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2013/06/27 | 744 | 3,111 | <issue_start>username_0: Would it be out of the ordinary to get a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering and then go for a Masters in something like Civil or Structural Engineering?
I don't know a lot about how transitioning to a Masters program works.. Do people usually continue on in the same field, or is branching out common?<issue_comment>username_1: This depends on where you are. In the US, this would generally not be too difficult, particularly if one uses elective courses at the bachelor's level to take some of the courses in the "new" field.
Here in Germany, it would actually be almost **impossible** to switch as you've suggested. The reason for this is that the "prerequisite" for enrolling as master's student in a particular field is usually taken to be the *bachelor's degree in the same field as taught at the university!* This is known as a "consecutive" degree requirement, and makes life very difficult for people coming from outside Germany.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I know it is defintly possible. My father is a civil engineer and a couple of his coworkers have gone that route. I also know if you are trying to go into civil, many civil engineering companies like to hire a few mechanical engineers.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_3: At least in the US, that is very common. Obviously, it's not as common as getting a Masters in the same area as your Bachelors, but it's still pretty run-of-the-mill. This is especially true when there's some sort of overlap in the two fields, as there is between Mechanical and Civil/Structural Engineering.
A lot of top schools accept applicants into engineering Masters programs who lack engineering undergraduate degrees and even discuss this on their websites ([Berkeley](http://www.ce.berkeley.edu/grad/admissions/requirements), [Purdue](https://engineering.purdue.edu/ABE/Academics/Grad/no_engineering_degree.html), etc; I know those particular links are not for civil engineering, but they should at least highlight that it's pretty common for students to tweak their interests between undergrad and grad school). A simple Google search will bring up even more examples.
There are even programs out there specifically designed for people to make these sorts of switches (and even bigger ones). [Boston University's LEAP](http://www.bu.edu/eng/academics/special-programs/leap/) is one example where students can have majored in just about anything and convert to engineering at the Masters level.
Upvotes: 0 <issue_comment>username_4: It's pretty common, at least in the US. I, personally, have an undergrad degree in Anthropology, and am studying Management Information Systems/IT Project Management in grad school. I just had to take a few prerequisites before I could start my master's classes. The way it worked for me is I was granted "conditional acceptance" to my master's program, with the condition that I had to complete all the prereqs (3 classes, in my case) within a year. Talk to the advisers in the master's program you want to do, they should have all the information you need.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/06/28 | 1,159 | 5,188 | <issue_start>username_0: By the time I apply for a PhD, I will have almost a year of experience as a Research Assistant, but I doubt I will have a paper published till then. The project is still in the data analysis stage, and it will most probably be in the review stage when I apply. Other than this job, I have no other research experience/papers/projects that are much relevant. Though I have 1.5 years of corporate experience in IT.
I think the above might be a common cause for concern, especially for people looking to switch fields, and thus hope the question is qualified enough for a general audience.
As for my particular case, I am looking for PhD programs at the intersection of Neuroscience and Computer Science (e.g. Cog Sci, Computational Neuroscience, Neural Engineering etc). I have a bachelors in Computer Science, but my grades are bad. My GRE score is quite good however, and I'm from a well-known college in my country.<issue_comment>username_1: This is a difficult question to answer and I know little about the intersection of CS and neuroscience. I do know a *little bit* about the intersection of CS and social sciences (i.e. HCI/information sciences) so I will write about that. In addition, I am the student representative on the admissions committee of our department so I have *some limited* experience with that process as well.
You do not **need** a publication to apply for PhD in the US. For other countries, it might be different and I do not have that information. *Potentially,* you will be more competitive if you have a publication. But remember, that all publications are not created equal. If you have a first author paper (or otherwise depending upon the publication standards in your field) in a top ranked journal/conference in your field, then you are competitive (**assuming that other parts of your application pass muster**).
If that publication is in a lesser known journal/conference, you still have displayed some knowledge about how to conduct and publish research - which in the end is better than nothing.
However, in my experience, I have seen that **detailed** letters of recommendation from authors known to members of the admissions committee are usually given way more weight than any published research.
Also, take my words with a pinch of salt. Everything varies from field to field and from year to year.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: I can only answer from my experience as well, as I am in Australia and studying a physics PhD - my supervisor advised me that it is always good to have some publications under your belt before graduation - makes it a bit easier to defend the thesis/pass examination (we don't do thesis defence in Australia, or at least, at my university).
The reason why it is beneficial is because as you have had part(s) of your research published, it has already been reviewed and accepted in the scientific community.
However, having said that, I was not published at all in my MSc and I had very little difficulty. You do have experience in research with your job and significant IT experience, as well as a very strong letter of recommendation (what got me over the line). You may want to contact the admissions officers of where you are intending to apply to discuss these concerns.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_3: I am a PhD student of neuroinformatics in UK and my background is computer science. I think I know a bit about the intersection of neuroscience and CS.
Theoretical/computational neuroscience is a growing field and as far as I am aware people with physics/CS background are very much needed. Experimentalists have a whole wealth of data but they usually don't have skills or time to analyse the data, create models, run simulations and obtain predictions.
You don't need publications to be accepted to a PhD programme. There are actually some PhD students who didn't publish a paper during their programme at all... Having good grades and recommendation letters helps but I would risk to say that primarily you need to show a genuine interest in the field, show that you want to find answers to certain questions etc. You already have an experience as a Research Assistant and definitely it is your strength. Focus on what skills you already have and not what you are lacking. If, for example, you are a brilliant programmer in a couple of languages and handle huge databases well, try to sell that. There must be some labs where your skills are on high demand.
Another thing is what university/lab you would like to aim at. If you want to work for top researchers in the field, it might get very competitive and not having good grades and publications works against you. But of course there is a number of less known labs that work on interesting projects and have various collaborators around the world.
Finally, as already mentioned in comments - get in touch with the professors, find out about their research, read their papers, raise some questions. And remember that some labs might be interested in working with you but cannot offer you any funding. In that case it still might work OK as there is various ways to obtain individual grants.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/06/28 | 1,081 | 4,648 | <issue_start>username_0: I have a B.Tech (Bachelors of Technology) from IIT Madras (class of 2000) and looking to change tracks from my current job in the software industry. In university, I specialized in computer science and engineering.
