</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"https://i.stack.imgur.com/LgFwS.png\" rel=\"noreferrer\"><img src=\"https://i.stack.imgur.com/LgFwS.png\" alt=\"Edit article and choose to unmerge this article\"></a></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38779",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29306/"
] |
38,780 |
<p>I am in contact with institution A about a potential tenure track position. Meanwhile another institution, let's call it B, has offered me a position. Naturally, I have to mention to A that B has made an offer. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Should I mention the name of B to A when being asked? Or should I just say "another institution has made an offer?</p>
</blockquote>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38790,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>You may not have a choice. If I were A and you were to tell me you had an offer from another school, I would immediately ask the name of the school B. </p>\n\n<p>Your refusing to tell me B's name may raise some red flags for me (indicating a level of shiftiness about your candidacy that I may not have been aware of). I cannot think of a good reason why you wouldn't tell me -- other than B is so far below my institution's rank that it'd be laughable (aka, A=MIT and B=Poconos Community College).</p>\n\n<p>However, if B=CalTech and A=MIT, then I would very much make sure that we were processing your application with all due haste.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>With the new details that A=preferred for personal reasons but B=higher ranked, then certainly you can tell A that you have an offer from B. It would likely lead to increased interest in your candidacy <strong>if</strong> A is at least somewhere the same ballpark as B.</p>\n\n<p>That is, if A were Poconos Comm College and B were CalTech, then A may feel that there is no possibility of getting you and drop you even before an offer for being overqualified. You need to emphasize why you are so interested in A. </p>\n\n<p>Note that lying is a bad idea. If we phoned our colleague at CalTech and they had no idea who you were, you'd be immediately dropped.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38792,
"author": "Bob Brown",
"author_id": 16183,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/16183",
"pm_score": -1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Tell A that you would prefer to work for them, but that you have another offer which you must accept or decline by [date certain] and ask whether they can help you. It is neither necessary nor helpful to name B.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38780",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29307/"
] |
38,781 |
<p>If you're hiring a postdoc, how much do you care about the techniques they've used in the PhD?</p>
<p>I'm thinking ahead to the postdoc search (will probably start in earnest in summer/fall). My current field is a somewhat obscure area of human molecular genetics, lots of old-school techniques. I'm very interested in moving to a model organism that will provide quick output during the postdoc and let me transition to a career at a primarily undergraduate institution. I've also had very little opportunity for bioinformatics training, which I would like to learn. (I see lots of online ads for postdocs listing a slew of particular skills, but I've heard these are less common paths compared to personal networks so I'm wondering if they're representative.)</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38782,
"author": "Anonymous Physicist",
"author_id": 13240,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/13240",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I'm not hiring a postdoc, but: Bench skills/experience matter a lot. PIs want to hire someone who can use the existing lab to produce data without training.</p>\n\n<p>That said, it is difficult to anticipate what skills PIs will be looking for at the moment you need a job.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38786,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I'm likely to ask a fresh PhD holder (whether the title is postdoc or not) to do things that are in keeping with the work they did during their PhD, but I'm likely to ask them to do things beyond that, too. You should expect to be asked to figure out how to do things that were explicitly not part of your existing training. You might have questions, which I might or might not be able to help with. Once you have a PhD, you should be able to do anything you did during your grad school training, and you should be able to acquire new capabilities as needed. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38823,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The degree to which bench skills matters depends strongly on your field. In something like computer science, advisors often hire a postdoc expecting them to adapt their existing knowledge to a new area, in which case the knowledge often matters little. In biological sciences, however, I have often seen postdocs hired as a way of \"importing\" methods into a laboratory, in which case the bench skills are precisely what they are hired for. Thus, in your case, I would expect that they would be quite significant.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38781",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29308/"
] |
38,784 |
<p>I am a coauthor on a psychology conference paper that was accepted based on a short abstract. The first author became unable to attend the conference and offered the opportunity to present to the coauthors. I accepted and later found out that I need to prepare the slides and text for the presentation. </p>
<p>The first author had presented similar material to a very different audience (a practitioner audience in a workshop setting in Spanish) and offered me the slides from that presentation. The material needs considerable reworking: it needs to be adapted for a researcher audience; have a theoretical framework integrated; be shortened considerably; and be written in (or translated to) English. I should also say that I made scientific contributions to the overall project and these particular results. </p>
<p>My colleague agreed that given the extent of the changes, I should be first author (up from fifth author where I am currently) and he second (remaining authors unchanged). He contacted the conference organizers with the request, but the conference program has already been finalized. The first author believes that this means that no authorship changes can be made, but I am not sure. </p>
<p>There will be no conference proceedings, so the conference program is the only documentation, other than the presentation slides and any documents we distribute. </p>
<p>Can authorship changes be made in the presented version of a conference paper even if the conference program is already finalized? Can we list the paper on our cvs differently from how it appears in the program? Are there any written guidelines on this topic? </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38803,
"author": "OK-",
"author_id": 8542,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8542",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>According to <a href=\"http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2001_03_30/nodoi.9203462371499238483\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Science</a>,</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>there are no hard standards for the order of authorship. Most\n institutions have guidelines, but few are written down.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Having said that, the situation varies from case to case. You need to consult with the conference organizers. As far as I know, the order of authors is not generally changed after submission, let alone after acceptance or publication of proceedings. This is also true for extreme situations; for instance, I know of at least two A* journal publications where the first author passed away after submission and the second author completed the article. Still, the original order of authors remained intact.</p>\n\n<p>Also see related questions on <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2467/what-does-first-authorship-really-mean\">the first author</a> and <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/535/order-of-authors-on-publications\">the order of authors</a> in a publication.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38804,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have very little experience with \"talk only\" conference papers (<em>and, as jakebeal correctly asks, why is it a paper if there is no paper?</em>), but generally, the ordering of authors (or even who <em>is</em> an author) of a conference submission has very little to do with who prepares the presentation or who actually does the talk.</p>\n\n<p>Rather, the order on papers is usually either alphabetical or by some measure of \"who did the most work\" for the actual research that is being presented. Hence, a change in who presents a paper (which often happens, due to time constraints, visa problems, illness, ...) usually does not require a change in the order of authors, as the underlying work (and who did it) has not changed.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38784",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29309/"
] |
38,789 |
<p>I am an international student who has been admitted at a low ranked institute in the US. I also have an offer from an institute in my own country to do a Masters'. I ultimately want to get admitted at a prestigious program in the US. </p>
<p>I was recently advised to join the low ranked US institute, do my course work well, establish contacts with professors at more prestigious schools, and then switch to a better school for a PhD. It sounds immoral to me. But I was told it is not immoral in practice as the institute receives thousands of offers to fill up the seat you will be vacating. </p>
<p>Is doing the above seriously unethical? </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38793,
"author": "Eric D. Brown D.Sc.",
"author_id": 29287,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29287",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This is far from immoral or unethical. Theres nothing wrong with attending a program and transferring to another one that might be a better fit. Making the transfer to another program would really be up to you, your work and the networking contacts you make while in your masters program.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38815,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If you were to apply to my hypothetical mid-tier PhD program school A and were given funding -- and if I were your advisor and put a lot of work toward mentoring you and advancing you to candidacy -- and I were to find out it was always your intent that you would switch schools to the more elite school B at the first opportunity, then yes I would be miffed.</p>\n\n<p>For example, my school offers tuition waivers and stipends (approx $28,000) to every incoming doctoral student in Arts and Sciences, for six years. This is guaranteed funding. Students are assigned advisors from the first year to work on their projects. We invest a lot in our students. In my case, we're a top R1 but I know my colleagues at mid-tiers try hard to scrounge together packages for their students and make up with even more intense mentoring. </p>\n\n<p>It's one thing to switch schools because of fit issues that come up between advisors and advisees. I would never tell a student who is unhappy to stay. It's also another thing to be scouted and stolen. This occasionally happens. But to come into a program that is providing you with resources with the intent that you graduate (from them), with one foot already out the door seems lacking in <a href=\"http://www.diffen.com/difference/Ethics_vs_Morals\" rel=\"nofollow\">ethics</a>. </p>\n\n<p>People often use the marriage metaphor for doctoral programs -- while divorce is always an option and the (unhappy) result of a lack of fit, marrying into a program with the intent of cheating and switching up at the first opportunity is not ethical practice. [Again, some schools don't give you any sort of commitment in the form of funding either, so in that case you are free to explore other options].</p>\n\n<p>There's also a couple of hitches in your plan:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p>When you apply to other schools, you will need letters from school A -- presumably the reason you are doing this is to get letters from an American institution -- i.e, from us at a moment when we might be none too pleased with your strategizing.</p></li>\n<li><p>The new school you're applying to will want to know why you're not continuing with the PhD at the old school. If you are honest and tell them that you are switching because you already intended to use school A as a stepping board, they may take it as a sign of your low regard for academic ethical behavior. Someone who cheats once may cheat twice.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>On the other hand, applying to an MA/MS program at school A in order to get into a high-ranked PhD program at school B is not only typical but desirable behavior on the part of school A. </p>\n\n<p>p.s. My advisor once told you me that you owe as much loyalty as you are given (in reference to academia). If you are in a program that give you guaranteed funding and where your advisors invest time and energy in you and your project, then of course they will be hurt if you change mid-stream and they learn that was always your intent. If, on the other hand, you owe little to a place that guarantees no funding and your advisor is missing or never assigned. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38888,
"author": "Pete L. Clark",
"author_id": 938,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/938",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If I understand the OP correctly, he does not yet have a master's degree so could enroll in a master's program <em>and then</em> transfer to a different PhD program. That is absolutely, wholly kosher, and in fact it is a very common practice. For instance, at my state university every few years an exceptionally strong student gets a master's degree along with their bachelor degree (or perhaps takes an extra semester or year) and then goes on to do a PhD at an elite school. Everyone is happy with this.</p>\n\n<p>Also, in my opinion if you do not get funding -- and especially, if you are paying any nontrivial tuition or fees whatsoever -- then absolutely you can leave at any time and under any circumstances (even in the middle of a semester: you will probably have to continue paying tuition and fees as though you were still enrolled; if you are willing to do that, you don't need to show up). </p>\n\n<p>There <em>is</em> a case where I see an ethical issue: what if you get funding for a graduate program (master's or PhD, though funding for master's programs is rather rare) and your intent is to transfer out of that program before completion? Here I think it matters what the precise meaning of that is. Though some have differed on this point, in my opinion if you simply want to transfer to a better program if/when you are given the opportunity, then okay, that is your right if you get admitted. If that other program is really better for you, then those in your current program who are invested in your success will be happy for you. However, if you are <em>in absolute terms</em> uninterested in receiving the degree from the program you've accepted funding in -- in other words, if you couldn't transfer somewhere else you know that you would either continue on without a degree or drop out of the program -- then you are behaving unethically and deceptively: quite generally it is unethical to receive funding to do X if you are not in good faith trying to do X. </p>\n\n<p>The other thing I would say is that once you're in a PhD program, transferring to another program can be done but is not that easy, and in fact may involve setbacks and duplication of effort (e.g. you may need to spend time fulfilling requirements in the new program that you had already fulfilled in the old one). The people who transfer programs usually have clear personal/family/life issues motivating their decision or are struggling in their current program. Neither of these situations is ideal for \"leveling up\" to a better program. If you're a good student in a mediocre PhD program, I think the question is whether you can find a suitable advisor who will help you maximize your potential and ambitions. If you can, then growing where you're planted and thinking in terms of leveling up in your postgraduate academic jobs is a much better strategy than trying to switch horses midstream: this has every risk of being unhelpfully disruptive <em>to you</em>.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38789",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29311/"
] |
38,798 |
<p>Here is the somewhat awkward situation.</p>
<p>I am a TA for a class that I have never taken before. The professor (probably) knows this, but I don't think the students have caught on, since it is a lower-division class and as a graduate student I have significantly more mathematical maturity than most of them.</p>
<p>As a TA, I am responsible for preparing the lecture notes for the class. A different TA is responsible for grading assignments.</p>
<p>A few weeks ago, the professor made a (small) mistake in his lecture, and I transcribed the error onto the lecture notes without realizing it was a mistake.</p>
<p>Recently we had a midterm, and the other TA noticed that a lot of the students were making the same mistake. The other TA recognized it was wrong and is now docking points for the error, even though I told him there was a mistake in the lecture notes.</p>
<p>What should I do? I think the students will be mad when they hear about this, and if I tell the professor, he might get mad at me for preparing bad lecture notes.</p>
<p>Edit: It was the kind of error that would be confusing after the lecture, but hard to spot during the lecture. Basically he used a matrix where he should have used the matrix's transpose. And in the example problem he solved on the board, the matrix was a diagonal matrix, so it made no difference. But the matrix on the midterm wasn't.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38800,
"author": "ff524",
"author_id": 11365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11365",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Just tell the professor: \"The transcription of the lecture included an error, and many students made the same error on the midterm.\" (It really doesn't matter whether the mistake was made first in the lecture or the notes.)</p>\n\n<p>He will decide what to do about the midterm.</p>\n\n<p>He will almost certainly be very happy to hear about his error from you, rather than from a large number of irate students (which is likely to happen if you don't tell him).</p>\n\n<p>Nobody is infallible - not professors, not teaching assistants, not students. If he gets mad at you for preparing \"bad lecture notes\" for proliferating one mistake that he made, he is completely unreasonable.</p>\n\n<p>As an aside: this evening, I gave my students a quiz, and during the quiz my TA - who was helping me proctor - pointed out an error. I thanked him and told the students to disregard that question. Then, after the quiz, I had the students get together in groups and work on \"fixing\" the question (the nature of the error made the fix non-trivial). It was an interesting and helpful educational exercise, for my students and for me. Errors can sometimes be an opportunity for good things.</p>\n\n<p>Of course, I told my students that this is an important lesson on the dangers of taking code snippets off the Internet or from a book without carefully checking them :)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38801,
"author": "Ramrod",
"author_id": 28310,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28310",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think this atleast partially depends on the maturity of the students. Are these first year students? Or perhaps students who struggle with math? Shouldn't they know enough to realize the error?</p>\n\n<p>If you honestly transcribed the error as presented by the professor, I can't see where you're at fault. Your job isn't to fact check entire lectures. Since the other TA doesn't seem too keen on making adjustments, you may mention about asking the professor for input. If they don't seem keen on that, go to the professor anyways so they won't be blindsided with angry students. Mistakes in notes can be a headache.</p>\n\n<p>Of course, to play devil's advocate, the case can also be made that the students didn't understand the material. They're regurgitating the same mistake made in the notes without asking questions.</p>\n\n<p>It's a tough call, but at the very least (regardless of point deductions) the professor needs to know the situation. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38798",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29315/"
] |
38,807 |
<p>I have had a privilege of knowing what concerns the admission committee about my applicant's file for pure math degree. As of right now, the most significant concern expressed was my weak performance on the GRE subject test (in math.) My question is, would the committee care about the perfect performance on AP Calculus tests, AB and BC? Could it somehow help to mitigate the less-than-appealing GRE math score?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38809,
"author": "Nate Eldredge",
"author_id": 1010,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1010",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would say a graduate admission committee in pure mathematics would consider AP Calculus scores <strong>completely irrelevant</strong>.</p>\n\n<p>Good scores (even perfect scores) on these exams show only that you are (or were) competent at high school / freshman calculus; if this were not the case, you probably should not be applying for grad school in mathematics at all. As a mathematician would say, calculus competence is <em>necessary but not sufficient</em> for success in a grad program. Of more direct relevance is your preparation in more advanced, proof-based subjects (abstract algebra, real and complex analysis, etc), of which the GRE is a better (thought not necessarily <em>good</em>) measure. You must have observed that these courses are of a very different flavor from calculus, with much more theory and less rote computation; at the graduate level this trend will only continue.</p>\n\n<p>Even if you are brilliant at calculus, math professors know that this does not necessarily carry over into more advanced subjects. They really want to see what you have been doing <em>lately</em>.</p>\n\n<p>(Disclaimer: I am a mathematician but have not been on an admission committee.)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38846,