I want to know if I can get paid as a faculty for teaching at university level either in private or public universities. I’m also interested to learn what possible salary ranges I should expect.<issue_comment>username_1: (U.S. answer follows)
It is virtually impossible to get a teaching job at the college or university level without an advanced degree at the Master's or PhD (or terminal professional degree) level. Most faculty have a terminal degree. The opportunities for teaching with a Master's are limited, especially because competition is high and even collegiate level positions that are open to Master's holders still attract PhDs. Master's degree holders are normally limited to non-tenure track teaching positions and adjunct teaching positions.
If you really do want to be a teacher without an advanced degree, there are opportunities at secondary schools, although most public schools will expect you to start working toward your Master's degree in either Education or your specific field within a few years after you begin. Private secondary schools are less strict in this regard, but these days you'll find that most teachers will work towards their Master's even in private schools. With a computer science / engineering degree, you should be competitive for teaching positions in mathematics, physics, computer science/technology, and possibly other sciences. When I started teaching high school physics, my undergraduate degree was in electrical engineering (but I also finished a Master's in education).
There are obviously exceptions to the above -- <NAME> could get a job teaching at virtually any school in the country, and he doesn't even have a bachelor's degree. But, unless you are in a unique category like that, you should be prepared to get an advanced degree of some sort if you want to teach at the college or university level.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: You may be able to get classes as an adjunct instructor at a community college. I currently have a bachelor's degree in computer science, with no graduate degrees. I have taught courses as an adjunct instructor in computer science and in developmental mathematics at community colleges in different states.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: My Japanese teacher needed to go back to college for a Masters degree, or be forced to leave Santa Barbara community college. Being from Japan gave no leeway in teaching Japanese to beginners. Hence the strictness in the US for a Masters degree to teach at any college level.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: You will need a masters degree (at least) to teach university courses. With a bachelor degree however, you might be able to score a position at a highschool considering you've already worked in the industry.Though, if you're really dead-set on giving lectures at university, your best shot would be to pursue a master degree. There are possibilities to study a masters whilst working. You might even be able to teach a bit in highschool whilst studying for your master degree, see what that is like.
Though you might be able to become an assistant instructor, like username_2 said. Which (here) means that you get to correct students work, give practical lectures (practical coding instead of theory based courses). Once again, having worked in the industry might play to your advantage.
I honestly think having worked in the industry increases your odds, but they are still against you.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: very bad info here. ive been teaching for years with no pressure to get a masters. there's a nationwide shortage for teachers, so why would a masters be necessary? also you can teach at the college level if the courses are considered prerequisite or remedial/college prep classes. HS teachers are preferred for these classes as they are acclimated to the type of clientele you can expect in those type's of classes.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_6: Yes, it's sometimes possible to teach at a community college, for example, without a master's degree. I know of one community college that prefers to hire those with a master's degree, but they also accept those with bachelor's degrees + 20 hours of grad-level coursework.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_7: I go to a decently ranked university and some of the lecturers for the first year computer science classes only have bachelor degrees.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/06/28 | 2,393 | 10,070 | <issue_start>username_0: Common sense dictates that any and all work/research/drafts/etc that we do in our journal-research and PhD ought to be backed up and backed up again. Most of the time, this is constrained to laptop/desktop, USB memory and perhaps a copy in your own email - one disaster could wipe all that out (almost happened to my MSc research - got caught up in a severe natural disaster).
My question is, is there a more secure and 'safe' means to save/backup our PhD and/or journal-research work? Do universities offer such services, or is it up to individual researchers to find their own solutions?
I should note that I have no illusions of any system being completely 100% safe and secure, but are looking at ways that are more secure than the 'traditional' methods listed before in the first paragraph (2nd sentence) of this question.<issue_comment>username_1: This is not really a research-related question at all, but I can tell you what I do. I put everything (excluding large data sets) under distributed version control (Mercurial) and push to remote repositories frequently.
NB: You can easily automate the pushing if you desire; this has positive and negative aspects.
Of course, the two leading DVCS are Git and Mercurial, so either of these would work. Free hosting for Git is available at Github and Bitbucket, free hosting for Mercurial is available on Bitbucket. There are many other places you can put your repositories, of course, including remote servers your organization owns.
Note: large data sets require special handling, so I'm not sure about that, but they are often not original work, and can be retrieved from other places if necessary.
I strongly recommend doing this in conjunction with some sane method for saving "scratch" work (i.e. work in progress that is not yet suitable for a fully formed commit), so you don't have significant unsaved work lying on your hard disk. The important point here is to have a workflow by which you can sanely push commits at frequent intervals - I try to make commits every 1/2 hr or less. I use [Mercurial queues](http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/08/a-git-users-guide-to-mercurial-queues). There is also a brand new thing called the [Evolve Extension](http://mercurial.selenic.com/wiki/EvolveExtension), but I have not tried
that yet. Git has similar software available. See for example, the Stack Overflow question [git equivalent to hg mq?](https://stackoverflow.com/q/952651/350713) and [What's the Git approach to publish a patch queue?](https://stackoverflow.com/q/5016862/350713). NB: If you do use a patch queue, you need of course to version it, otherwise you can't push it.
These methods can appear complex if you are not used to version control. However, I can attest this approach works well. My workstation died three times in the last 3 1/2 years, and each time I was able to switch to a different machine and carry on working without interruption, without access to the machine I had just been using.
See also [Why use version control systems for writing a paper](https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/5277/285), particularly [user244795's answer](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/5519/285).
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Backups, short-term and long-term storage of research material is actually something we have to address whenever we apply for a IRB for a research study or an IRB exemption. We have to spell everything out in great detail including when we are going to destroy or get rid of the acquired research materials (since they usually contain personal identifiers like name, address, email etc.)
This is our approach:
1. We have our own encrypted lab server on a [RAID configuration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID). Access to the server is restricted to myself and my adviser.
2. We store generalized, public versions of our scripts on [github](http://www.github.com/). The previous answer has very good specifics on github so I will not go into the details here.
3. Periodically, we backup our lab server to another externally hosted server (not physically located in the US). This backup script is encrypted and password protected.
4. Physical interview questionnaires, survey instruments, interview transcripts are stored in a locked file cabinet with access to my adviser and myself in our lab. Entry to our lab is through keycard only.
5. Interview recordings, videos and audios are also stored and backed-up according to the procedures in [1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID) and [3].
This approach seems to have worked so far.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: For most cases, using git or hg is too much for research that don' t include much code.