"author": "Ben Bitdiddle",
"author_id": 24384,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24384",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>No. Half the people who take the Calculus BC exam get perfect scores, so you can assume almost every applicant has a 5 on the BC exam. (Except they wouldn't say so, because by the time they graduate college they usually have other accomplishments that carry more weight.)</p>\n\n<p><a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AP_Calculus#Grade_distributions_for_AP_Calculus_BC\">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AP_Calculus#Grade_distributions_for_AP_Calculus_BC</a></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38807",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29323/"
] |
38,814 |
<p>Student societies are often fantastic fun. At the university I attend there are some members of societies who don't attend the university, they just come along because they happen to like an unusual hobby (Quidditch, table top rpg, fencing...). I have never seen any lecturers or professors however. </p>
<p>Is it considered odd for a lecturer or professor to be part of a society of their own university? Why? Would it still be possible? I would like to work in a university (in a research orientated position) and if there was no serious disadvantage or barrier I would defiantly want to be part of societies there. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38817,
"author": "o-0",
"author_id": 21552,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/21552",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In essence there is no problem, here in the UK, for the lecturers/professors to join societies. I experienced it first hand, both as a student and lecturer, and loved it. But you have the following ethical responsibilities: </p>\n\n<p><strong>Socializing and Not Dating</strong>: Most social clubs go out a lot. For example, they might go to some other part of the country to do hill walking, or pub crawling which involves loads of drinking. The bottom line is that you can socialize with students, but don't lose your mind and start dating a student while camping somewhere. Some social clubs are hubs for dating, so join them for the cause and socializing, and avoid dating altogether. </p>\n\n<p><strong>Close Friendships</strong>: Here in the UK, in my experience at least, some students are looking for an easy way out of studying. They are young, and therefore they just want to get by. Don't create a situation where they can take advantage of you and abuse your friendship.</p>\n\n<p>Overall, know your limitations. Deal with students outside the university in a respectable manner, and don't get too comfortable. At the end of the day, you are the lecturer and they are the students. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38825,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Student societies are about more than just shared interests: they are also a place for students to escape from the pressure of their studies, to blow of steam, and to relax. Having an authority figure around (and a professor is most definitely an authority figure) generally has a strong chilling effect on these aspects of a student social life. With a professor around, students are likely to feel uncomfortable complaining about classes, bad-mouthing other professors, just plain being profane, and other such things that they would otherwise do---and this goes for both undergraduates and graduate students. Having other non-students there, like alumni or random community members, does not have the same effect, because they are not in authority over students. Likewise, it doesn't matter if they're your students or not: you still belong to the same group, and they generally don't know how much or how little you actually interact with other faculty in other areas.</p>\n\n<p>In short: it's a student space, and a professor in that space can disrupt it. Except in rare cases, then, I would strongly advise <strong>not</strong> to join: don't harsh on their mellow.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38828,
"author": "Dennis",
"author_id": 29346,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29346",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This answer is built upon my personal experience in the Netherlands (A neighbor country of the UK). It basically supports the answer by @Dave Rose.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>During my study I attended numerous activities, and though most were just attended by students, some where also attended by lecturers. Some key observations:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>Only activities with a very open nature were attended (hosted in a public place & it was also common to bring flatmates for example)</li>\n<li>Most activities were without lecturers, and if they were there then always just 1 or 2 at the same time</li>\n<li>They did not act as lectures (typically they won't have 10+ beers or stimulate people to get drunk, but will also not criticize those who do)</li>\n<li>They don't bring up the activities afterwards in public (especially nothing embarrassing)</li>\n<li>They mostly let students come to them rather than approach them proactively (may also be because of their general personality)</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Of course it was a bit surprising at first, but given the previous five points, my fellow students and I didn't mind and just considered it to be 'the more the merrier'. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38837,
"author": "mozart the best",
"author_id": 29356,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29356",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>At my institution, all student societies must have a \"senior member\" who is a member of academic staff in order to be officially registered (which helps with funding/sponsorship). </p>\n\n<p>In practice, there's plenty of postgraduate student involvement in societies, and the youngish academics (esp. postdocs and one year research fellows) don't really stick out if they get involved. Some of the more academic societies have very high faculty involvement, and this does make the socials <em>relatively</em> sedate affairs.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38849,
"author": "Anonymous",
"author_id": 11565,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11565",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I don't know about the UK, but I can answer for the US. In short, it depends and you can usually find out for the particular society or club you're interested in.</p>\n\n<p>There are some organizations that are deliberately welcoming of faculty. Many of them have websites, and it's common for them to specifically say that faculty and staff are welcome to attend. In this case I think these organizations can safely be taken at their word. </p>\n\n<p>I would be reluctant to join any student society or club that was mostly social. But if the club is centered around some specific activity (e.g. fencing) my experience is that such clubs are more welcome of participation by faculty.</p>\n\n<p>Finally, it's often easy to look up contact information for the (student) leadership of the club. Get in touch, and ask if you'd be welcome to join. If you decide to try it out, it is polite to keep your eyes and ears open for the possibility that you are intruding a little bit on a student space; if you feel at all uncomfortable, it is polite to thank everyone at the end of the meeting and not return. But you might instead be warmly welcomed, and have everyone express the hope that you'll come again.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38814",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26492/"
] |
38,829 |
<p>Is there something like a "standard dress code" for a Ph.D thesis discussion? And, if there is - how important is it? Obviously, one should not (I think) dress <em>too casually</em>, but I do not know what is deemed appropriate.</p>
<p>I don't know how much this varies around the world; if it helps, I am from Europe.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38830,
"author": "Brian Z",
"author_id": 9298,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/9298",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In my experience, different professors can have very different feelings about this. If you have any doubt, best to ask your primary adviser.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38832,
"author": "TheWanderer",
"author_id": 11338,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11338",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think it varies across cultures. Being a stereotypical italian, I think it is important to dress smartly and with style. Most importantly, however you dress, you should do it for yourself, rather than for the committee. </p>\n\n<p>Clearly, if you go with a t-shirt and jeans, there might be those who think that you are not taking it seriously. But it depends on who these people are. Are they those who go to world-leading conferences and give a talk wearing shorts and a regular shirt? If so, you might be in trouble if you wear a suit!</p>\n\n<p>The way you dress might be important for the first 5 minutes, afterwards it will depend on the work you have done.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38829",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28451/"
] |
38,831 |
<p>I understand that it is difficult for people with stuttering to verbally communicate and explain their ideas/research or to give lectures. Does that means there is no chance for them to work in academia even with the PhD degree?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38834,
"author": "blankip",
"author_id": 11420,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11420",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I don't want to turn this into an answer about how universities or society in general should deal with disabilities. I will offer what I have witnessed first hand through a good friend. </p>\n\n<p>Can you work in Academia?</p>\n\n<p>Yes. </p>\n\n<p>Will people make fun of you?</p>\n\n<p>Probably but who cares. People make fun of others for everything. </p>\n\n<p>But...</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>don't try to hide your problem</li>\n<li>embrace the stuttering. Nobody cares that much unless you do.</li>\n<li>spit out what you are trying to say. The content and meaning are key. Don't let the stuttering stop your speech.</li>\n<li>don't try to dumb down your words to help the stuttering (to a point). You will be judged by most on what you say, don't let stuttering get in the way of that.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>So my friend - let's call him Paul (sorry Paul for using your real name) had a big banquet speech he was asked to do after much of his research was published. Four of the faculty members/advisors Paul was thanking were named John... So he says, \"I would like to thank Joh-Joh-Joh-Joh-Joh-Joh-John. (He catches his breathe and smiles at the crowd). Well I had fou-fou-four Johns and I think I thanked too many.\" It could have been two hours of drinking but people were honestly laughing for two minutes straight. </p>\n\n<p>In reality it probably would effect you more if you were in a field were public speaking were part of the field. Paul was a scientist. I hate to say this but I think the stuttering became his calling card and made him even more likable, and even better presenter. </p>\n\n<p><strong>Add:</strong> After seeing this question get a ton of hits I want to be clarify my answer. Stuttering and other issues, whether it is a disability or just something that someone isn't good at - be honest with yourself about any \"shortcomings\" and don't make others feel awkward (I know this is hard). Whether it is a strong accent, stuttering, talking low, saying \"ummmm\", whatever - if you know you have an issue own it and put your audience at ease. </p>\n\n<p>A perfect example of this is Jeff Foxworthy. He readily admits that he talks like a redneck. That is his shtick. People like him and think he's hilarious because he openly talks about his accent and redneckedness. If he came out to an audience, unknown to them, and tried to (poorly) hide his accent and redneck background, people would feel uncomfortable. Everyone has issues, some worse than others. Acknowledging your issues makes your more personable and relateable to your audience as they know that they too might have trouble talking in front of a large group. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38838,
"author": "KSmarts",
"author_id": 29354,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29354",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>People with a stutter can definitely have a career in academia. I know this because I've <em>had</em> a professor with a stammer. </p>\n\n<p>From what I understand, a stutter can be amplified by stress. So if someone has serious anxiety about public speaking (giving lectures, presentations, etc.), it may not be a good idea to pursue an academic career. Of course, one could easily see the anxiety as the primary problem in this case, and the stutter as incidental. In general, if you have a stammer and think you could be a professor, then you probably can. You've had the stutter all your life, you know better than any of us how to handle different situations.</p>\n\n<p>Don't worry too much about whether other people think you can do the work, either. What they think about your ability doesn't affect your <em>actual</em> ability. Furthermore, if anyone tries to interfere with your work or deny you a job because a speech disorder, they are probably violating worker protection laws.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38851,
"author": "J.R.",
"author_id": 780,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/780",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>If <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Abbott\">Jim Abbott</a> can pitch with one arm, if <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hector_Picard\">Hector Picard</a> can complete a triathlon, then you (if the question is about you) can certainly lecture with a stutter. Follow your dreams. </p>\n\n<p>By the way, I work in academia alongside a physicist who is a very effective lecturer despite his stuttering. I've also known people who succeeded in academia despite their lisps, their heavy accents, their shyness, or their wheelchair – folks who were generally well-liked by students and had rightly earned the sincere respect of fellow faculty. Need I mention Stephen Hawking?</p>\n\n<p>Lisps and limps, stammers and stutters, accents and hoarse voices; these are all things that will get noticed during the first day of class, but go largely unnoticed by the third or fourth week, especially when the lecturer has passion for the subject and is amiable in the delivery. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38926,
"author": "Liam Schumm",
"author_id": 27167,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27167",
"pm_score": 0,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You would at some points be held to a higher standards than others; however, if your research is good, you should be respected.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40062,
"author": "Shahryar",
"author_id": 10773,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10773",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Make it your advantage. The art of embracing things like that and instead glowing confidence can make one to be remembered and to be respected above normal.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 67882,
"author": "Jorge",
"author_id": 53339,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/53339",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This blog is the first one that I have found about pursuing an academic career having to stutter on The Internet. I was born with hypoacusia, and I was treated to recover almost all of the hearing capacity. Then, I have been stuttering since I was a kid. Now, I am doing the last year of my Ph.D. abroad and in English. In my native language, I have managed to control my stuttering by using synonyms to hard words, talking very slowly and using tag words linked to words that are hard to say to me without stuttering. Indeed, it has been a challenge to apply these techniques in English.</p>\n\n<p>In all my years in academia (undergraduate, then in my Masters (working as a teaching graduate assistant) and finally in my Ph.D. years), I have to say that it is possible to carry on and survive academia with stuttering. Although I had had terrible presentations when my stuttering was so intense, that I couldn't finish explaining my point, I also had very good presentations where I could speak almost with total fluency. I have learned from these good and bad experiences, and I came out with a strategy to deal with the stuttering. Also for me, I tend to stutter when I am introducing myself to new people. Indeed, meeting new colleagues, presenting your work and networking are very common things to do in academia. </p>\n\n<p>I have some tips on how to deal with situations when stuttering is more probable. Maybe these tips sound too obvious, but this has worked for me so far:</p>\n\n<p>1) Indeed, by feeling that you have prepared your presentation by practising by yourself and even making a script help to boost your confidence and avoid the stuttering.</p>\n\n<p>2) I find the first seconds of the talk the worst because automatically I feel that I will stutter. Therefore, I have found that the best way to overcome that is to find the words which I felt more comfortable to speak with and try to organise a starter sentence. For instance, I tend to start my sentences with tag words such as \"OK\" or \"well\". Although sometimes I had silly ways to start talking, this helped me to \"break the ice\" and no stutter from the beginning. When I have applied this technique, most of the presentations had finished very well. This method gave me confidence from the start; like a boost.</p>\n\n<p>3) Another strategy is trying to avoid the use of text as much as possible in the slides. Only using pictures or diagrams. I always felt so frustrated when I tried to say a word that is on the slide; this situation leads me to stutter for sure. Therefore, by using mostly graphs and diagrams, I was not feeling the pressure that I have words to say. Then, I can be open to improvising and use synonyms when reaching a word which I use to stutter with (I am aware that this technique of using synonyms is used widely by people who stutter. However it has been a challenge for me to apply this method in another language). I had the opportunity to master this technique when I was a teaching to undergraduates. Indeed, I felt so much confident that the stuttering was almost entirely gone. Moreover, the students were so happy with the way I explained using diagrams and animations.</p>\n\n<p>4) Indeed, I have experienced an improvement in my speech when I modulate my breathing. I encourage to do this exercises a couple of hours before any presentation. Conscious breathing helps to relax. It is like tuning and adjusting the sound system of a concert.</p>\n\n<p>5) If you have plenty of time, it is recommended to have a script for your presentation. By doing this, you can see which words are the most problematic to say. Then, it will help you to prepare alternative-more-relaxing-words to say.</p>\n\n<p>In general, I have to say, my presentations in academia have been like a rollercoaster with ups and downs. The important thing is not to succumb or feel defeated when you have a bad presentation. Like every time, just learning from my mistakes and analysing why I was stuttering. I know it feels awful when you again stutter in a presentation. However, the key thing is to avoid feeling so bad and understanding and accepting that stuttering is part of your life. I think that in part when you are applying this technique of talking slowly and with some style, you are making your lectures or way to interact socially so unique that people will remember you more. </p>\n\n<p>Please let me know if you have any comments. I will like to discuss with people having my same situation. So far, I have not met anyone experiencing this situation at a Ph.D. studies level. Finally, I have to say that I chose an academic path because I like to research and teach.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 77516,
"author": "Marshall",
"author_id": 62504,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/62504",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A person who stutters can definitely have an excellent career in academia. I am a stutterer and have been a professor of business at a good university in Canada for over 30 years. I did encounter some discrimination in both obtaining my Ph.D. and in securing an academic job. For example, when I was working on my Masters degree I asked the Department head to write me a letter of recommendation to get into the doctoral program. He refused, stating that he 'could not waste a valuable spot on someone who couldn't teach'. He was wrong to do that, of course, as I teach just fine (albeit with some stuttering). You should pursue the career that YOU want and not let others tell you what they think your limitations are. The only limitations, I believe, are the ones we impose on ourselves. Good luck! </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 77518,
"author": "Leon Meier",
"author_id": 56935,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/56935",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Don Knuth, computer scientist No. 1, is somewhat stuttering. Not much, but he still struggles with his speech. Stephen Hawking cannot speak without a computer at all. Said that, the absence of clear speech is not a stopper; you <strong>can</strong> make an excellent academic career. You may have some trouble speaking publicly, but that's a different issue.</p>\n\n<p>If stuttering bothers you personally, you might think about investing time and money into working with a speech therapist rather than into academia, which is a hard sports anyway. Your progress with the therapist may be small, especially if you are older, but it's worth it for your life. Not for academia.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38831",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29348/"
] |
38,836 |
<p>I've sent the article to the conference and it has been accepted. However, I received a message that my paper has been accepted as the short paper. </p>
<p>I know that there's a difference in, for instance, the oral presentation time between those 3 kinds of papers. However, I wonder if the type (regular, position, short) can say anything about the <em>quality</em> or the <em>importance</em> of the paper's subject?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38839,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Here is what I have observed at the peer-reviewed conferences that I attend:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>A regular full paper is your basic standard peer-reviewed paper. </p></li>\n<li><p>A position paper is for ideas that don't have and results, per se, but are worth communicating to the community, or for announcing a result that has been published with another community.</p></li>\n<li><p>A short paper is for work that is worth publishing, but doesn't rise to the level of quality or significance of a full paper.</p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Short papers are generally significantly less respected than full papers, but may be worth it anyway: a short paper in a high-profile conference is often better than a full paper in a less significant conference. Position papers are funny and in a different category: they aren't attempting to be the same as a full paper, and are typically judged more by a standard of \"interesting to discuss.\"</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38841,
"author": "Alexandros",
"author_id": 10042,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10042",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I will speak from the CS perspective, which I know. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>If the type (regular, position, short) can say anything about the\n quality or the importance of the paper's subject?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Unfortunately, it does. Although the short paper will still appear in the proceedings, it will have a maximum limit of usually 4 pages. Therefore most details will have to be omitted, due to the limited space. Also, in CS conferences short papers might be presented in a fast-forward fashion (1-2 minutes per paper) or together with the demo papers presentation and therefore they do not attract as much attention as the regular papers. In that case, during the demo / poster session people can come in to your \"booth\" and discuss about your paper (which is more informal but still a nice way to network).</p>\n\n<p>The better way to take advantage of this situation (your paper was accepted after all, even as a short paper) is to make an extended version of this paper for submitting to a relevant journal, where you can reveal all the missing details from the proceedings short version, along with some additional extra material.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38844,
"author": "TheWanderer",
"author_id": 11338,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11338",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>To add to other answers, I'll say that at least in HCI, it depends on the conference. At CHI, for example a short paper is not necessarily one that has less quality. It means that the contribution can be adequately be described and discussed in 4 pages. \nHowever, there are other conferences who explictly declare in their CfPs that short papers can be about preliminary results, works in progress, etc.</p>\n\n<p>If we are talking about evaluating a researcher's CV, a preponderance of short-papers might indicate that the person in question was not able to focus on any one topic long enough to study it in detail.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38836",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29353/"
] |
38,843 |
<p>I met someone who was doing a PhD in dance. What exactly do those people do? Do they do research in dance? Conduct experiments in dance? Prove theorems about dance? Do they become dance professors when they graduate?</p>
<p>Do they mostly focus on the history of dance, and compare different styles of dancing?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38847,
"author": "BrianH",
"author_id": 6787,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6787",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>In short: yes, and a whole lot more.</p>\n\n<p>A PhD in the arts usually most closely resembles other PhDs in the humanities, like English or History, but often have a more experiential/practical component as well. Depending on the program and field of study, it might be somewhat of a mash-up of psychology, anthropology, physiology, literature, history, political science...whatever relates to one's area of research and study!</p>\n\n<p>I'll give a concrete, real-world example: in the Psychology department of my present university there are faculty and students (undergraduates and those preparing for masters/PhD studies) conducting cross-departmental research with the Theatre & Dance department on the \"Psychology of Dance\". In one experimental study they looked at inter-rater reliability of those who are not particularly trained or experienced in interpretive dance, and then showed them specially created dance performance videos. They were looking to see if interpretive dance really is a genuine form of communication: can the artists/performers communicate specific emotions consistently to the audience such as anger, fear, affection, companionship, etc? Or is it all just people assigning arbitrary meanings, like people giving serious meaning to a randomly generated drawing? Their results so far indicate that especially for some emotions, there is a very strong inter-rater reliability: even those who have never studied/seen interpretive dance before can identify certain emotions, activities, representations, etc - and as usual they work on writing up and publishing such results, giving talks, etc.</p>\n\n<p>As another example, at <a href=\"http://performance.tisch.nyu.edu/page/courses.html\">NYU they have a Performance Studies</a> program and they have a lot of detail on their website about the kind of things student's are doing. These include things like studying different styles of dance, dance in other cultures, documenting and studying modern performance art, and so forth.</p>\n\n<p>As with most PhDs, the purpose of them is research and instruction, but what one does with it varies. Some will be instructors, professors, researchers, owners of studios, contributors in community organizations, lecturers, writers, performance artists...some will go into 'industry' as choreographers, directors, producers, and so on. It's a far cry from Underwater Basket Weaving!</p>\n\n<p>One thing I'll note from personal observation: many, many people working in the arts choose not to go by the title \"Doctor\" or even \"Professor\". This seemed odd to me, but it's a culture thing - they just don't do it. So, many people who have a PhD in the arts, especially in music and dance, don't advertise their education in any way - so you've probably known more people with a PhD in the arts than you realize!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38848,
"author": "StrongBad",
"author_id": 929,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/929",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I am not familiar with PhDs in Dance, but in Music and Art the thesis consists of a traditional written document and usually an original piece of art. There are some history and theory only degrees, but these are often then degree is Art History. I wouldn't describe what they do as experiments, but you could argue that they prove, or provide evidence, in support of Art theory. For example, a PhD in poetry might consist of a book of poems and then a scholarly introduction of how the poems fit into the broader field of poetry. A PhD in music might involve composing an album and the thesis would place relate the album to past types of music. Alternatively, a PhD in poetry could also just examine a particular poet's work, or a group of poets and a PhD in music could look at a particular musician.</p>\n\n<p>Getting a doctoral degree in the arts is relatively new. It used to be that an MFA was a terminal degree. I think most doctoral students in the arts are looking to be professors</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40039,
"author": "Nicola",
"author_id": 30531,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/30531",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There are several approaches to a PhD in dance. One of the first that pop up into my mind is understanding how we interpret and classify movements in different cultures, or in intra cultural communities. \nOther can be the analysis and interpretation of traditional dance, and their role in a society. </p>\n\n<p>The output can be teaching dance theory, but there can be also some jobs in robotics (most of them use Labanotation Analysis for classifying movement, that it was actually invented for writing down dance movement)!\nIt is only a matter of research questions, but let's not forget that dance is about movement, and movement it is a big research field right now :)</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/13
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38843",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24384/"
] |
38,857 |
<p>I'm currently finishing up my last year of study as an undergraduate mathematics major at a top 2 public school. I've been interested in getting a phD in mathematics for some time now, but my GPA and work in some classes in my 1st and 2nd years leaves a lot to be desired. Let's just say I got pretty bad grades in important classes. Since then, I've worked my but off and currently have around a 3.3 GPA.</p>
<p>Luckily, I was accepted into a Statistics/Computer Science related Masters program. In this program, I will have the opportunity to take electives and plan to take some higher level math classes. </p>
<p>My question is, will doing very well in my masters program next year override my poor performance as an undergrad? Also, should I be really trying to get a research position this summer?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38858,
"author": "Eric D. Brown D.Sc.",
"author_id": 29287,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29287",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think you'll be fine if you can show your skills and abilities during the Stats/CompSci Masters program. Yes...definitely go after a research position as it will add your profile when it comes time to apply for a PhD program.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38881,
"author": "Oswald Veblen",
"author_id": 16122,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/16122",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Yes, high grades and excellent letters of recommendation from the master's program can help overcome poor grades from earlier. </p>\n\n<p>Remember you will apply for the PhD program a year in advance, so the professors you have the first two semesters in the master's program will be the ones you need to ask for letters. You need to be excellent from the start of the master's program. </p>\n\n<p>The other thing that can help overcome bad grades (to some extent) is a high score on the math subject GRE. You want to study thoroughly for that, unless you already have a high score. See e.g. <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/13678/what-is-the-median-math-gre-subject-score-for-admission-to-a-group-2-or-3-phd-pr\">What is the median math GRE subject score for admission to a Group 2 or 3 PhD program in applied mathematics?</a></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38857",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29376/"
] |
38,861 |
<p>I am in high school but soon I will be going to college. I already have a hard time dealing with the silliness of high school (on an intellectual level), and in particular I have 0 interest in humanities courses (frankly I think literature is pathetic thing to study). I am interested only in maths and science.</p>
<p>When I get to college, I plan only to take maths and science courses and not attend any humanities courses even if they are required as part of the core curriculum. What are the potential ramifications of this assuming the college is one of the prestigious ones like Harvard/MIT. Will a bad grade in humanities course mean less opportunities later on?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38862,
"author": "Patricia Shanahan",
"author_id": 10220,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10220",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I have a lot of sympathy with your viewpoint. I grew up in England, so once I had completed the O-level General Certificate of Education, at age 16, I could spend most of my time on mathematics and physics. My mathematics undergraduate program only had courses in various branches of mathematics.</p>\n\n<p>I do read widely, including history and literature, but that is something I do for fun, not something anyone is forcing me to do.</p>\n\n<p>The consequences of not taking humanities will depend entirely on the college and its regulations. In some cases, it would mean no degree, which would obviously mean less opportunities. You should carefully examine the undergraduate programs at each college you are considering for the subjects in which you are most interested, to see which have what graduation requirements.</p>\n\n<p>I don't think Harvard would be a practical choice for you: \"General Education, Expository Writing, and the language requirement combined require nine to 11 half-courses, or around 30 percent of your overall program.\" <a href=\"https://college.harvard.edu/academics/planning-your-degree/graduation-requirements\" rel=\"nofollow\">Graduation Requirements</a></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38863,
"author": "Corvus",
"author_id": 27900,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27900",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Science is not merely something that you do in isolation; science is a communal activity by which hundreds or thousands of people work together on a shared path to discovery. Therefore to practice science you need not only to uncover new truths or at least posit new hypotheses; you must communicate them to the other participants in the institution of science, be it orally or in writing. The most brilliant thinker fails to do science if she fails to convey her discoveries to others. Your humanities will teach you a great deal about how to communicate more effectively; they will help you become a much better scientist. </p>\n\n<p>So in short, what happens if you take no courses in the humanities? You will be a less effective scientist than you otherwise could have been. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38864,
"author": "Compass",
"author_id": 22013,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22013",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>What are the potential ramifications of this assuming the college is one of the prestigous ones like Harvard/MIT.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't think I've ever been in a humanities courses that had more than 30 people in it.</p>\n\n<p>It is likely the professor will take attendance or require participation to ensure that coursework is being done. In most cases, you have to get a certain minimum grade for core as well.</p>\n\n<p>Looking at <a href=\"http://static.fas.harvard.edu/registrar/ugrad_handbook/current/chapter3/computer_science.html\">Harvard's core in Computer Science</a> as an example:</p>\n\n<p>You have to take 7 of these types courses, and <em>receive a passing grade in each of them.</em></p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Foreign Cultures</li>\n<li>Historical Study A</li>\n<li>Historical Study B</li>\n<li>Literature and Arts A</li>\n<li>Literature and Arts B</li>\n<li>Literature and Arts C</li>\n<li>Moral Reasoning</li>\n<li>Science B</li>\n<li>Social Analysis</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>So if you decide to just skip them entirely, that will be probably 7 x 3.5 credits = 24.5 credits worth of courses. Let's say you pass with a D, a fantastic 1.0 for GPA calculations.</p>\n\n<p>With an estimate of 120 credits for graduation, and As in every other class (95.5 credits), you'll end up with a GPA of 3.39, <a href=\"http://poetsandquants.com/2014/03/27/average-gpas-at-top-50-u-s-business-schools/\">which is likely to impact graduate school or professional school applications</a>.</p>\n\n<p>If you AP out or something, and end up with only needing 90 credits for graduation, it becomes a 3.18. I'm pretty sure it's all but impossible to get into any sort of graduate program with a GPA that low.</p>\n\n<p>I'd also like to point out that writing skills are typically looked upon positively as well, in both research and academia.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38865,
"author": "jamesqf",
"author_id": 27365,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27365",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It's really simple: if you don't attend the classes, don't do the homework, or don't take the exams, you will flunk the course. (Unless of course you are a football or basketball player at certain schools.) If you flunk enough courses, or any of the required ones, you will flunk out of the university, which means you will not get a degree. The ramifications of this are that you won't get any sort of job in your field. 'Required' means just that.</p>\n\n<p>What you may be able to do is to take some of the lower-level courses by examination*. Other courses can be quite interesting, and a good way to get easy As. And, if a social life is of any interest to you, the female/male ratio tends to be a LOT higher in humanities than in science & math (or at least it was when I was an undergrad).</p>\n\n<p>*I did this with several of the basic ones like English 101/102 and US history, but I was over 30 at the time, and had spent the intervening years in the military and building my first business.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38866,
"author": "user6726",
"author_id": 28972,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28972",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It depends on what your eventual life goals are. For example, if your intent is to pursue some line of \"automatic\" scientific employment, like running tests in a lab according to pre-set procedures, and if that is all you plan to do in life, then avoidance of humanities courses probably won't harm your plans. On the other hand, if you plan on engaging in more adventuresome forms of employment, such as being a research scientist, or even worse, an academician, then an absolute avoidance of humanities is deleterious to your goals. This does not need to come in the form of official coursework, but it needs to happen somehow.</p>\n\n<p>I do not mean to imply that knowledge of the latest <em>au courrant</em> theory of literary interpretation is intrinsically useful to your career as a future scientist, but lit-crit is not the whole ball of wax when it comes to the humanities (with due apologies to any lit-crit readers out there). The noted astrophysicist Arthur Eddington was one of many practicing scientists who made substantive contributions in the area of epistemology, and actually understanding (vs. merely memorizing the math) the issue underlying De Broglie-Bohm theory vs. the Copenhagen interpretation calls for a grasp of metaphysics. Insofar as your actions as a scientist have unavoidable consequences, with respect to other humans, life-forms, of physical structures, you cannot avoid consideration of ethics, and the study of history as a means of validating your conclusions regarding those ethical principles.</p>\n\n<p>By \"cannot avoid\", of course, I mean \"cannot rationally cannot\" -- you <em>can</em> do whatever you feel like at the moment.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38868,
"author": "chipbuster",
"author_id": 8158,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8158",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A fun fact: when I was in high school, I rejected mathematics as a silly and useless field that nobody would ever actually use.</p>\n\n<p>Well, I was wrong, of course, but my points is that subjects as taught in high school are not at all like subjects taught at the university level. Outside of the need to stick to a state curriculum and teach to a standardized test, and in the hands of a skilled teacher who has dedicated their life to the field, a lot of subjects that seem boring and dull can come to life.</p>\n\n<p>Tell you what, when you get to college, take just <em>one</em> humanities course and darn well try to like it. If you don't, at least you gave it a shot. From there, you can try to \"cheat\" your way through the system---for example, some larger schools offer \"History of {Chemistry, Mathematics, Physics}\" courses that you might be able to have count as humanities credit. You can satisfy your course requirements and learn more about the great minds in your field at the same time. There might also be classes that have you do literature reviews of a field of your choice--these often count for writing requirements.</p>\n\n<p>Essentially, what I'm trying to say is that not all humanities courses boil down to \"reading Kant or writing some dopey philosophy essay.\" Even at a school as small as mine, there are lots of interesting courses that fulfill the humanities requirements while still letting you work on scientific problems---and some really good courses on just the humanities too, and not taking the courses will cause you to miss out on a lot of potential learning experiences.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38871,
"author": "Bombyx mori",
"author_id": 6335,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6335",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think, to be very honest that you have <strong>wrong expectations</strong> of college life. The goal of college education is to offer a holistic educational environment that helps you to become a better person overall. This means you have to challenge yourself in subjects you never heard of and presume you are not interested. For example, it is fashionable to understand how to design a computer interface that could act interactively with its user like iOS Apps. What kind of menu should I use? How should the user understand the functions of my software? But there is no such class offered ten years ago in most universities. The courses offered by the university that is mostly relevant to you would be graphic design, art history, photography, architecture, etc in the art division of the university. So if you miss these classes, you will miss an opportunity to become someone you could be, guided by an expert much more experienced than you are. My point is not original - it has been well articulated by Steve Jobs in his famous graduation speech. </p>\n\n<p>To me, it is precisely that a subject is \"far away\" from my current field that makes it worth exploring in college. I am far from perfect and if I can remedy some of my deficiencies during college life, why should not I do that? For example, a health dose of history and literature (like knowledge of the Biblical literature) makes my trip in Europe much more enjoyable. To look at the painting of Da Vinci or Michaelangleo in the Vatican and do not know how to begin appreciate it properly would be a shame. I am not advocating for learning everything just because it might show up once at some crucial moment in future. But I think it is at least helpful to know what one's weakness is. And obviously I would not know how much I do not know unless I step into the classroom listening the actual lecture. The better the university is, the more diversity they have in the classroom and the more individualized the education will be. Unless you are sure your interest with humanities is negative infinity, such that no positive input would be able to change your attitude, I think it is not too late to start from zero now. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38861",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29380/"