For a concise answer:
Put everything in a web service like dropbox that provides function of version control. Dropbox is easy and straightforward to use and don' t bother you with complex version control commands, while it provides file version system for last 30 days. The free space is usually enough for current work.
For code, you can put at bitbucket.org, since it offers nice unlimited plan for academic use, which offers you private repos and unlimited team member. Of course you can open source your code at github.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: Because no-one's mentioned it yet, I use and love CrashPlan (<http://crashplan.com>). It's cheap, everything is backed up and encrypted to "the cloud" and it's always running. A nice complement to full disk cloning and git/mercurial.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_5: To add a slightly less "public" view (my institute is a non-university research institute which would be counted either as academic or industrial depending on whom you ask). We mainly work with original data we measure ourselves. The major concern of our administration seems to be that original data does not inadvertently end up becoming public, destroyed/lost data seems to be less of a concern (but there are backed up servers, see below).
* Default policy is that data and code (and paper drafts) stay inside the institute (though we may take them home, as working from home office is a valid and frequently used option) and within the collaborating groups, respectively.
* Basically this has not only the obvious consequence of no google docs, no public github or the like (unless specified for the particular project) but also e.g. no private github plan.
* Instead of private github plan (or the like) we have our own git server. The main purpose of the server is not backup (it is located in the main server room, so e.g. a fire killing the file server would most likely kill the git server as well), but collaboration. However, having collaboration with a DCVS automatically means backups that are distributed as far away as the collaborators are.
* OTOH, our computer services provides a file server which is automatically backed up.
* Once a publication is out, original data, source code and the paper are backed up in a publication data base as well.
* Due to home office, I have an external hard disk that I carry hence and forth (particularly for data that is too big to be conveniently exchanged via internet with the git server). Which means that unless the big disaster happens when the external hard disk, my laptop, my desktop, and the file server with the backups are all destroyed (what is the probability that I'm well and up to work after such an event?), there will be some copies surviving.
* At a university where I worked before, the central computer administration did backup services for specified computers of the institutes. We once needed that after a fire in our institute's server room.
* I may add that from my perspective of a scientist who is also doing measurements on physical (in fact, biological) samples, I've experienced much more trouble due to physically destroyed or spoiled samples than with computer failures.
Sure, we have our share of instrument computers dying (big issue, as it can be difficult to find parts that are compatible particularly with older instrument hardware - but no data loss issue: measurements are usually immediately transferred to file server, office computers, external hard disk). Office computers seldom die without warning symptoms beforehand. There also was that fire in the server room (university computation center back-up did work).
In the same time, we've had 3 failures of deep-freezers where our tissue samples are stored. Plus other accidents (tissues thawed by inexperienced student, lots of tissues never frozen correctly by collaborating surgeons, ...).
So even without a "proper" data backup plan like automatic backup of all computers, physical loss of delicate samples seems to be the more pressing problem than loss of data.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_6: The classic digital-preservationist mnemonic for this is "3-2-1."
* THREE copies of everything, on at least
* TWO different types of storage medium, with
* ONE offsite.
The storage-medium thing is so that you don't get bitten by (e.g.) a bad batch of one manufacturer's hard drives (cough cough Seagate) or a general weakness in a particular medium (such as USB drives' propensity to get lost or break). Offsite is so that a building fire or earthquake or tornado doesn't do you in.
The lowest-stress way to handle this is typically a backup-designated hard drive in your office with automated backup scheduling, plus cloud storage -- though be wary of cloud-storage that syncs but does not keep deleted files (DROPBOX), because you might delete a file, have the deletion synced, realize you NEED the file, and then be unable to get it back from the cloud.
If your data need heightened security and your campus doesn't have any suitable storage offerings (unfortunately common), look for a "zero-knowledge" cloud-storage provider such as SpiderOak or Tresorit. DO NOT half-ass your security measures! Leaking personally identifiable information has ended research careers (look up "Yankaskas" for the horror story I use in my classes).
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/06/28 | 1,037 | 4,341 | <issue_start>username_0: When you are asked to list what continual professional development (CPD) you have completed in the previous 12 months, where do you draw the line on what gets included?
* I would think attending a seminar on teaching skills should be included.
* A new degree, diploma, certificate, etc. would certainly be included
* I would think that participating on this or any other website (Academia.se) would not be included.
* I would think that discussions, no matter how long or involved, would not be included.
* How about reading books?
* How about watching a video series specific to the position?
* How about audio books?
* How about reading articles?
* How about research for writing articles on the subject of teaching (if you are a teacher)?
I would also think as a general rule that things done to improve a teacher's teaching or subject knowledge would count.<issue_comment>username_1: This depends on the authority that you have to report your CPD to.
However, here in Queensland, most of what they decree as being CPD is on your list. Speaking to a rep, reading articles can and often do count towards CPD - and most certainly writing articles and courses, as *long as they relate to your subject areas.*
You are quite correct in that things done to improve the teacher's skills in all aspects of teaching and knowledge that would relate to the teaching area are, for here in any case, considered as CPD.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Seconding Damien's answer - it depends on who you are reporting to, and it depends on what they want. **Ask for guidelines.**
I report to a committee of peers in my department who forward my report with recommendations to the dean. I am judged in several categories. Explicit guidelines on what counts (and what does not) in each category are provided. I would earn credit somewhere for everything on your list. Each category is weighted differently, so I do not received equal credit for all activities. I have taken your list of activities and placed them into the categories for which I would receive credit, and added some of my own.
>
> Instructional Design and Development - Activities to improve the courses that I teach and the methods by which I teach them.
>
>
>
* Attending a seminar on teaching skills
* Video or webinar series on the position
* Experimentation in teaching methodology
* Developing new materials that better suit the needs of the course
>
> Teaching Performance and Feedback to Students - Activities that improve my interacting with students in and out of the classroom.
>
>
>
* Nothing from your list fits here
* Reflecting on student evaluations and using them to improve your instruction
* Faithfully keeping office hours and responding to students in a timely fashion
* Advising students and writing letters of recommendation for them
>
> Scholarly Activity / Professional Development - Activities to improve my knowledge of my discipline and which improve the discipline as a whole
>
>
>
* A new degree, diploma, or certificate
* Reading books, articles, letters, reviews, etc. in your field
* Conducting research in your field, even if specific to education in your field
* Attending, and especially presenting at, conferences
* Submitting grant requests, and especially receiving grants
>
> Service - Activities which forward the mission and goals of the department, the institution, the profession, or the community.