] |
38,867 |
<p>I am an "abnormal" graduate student in the sense I had been diagnosed with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asperger_syndrome" rel="noreferrer">Aspergers syndrome</a> by a professional psychiatrist when I was in college. In college days I mostly study mathematics on my own and covered the subject by reading textbooks/lecture notes online, and I mostly learn by having private conversation with the professor instead of going to the lecture. However after entering graduate school I noticed for teaching undergraduate students, this approach does not really work. Last semester I tried to teach measure theory to my students in the probability class, and the result was in the end of the semester they still did not get <a href="https://matheducators.stackexchange.com/questions/5981/what-is-a-good-way-to-explain-the-lebesgue-integral-to-non-math-majors">what expectation really is</a>.</p>
<p>This semester I have changed my approach and assuming that they knew nothing more than pre-calc. As a result my teaching performance has improved. But I still suffer from problems I assume normal instructors would not encounter. For an extreme example, I met a student asking me for quiz contents tomorrow and who makes the quiz, because the ones I gave tend to be more difficult. I responded that any event is likely including I die because of traffic accident or suicide because of depression, and in the above case there will be no quiz to prepare for. </p>
<p>(Added: When he pointed out this was quite bleak point of view, I suggested that) another quite unlikely event is I won Megamillion tickets and decided to quit grad school, so there will be no quiz too. (Added: Similar to this I also quoted possibility of me being late or there is a class cancellation due to snow storm. When he pointed out that no one can foresee these events, I suggested that is why having health insurance that enable me to see a therapist as well as covering physical diseases is important.) I suggested that he should prepare for anything that might happen with the quiz, and take consideration of the probabilities to maximize his performance of quiz with the time and energy constraint available. </p>
<p>(Added: When he suggested that bell curve is all he needed to pass this course), I also told him real life events often do not follow Bell curve and central limit theorem has limited value for random variable with no expectation exists. To make sure he is not confused, later at night I sent an email to the class repeating my points and suggested everything in the book we learned so far can be tested, and the bonus problem content can be coming from anywhere.</p>
<p>Later I received an email from the instructor of the course, claiming that the student was so unhappy that he suggested to remove me as an TA, because I made him "extremely uncomfortable" and "a bit scared". Further the student suggested I am "literally crazy". But I could not notice anything illogical in what I told him or craziness out of me. The instructor and I had a down to the earth conversation on this. I promised that this would never happen again. However, to be a responsible person I am confused what exactly went wrong. I suppose this is not an isolated event because the instructor told me he has received "many complaints" from students already. My questions are as follows:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>What did the student went through? Why is he unhappy? I did not use any profane language or threatened him in any way. I think what I said are largely "abstract nonsense" everyone knows. In fact, I think I was being very polite for speaking with him on this boring topic for 15 minutes or not appear to be unhappy with him at all. I thought he would think like what I did during my student days, that before a test students wish the class might be cancelled and one can spend more time to review.</p></li>
<li><p>Has there been anyone else in this forum also having Aspergers syndrome? Can someone describe his/her experience and make some suggestions?</p></li>
<li><p>Is there anyway for me to avoid this kind of unwanted events in future? There is no prospect that I can "convert" to a normal person. And I do not want people to be unhappy with me for trivial events like this in future. I could have dismissed the case as the student being irrational, but I think there might be something deeper into it. So I think I should ask.</p></li>
<li><p>Even if there is no one mentioning this on my future teaching reference, would I be qualified for a teaching position in future once I got out of grad school? I ask because it is literally impossible for a graduate student in my university to get a serious research oriented post-doc unless he or she did something very remarkable. While I am not diffident about myself, I feel I should be serious with my future teaching career now, since I would have to teach as a post-doc as well and there will more teaching load.</p></li>
</ol>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38869,
"author": "Anonymous",
"author_id": 11565,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11565",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In the first place, I believe that the student was quite rude.</p>\n\n<p>That said, your response regarding the quiz was presumably regarded as sarcastic and mean-spirited, even if it was not intended as such. I think that it is a fair question which deserves a reasonable answer, based on what you intend to do. That answer might be \"Everything we've covered in class in the last three days, and in Sections X, Y, and Z is fair game for the quiz\" if you don't want to be more specific.</p>\n\n<p>Until you get more comfortable with teaching, I recommend making your courses extremely predictable. (This is especially true if you are a TA rather than an instructor.) You can get creative with your lectures, but I would recommend making all of your course policies very explicit (e.g. what material is covered on the quizzes), standard, and explaining them as clearly as possible. Your quizzes should focus on material emphasized in your lecture and/or the book, and not have any \"trick questions\".</p>\n\n<p>In general, in ordinary conversation, I would usually recommend ignoring the possibility that highly unusual circumstances (i.e., your death) might occur. The question \"What will you do?\" may be interpreted as \"What will you probably do?\" or \"What do you intend to do?\"</p>\n\n<p>Best of luck to you.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38872,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>+1 to <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/38869/4140\">Anonymous' answer</a>.</p>\n\n<p>In addition, you mention that you have <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asperger_syndrome\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Asperger syndrome</a>. One of the key symptoms in Asperger - right in the first paragraph at Wikipedia - is \"significant difficulties in social interaction and nonverbal communication\". That is: your interaction with the student was likely \"abnormal\", to use the term that you used. And importantly, you probably have a hard time in understanding just what it is that caused the student distress.</p>\n\n<p>What could have been \"abnormal\"? This is hard to say. Communication happens on many levels. Only a very small percentage (I have seen suggestions of 10%) are the actual information content. The rest is \"everything else\": choice of words, intonation, facial expression, body language, context, surroundings, relationships and so forth. It is <em>very</em> hard to explain what really goes on here. And of course your 10% information content could have been exactly on the mark, while the other 90% could have been just a bit outside what the student expected within the parameters of such a conversation. And that would be enough for him to conclude that you are \"crazy\". (Although of course telling this to your professor is rude.)</p>\n\n<p>So, what can you do? One problem with Asperger is that you will need to consciously learn and practice communication norms that non-Aspergers soak up automatically, so they don't even need to think about them. I am not a therapist, so take my advice with a large grain of salt. But I would make sure that you stick with the actual information you need to convey (as Anonymous recommends). Given that you have problems in understanding how you come across, better to reduce the possibilities of being misunderstood. Don't do jokes, don't discuss six-sigma events like a meteorite hitting you.</p>\n\n<p>In addition, I would <em>strongly</em> recommend that you look for help. Either talk to a therapist - student services at your university could probably help you there. Or at least look for a self-help group. Asperger's is not too rare, so you may find such a group close by. If you have a trusted (non-Asperger) friend, ask him to observe you in conversation and ask him to give you feedback. Maybe even take a video of you in an interaction so the two of you can go over it in detail.</p>\n\n<p>If you work on your communication skills, I don't think you would be barred from teaching. One question is whether you actually enjoy it - many people with Asperger's don't enjoy interaction with other people.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38877,
"author": "blank",
"author_id": 29386,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29386",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>(posting anonymously, so can't make this a comment)</p>\n\n<p>The first piece of advice I've been given is to accept that the majority of students are not really interested in learning, only in passing the exam. They are, in my experienced, obsessed with meaningless details like how many questions there are on the exam (who cares, when you don't know how long a question is?). Tell them exactly what they will be asked and when, so they can get marks with as little effort as possible (and repeat it every time they ask, even though you've already told them multiple times), and a good proportion of the students will be happier.</p>\n\n<p>The second piece of advice I've been given is to not care about student feedback. </p>\n\n<p>I don't think either of these fit well with being an Aspie.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38879,
"author": "tim",
"author_id": 23297,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/23297",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>What did the student went through? Why is he unhappy? </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I can only guess, but I would say that the student expected concrete and short answers, such as: </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Question: \"Who makes the quiz?\" Answer: \"I will be making the quiz\" (unlikely events preventing you from making the quiz are implied).</li>\n<li>Question: \"what will be the content of the quiz?\" Answer: \"Everything we covered in the last X weeks\" or \"Chapters X, Y, and Z of the book\" or \"Topics A, B, and C\".</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Your answer to the first question was probably received as too general and off topic, and might have made the student uncomfortable because it was a bit personal (regarding depression and suicide).</p>\n\n<p>As to your answer to the second question: <code>everything in the book</code> is not an answer students like to hear, but it certainly can be a valid answer (if everything in the book is actually relevant to the class). <code>content can be coming from anywhere</code> on the other hand will make most students unhappy, because they cannot prepare for it. I know it is just for bonus points, but still, it would probably be better to base those questions on the content of the book as well, as to not frustrate students.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Is there anyway for me to avoid this kind of unwanted events in future? </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Try to give short answers that you think will help the students the most. You can - as you did in this case - follow that up with an email, in which you can go into a bit more detail.</p>\n\n<p>And although there is nothing wrong with being a hard teacher, scaling down the difficulty of your tests will make students happier and more forgiving. You don't have to create incredibly easy tests just so students will like you, but if your tests are always more difficult than those of other teachers, this can make students resentful (even if their main objective is to learn, passing this class and getting good grades is important for them and their future).</p>\n\n<p>As others mentioned, you might also want to look for outside help. This can be therapy if you want to and can afford it, but you could also discuss events such as this with friends/family/possibly colleagues, and send important email (and maybe tests) to them before sending them out to students for proofreading.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Even if there is no one mentioning this on my future teaching reference, would I be qualified for a teaching position in future once I got out of grad school?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't think you should let yourself be hold back by this. It seems that you would have to do some work (because you received \"many complaints\"), but if this is something you like to do, do it.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38883,
"author": "Alexandros",
"author_id": 10042,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10042",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First of all, kudos to the OP for sharing his problem. Without a doubt, this the first step towards addressing the problem. Unfortunately, most of the answers do not seem to get to the \"meat\" of the problem. And the main question is:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Was the OP rude to the student and was the student on the right to\n complain about this behavior?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>The answer to both questions is a big YES. When someone asks a question about a test quiz and gets an answer like \"I do not want to tell you because I might commit suicide because of depression\" the student (in his human imperfection), has the right to feel \"scared\" and \"awkward\". But even then, the student still made the right choice: He notified the university \"authorities\" (the main instructor of the course) about the problem he faced. This is what we suggest all students to do (in this SE forum) when they are dealing with a dangerous or threatening situation within the university campus. And although the danger was not real, the student felt that way, so he reported it. What would a teacher do, when one of his students told him when asked about a meeting, \"I do not know if I can make the meeting tomorrow because I might be dead\"? Exactly the same thing. Notify the university authorities. So first, I believe we must all agree that the student did the right call. Otherwise, the OP might not even have acknowledged the problem and how the student felt from this situation (which I am not sure if he totally gets is 100%). And BTW commenting on \"I do not want people to be unhappy with me for trivial events like this in future\", let me tell the OP that being \"scared\" by your university teacher is not a trivial event at all.</p>\n\n<p>I am not a doctor and I cannot provide remote diagnoses. No one should do it especially online. But being a teacher is mostly about the students and not ourselves. We are still human, we are imperfect and we sometimes make irrational mistakes. But if something (disease, personal state, even grief) prevents us to do what is best for THEM, we should do whatever it takes (therapy, medication, personal leave) to protect them and be the best teachers we can be. Otherwise, we are not doing those young people justice. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38886,
"author": "mhwombat",
"author_id": 10529,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10529",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think the other answers have done a good job of explaining the why the student was offended by your response in this situation. So instead I will try to give you some general \"rules of thumb\" that would help you avoid similar situations.</p>\n\n<p><em>When someone asks you a question, before you answer, think about why they are asking and what the answer means to them.</em> Often there's a deeper, more fundamental question underlying what the person actually asks, and that's the question that you need to answer. In this case, the student was nervous about the exam, and wanted to know how he could improve his chances of passing.</p>\n\n<p><em>If you have to deliver bad news, acknowledge what it means to the other person, and stick to directly relevant facts.</em> In this case, the bad news that you had to deliver was that you couldn't (or wouldn't, for pedagogical reasons) tell the student what was on the exam.</p>\n\n<p>Here's an example of an answer that might have worked better in this situation: \"I understand you're worried about the quiz. I can't tell you exactly what's going to be on it, but it will be material that we discussed in class. If you review your class notes, you should be well-prepared.\" The first sentence acknowledges how the student feels. The second sentence delivers the bad news. The third sentence answers the underlying question, sticking to the facts. You might add something helpful like \"Make sure you understand the concept of 'expectation'.\"</p>\n\n<p>This answer will not completely satisfy the student, who was probably hoping to be told exactly what the quiz would be so he wouldn't have to do as much studying. But at least it delivers the bad news in a way that doesn't make the student feel any worse than he already feels.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38891,
"author": "Anonymous Mathematician",
"author_id": 612,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/612",
"pm_score": 7,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>I think what I said are largely \"abstract nonsense\" everyone knows.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I'd bet that's part of the issue here. When people ask a question, the general assumption is that the answer will try to maximize usefulness. When this doesn't seem to be happening, it's viewed as a very strong signal. For example, suppose I ask you \"Are you having lunch with John tomorrow?\" and you reply \"I don't know. Maybe he'll commit suicide tonight.\" If there's no special risk of suicide, then this is a useless answer, since everyone knows suicide is a theoretical possibility that would disrupt the lunch plans. So it's natural to interpret this answer as suggesting you honestly fear John will kill himself. Giving a logically correct but near-vacuous answer is considered highly eccentric (if not done deliberately) or rude (if done deliberately). Either way it will upset people, because it completely throws off their ability to judge what is really meant. It can be OK as a joke under the right circumstances, but otherwise it's generally problematic.</p>\n\n<p>So there's a real danger whenever you try to explain \"abstract nonsense everyone knows\". It can be misinterpreted in many ways. \"He thinks I'm an idiot who needs to be patiently told things everyone knows\", \"He's making fun of me\", \"He's intentionally being rude\", \"He's gone crazy and can't stop talking about suicide and the bell curve even though they are irrelevant to my needs\", \"He's severely depressed and is trying to prepare me for the possibility that he might be gone by tomorrow [or is awkwardly asking for help]\", etc.</p>\n\n<p>Math culture can play a role here as well. It's not uncommon for mathematicians to be a bit obsessive about logical correctness in everyday life. For example, when someone asks me about my lunch plans, I have to fight to urge to reply \"as far as I know\" instead of \"yes\", since of course I don't really know for sure. If I see a bag sitting my itself in my classroom as everyone is leaving and ask the class \"Did somebody leave their bag behind?\", I'm sure to get an answer of \"yes\" from multiple students. Among mathematicians, this communication style is widely tolerated, and it can be viewed as amusing or a sign of in-group solidarity, but it can really provoke non-mathematicians.</p>\n\n<p>So it's important to keep in mind that Asperger's and math culture can line up in ways that interfere with effective communication. This is usually less important in advanced classes, but it can be a big deal in introductory classes, especially with students who are not majoring in mathematics.</p>\n\n<p>Dealing with this can be nontrivial, but I'm confident you are on your way to sorting it out. As I see it, the two biggest obstacles are realizing that there's an issue and recognizing that it's more than just \"students can be irrational\", and you've made it past both of these obstacles.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Even if there is no one mentioning this on my future teaching reference, would I be qualified for a teaching position in future once I got out of grad school?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Yes, Asperger's is far from rare in mathematics and it is in no way a disqualification for a teaching career. Overcoming initial hurdles can lead to a very effective teaching letter, since this demonstrates a serious and professional commitment to teaching.</p>\n\n<p>Many universities have a teaching center or the equivalent, where people can go for feedback or assistance with their teaching. For example, someone could sit in on your class and offer advice, or video a session and go over it with you (seeing yourself teach from a student's perspective can be illuminating). It might also be possible to be paired with a long-term mentor. There can be advantages to working with someone outside the math department (who is not involved in evaluating you professionally) or within the department (who can offer better feedback on the clarity of your mathematical explanations). Either way, it's worth looking into what resources might be available, since this can be a valuable way to improve and to demonstrate commitment.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38900,
"author": "gerrit",
"author_id": 1033,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1033",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There have been a lot of useful answers already. Although my own teaching experience is limited, my own Asperger's syndrome has frequently led to communication problems because of different understandings, so I will try to address your questions from an Asperger perspective.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Is there anyway for me to avoid this kind of unwanted events in future?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>You can minimise, but not completely avoid.</p>\n\n<p>All humans, in particular <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotypical\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">neurotypicals</a>, are irrational. The statement “I might be dead tomorrow” is rationally obvious. Rationally, the statement might be expected to have <em>zero</em> impact (but see <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38867/how-should-an-graduate-student-with-aspergers-syndrome-prepare-for-a-teaching-ca/38900?noredirect=1#comment86771_38900\">MSalters' comment</a>). However, it will have non-zero impact on almost everybody (including many Aspergers, who have been functioning in a majority neurotypical environment and have consciously or subconsciously adapted). This illustrates that people are irrational — unless, as MSalters points out, listeners <em>assume</em> the statement <em>must</em> have non-zero information, and therefore assume there must be some non-literal (i.e. hidden) content.</p>\n\n<p>You can minimise this kind of unwanted events by constructing a (mental) model of how information is perceived. This is non-trivial. It requires an understanding of <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Theory of mind</a>. For such an understanding, Asperger's Syndrome is a handicap. Although Aspergers are likely over-represented in a mathematics department, Aspergers are still the minority. So, we need to adapt.</p>\n\n<p>Other answers have addressed how information is perceived in this specific example. I'm almost sure you have experienced similar¹ miscommunications before — if you're not aware of any, then that's almost certainly because you did not receive the feedback you received now. Therefore, my literal answer will be: No, there is no way to completely avoid this kind of unwanted events in the future.</p>\n\n<p>However, you can minimise. How would you go to construct such a mental model? I would recommend seeking communication with fellow Aspergers. There are many forums, chatrooms, and mailing-lists for Aspergers online, including some <a href=\"http://www.larry-arnold.net/Neurodiversityeu/autunivl.htm\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">specifically focussed on Aspergers at universities</a>. Perhaps there is a autism meetup group at your campus or in your city. As Asperger's, we need to adapt to a neurotypically-dominated world. Based on my personal experience, at this stage in life, I think this is more productive than therapy. Online or offline — sharing experiences with people with similar neurological wirings is no doubt helpful.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>¹In this case, by <em>similar</em>, I mean: any misunderstanding that can be attributed due to an Asperger sender intending a literal content, but a receiver interpreting a non-literal content.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38913,
"author": "ceoec",
"author_id": 28695,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28695",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This probably would be better as a comment, but I cannot comment yet so I have to write this as an answer:</p>\n\n<p>I work with children with high function autism/ aspie. I think the \"trolling\" part was Aspie learned it is not good to just say \"no I won't tell you\" so OP do not have the intention to be rude, indeed a lot of Aspie would say a lot of weird things when they are learning how to deny a request in a more socially acceptable manner. And saying no is somehow difficult for 'typically developing' person, so yes it is really hard for Aspie to do that in a proper manner. </p>\n\n<p>I think one safe approach would be just say no to the students, as in a teacher and student relationship, being direct would be okay, students may say you are strict (or even unkind), but at least they won't say you are weird. (But I won't suggest you to do so to your peers...)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38997,
"author": "Mark Joshi",
"author_id": 29181,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29181",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Certainly many mathematicians are strange in one way or another. In some departments to the point that not being so makes you stand out. In one very prestigious department I worked in, it was quite common to make statements like \" he was strange even by the demanding standards of this department.\"</p>\n\n<p>So I wouldn't rule out a mathematics academic career. That said, I think it's unwise to become a lecturer/professor if you don't actually enjoy teaching. </p>\n\n<p>I would echo what others have said regarding seek professional help. A large part of teaching is trying to understand the learner's point of view and this is roughly what Asperger's syndrome makes you bad at. </p>\n\n<p>One coping strategy I would suggest is that every time something goes wrong, make a note of what happened and work out what the correct response should have been. Then remember this and use it the next time the situation arises.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 39000,
"author": "user29493",
"author_id": 29493,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29493",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You wrote:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I met a student asking me for quiz contents tomorrow and who makes the quiz, because the ones I gave tend to be more difficult. I responded that any event is likely including I die because of traffic accident or suicide because of depression, and in the above case there will be no quiz to prepare for. And another quite unlikely event is I won Megamillion tickets and decided to quit grad school, so there will be no quiz too. Similar to this I also quoted possibility of me being late or there is a class cancellation due to snow storm. When he pointed out that no one can foresee these events, I suggested that is why having health insurance that enable me to see a therapist as well as covering physical diseases is important.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>This is a very odd response - if I had a teacher say something like that I would be alarmed as well.</p>\n\n<p>First of all, suicide, depression, personal health, and therapists are all private topics that are personal, alarming, and intrusive to bring up out of nowhere. These are things you should be very careful about discussing with others, especially in a professional context. When you're talking to students, you have to have different boundaries than when you're talking to a friend - you have to be professional and not bring up personal and private things, especially concerning and alarming things like therapists and depression and suicide.</p>\n\n<p>What were you thinking when you said that? Why did you bring that up? It's important to be aware of people's boundaries and how they might react when you say something, especially as a teacher.</p>\n\n<p>Second, it's not in any way relevant to what he asked - he was asking for information on the test and none of what you said has anything to do with that.</p>\n\n<p>I'm not sure if anyone's linked to this yet, but it would be good for you to read and study this and follow it when talking to people: <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle\">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle</a></p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I suggested that he should prepare for anything that might happen with the quiz, and take consideration of the probabilities to maximize his performance of quiz with the time and energy constraint available.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>This is oddly and very formally worded, but it's at least an answer to the question. Why not just give a simple and direct answer like \"Everything we talked about in class could be on the test.\" I thought people with Asperger's were often very direct - doesn't that strike you as a clear and direct answer, whereas talking about winning the lottery or snowstorms is off-topic?</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I also told him real life events often do not follow Bell curve and central limit theorem has limited value for random variable with no expectation exists.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Well yes, but again what does that have to do with anything?</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>To make sure he is not confused, later at night I sent an email to the class repeating my points and suggested everything in the book we learned so far can be tested, and the bonus problem content can be coming from anywhere.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Saying \"everything in the book can be tested\" is a fine answer, but I hope you didn't \"repeat the points\" about suicide - that's the kind of thing you could easily get fired for.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Later I received an email from the instructor of the course, claiming that the student was so unhappy that he suggested to remove me as an TA, because I made him \"extremely uncomfortable\" and \"a bit scared\".</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Not surprising, seeing as you brought up suicide and seeing a therapist. That tends to make people uncomfortable and scared.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>However, to be a responsible person I am confused what exactly went wrong.\n Is there anyway for me to avoid this kind of unwanted events in future? There is no prospect that I can \"convert\" to a normal person. And I do not want people to be unhappy with me for trivial events like this in future. I could have dismissed the case as the student being irrational, but I think there might be something deeper into it.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>In a word - boundaries. Be aware of what boundaries people have, what they expect and don't expect, what they are comfortable with and uncomfortable with. This isn't trivial or irrational - it's a big deal. When people's boundaries are violated, the way you violated that student's boundaries, they feel very uncomfortable and it will cause you a lot of problems.</p>\n\n<p>Suicide and mental health are an extreme example - that's the kind of thing people only talk about with people they're close to. Same goes for sex, religion, and politics. With people you don't know well, or people you have a professional relationship with (like students you teach) make sure you stay with \"safe\" topics of conversation. </p>\n\n<p>I would suggest finding a therapist or social skills group or someone who can talk to you about this and help you get a better understanding of people's boundaries and expectations and how to relate to people in a professional setting.</p>\n\n<p>By the way - this isn't just you. It's very difficult to figure out how to comfortably talk to people you don't know or people you have to be \"professional\" with, and this is true for everyone, Aspergers or not.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 39006,
"author": "Peter Bloem",
"author_id": 6936,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6936",
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"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Just to add to the ocean of answers:</p>\n\n<p>When people ask something, there's the literal question and the actual problem. Usually they have surprisingly little to do with one another. This counts double when it comes to students.</p>\n\n<p>I imagine the student was worried about not passing the test, and the uncertainty of what the test would contain was creating stress. They were looking to relieve this stress by obtaining more information. This is the kind of subtext that your condition blinds you to. I guess it's no use telling you to empathize with the student, since that's not really an option, although an analysis of the way people deal with uncertainty and stress might help you to understand some of the patterns.</p>\n\n<p>I think a good thing to do is to be up front about it. Tell people about your condition and what they can expect from you. Your student was already stressed by the test and her own uncertainty, so an unexpected response form the TA exacerbated the issue, and made her lash out (albeit through your professor). If your students know about your condition, and know how it works, they can help the communication from their side. They can be more explicit in their questions, and when you respond in a strange way, they'll know where it comes from and how to deal with it. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40480,
"author": "Lemon",
"author_id": 30849,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/30849",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My child was diagnosed mild Aspergers 2 years ago, and I found I have the same syndrome though I'm too late to be diagnosed. I'm in IT line which requires less communication more calculation. I prefer work/social/play with familiar people, nervous otherwise, good in maths, poor in language, communication. But people describe me nice, shy and smart. You'll be a good teacher in future, just need time to gain experience. Or do researching instead of teaching?</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 40540,
"author": "cbeleites unhappy with SX",
"author_id": 725,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/725",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Let me add some formulation suggestions, mainly in addition to <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/38886/725\">mhwombat's answer</a> and some feedback to the dialogue in the question.</p>\n\n<p>I think an important assumption of \"normal\" communication is that the words are meant to transport an information content > 0. </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>Refrain of adding irrelevant sentences: do not talk of generally known but typically irrelevantly low risks (car accident, suicide).<br>\nPeople may interpret things into them that you never intended to say. In particular, the fact that the risk is important enough for you to state it will be interpreted as being substantially above the known general <em>negligible</em> risk. I emphasized negligible because negligible translates to both negligible wrt. preparing for the exam and to neglecting to mention these risks in everyday spoken communication. </p></li>\n<li><p>If you keep a conversation going, people will probably take this as a hint that a) you <em>want</em> to keep the conversation going and b) you want to communicate some content. So, if you don't have a relevant statement to make, do not make a statement. No not make irrelevant statements (there are uses of this, also in exams, but maybe you should leave this to teachers who have a very keen perception of whether communication goes well, and who also know how to rescue failing communication).</p>\n\n<p>The dialogue you cite leaves the impression with me that you actively kept up the conversation. Yet below you state that it was extremely boring to you. Such a contradiction between predicted (impression) and literally stated desire/emotion/communicaton aim will mainly tell people that they cannot successfully recognize/predict what you want. Logical conclusion: they don't know what you want and the expectation shifts towards difficulty as in possible failure in communication also in the future. Plus: expect it to be hard work to communicate successfully with you.</p></li>\n<li><p>If you are not able to judge the students' emotions very well (with very well I actually mean a perception that is well above the average \"normal\" person's ability to judge emotions!), the time around exams is not a good time to try being funny or communicate by subtle hints.</p></li>\n<li><p>In contrast to what other people suggested, I don't see for the described situation that being short, direct, honest and to the point with the answers about the exam (\"I will prepare the quiz, and it can cover all the topics we had in the lecture so far.\") would make the students unhappy or anxious or upset. In particular: this is not upsetting at all as I'd consider this the \"default-value\" for the answer and therefore totally expected.<br>\nBut then I'm from a culture that has a reputation to be very direct.</p></li>\n<li><p>Even if the student realizes that you probably don't mean what they would usually expect to be the meaning, they will (possibly emotionally/unconsciously) conclude that they cannot properly communicate with you - and that is highly alarming to students facing an exam: the failed communication leads them to fear that the communication in the exam may go wrong as well. This is completely rational: they conclude from a failure that failure may occur - though at the same time it is not comprehensible to you if you cannot detect the failure in communication. And in exam situations the acceptable risk of failed communication is very low. </p></li>\n<li><p>You emailed</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>bonus problem content can be coming from anywhere</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>a \"less alarming\" formulation (assuming this covers the meaning you wanted to transport) could be</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <blockquote>\n <p> To solve the bonus problem, you'll have to transfer techniques covered in the lecture to solve a new type of problem.</p>\n </blockquote>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>This will be less alarming than \"can be everything\" because it is a positive and more precise statement of what the bonus question is about. </p></li>\n<li><p>In a comment above you told me: </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I do not want to give the false impression that they can prepare for the quiz.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>This was a highly unexpeced statement for me. In particular, the dialogue you described in the question did not suggest to me that this was a possible intention of yours. And I still find it slightly (situatively) contradictory to your statement \"before a test [...] spend more time to review\". I'm aware that I implicitly assumed that this statement would apply to the current test as well. </p>\n\n<p>I met very few exams for which no preparation was possible or reasonable. Preparation for me means increasing the understanding of the subject and connecting it to other subjects rather than being able to repeat stuff from a list. So if you really and literally mean the students cannot prepare for the exam, state it. Logically, if the students objectively cannot prepare, they also need not prepare - and because that is a very unusual situation, state this as well and in addition explain why they can and need not prepare for this exam - they'll be suspicious and not take your statement at face value otherwise:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <blockquote>\n <p>You cannot and need not prepare for this exam. Don't worry, this exam is meant to be taken without further preparation, because [reason].</p>\n </blockquote>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>with [reason] e.g. being \"you can solve all questions by logical thinking\"</p></li>\n<li><blockquote>\n <p>My points on extreme cases was a hint.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I wouldn't have gotten that hint. I <em>may</em> have gotten such a hint/nuance by someone whos communication I can judge very well. In the dialogue you quore, I'd have dismissed your sentences as weird/inadequate and possibly-to-probably irrelevant and my major conclusion would have been that I do not understand you reliably. Therefore, I would <em>not</em> even have looked for any hidden meaning: the chance of hitting the right hidden meaning [if there is any] would have been too low compared to the \"noise\" of obviously failed communication.<br>\nMy guess is: just as you cannot judge the nuances of what the students say, they (and I) cannot judge the nuances of what you say. Or maybe you overestimated the amount of \"guessing\" that goes on in \"normal\" communication. </p>\n\n<p>But the result is anyways a communication problem that goes both directions. I think the solution here again is to go for very clear and direct subject related sentences without hints or other kinds of hidden meaning, keeping in mind the \"> 0 information\" criterium. Plus building up a reputation of having such a direct style of meaning literally what you say. If people can trust that they just need to take you literally, things may be much easier for both sides. </p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>So, if it is not wise to restrict the world-view to bell-curve only, you could say:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <blockquote>\n <p> It is not wise to restrict yourself to bell-curves. </p>\n </blockquote>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Although, personally, I'd have not said anything at all. (Which, by the way may be taken as a hint or not, but this does not matter particularly - you are safe either way) </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>(resorted statements)</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><blockquote>\n <p>I want to let them know real life is often random and one has to make reasonable guess at times. </p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>While this is true in a narrow and literal sense, I have the suspicion that you may experience life (particularly where other people's reactions are concerned) as far more random than I do. E.g. most communication with other people (including their reactions) is highly logical and even predictable to me. I am not used to perceiving everyday life as random, although I professionally do lots of statistics and I often take the role of the one who points out what cannot be concluded due to randomness/noise. </p>\n\n<p>In the context of exam, I'd call randomness arbitraryness (of the examiner) and see it as totally inadequate. This would not be the \"narrow randomness\" of having different versions of the exam populated with random numbers to avoid cheating in the calculations, this is rather the randomness that means that the student has to be very knowledgeable in the subject in order to be able to <em>guess</em> what the examiner is driving at/wants to hear. </p>\n\n<p>In other words, be clear about the separation of different layers of meaning in the exam and don't mix them. The topic of the exam being randomness does not imply that questions or grading should be arbitrary. On the contrary: questions still should yield a reliable and reproducible measure of the students' abilities wrt the topic of randomness. </p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<hr>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>In this case the student would have to make an educated guess what might be on the quiz, and if he failed to do that he would have to study very hard in advance like I did, or more likely a combination of the two approaches.