>
>
>
* Participating in Stack Exchange
* Serving on committees at the department and institution level
* Serving as department chair
* Being active (and especially holding an officer position) in professional organizations
* Educational outreach to the community
>
> Collegiality - Activities that improve my relationship with my colleagues and improves my colleagues' abilities to perform their jobs.
>
>
>
* Discussions with colleagues focusing on best practices
* Sharing of teaching materials with colleagues
* Mentoring younger colleagues
Again, the specific answer to your question is held by the authority to whom you are responsible - your supervisor, department, department chair, dean, provost, vice president, etc. **Ask for guidelines.** If your supervisor wants you to be productive in the desirable way, you should receive guidelines.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/06/29 | 517 | 2,223 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm currently 2 units into my MSc degree (6 units over 2 semesters left).I know this is rather early, But I would like to start work on my dissertation as soon as I can, to give myself enough time and preparation to do "distinction level" work.
How do I come up with a topic I'll stick with? I've had tons of advise from different sources telling me to choose from an area of interest. Considering I still have the bulk of my degree work ahead, this wasn't too useful for me. Do I read all areas ahead of the units to "*fast forward*" the process?. Any advice is welcome.<issue_comment>username_1: This is a classic example where talking to your advisor is of the utmost importance. Some advisors want their students to choose a topic as early as possible, and others don't mind if their students take their time. As for the topic, hopefully, your advisor should be able to point you in a direction if you don't already have one.
While I understand the rush to get started on something concrete, you really don't want to do a lot of work on a topic that ends up being (1) uninteresting, and (2) unfruitful. Talk to as many other faculty and students as you'd like, and there isn't anything wrong with reading ahead, with the exception that you might not understand something well enough to make a good decision about whether you should do research in the subject.
My bottom-line suggestion is to take your time picking a topic, because you really do want it to be a good one.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Whether you have a formal advisor or not, you can approach faculty for advice and for suggestions. It is almost impossible for a novice to pick a really good Ph.D. topic (while working alone in a vacuum). Go by various professor's office hours and talk with them about their work. Tell them you are seeking good problems to work on. Ask good questions, and engage them intellectually. Something good is bound to happen. Talk with other grad students who are further along in their program. Try collaborating with other students: this is a great way to get hands on experience with problems, and if things work out, you may get a publication out of it.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/06/29 | 272 | 1,039 | <issue_start>username_0: I just saw that one of my research articles was the most-read paper in one of the top journals in my field in February of this year. What is the appropriate way, if any, to list this on a vita? It's not an "Award", strictly speaking, so would it be best to just list it as a comment next to the paper?<issue_comment>username_1: First of all, congratulations!
Secondly, whether or not to include this in your CV depends what you are applying for - if you are applying for positions that involve research, then yes, add it as a comment next to the paper. Then again, it probably would not hurt just to have a comment about it in there anyway.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_2: Great work ! The way I do it is under the Publications section of my CV. The following citation is formatted in the ACM style. You can modify it for your own citation styles.
**J1**. <NAME>. 2013. "The best paper ever". *ACM Transactions of Awesomeness*, 1 (4). ACM Press, NY, USA. (**most read article in March 2013**)
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/06/29 | 1,404 | 5,974 | <issue_start>username_0: Should I use software for managing my references? What is the benefit of it? I can write down the references by myself, so I'm not sure what the benefit is.<issue_comment>username_1: There a few advantages:
1. If anything, your references listed in the manager can at the very least be a back up for your written copy.
2. It is a good time management technique to list the references as you go, handwritten is fine, but with the reference manager, it is ready to be copied onto your completed manuscript - in order, with all the formatting set.
Essentially, it will save you quite a bit of time later on in your research.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: You do not **need** to use reference managers. However, if you use some reference managers like Mendeley then, some of the benefits are obvious:
1. The pdf of your article is linked to the reference itself.
2. You can organize references into logical groups (areas, subjects, disciplines, sub-disciplines) by utilizing folders and tags.
3. You can one-click save articles and organize them from your browser. This is invaluable in saving time on organizing.
4. You can sync across multiple devices like desktops, laptops and tablets. For instance, Mendeley has an iOS app which does this for you. I use Android so I workaround using Droideley or Scholarley.
5. You can read your articles inside the reference manager and then do useful things like highlighting and annotations which can then be saved as notes for future reference.
6. You can export to specific citation styles. This is very useful for someone doing interdisciplinary work. For instance, I have to constantly use the same or similar bibliography using APA style, ACM style, IEEE style.
7. They are very useful for multiple collaborative platforms. For instance, when collaborating with some computer science colleagues, I generally use LaTeX and Mendeley does a brilliant one-click job of exporting to BibTeX. When I work with social scientists, I generally use MS Word and there is a MS Word plugin for Mendeley which dynamically adds references in-line as well as the full bibliography at the end of the document.
I hope this has been partially useful to you. This is a little Mendeley focused and I am in no certain terms claiming that it is the best or the most useful. However, for me, it certainly has its advantages.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: This provides a good overview of the articles you've read. Furthermore it is easy to change the format of your references (for example from APA to Harvard).
If you write different articles, it is easy to use the references that you used before.
On a sidenote: Google Docs has a pretty neat feature called 'research' where you can just search for the title and the reference shows up. In that way you do not have to use a reference manager.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: Personally, I would say not unless it suits you.
I'm happier with a flat .bib (i.e. bibTex, for use with LaTeX) file, just managed in notepad++. You can use the url field of a .bib to point to a local file, but I don't. Instead, what I've recently started doing is to save a pdf of the reference with a filename based on (but generally longer than) the key I use in my .bib file. I wish I'd done this sooner though! That way I can copy a file and a folder to another machine, on another OS, with no internet connection (e.g. when travelling) and everything just plain works.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: It depends. If you only want to write course assignments and then maybe a master's thesis and then leave academia, you might not need a reference management solution which will be most useful when you write multiple papers and books.
On the other hand, there is one reference management solution which is used not only (mostly) by researchers. It is being developped by a Swiss software company (I work for them) and it is hugely successful in Germany and other European countries. The first version of Citavi came out 10 years ago, but it is not yet known in the US. Citavi allows you to not only save the bibliographic information of titles you want to use in your publications, but it lets you save the quotations, your comments, summaries, and your own ideas, too. You can then organize them into the structure of your paper before you actually start writing.