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Well yes, but again on a \"normal\" level this is obvious - also for the student. The \"> 0 information assumption\" means that explicitly stating this emphasises this educated guessing, so you transport a meaning that this is far more relevant in the present situation than usually. </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Neither solution is optimal but it would help out him much more this way than giving a few fixed topics and ask him to review these topics.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't agree, although I see your point. I may be thinking of a list of much broader topics than you think of, though. But IMHO the more general connections to other topics can only be made after one has mastered the narrower points and only the general level allows informed guessing. Otherwise the guess is not educated but wild. </p>\n\n<p>And again, there should be no need to guess \"what topic did the teacher have in mind here?\". But asking good exam questions is an art that few people master. </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p>Emotionally mature students are probably able to \"buffer\" some or even most \nof the \"weirdness\" due to your Asperger's in normal lecture situations (in particular if they know about your condition). But they are probably unable to do so in stressful situations like before/during an exam. So exams (including some time before and when handing back the exams) are a time where you need to be extra careful. </p>\n\n<p>As explained, failed communication will increase their stress/nervousness as in addition to the subject they realize they need to prepare for an additional psychological stress test. </p>\n\n<p>Last but certainly not least I want to point out that the nervousness of students before an exam may include conditions like exam anxiety. The combination of student anxious because of the fact that they are facing an exam (which can be totally independent of their ability wrt. the topic of the exam) with your Aspergers is IMHO just heading for trouble. </p>\n\n<p>Unfortunately, I cannot give any good advise on this: such a student would probably anyways try to not let you (or other examiners) know of their anxiety, particularly if that is triggered by a fear of examiners being unfair and arbitrary and taking advantage of their power [so it is tactically bad to show weakness]. If the communication with you does not work as with other people, this may trigger lots of suspicion and anxiety. And I guess this is a situation that you will basically be unable to recognize - most examiners may not be able to recognize it. For this, your only safe bet is to behave always as extremely reliable and fair and as predictable as possible.<br>\nPersonally, I'd think it much preferrable to have direct, honest, to the point and expicitly logical communication than failed guesses how a fancy communication could be. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 102803,
"author": "PhDinEng",
"author_id": 86509,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/86509",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Good for you for trying to find out what went wrong! </p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>What did the student went through? Why is he unhappy? I did not use\n any profane language or threatened him in any way. I think what I said\n are largely \"abstract nonsense\" everyone knows</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p><strong>Talking casually about death, dying, and suicide is a social taboo.</strong> Some people may interpret this as frightening. As someone with Asperger's, you may have to memorize certain social norms. Temple Grandin has noted (see her <a href=\"https://www.ted.com/talks/temple_grandin_the_world_needs_all_kinds_of_minds\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">TED talk</a>) that one thing that she thought was helpful is that when she was a child, social norms were taught to children (\"children were taught manners\"). Nowadays, most children are expected to pick up on social norms intuitively. I found this book helpful (even if you aren't a girl): \"A Smart Girl's Guide to Knowing What to Say\" by Patti Kelley Criswell (Author)</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Is there anyway for me to avoid this kind of unwanted events in\n future? There is no prospect that I can \"convert\" to a normal person.\n And I do not want people to be unhappy with me for trivial events like\n this in future.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>One thing you might want to do is just tell the class that you have Asperger's. You could start out a tutorial session with something like: </p>\n\n<p><em>\"Before I start talking about the material this week, I think I need to just let you know that I have Asperger's. This means that I don't pick up on social cues very well. So sometimes I might say things that are odd to you. I am sorry. I am trying to interact better with people, so if I do something odd, please feel free to tell me, and I will listen and take note. If you want to learn more about Asperger's, you can watch this great TED talk at this URL. Now let's get on with the material.\"</em> </p>\n\n<p>In my experience, students are much more willing to accommodate someone if they know what is going on, and if they know you want to improve. It might make them happy that they can teach <em>you</em> something.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38867",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/6335/"
] |
38,874 |
<p>I have recently been given an opportunity to attend a conference on Robotics although I don't have any paper to present. The registration fee is around 7k. Before spending such an amount, I wanted to know if it is worth attending conference sessions just for its sake. Please help.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38880,
"author": "Stephan Kolassa",
"author_id": 4140,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4140",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>There is one additional benefit of attending conferences: networking.</p>\n\n<p>Networking works best, of course, if you present a paper, because then you are formally advertising your work and yourself. But whether or not you are presenting, you should spend <em>a lot</em> of time talking to other people, getting to know them and getting <em>them</em> to know <em>you</em>. Spread your contact information and your research interests far and wide.</p>\n\n<p>No, this won't show up in your CV. But knowing people and being known is usually <em>far</em> more important than whether a conference or a conference paper shows up in your CV.</p>\n\n<p>Browse the many questions tagged <a href=\"/questions/tagged/conference\" class=\"post-tag\" title=\"show questions tagged 'conference'\" rel=\"tag\">conference</a> or <a href=\"/questions/tagged/networking\" class=\"post-tag\" title=\"show questions tagged 'networking'\" rel=\"tag\">networking</a> or <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/networking+conference\">both</a> for ideas on how to go about this. (Hint: start preparing <em>before</em> the conference, by checking who will present and who you will want to meet. Maybe even contact a few people beforehand and set up meeting.)</p>\n\n<p>Whether this is worth the registration fee (in whatever currency), plus travel time and costs will depend on you, your career plans and how well the conference and its attendees match your interests. I certainly have attended conferences without presenting for networking purposes.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38896,
"author": "Johnathan Clayborn",
"author_id": 29299,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29299",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I agree with Stephan. Just attending a conference is not useful for a CV. Speaking at a conference is helpful, but not attending one. Networking is certainly a valuable benefit of attending conferences. For me, personally, I will not spend the money in travel and other fees associated with the conference if I am not at least somewhat interested in what they are talking about, so I will hopefully learn something too. I also definitely agree with Stephan about knowing whom you will want to meet prior to going. Just walking around and meeting random people might not be very productive. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38901,
"author": "Phil",
"author_id": 19988,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/19988",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Well, I wouldn't put it on my cv. But there are a few reasons, in addition to networking, that it might be beneficial:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>It gives you a first hand account of the state of the art</li>\n<li>It gives you the opportunity to question the authors directly about the work to understand it more deeply. </li>\n<li>It gives you a broader perspective on your field (if you go to presentations that are not about the specific topic you are mainly interested in).</li>\n<li>You'll have a better idea about what goes on at conferences if you present at one in the future.</li>\n</ol>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38874",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29384/"
] |
38,875 |
<p>I'm a statistician being offered 45k CAD for a postdoctoral position in Canada. I have a few questions: </p>
<ol>
<li>Is this number negotiable at all? </li>
<li>Is it rude to ask for extra money to cover relocation expenses (US to Canada)? </li>
<li>The cost of a parking pass is 1000 CAD per year at this place (compared to 200 per year for faculty at my current university). Is it weird to ask for this to be compensated? </li>
</ol>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 44626,
"author": "Tony Albano",
"author_id": 33904,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/33904",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<ol>\n<li>In my experience, postdocs are grant-funded with a nonnegotiable salary. It doesn't hurt to clarify though.</li>\n<li>The department chairs I have known would not have considered this rude. Reimbursement for moving costs is often offered as a sort of signing bonus. </li>\n<li>Reimbursement for parking is unheard of in my experience. Again, asking politely shouldn't be a problem, but I wouldn't get my hopes up.</li>\n</ol>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 55240,
"author": "T K",
"author_id": 12656,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12656",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<ol>\n<li><p>I didn't negotiate a Canada offer and declined. After the fact, I was told it was negotiable once the colleague became a collaborator, but this was only because my postdoc was funded by an institute and he would have been sweetening the pot using his research funds in addition to the institute's money.</p></li>\n<li><p>You can always ask. Some postdocs do have moving expenses covered.</p></li>\n<li><p>I don't know.</p></li>\n</ol>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 55672,
"author": "I Like to Code",
"author_id": 8802,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/8802",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<h3>Q: Is the salary negotiable?</h3>\n\n<p><strong>Short answer:</strong>\nYes, it is,\nbecause principle investigators have some discretion\nabout how to use their research funding.</p>\n\n<p>Let me illustrate this point by sharing my experience.</p>\n\n<p>A few years ago, I applied for a postdoc at a Canadian university.\nI was originally offered a stipend of 36K CAD.\nAfter speaking to the principle investigators,\nthey decided to increase the stipend to 38K,\nand to pay for my medical insurance,\nwhich brought the total to about 40K.\n(I suspect that the reason they increased the offer is\nthat they learned that I was married with kids,\nand my wife was not working,\nso they were compassionate.\nHowever, they did not explicitly state why they increased the offer,\nso take this only as my best guess.)</p>\n\n<h3>Q: Are moving expenses covered?</h3>\n\n<p><strong>Short answer:</strong>\nMaybe. You need to ask.\nIt also depends on the type of postdoc.</p>\n\n<p>It can depend on what type of postdoc opportunity you have.\nI had a friend who took a 3-year postdoc at Berkeley\nand his job offer included relocation expenses.\nIn his case, because the job was for 3 years,\nit made more economic sense for the job offer to include relocation.\nBut if your job offer is only for 1 year,\nit may not normally include a relocation package.\nIncidentally, tenure-track job offers usually include\nsome amount of relocation allowance.</p>\n\n<h3>Q: Can I ask for compensation for parking?</h3>\n\n<p><strong>Short answer:</strong>\nYou can definitely ask, but I wouldn't get my hopes up.</p>\n\n<p>If the price for parking is 1000 CAD per year,\nit is possible that most students and even some faculty\nmay take public transport to school.\nYou should investigate the public transport options.\nAs a postdoc, I took a bus to and from school every day,\nwhich took at most 30 minutes if there was a long wait.\nIn fact, at that university,\nriding buses was free with a university card,\nwhich was a nice perk.</p>\n\n<h3>Conclusion</h3>\n\n<p>In the end, I declined the offer from a Canadian university\nand accepted a postdoc at another university.\nThe main reason why I chose a postdoc at another university\nis because I felt that the project was more interesting\nand a better fit for my skills.</p>\n\n<p>Personally, I did not think that salary was that important as a postdoc.\nMy mentality as a postdoc was that my postdoc was a temporary position,\nuseful as a stepping stone to a permanent tenure-track academic job.\nWhile a bigger postdoc salary is nice,\nthe most I could get might be 5K more a year.\nIf I instead focused on getting good research experience,\nand landing a tenure-track job,\nat that point my salary would be at least 80K a year,\nwhich is approximately double my postdoc salary.</p>\n\n<p>If for some reason having a high salary in the short-term\nis important to you,\nthen you shouldn't be looking for postdoc jobs,\nor even tenure-track jobs,\nbecause they don't pay that well.\nIn that case, it may be more expedient to get a job at\na bank, hedge fund, or in consulting,\nor even at a company like Google, Microsoft or Apple.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38875",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] |
38,876 |
<p>I am told that we can use copyrighted images in our lectures to students now as they are for purely educational purposes, as long as we correctly attribute them. That is to say there is no need to ask the permission of the copyright holders. </p>
<p>What is the status of using copyrighted images in conference talks? Does it also count as education?</p>
<hr>
<p>As pointed out, this will depend on the country in which the talk is given. Let me restrict the question to the US and UK in that case. If anyone knows the situation in another country then it would be great to hear that too of course.</p>
<p>In the UK, the reason why I suggested you could use copyrighted material in lectures without asking permission was <a href="http://lti.lse.ac.uk/copyright/copyright-2014.php#education" rel="noreferrer">http://lti.lse.ac.uk/copyright/copyright-2014.php#education</a> .</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38884,
"author": "Piotr Migdal",
"author_id": 49,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/49",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Legal status can vary by country, content and sometimes even - the intended audience.</p>\n\n<p>In many places you are allow to use otherwise copyrighted materials within <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">fair use</a>, e.g a figure from a paper.</p>\n\n<p>For things, which are not directly relevant to talk (e.g. \"let's put a nice stock image of a man with a plant\") the story may be different.</p>\n\n<p>In any case:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>from the practical perspective, you are unlikely to go to jail (or even: getting fined) for showing copyrighted images in an academic talk,</li>\n<li>from the legal perspective, unless you are a lawyer (or your country has a very clear law on copyright) you are unlikely to know wether is is legal or not. </li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Highly relevant:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/7620/can-i-use-images-showing-up-in-google-search-for-my-presentation-slides-without?rq=1\">Can I use images showing up in Google search for my presentation slides without violating any copyright?</a></li>\n</ul>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38894,
"author": "Johnathan Clayborn",
"author_id": 29299,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29299",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In the US this is legal and is covered under the "Fair Use Act".\n<a href=\"https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">Link</a> (<a href=\"https://web.archive.org/web/20210605143659/https://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html\" rel=\"nofollow noreferrer\">archived version</a>).</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 42621,
"author": "Heike R",
"author_id": 32181,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/32181",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p><strong>In Germany:</strong></p>\n\n<p>You are allowed to use copyrighted material for teaching and research (also conference talks) as long as it is not more than 10% of the original work or if it only concerns small works (less than 25 pages) and as long as it is only for a specific audience (one where you can name the participants afterwards). This is regulated by <a href=\"http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/urhg/__52a.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">UrhG §52a</a>, although the numbers are determined by several court decisions and not by the law itself.\nPresenting images from papers in a scientific and non-profit talk is legal.</p>\n\n<p>What is illegal: To upload the slides of the talk or a video of the presentation to the internet afterwards. This would violate the 'specific audience' clause since everyone could see it.</p>\n\n<p>Do not forget to cite the source of the images. This is always required.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38876",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/37765/"
] |
38,887 |
<p>I am a 29 year old female. I want to go back to school. I have been told that I have a <em>very</em> good chance at getting into a very good graduate computer science program (machine learning, AI, robotics, theoretical cs, so many algorithms... it's the real deal here, you guys). Due to cost, the fact I need to work full-time and giving myself the best chances for success, I will be doing this at a very slow, part-time pace. </p>
<p>As an undergraduate, I saw woman drop out for family, so my question is:</p>
<p><strong>How common is it for women to drop out of graduate school because they have children?</strong></p>
<p>I'm preferentially looking for answers that draw on personal experience or statistics. </p>
<hr>
<p>Some additional background you might find relevant:</p>
<p>My boyfriend/fiance/partner of 10+ years died about a year ago. I don't know what I'm doing about all that yet. </p>
<p>I have been out of school for a while. You don't really need a degree in IT and I hadn't really considered going back because it didn't seem manageable or practical with the rest of my life. But... now that life is gone, it's cool because it has to be, and I would have never even dared to dreamed about being able to enroll in this graduate program before. </p>
<p>I don't necessarily care if I have a family and/or kids but I'm fairly positive it will not happen on accident. To me, being with someone or married does not automatically mean having kids, either. For the sake of the question, when I am ready, I feel it will be very logistically easy for me to date again. </p>
<p>Articles like these motivate my question: </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2013/06/female_academics_pay_a_heavy_baby_penalty.html" rel="noreferrer">In the Ivory Tower, Men Only</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.nber.org/digest/aug04/w10331.html" rel="noreferrer">Work and Family on the Rise among College Graduate Women</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.nwlc.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/when_girls_dont_graduate.pdf" rel="noreferrer">When Girls Don't Graduate</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/07/for-female-scientists-theres-no-good-time-to-have-children/278165/" rel="noreferrer">For Female Scientists there's no good time to have children</a></li>
</ul>
<p>Helpful Articles:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://cgsnet.org/masters-completion-project" rel="noreferrer">Council of Graduate Schools' Master's Completion Project</a> (Perhaps combine that with statistics on the rate of pregnancy / childbirth among United States graduate students? There's data for <a href="https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-13-198" rel="noreferrer">unmarried Chinese graduate students</a>...)</li>
</ul>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38892,
"author": "Johnathan Clayborn",
"author_id": 29299,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29299",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>First of all, let me start out by saying that I am sorry for your loss. I cannot imagine what you must have gone through. With regards to your specific question, I cannot provide an answer from the \"as a woman\" perspective, but I can answer as a father, and as a graduate student. I've successfully completed my Master's Degree and I'm ABD status this week in my PhD. </p>\n\n<p>Graduate school is hard work. Lots of people drop out for a wide variety of reasons. Some people can't hack it mentally or emotionally. Some people get discouraged and give up. Some people have too much going on with their work. And some people do drop out for family reasons. I've been working full time and going to school full time since I started my Bachelor's program. It's tough, but not impossible. The biggest key to success that I've found is maintaining balance and effective time-management. If you become pregnant during your coursework almost every school should have a clause that allows you to take a temporary leave of absence from your program which will give you some time off right after childbirth. My own kids are young, but not babies. I facilitate my family time by working on my homework at night after they go to bed, or on the weekends when they are out playing. Having a set schedule certainly helps you succeed too.</p>\n\n<p>So, the short answer to your question is yes, people (men and women) do drop out of graduate school for family reasons. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38893,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>On questions of family, the road is a lot harder for women in academia than men. Some of that is biological, but most of it is cultural: there's still a <em>lot</em> of sexism both within academia and in the larger culture, and numerous studies have shown that women are judged more harshly than men for making the same choices. </p>\n\n<p>This all shows up in a phenomenon known as the \"leaky pipeline,\" which is <a href=\"http://ucfamilyedge.berkeley.edu/leaks.html\">quantified nicely here</a>. That particular data doesn't quantify graduate school, but it follows similar trends: at any given stage, women are somewhat (but not hugely) less likely than men to progress to the next stage, and this difference is amplified (again, significantly but not hugely) by having a family. Overall, this means that women are badly underrepresented in academia, particularly at the higher ranks. For your own goals of education, however, there is no reason to think that you are unlikely to be able to succeed: most who start, finish.</p>\n\n<p>However, I would question your assumption that the cost of education will mean that you need to work full-time and must go slowly. If you get into a <em>good</em> computer science Ph.D. program, <em>they</em> should be paying <em>you</em> as a full-time job and covering tuition. Some Masters' programs, particularly the really good ones, are the same way. If won't be great wages---typically, you are paid just a stipend that covers the cost of living in your areas---but a good program will generally enable you to dedicate yourself fully to it, which also greatly increases your probability of success.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 39010,
"author": "daaxix",
"author_id": 4572,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/4572",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>My wife and I both started graduate school, in STEM fields, in Ph.D. programs, a bit later than most. </p>\n\n<p>Due to this, we decided to have children during graduate school. Note that I am in the USA at the one of the top programs in my field at an RU/VH university.</p>\n\n<p>A few negative points are </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>As a graduate student, you are expected to work full time, <em>but</em> you are not paid enough to <strong>afford daycare costs</strong> for young children.</p></li>\n<li><p>For the first year of the child's life your research output <em>will be severely limited.</em> Some PIs may not like this.</p></li>\n<li><p>After children, you have to be very focused and disciplined to continue, time scarcity increases a great deal, and time is already scarce even if you are a single graduate student with no life.</p></li>\n<li><p>My wife had severe morning sickness, which decreased her research output. Pregnancy complications can affect your work.</p></li>\n<li><p>After you have children, being poor really starts to become a burden. After all, we want to give our children a good life.</p></li>\n<li><p>Your time in graduate school <em>will be extended.</em></p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>A few positive points are</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>Due do the nature of research and graduate school, hours are very flexible compared with a typical job. This allows for juggling of schedules when needed, etc. which is very helpful to us.</p></li>\n<li><p>The Ph.D. is less crucial than a post-doc or a tenure track position, so I would posit that there is less risk to have children during graduate school as opposed to other crucial academic career milestones. However, the caveat is that graduate students receive the <em>least money.</em></p></li>\n<li><p>Many PIs don't care what you do, as long as you make research progress. This makes it easy to work around a young child's needs. </p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>The way that we have dealt with this situation is by </p>\n\n<ul>\n<li><p>Having understanding PIs who also have children, and are flexible.</p></li>\n<li><p>Acquiring some debt (that we wouldn't otherwise incur) and I've done some lucrative consulting on the side. The consulting has however, increased the time to graduate in my program.</p></li>\n<li><p>Being very disciplined in our schedules and having our children in daycare/preschool so that we can work. This is <em>very expensive.</em></p></li>\n<li><p>Not having a social life (but graduate students aren't supposed have those anyway right?).</p></li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>To answer your question, for us it is working. However, I do know a few other couples who are doing this, one other couple is like us with both parents in graduate school, but nearly all of the others have only one parent in graduate school. </p>\n\n<p><strong>From my perspective, it appears that women leaving academia due to children is becoming less of a problem, but is still large, and unsolved.</strong></p>\n\n<p>Note : our university <em>does not</em> provide daycare to graduate students. They do provide a $1000 annual subsidy, but our daycare costs are $10,500 per year. These costs decrease for preschool, but are very expensive for the first three years.</p>\n\n<p>Second Note : My graduation time will likely be right around the 6.5-7 year mark, I had my mother die during my time in graduate school, and we have had two children, so the actual time increase wasn't obscene, but I already had an MS in Mathematics coming in and was expecting to finish in 3-4 years. My wife entered her program straight from BS and will probably finish in 5.5-6 years. </p>\n\n<p><strong>I would also like to say that the needs of the child and the lack of sleep disproportionately affect women</strong> in this situation, and this is a biological necessity in the first 2 years of the child's life. For this reason, equality for women in academia does not mean equal treatment, it means providing for the <strong>ability for women to have children if they so please, without it impacting their career!</strong> This necessitates providing more support for women and families to have careers <em>and children.</em></p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 63821,
"author": "confused",
"author_id": 32010,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/32010",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I would suggest reading Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. While the book doesn't directly address academia, it talks about this topic more broadly.</p>\n\n<p>Just because you plan to have children in the future, does not mean that you need to make choices based on hypothetical children today. Yes, being pregnant or a mother to young children is hard but it shouldn't deter you from achieving professional goals.</p>\n\n<p>I personally had multiple new mothers in my class when I was in graduate school. While all of them had a very hard time, none of them found motherhood as an obstacle to graduation and they all obtained a PhD. None of the people who dropped out of the program did so because they recently had a child.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 63822,
"author": "Fomite",
"author_id": 118,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/118",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I am not a woman, but I am in a field where women are the majority of graduate students, so I have a non-zero amount of personal experience watching my friends go through this.</p>\n\n<p>It's a harder road than you'd otherwise have - there's no escaping that, and while that's extremely unfortunate, it's also the current culture of academia. However, a large proportion of the women I knew while in graduate school had children, and to the best of my knowledge, this was the cause of exactly none of them dropping out. Several had more than one child.</p>\n\n<p>It is certainly difficult - a baby does not understand \"Please go to sleep, this paper is due tomorrow\", and several faculty members made not entirely supportive comments when it seemed like a substantial fraction of the department was suddenly pregnant, but I don't know of anyone who dropped out because of it. Of course personal circumstances will vary - but if it's something you want to do, it's certainly doable. One piece of advice I would have is to make sure to find a supportive supervisor - your time to graduation might be slightly longer, and having someone who doesn't view that as a failure is helpful.</p>\n\n<p>As an aside, I'm very sorry for your loss.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 63825,
"author": "paul garrett",
"author_id": 980,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/980",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I am not a woman, but I had a PhD student who was, and who was in her mid+ 30s in grad school, and had two kids while in grad school, and finished an excellent thesis in 6 years. Sadly, her (now ex-) husband was not helpful, in fact the opposite, etc., but she wanted both the kids and the mathematics. A very energetic, intelligent, and strong-willed person, yes, not to mention a bit more grown-up and focused than many grad students. She at first thought there was almost a \"rule\" that she'd have to drop out, but I assured her that there was no such rule, although there was the obvious practical need to figure out how to work things. (Amazingly, there is an almost-reasonable university-subsidized daycare... of course, the waiting list is longer than most people would imagine...)</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 102900,
"author": "nervousapplicant",
"author_id": 86619,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/86619",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>This comment from the OP struck me and I think it's something to keep in mind when answering the question:</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>I saw so many woman as an undergrad stop because they got married or something (which is fine). I have never looked into the graduate world before. So... I'm asking... \"what is typical?\" Do graduate students stop for family at the same rate I saw undergraduate students stopping for family?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>I don't know the details of your experience but it is certainly quite different from my own (woman in science at elite university). I saw zero undergraduates quit school because they got married or became a parent. There was one man who took a few months off because he knocked up his girl friend but he came back. There was one woman who dropped out for other reasons then later became pregnant. Even so, I believe she'll be returning next year. A few people at my university became engaged as undergrads but (with the exception of the guy that knocked up his girlfriend) none of them got married as undergrads. Even if they had, I can't imagine any of them dropping out because of it. My mom got knocked up with me and still finished her undergrad degree. Perhaps others could weigh in on their experience but <em>from my perspective</em>, I very much doubt graduate students drop out for family reasons at the rate you saw undergrads drop out.</p>\n\n<p>I recently got my undergrad degree and am waiting to hear back from PhD programs so I don't know as many graduate students as others on here might. I have only known one pregnant graduate student - she had her baby and is back to working on her Ph.D. Late-stage pregnancy and getting a tiny human out of your body might make it take a few months longer to get your degree but the length of time for finishing grad school is so varied anyways that I don't think it matters much in the grand scheme of things. I will say it's probably easier if only one parent is a graduate student (and the other has a stable job or works remotely). I also imagine it would be very, very difficult if the other parent is lazy or if one is a single parent but even then, it can still be done. I agree with the the other poster who says don't make choices based on hypothetical children. Also, if you're doing comp sci you will probably be able to make a decent salary later on so if you don't want to give birth at 45 or whatever you will be able to afford adoption or maybe even a surrogate. There are many options for having children.</p>\n\n<blockquote>\n <p>Due to cost, the fact I need to work full-time and giving myself the best chances for success, I will be doing this at a very slow, part-time pace.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>Do look into fellowships and scholarships for women in comp sci because there are many. In biology, it is typical to go bachelors -> PhD and it is typical to receive a stipend (~$30,000/year) during PhD studies. Can anyone comment on what is typical for comp sci at masters and PhD levels? There are also companies that reimburse tuition for higher level degrees.</p>\n\n<p>As an aside, I've looked at data of women in STEM and the rates of grad school graduation for women and men are pretty equal (at least since Title IX laws came into play) - it looks like the leaky pipeline issues happen earlier or later. The raw number of men and women is different but the rates are similar That's just me messing with data though.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38887",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29391/"
] |
38,889 |
<p>Do IEEE Journals accept LaTeX-formatted manuscripts using the standard <code>article</code> or <code>proc</code> class provided by LaTeX?</p>
<p>It is not made clear to me, if I should stick with the <code>IEEETrans</code> class IEEE has provided me with or I can just use the standard article classes - pre-installed with LaTeX - and submit my manuscript this way. </p>
<p>Thanks in advance</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38890,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>My reading is that you can submit anything that complies with the rules on <a href=\"http://www.computer.org/web/peer-review/journals#Manuscript%20Types%20&%20Page%20Lengths\" rel=\"nofollow\">Manuscript Types and Lengths</a>, but if you actually use the template for the journal you are submitting to, they really, really appreciate it. If your article is accepted, you will have to work with them to reformat it to use the specific journal's style.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38895,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I disagree with Bill Barth's answer: I strongly believe that you should use the LaTeX classes that IEEE has provided you with. The reasons are two-fold:</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li><p>The reviewers will be used to almost always seeing IEEE submissions in IEEE standard formats. If you submit in another format, it will likely prejudice the reviewers against you, as it will appear \"amateurish.\" Whether or not this is fair, it is a risk you are taking with your paper that there is no need to take.</p></li>\n<li><p>Many IEEE journals have length constraints, and some are quite adamant about them. If you submit in a non-standard format, it will be difficult to tell whether you are actually complying with the length constraints or not. This may annoy the editor, again unnecessarily.</p></li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>IEEE formats are pretty easy to use, and have really good instructions. Since that is the case, I simply see no up-side to avoiding the standard formatting, and plenty of down-side.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/14
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38889",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/27067/"
] |
38,905 |
<p>Why as the level of a college course goes up, is the course generally more specific and more specialized but not necessarily the easier one on the lower level, also you don't have to have the knowledge of the previous class, even if it served as a prerequisite?</p>
<p>For example, you study general biology first, then study anatomy or endocrinology, but you probably won't need to have the knowledge of general biology to study anatomy or endocrinology.</p>
<p>Is there any reason that every subject appears to be in that pattern?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38908,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>I strongly dispute your assertion that knowledge of the more general subject is not needed for the more specific subjects. To use your own example, general biology will include general cell anatomy and metabolism and probably some basics of evolution. More specialized courses like anatomy and endocrinology will make no sense without these basics.</p>\n\n<p>Even when a direct subject material connection is not obvious, in a well-designed set of courses there is often an important dependence in skills. For example, in the mathematics classes that I took, there was not much direct connection in material between Analysis and some the higher-level subjects like Abstract Algebra and Topology that had it as a required prerequisite. However, Analysis was the subject where students were expected to learn how to properly approach and formulate mathematical proofs, and the higher-level subjects assumed these skills. Likewise, many engineering departments have a required \"general engineering\" subject for freshmen, which drums in the general philosophy of engineering through hands-on applications in various areas: even if an electrical engineer never uses a machine-shop again, the \"engineering way of thinking\" that they have learned will be critical to their success later on.</p>\n\n<p>Returning, then, to your basic question: there's an awful lot of knowledge in the world, and much of it simply <em>is</em> very specialized. General classes give the foundation required by many different specialized subjects, and so a well-designed curriculum tends to naturally form a \"tree\" structure that starts general and becomes more specialized as one progresses deeper into a subject.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38910,
"author": "410 gone",
"author_id": 96,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/96",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It's because of a combination of several reasons.</p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>There is knowledge overlap between the general and the specific.</li>\n<li>The general gives context, and thus meaning, to the specific.</li>\n<li>Complex systems such as biological systems are rich in emergent phenomena: having an understanding of the system is crucial to understanding one of its components.</li>\n<li>There is skills overlap: develop the skills in the general, and apply them to the specific.</li>\n<li>It's economically efficient to teach it that way: general basic courses form the foundations for a whole host of later specialisms.</li>\n<li>It's economically efficient to learn it that way: there are very few biology opportunities for someone who knows the rudiments of endocrinology and no other biology. If you want economically useful endocrinology, you're going to have to learn it to quite a deep level.</li>\n</ol>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38905",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/1391/"
] |
38,916 |
<p>One of our thesis advisers insists (<em>not</em> suggests) that we include the title of the journal we are citing in the introduction, one part of which is a paragraph containing some of the reviews we will be expounding more on the next chapter. </p>
<p>So far, almost all the studies I’ve seen only use in-line citation in their literature review. Our adviser made it seem that it is a wrong practice to do this without mentioning the title. I don’t think it is, based from what I’m usually reading and I think it’s good because it reduces the length of the paper (especially when the cited titles are loooong). Also, the title of the cited works are included in the bibliography section anyway.</p>
<p>Our other thesis adviser neither supports him nor discourage us from following him in this matter. (There are other times though that this happens.)</p>
<p>I want to do the in-line citation, but I know he’ll insist that again. If I reasoned out, he won’t listen to me (based from previous attempts). </p>
<p>In our university, our advisers are there just to guide us and not to grade our thesis. (But their direction in making our thesis will definitely affect our grade, of course.)</p>
<p>What should I do?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38922,
"author": "xLeitix",
"author_id": 10094,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/10094",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>One of our thesis advisers insists (not suggests) that we include the title of the journal we are citing in the introduction</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>So do it. Questions of style are pretty much always down to taste of the involved individuals. If that for whatever reason is important to one of your advisors (although it does sound highly unusual), then why not just do it? Is that really a battle you want to fight against the person grading your thesis?</p>\n\n<p>I would understand pushing back against this of this was a paper that <em>other</em> researchers will review, but outside from your thesis advisors, a thesis is pretty much a write-only document anyway.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38928,
"author": "Wrzlprmft",
"author_id": 7734,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/7734",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Your advisor may be referring to or be inspired by the following:\nAll journals I know require you to use a complete citation¹ in the rare case that you want to cite something <em>in the abstract</em> of your paper (<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.91.022115\" rel=\"nofollow\">example</a>).\nThis makes sense as there are some cases in which people only have access to the abstract and thus a stand-alone citations are desirable.</p>\n\n<p>However, this does not apply to the introduction (of any kind of work) and I would not see any good reason for it. Moreover this has the following problems:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Unless you use this citation style throughout your thesis, it would make your citation style inconsistent, which is confusing for the reader.</li>\n<li>It interrupts the regular text flow and thus makes the text more annoying to read.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>Whether this is worth starting a quarrel is something only you can decide as it depends on the influence of your advisor and the risks you are willing to take. Most importantly you should find out the opinion on this by whoever will actually read and grade your thesis. If your advisor has some influence but will never read your final thesis, you could change the citation style just before printing.</p>\n\n<p>Either way, you can ask your advisor whether he has any other argument for this other than his own opinion (but again you are taking a risk here, only you can evaluate). After all, he might give bad advice to other people in this regard – or we are all missing a good reason for this advice.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><sup>\n¹ Containing sufficient information to uniquely identify the cited work, usually author, journal and year, sometimes also the page number, but usually not the title.</p>\n\n<p></sup></p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38916",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29349/"