The video "[Citavi 5 in a nutshell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3vbWIcljDQ)" shows how it all fits together, and how Citavi can help you to be more efficient while doing research and writing.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_6: I think using a reference manager is an absolute must if you have more than a couple of references and if you plan writing more than one paper/work. It is true that you can generate a reference list by yourself and insert the citations manually, but this will introduce error sooner or later. You will immediately see the benefit of a reference manager if you decide/are forced to change the reference style. A good reference manager with an appropriate Word/LibreOffice plugin will reformat the document automagically.
Collecting references, managing all the information about a publication, including abstract, your notes, keywords and tags are other options where reference managers shine. Most of them can be used as document readers and can collect comments and highlights. And all decent ones sync everything via cloud, have versions for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android.
There are several excellent options available. You can try [Mendeley](https://www.mendeley.com/) or [Zotero](https://www.mendeley.com/) and you will see the benefits immediately by yourself. Don't be afraid if you change your mind later, the reference databases can be rather easily transferred between them.
I am using a reference manager more than a decade and could not live without it. I started with BibTeX, moved to Zotero and later to Mendeley.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/06/30 | 1,427 | 6,065 | <issue_start>username_0: I am completing my masters in chemical engineering. I have completed my first two semesters but was unable to find a research thesis topic to work upon. Will it be bad to complete my masters degree without a thesis, if I don't get a better option?<issue_comment>username_1: There a few advantages:
1. If anything, your references listed in the manager can at the very least be a back up for your written copy.
2. It is a good time management technique to list the references as you go, handwritten is fine, but with the reference manager, it is ready to be copied onto your completed manuscript - in order, with all the formatting set.
Essentially, it will save you quite a bit of time later on in your research.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: You do not **need** to use reference managers. However, if you use some reference managers like Mendeley then, some of the benefits are obvious:
1. The pdf of your article is linked to the reference itself.
2. You can organize references into logical groups (areas, subjects, disciplines, sub-disciplines) by utilizing folders and tags.
3. You can one-click save articles and organize them from your browser. This is invaluable in saving time on organizing.
4. You can sync across multiple devices like desktops, laptops and tablets. For instance, Mendeley has an iOS app which does this for you. I use Android so I workaround using Droideley or Scholarley.
5. You can read your articles inside the reference manager and then do useful things like highlighting and annotations which can then be saved as notes for future reference.
6. You can export to specific citation styles. This is very useful for someone doing interdisciplinary work. For instance, I have to constantly use the same or similar bibliography using APA style, ACM style, IEEE style.
7. They are very useful for multiple collaborative platforms. For instance, when collaborating with some computer science colleagues, I generally use LaTeX and Mendeley does a brilliant one-click job of exporting to BibTeX. When I work with social scientists, I generally use MS Word and there is a MS Word plugin for Mendeley which dynamically adds references in-line as well as the full bibliography at the end of the document.
I hope this has been partially useful to you. This is a little Mendeley focused and I am in no certain terms claiming that it is the best or the most useful. However, for me, it certainly has its advantages.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: This provides a good overview of the articles you've read. Furthermore it is easy to change the format of your references (for example from APA to Harvard).
If you write different articles, it is easy to use the references that you used before.
On a sidenote: Google Docs has a pretty neat feature called 'research' where you can just search for the title and the reference shows up. In that way you do not have to use a reference manager.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: Personally, I would say not unless it suits you.
I'm happier with a flat .bib (i.e. bibTex, for use with LaTeX) file, just managed in notepad++. You can use the url field of a .bib to point to a local file, but I don't. Instead, what I've recently started doing is to save a pdf of the reference with a filename based on (but generally longer than) the key I use in my .bib file. I wish I'd done this sooner though! That way I can copy a file and a folder to another machine, on another OS, with no internet connection (e.g. when travelling) and everything just plain works.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: It depends. If you only want to write course assignments and then maybe a master's thesis and then leave academia, you might not need a reference management solution which will be most useful when you write multiple papers and books.
On the other hand, there is one reference management solution which is used not only (mostly) by researchers. It is being developped by a Swiss software company (I work for them) and it is hugely successful in Germany and other European countries. The first version of Citavi came out 10 years ago, but it is not yet known in the US. Citavi allows you to not only save the bibliographic information of titles you want to use in your publications, but it lets you save the quotations, your comments, summaries, and your own ideas, too. You can then organize them into the structure of your paper before you actually start writing.
The video "[Citavi 5 in a nutshell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3vbWIcljDQ)" shows how it all fits together, and how Citavi can help you to be more efficient while doing research and writing.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_6: I think using a reference manager is an absolute must if you have more than a couple of references and if you plan writing more than one paper/work. It is true that you can generate a reference list by yourself and insert the citations manually, but this will introduce error sooner or later. You will immediately see the benefit of a reference manager if you decide/are forced to change the reference style. A good reference manager with an appropriate Word/LibreOffice plugin will reformat the document automagically.
Collecting references, managing all the information about a publication, including abstract, your notes, keywords and tags are other options where reference managers shine. Most of them can be used as document readers and can collect comments and highlights. And all decent ones sync everything via cloud, have versions for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android.
There are several excellent options available. You can try [Mendeley](https://www.mendeley.com/) or [Zotero](https://www.mendeley.com/) and you will see the benefits immediately by yourself. Don't be afraid if you change your mind later, the reference databases can be rather easily transferred between them.
I am using a reference manager more than a decade and could not live without it. I started with BibTeX, moved to Zotero and later to Mendeley.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/06/30 | 1,792 | 7,416 | <issue_start>username_0: From what I know, every Phd student needs to choose a supervisor in the first year. For someone who is entering a Phd with a broad interest in a field, this might be difficult since they don't immediately know what they want to work on. How do they go about choosing a supervisor in that case?<issue_comment>username_1: When searching for a supervisor, look at their research profile (usually on a university website), paying particular attention to their fields of expertise/interests - look at and read any papers that they have had published and the nature of the PhD projects that they have already/are currently supervising.
Discuss what options there are with members of the Faculty that whose general fields you are interested in. Ask what projects are upcoming.
Hope this helps.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Most research groups have seminars or weekly meetings. If you're not sure about a particular supervisor, but have a set of interests, try attending research group meetings for faculty in those areas. Faculty are quite used to this and will usually welcome the attendance (but do check with them first)
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: Pick someone at random. (Use your research interests and experience, and the available faculty's research interests and experience, to bias your probability distribution.) Work with them for a semester. If you both like the work that you're doing together, and they're willing to take you on as a student, you're done. Otherwise, repeat.