] |
38,917 |
<p>I am trying to help assess grad school applications this year but have little experience. In most cases I can work out a rough ranking but I find Italian university grades very hard to understand. For example, we have one candidate with</p>
<ul>
<li>Master degree in Information Technology (Date) University of Catania
Grade: 1st (Italian grade: 110/110 cum laude)</li>
<li>Bachelor degree in Information Technology (Date) University of
Catania Grade: 2.1 (Italian grade: 110/110)</li>
</ul>
<p>Does this rank the student as being the top of their year or do many people get 100% in an Italian university?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38918,
"author": "Aubrey",
"author_id": 26682,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26682",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>It seems to me that without having specific information (for example, the year of graduation), it is impossible to give you a proper answer.</p>\n\n<p><em>110/110 cum laude</em> means that it is top of the class (it's the maximum possible result), but if we knew the year we could search the percentage of students who got the same result in that class. \nIn the end: the results are really good, but without a bit of research we cannot know exactly how good they are related to others. </p>\n\n<p><strong>Update</strong>: you can see some statistics <a href=\"http://www2.almalaurea.it/cgi-php/universita/statistiche/tendine.php?LANG=en&CONFIG=profilo\" rel=\"nofollow\">here</a>.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38923,
"author": "Massimo Ortolano",
"author_id": 20058,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/20058",
"pm_score": 6,
"selected": true,
"text": "<blockquote>\n <p>Does this rank the student as being the top of their year or do many people get 100% in an Italian university?</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n<p>110/110 <em>cum laude</em> is the maximum obtainable result for a graduation in Italy. To achieve this result a student should pass most of the exams with a grade equivalent to that of US A/A+ and produce a very good dissertation. Take into account that in Italy, typically, exams are not graded on a curve.</p>\n\n<p>More specifically, exam pass grades in Italy range from 18 to 30. To have the possibility to get a final grade of 110/110, a student should typically average about 28 or more along the 3 years of the BsC degree or along the 2 years of the MsC degree.</p>\n\n<p>However, the relative number of students who achieve this result can depend on the field and can vary between universities (this is a major source of problems when comparing grades). Unfortunately statistical data about grades are not easily found on universities web sites (e.g. I couldn't find these data for my university). Maybe the consortium <a href=\"http://www.almalaurea.it/en\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Alma Laurea</a> might provide general statistical information. </p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><strong>Edit I:</strong> I've found some statistical data: <a href=\"https://www.almalaurea.it/sites/almalaurea.it/files/docs/universita/profilo/profilo2014/rapporto2014-profilo_volume-completo.pdf\" rel=\"noreferrer\">this pdf file</a> from Alma Laurea contains a report on the 2013 graduates (unfortunately, it is in Italian only). On p. 120 there is a graph which shows grade classes vs field. For the engineering field (ingegneria), 16% of the students achieved the maximum result of 110/110 <em>cum laude</em>.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><strong>Edit II:</strong> As <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/26682/aubrey\">Aubrey</a> noted in <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/38918/20058\">his answer</a>, the Alma Laurea web site contains also a <a href=\"http://www2.almalaurea.it/cgi-php/universita/statistiche/tendine.php?LANG=en&CONFIG=profilo\" rel=\"noreferrer\">searchable database</a> of graduates' profiles. For example, for the year 2013, for the Department of Electric, Electronic and Computer Engineering (Information Technology probably belongs to that Department) at the University of Catania, the database reports <a href=\"http://www2.almalaurea.it/cgi-php/universita/statistiche/framescheda.php?anno=2013&corstipo=tutti&ateneo=70008&facolta=944&gruppo=5&pa=70008&classe=tutti&corso=tutti&postcorso=tutti&disaggregazione=tutti&LANG=en&CONFIG=profilo\" rel=\"noreferrer\">these data</a>. The average grade for the MsC degree is 107.5/110 (110/110 <em>cum laude</em> is considered as 113/110 for the calculation of the average).</p>\n\n<p>For comparison, and to show that there can be a large spread on the averages, for the same year and the same kind of Department, graduates from the <a href=\"http://www2.almalaurea.it/cgi-php/universita/statistiche/framescheda.php?anno=2013&corstipo=tutti&ateneo=70032&facolta=899&gruppo=5&pa=70032&classe=tutti&corso=tutti&postcorso=tutti&disaggregazione=tutti&LANG=en&CONFIG=profilo\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Politecnico di Torino</a> (my university) have an average grade of 99.6/110 and those from the <a href=\"http://www2.almalaurea.it/cgi-php/universita/statistiche/framescheda.php?anno=2013&corstipo=tutti&ateneo=70026&facolta=765&gruppo=5&pa=70026&classe=tutti&corso=tutti&postcorso=tutti&disaggregazione=tutti&LANG=en&CONFIG=profilo\" rel=\"noreferrer\">University of Rome</a> an average grade of 101.8.</p>\n\n<hr>\n\n<p><strong>Edit III:</strong> Last but not least, students can ask to their universities the so called <a href=\"http://ec.europa.eu/education/tools/diploma-supplement_en.htm\" rel=\"noreferrer\">Diploma Supplement</a>, a document which should help the international recognition of the qualifications. This document provides information on the Italian grading system and reports the corresponding student's grades in the <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECTS_grading_scale\" rel=\"noreferrer\">ECTS grading scale</a>. So, in case of doubts, better ask foreigner students to attach this document to the application documentation. </p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38917",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29418/"
] |
38,930 |
<p>Why do professors take on service duties, such as reviewing papers for a journal, or sitting on university committees?</p>
<p>What benefit does this have to their careers? I can't imagine they <em>enjoy</em> reviewing papers, at least not more than all the other things they need to fit into their busy schedule.</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38931,
"author": "J W",
"author_id": 12339,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12339",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Taking on service duties demonstrates to the community, including co-workers and superiors that you are willing to roll up your sleeves and pitch in; it demonstrates a certain level of team spirit. Not doing so could get noticed at some stage and might affect your reputation as a good employee or community member.</p>\n\n<p>A benefit from sitting on certain committees is that it could allow you to influence policy or decision making.</p>\n\n<p>You could also derive a certain feeling of personal satisfaction from undertaking service duties.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38933,
"author": "Bill Barth",
"author_id": 11600,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/11600",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": true,
"text": "<p>Most professors are required by their departments to do some sort of service to the university and department. It's a duty of their job, often assigned by their department chair, and may be required as part of their tenure case. Someone who is actually a professor may be able to say more. </p>\n\n<p>Paper reviewing, and the peer review system as a whole, is a cooperative system. Profs need peer-reviewed publications to get tenure, so someone has to do the reviewing. Nobody gets explicit points or credit for reviewing, but if everyone tried to free-ride, then no papers would get reviewed, and the system would collapse. As a non-professor, I don't do as much reviewing (dozens of papers a year) as my professorial colleagues (hundreds per year, often, depending on field), but every time I submit an article to a journal, I'm asked to do a review by the editor, which helps keep me involved in reviewing. I suspect that people also don't want to develop reputations as free riders, so when asked to review, within reason, they do it. </p>\n\n<p>In addition, sitting on a program committee for a conference involves a lot of reviewing, and it can be a great way to meet and network more closely with more senior or more junior researchers depending on your own level, both of which have their advantages. Doing both kinds of reviewing and doing it well can help one build a reputation as someone who supports the system. Besides the general benefits of a good reputation, it may lead to program committee chair positions, other conference organizing positions, and journal editorships. </p>\n\n<p>In the end, having a bad reputation for not reviewing and not doing other kinds of service could seriously affect one's tenure case or future job prospects. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38934,
"author": "jakebeal",
"author_id": 22733,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/22733",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>In addition to the other good answers here, service is also a good way to promote something that you actually believe in:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Do you like Conference X and want it to be better? Somebody's got to run it, and run it well, or else it's going to be a crappy conference.</li>\n<li>Don't like jerk reviewers? Be a thorough reviewer who gives constructive criticism.</li>\n<li>Were you helped by others in any way? Step up to do the same and <a href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pay_it_forward\">pay it forward</a>.</li>\n</ul>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38948,
"author": "Tom Au",
"author_id": 755,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/755",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>A professor that wants his career to survive needs to help his university to survive. </p>\n\n<p>Two \"survival\" tasks for the university are reviewing others' papers, so that the university will continue to be seen as a source of research, and \"administrative\" tasks that allow the university to continue operating.</p>\n\n<p>Not every professor will enjoy doing both sets of tasks. Some will prefer one to the other, and specialize in those, while a few can do \"nothing\" and let others carry the burden for them.</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38949,
"author": "user6726",
"author_id": 28972,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28972",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>1: It is a job requirement (relevant to tenure, promotion and raises, being allowed to have graduate students, and in extreme cases, keeping your job). 2: It can be in your self interest to support good research and weed out bad research. Likewise teaching, and policies about teaching (such as, what courses are required, what can be used to satisfy generic requirements).</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38930",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24384/"
] |
38,937 |
<p>One of my research papers have been accepted to a very prestigious conference (top most in my field of study in Computer Science).
Since I am not a full time student, university rules do not allow for funding my travel and conference registration charges. Also, I do not earn enough to support my own travel to a different continent. Moreover, my advisor, who is also a co-author in the paper cannot travel due to personal issues. </p>
<p>The conference website doesn't mention about any kind of support neither have I ever seen(short career) such a support being provided. </p>
<p>So my questions are:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Should I rather target journals for publications since most of the reputable ones in my field are free to publish but may take anywhere between 1-2 years to get accepted. Moreover, they may require more comprehensive work and analysis which I may not always be able to commit to, resulting in my work lying unpublished.</p></li>
<li><p>Is it normal to just aim for journal publications ?</p></li>
<li>I am a Phd Student. I want to go in academia in future. I believe aiming for journal publication would result in less number of publications for me. Would it affect my career in future ?</li>
</ul>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 39016,
"author": "Jacques Wainer",
"author_id": 28968,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/28968",
"pm_score": 2,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Very likely having only journal publications will NOT harm your future career prospects. Let me elaborate. </p>\n\n<p>If you plan a career outside the US, this is even truer. As far as I understand most countries are moving towards a more journal evaluation of computer science. I cannot point to a paper to that effect, but most of the papers that discuss conference x journals in CS are from non US researchers, which may indicate that there is some pressure in these countries to move out of the conference publishing business-as-usual model for CS. </p>\n\n<p>For a career within the US, @jakebeal answer to <a href=\"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38086/why-are-conference-papers-so-important-in-computer-science-cs\">this Academia question</a> seems to suggest that journal publications are also the important metric of evaluation in \"lesser institution\". </p>\n\n<p>I heard from someone that was applying for faculty positions two years ago that the most prestigious CS departments were only considering candidates that had at least 1000 citations - so the most prestigious institutions do not seem to care for number of publications and where (this is hearsay information). </p>\n\n<p>Now for the caveats, as you realize, a journal-based career will imply in less papers - which I argue is not necessarily a problem, but you have to be sure that you will have some paper/papers published when you apply for a job. Avoid, if you can, journals with too long a review cycle - you may not have any/enough papers published by the end of your PhD. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 147854,
"author": "a3nm",
"author_id": 17423,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/17423",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>Yes, I'm afraid that having only the opportunity to publish in journals will harm your career prospects:</p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>you will appear to have published less than someone who could publish the same work first at a conference and then at a journal;</li>\n<li>journals have a far longer review cycle so getting journal papers out during your PhD will take time.</li>\n</ul>\n\n<p>In addition to what was suggested in the other answers, you could try to contact the conference organizers (before submitting) and ask to give a talk remotely. If you know some colleague who is attending the conference, you could also ask them to present the paper on your behalf even if they are not an author.</p>\n\n<p>Your situation is a prime example of why mandatory travel to publish in conference proceedings, which is the norm in CS, is a broken system.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38937",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/2823/"
] |
38,942 |
<p>I'm currently an undergraduate at a prestigious private university in the U.S. I'm majoring in Physics, Math, and Computer Science and currently am a junior. I've taken 5 graduate level courses so far (including Real Analysis and Algorithms) and have undergraduate experience working in a lab in a field unrelated to quantum computing (for which I'm in the process of writing a paper about). I've also taken a course in quantum computing, 2 semester of undergraduate quantum mechanics, 2 semesters of discrete math, and a course on complexity theory. I plan to take 2 semesters of grad quantum in my senior year as well as 2 semesters in mathematical logic. </p>
<p>I'm interested in going to graduate school for theoretical work in quantum computing and quantum information theory. I'm wondering if I should be aiming to apply to Computer Science, Math (Applied I would guess), or Physics departments if I want to do research in those fields. </p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38943,
"author": "Davidmh",
"author_id": 12587,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/12587",
"pm_score": 4,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>You should aim for whichever department has people working on the topic.</p>\n\n<p>Quantum Computing is somewhat multidisciplinary, and not present in every university. So, before applying, check where are the quantum computing groups and follow them. Your background seems to be a good fit for either side.</p>\n\n<p>By the way, I wouldn't be surprised if there was somewhere a department dedicated to quantum computing. Recently I saw a \"department of glycoscience\".</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38945,
"author": "Ben Bitdiddle",
"author_id": 24384,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/24384",
"pm_score": 3,
"selected": false,
"text": "<ol>\n<li>Figure out which conferences (and/or journals) are strong in quantum computing (your quantum computing professor would be a good person to ask about this).</li>\n<li>Figure out which professors publish the most in those venues.</li>\n<li>Apply to wherever those professors are.</li>\n</ol>\n\n<p>Good luck!</p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38955,
"author": "D.W.",
"author_id": 705,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/705",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The general principle is: study each place you are considering applying, and look at the faculty in each of those departments to find where the faculty who work on quantum computing are affiliated with -- and then apply to that department.</p>\n\n<p>You don't say what kind of research you want to do, but here are some guesses about where you're most likely to find folks. If you want to study algorithms, computer science departments are most likely where you will want to be. If you want to do experimental work (build experimental apparatus), a physics department is a good bet. Math departments are less likely to be a good fit. There will always be exceptions -- these are just some guidelines.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38942",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29437/"
] |
38,944 |
<p>I am a computer science student from Turkey. While I was checking the websites and publications of various CS Professors in Turkey for my future studies, I noticed a strange trend. (Excluding minor exceptions)</p>
<p>Usually, these professors hold a Ph.D from leading western institutions, and during their Ph.D they have published papers at extremely competitive top venues, like ICCV, ICDM, ICML and other places depending on their research interests. But, after returning back to Turkey and starting in an academic position, they can't even get their papers published in second tier venues.</p>
<p>So, what might be the reason for this ? If these people can publish during their Ph.D then why can't they do now ? Also, CS is not a field where extremely expensive lab equipment is required. So why are these people unsuccesful at publishing in top conferences/journals ?</p>
|
[
{
"answer_id": 38946,
"author": "RoboKaren",
"author_id": 14885,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/14885",
"pm_score": 5,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>The problem that faces faculty at second- (and lower-) tier institutions including those in foreign countries is that research is often not valued or not given the resources necessary to flourish.</p>\n\n<p>For example, at many national universities faculty have considerable responsibilities other than research, including teaching and national and local service. They may not have enough (or any) quality graduate students to help with teaching, to inspire them to explore new research areas, or to conduct research together. They may also have much more administrative duties with much less administrative support. </p>\n\n<p>Finally, there may be little incentive for them to do or publish research. They may have civil service salaries that are not adjusted for research output. External consulting or tutoring may be more lucrative than doing work within the university. </p>\n"
},
{
"answer_id": 38984,
"author": "JaT",
"author_id": 29480,
"author_profile": "https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29480",
"pm_score": 1,
"selected": false,
"text": "<p>I think that if the professor really published during his PhD, then probably it's a matter of not enough incentives in his home country (that is, he just needs to teach some courses per year, and scientific production is not a pre-requisite for tenure). In my country, for instance, in one of the most reputable universities, hiring equals tenure.</p>\n\n<p>However, if he didn't publish during PhD, then one of the possibilities is that he just can't do research (not that he is not capable, maybe he just doesn't fit). As far I'm concerned, to get in top10 univ. at US you just need very good grades and excellent LoR, so it's perfectly possible that a very smart yet not good at research do PhD studies at top10. \nThen, univ. back in their home country hires them due to prestige of top10, even if there are better researchers that did top50, for example.</p>\n"
}
] |
2015/02/15
|
[
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38944",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com",
"https://academia.stackexchange.com/users/29439/"
] |
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