No, I'm not joking.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_4: As it happens, your case was similar to mine—I didn't have a clue about exactly what I wanted to do, other than being interested in simulations rather than experiment. And, unlike username_3's advice, in my field (chemical engineering), we don't get the option of working with multiple advisors for extended periods of time, because of the way project funding works.
What makes things easier for us? All of the faculty give presentations to the first-year graduate students, and all of the first-year students were required to meet with a number of potential advisors before ranking our preferences. This makes it easier, because we had to be active in seeking out advisors. Talking with graduate students in the group was also very helpful, because it allowed me to learn more about the advisors' styles, as well as the people that are in the groups. (Some of the groups were very cordial, others were not nearly so civil in their interactions—made a *big* difference in making my decision.)
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: My advice will be similar to aeisimail's, and though I have not actually done exactly what I am suggesting, the main points are still based on personal experience.
(Also note that I come from the European setting (PhD in France currently) so the levels of education when you actually start looking for an adviser might differ, but I'll try to do my best to be general.)
In my opinion, there's **three almost equally important parts** to choosing what to do for PhD:
* the **subject** (narrow field of focus, project you're taking on)
Even if you are not sure what exactly you want to do, if you don't see yourself getting at least a little bit excited about the subject, you will not be able to do it *and enjoy it* for the whole PhD duration. It also helps if you see the adviser being fascinated by what he does.
* the **adviser** -- on *both personal and professional level*
Of course, you should read something about his previous works. Read some of his publications, something about ongoing projects. Ask around for information from other students. But also, if you have a chance, try and talk to the potential adviser, *in person*. Maybe some people can get a feel for an adviser from e-mail or other indirect communication, but for me, *if I can hold an easy conversation with someone for 5-10 minutes, I'll probably be okay working with them*.
* the **environment** -- both for working and for living
If you can, try and get a feel for the research group and the lab you would potentially belong to. Depending on the type of person you are, you will prefer different environments. But, a friendly atmosphere is beneficial to everybody. Also, take a look at where you'll have to live (if you're moving for you PhD): a very extrovert person might suffer after moving to a small, quiet town. A big bustling town might overwhelm a shy and introvert person. Make sure *you can be comfortable outside your PhD/job*, because as much as you can't do a PhD if you don't love what you do, you won't be able to do it well if you don't like what your life is outside of that.
It might seem right now that you can survive with a good topic and adviser, in a bad environment, or some other way around, but think about it: those three things will be with you through the whole PhD. You can't do a PhD properly if you don't love what you do, who you do it with and where you are. *All three of them are very important*.
---
And some more specific advice that I collected over the years, which is probably not applicable in all the situations but is worth taking under consideration:
* young advisers at the start of their career are more likely to pay more attention to their students. If you want to work *with* your adviser, it will probably be harder with somebody who's already made a name for themselves: you're more likely to end up just working *under* them.
* the longer the people are in academia, the more they do *administration* instead of *research*. Know how to *take advantage of what you have*. If you end up with an adviser over his head in administration, keep research questions rare and to the point, when you need them. But know that these kind of people will be able to resolve some administrative problems for you that others might not be able to.
* no matter what type of adviser you get, in the end it is your own PhD topic. The adviser does not hold the absolute truth, and does not have all the answers. He's good for directing you and helping you focus, sometimes discussing problems, but towards the end of your PhD, you are the one that will become the foremost expert on the topic. Prepare for that, so you don't end up disappointed the first time you see your adviser guessing and struggling around your problem just like you.
* find what fascinated you about your own (potential) topic. Don't get all starry-eyed about what the output should be when looking for at a subject. If the output is all neat and useful and pretty, think about weather it has, for example, too much maths for you to be enjoying working on it. It's not just about what you are *capable* of doing, it's about what you *enjoy* doing.
Sorry for the short novel, I hope you find something that helps you.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_6: The ideal PhD supervisor has/provides:
* A good track record of successful PhD students
* Expert Knowledge and High Reputation
* Sufficient Time for your PhD supervision
* Opportunities for collaborations
* A permanent and stable position
* Sufficient, Secure, and Flexible Funding
* Good office space
* A position at a reputable university
* Additional Mentorship Skills
More in my blog: <https://www.scss.tcd.ie/joeran.beel/blog/2018/03/20/how-to-find-a-good-phd-supervisor-for-recommender-systems-and-machine-learning-research/>
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/06/30 | 2,439 | 10,414 | <issue_start>username_0: When someone is just starting out, they can be overwhelmed with the number of journal articles published each month. Reading everything published seems impossible due to time constraints.
After someone has enough experience, they naturally watch for articles which are impressive, see where these are published and where the articles it cites are published but when someone is just starting out, it's not clear where to begin.
How does one go about identifying the best journals to keep up on when they have no experience reading any particular journal?<issue_comment>username_1: This depends on your field. In mathematics, physics, and a few related areas there is arXiv.org. From which you get rss feeds or e-mail announcements for individual research areas. This is particularly helpful because there are a huge amount a journals in mathematics and physics and you could never keep up with all of them.
The added benefit is that most of what you run across on arXiv hasn't made it to a journal yet so it is relatively new and free. Then after you find useful and interesting articles you can keep track of them and find out where they were eventually published.
Another set of tools that can be useful is a good indexing service that lets you trace backwards and forwards the references from a paper that you know is important. This lets you see not only what the important paper references but also who has referenced it and where they did so.
Because of the fact that my research field does not yet have a single journal dedicated to my field these are the tools that I use most to find new literature and see what is going on. Of course if you are still looking around for a research field to get into there are the big general topic journals in each area which are a good place to start if you want a big picture.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: **Ask your peers and mentors**. There are plenty of low quality journals, and you would not benefit from reading from those journals especially when you are just entering the field. I currently subscribe to the table of contents of 4~6 top journals in my field via RSS or email. It took me years to identify and settle in this list. I got to appreciate those journals for their high impact in the community. Before I entered grad school, I often read random articles with cool titles that I would find via search engines, but they were not too helpful in the long run.
Also, reading one article carefully is often more valuable than skimming through five articles. You may feel that you are falling behind since there is a constant stream of "exciting" articles, but in the grand scheme of things, only a few will survive the sand of time. Alternatively to reading journals, another good way of keeping up with exciting research frontend is to go to academic conferences and talks (in person or virtually via e.g., [videolectures.net](http://videolectures.net)).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: As has been mentioned in comments to other answers, one has to slog through things. A similar process is accumulating a list of restaurants (food vendors, grocery stores) from which you prefer to get food. You can stay within a comfort zone of, say, Mexican and Thai restaurants to make sure you always get something satisfying, but then you miss out on the possible delights found in fusion restaurants.
You can go by reviews of experienced critics, but their notion of best may not be yours. The only sense in which time is "wasted" is through your own judgment. Even if you get a bad experience from reading a particular article, you need such feedback in order to develop your sense of what is best. It is not always rewarding to copy other's idea of best and hope it works for you.
There are strategies for forming a list to try, but you still have to test the list. In particular, if you know a good starting point, search by author, subject, or title to find similar articles. If you know a bad starting point, do the same kind of search, but ignore (filter out) the corresponding author or subject or title.
For a list of potential starting points, check out articles that have received awards for exposition. They can be a guide to quality. In mathematics, two such prizes are the Steele and Polya prizes; search to see what is available in your field.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: I agree with username_2's excellent answer
that you should leverage the informed opinions of your mentors and peers
to decide what articles are of interest.
I would advise you to
**attend talks/presentations at conferences or at your university.**
1. Attending a talk requires a relatively small time investment
(20 minutes to an hour),
so you get a quick overview of a research project
without having to spend hours reading the article.
If the speaker is any good,
you should have gotten the main points from his/her talk.
2. During a talk, other researchers like to ask questions
or even in some cases argue with the presenter.
By hearing the types of questions that people raise in public,
and talking to people in private to see how they assess other people's work,
you understand better how other people perceive the research project.
Although each person has his/her own opinion about a research project,
nevertheless, people in a particular scientific community
tend to have opinions that fall within a particular spectrum.
By interacting with people and asking them what they think of a particular project,
you will learn how to calibrate your opinions
with the opinions of other researchers in your field.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: Although there are brilliant and highly respectable journals and articles in basically every field of study, I think the concept of "best articles to read" is not well defined. There are, in my opinion, three important questions to answer.
**Who** is reading the article. This refers both to your *position* (a MSc student, a PhD student, a senior researcher) and your current *role*, or *task* (to prepare an overview, to write down a solid intro for your own paper, to fill the Bibliography section in your theses, to serve as a referee, to discover new breakthrough ideas). In my opinion, one can rarely read articles just "for their own fun", unless they are at a very senior level.
Answer to the first question will help you to narrow down the search space. For example, new ideas -> arXiv, classical results -> textbooks, etc.
**What** are you going to get from the article. "To understand it all" is probably too generic answer, and in my experience, very rarely it is really necessary to get *all* details from the paper. Do you want to understand the role of this paper in a big study? (maybe it is sufficient to read through Intro and Conclusion). Do you want to understand if their method / approach is better than yours? (maybe you should focus on Discussion or Comparison sections).
Answer to this question can dramatically reduce the time spent on each paper, and ultimately increase the number of papers you can explore.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_6: I find [Google Scholar](http://scholar.google.co.uk/) (GS) extremely useful for me. For example, if I start to learn "*model checking*", GS will show me [this result](http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hl=en&q=model+checking&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=), which shows a paper of KL McMillan with 4633 citations, and a book of EM Clark with 9438 citations. They are the first people I need to follow.
I then go to the homepages of the authors, to check which papers they published in which conference in the recent years? big names work on the main stream, and publish papers in top conferences.
Mircrosoft Academic Search (MAS) is also useful. For example, as model checking is a subfield of software engineering, I check the [conference ranking in MAS](http://academic.research.microsoft.com/RankList?entitytype=3&topDomainID=2&subDomainID=4&last=0&start=1&end=100), which tells me the top are ICSE, ITC, CAV... This confirms my guess, as both EM Clark and KL McMillan published > 20 papers in CAV. So this conference is first in the list I need to follow.
Google Scholar also recommends papers for you based on your published papers.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_7: Great answers so far. I'll suggest another approach similar to ["snowball sampling"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowball_sampling) in social science.
Basically, you let really good/important articles (and journals) lead you to other really good/important articles (and journals).
Start with a few articles that stand out to you (or your adviser or mentor). They might be survey articles that assess the state of research and future directions, or they might be seminal articles that spawned new lines of research.
Then look at the editorial policies and editorial boards for the journals that published these papers. Are there any patterns that seem to tie these particular journals to these particular articles?
Now look at the articles that are cited in these initial papers, especially those that are described as "seminal" or "pioneering", etc. Repeat the process of looking at the journal editorial policies and editorial boards for these articles.
Also, using Google Scholar, look at the articles that cite your original set. Which journals seemed to publish the most follow-up articles, and promote debate or contrary research? Were there Special Issues of journals devote to the ideas or methods in the original set?
Rinse and repeat :-).
Through this procedure, you will usually settle on a set of 2 to 5 journals in a field (or sub-field) that are considered "important" for the type of research you are most interested in.
The advantage of this method is that you will home in on the journals that are important for *your* interests and focus, not just what everyone else (worldwide) might think is important.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_8: The first thing is to identify the keywords/topics you are interested in. Then "google scholar" or "web of science" them. Find the top cited articles and identify which journals these articles were from. The other way to identify the top journals is checking the impact factors of these journals. Then find journals with higher impact factors. Go through the journals to identify the articles/topics you are interested in.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/01 | 2,117 | 8,312 | <issue_start>username_0: I am a Master's student in math who is doing pretty well so far.
I aced my first two classes (real analysis)
and my summer session in probability theory is going well, too.
Even before my Master's study, I already thought of a PhD.
Nonetheless, there are concerns:
1. My good grades were the result of grit, not brain,
meaning that I had to spend time to understand what the book is telling me.
Furthermore, a lot of times during exam and homework,
I had to try and fail a few times before arriving at the solution.
2. I did not study math during undergrad. Before my Master's study,
I gulped down three semesters of calculus, plus LA and DE in one year.
So compared to other students, I am already behind.
In the next two months, I will learn complex numbers on my own
and review my linear algebra.
3. I am a professional in a field that has nothing to do with math or research.
After the holiday, I will speak to my advisor about taking a thesis class.
It's not an insurmountable obstacle,
but, in an unrelated field, I do have less time to concentrate on math.
At the end, how big is the jump from Master's to Phd?
Especially after what I said in (1), I do worry that it is beyond my ability.
I do not hold anyone responsible for my decision.
So, please kindly offer your best assessment of my situation.<issue_comment>username_1: As <NAME>, pointed out, it is unlikely a stranger on the net fully answer this for you, but what you are experiencing is similar to what I experienced, so I can tell you how it was from my perspective.
Given what JeffE commented, studying through true 'grit', does involve 'brains' as you are developing and applying problem solving skills and stategies - which has clearly been effective, as you mention, you have good grades. So, it seems you have developed effective study techniques.
Point 2 is pretty much not an issue, based on the skills and strategies you developed in point 1.
If you do an unrelated thesis, as you mentioned in point 3 - look at this way, you'll be developing the research and synthesis skills needed for a PhD.
What I found about the transition between the Masters and PhD, was that it wasn't so much of a leap, but a case of using the skills developed a lot more thoroughly.
I hope this helps.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: There are a few different things going on in this question, I'll try and address them separately.
First of all, heed JeffE's words about the impostor syndrome. The idea that some people are effortly geniuses (which is inevitably followed by "but not me") is untrue and distinctly unhelpful.
Moreover trying and failing a few (or many!) times before coming to a solution is the very *definition* of doing research! The important question you should ask yourself is if you enjoy the challenge of struggling against a problem; if so, then research would be a great fit.
As for your background, you seem to have a plan to address the gaps in your background, and if you're doing well in your master's programme, I wouldn't worry too much about being behind the other students. Another challenge may be if you have a full-time job; doing a Ph.D. with a fulltime job is by no means impossible, but requires a some great time management skills. Anyway there's plenty of resources on this forum to help with this issue.
Finally, as for the question in the title, I would say it depends the most on what you plan to do with your Ph.D. after you graduate. I'm a recent graduate (in math) from a well-known North American school, and the quality of the Ph.D's varied greatly. I think it really depends on what you want to do with the degree. If getting a Ph.D. is the farthest one wants to go in academia, the standards for graduating are pretty low, and I think can be achieved not too strenuously. If one wants to be competitive in the academic research job market, the bar is quite a bit higher.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_1: I'll answer your title question and sub-questions in three words (then add to that): ***Difficulty is relative.***
<NAME> finished his PhD in math at the age of 20. The average graduate student would probably take anywhere from 4 - 5 years. That doesn't mean Noam was a god among graduate students when he was a graduate student, and that's the reason he was able to finish his thesis faster than <NAME> (though he *is* quite exceptional) and <NAME> should just give up. Far from it. The fact that you're doing well in your master's courses is a good indicator you're well qualified for the coursework part. Working on a PhD thesis means producing original research. Producing original research means dealing with not so cut-and-neat problems like ones you'd encounter in your homework or textbooks. It means working with problems that you're not sure are close-ended, open-ended, or neither. In other words, different skill sets are needed for research in addition to the problem-solving heuristics which you've already acquired from your coursework.
Since you've never wet your foot it seems to me you have *no indication* of your ability to do research . So what do you do? Just go for it! You only live once as far as we know, and it seems to me that your real problem is your self-imposed doubt. Get that out of your head. Research is about staring and thinking about a problem long enough then coming up with an answer which turns out to be completely wrong and in that, the process repeats until you get your "Eureka!" moment.
You should also stop worrying about others being ahead of you. There'll always be someone faster and better than you (unless your name is <NAME> :-) especially in academia. A good algebraic geometer from UGA by the name of <NAME> didn't get his start in advanced mathematics until his late 20's, after working in industry as a meat lugger. He received his PhD at 35. Over 30 years later, he's still going strong. What you should learn from him is if passion calls for it, then there should be no stopping you. If you fail at a career, then that's that. It's not the end of the world. But if you never bother to even try, then you'll never know and you'll always have a "What if?" moment.
**So just to sum all of this up**: Apply to a PhD program and see what happens.
<https://mathoverflow.net/questions/7120/too-old-for-advanced-mathematics/45644#45644> (if you're interested in Roy's post)
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: In your shoes, if I were applying for a PhD program, I might be thinking in terms of an "ABD" (All but dissertation.)
From the sound of it, "grit not brain" will get you through your PhD courses. You likely will pass the "comprehensive" examination. And then the fear is that you will "freeze up" when it comes time to write the dissertation because you are behindhand in "natural" (as opposed to synthetic), talent compared to others.
You will have to balance these real concerns against the benefits of "taking courses" and getting as far as you can, before possibly running up against a brick wall with your thesis.
This was basically my story (some decades ago). I was "counseled out" of a PhD program by a dean who observed that I had the preparation and the brains for the program, but lacked the "spark," "thirst," or drive that would see others through, but maybe not me.
What's worse, as a history undergraduate with mostly As, I had trouble finding a senior thesis topic, and spent the first part of my senior year wondering if I would be able to graduate, and thinking about writing a "trivial" paper that would earn a C. In the middle of the first semester, I stumbled on a viable topic that earned me departmental honors.
I can see one of three outcomes for you. 1) A "light bulb" will go off in your head at some point before you approach the end of the PhD program. If this happens, you're fine. 2) You will somehow squeak through, not quite knowing how you did it, and come out of the process a bit shell-shocked. 3) Neither of the above will happen, as you feared, in which case you might "bail out" as an "ABD."
I can't predict the outcome for you, but am sharing my experience. Just understand what the risks are, take into account your circumstances, and (hopefully) make the best decision for you.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/01 | 655 | 2,803 | <issue_start>username_0: I will be undertaking my first teaching position as a graduate student in the fall - I will be leading two of the discussion sections for an undergraduate biology course.
What sorts of things should I expect to teach in a discussion section for a science course and how should I teach them?
When I was an undergraduate and took the same course (same material, different university), the graduate students had to re-teach the lectures in our equivalent of discussion sections, as if it was brand new material because the professor was not a very good lecturer. I know the professors for whom I will be teaching these sections are rather good lecturers, so I do not expect to have to re-teach everything to the same extent. I have several concerns, though:
* These sections are about twice the size of those at my undergraduate university, and I would like to encourage regular class participation of some sort, to make sure students stay engaged.
* The material is undoubtedly challenging so I am wary of bringing in too much new material, such as discussion of scientific papers, which is the first kind of discussion that springs to mind. (Also, someone will inevitably ask "is that going to be on the exam?")
Because the material is challenging, I could probably do with some review. But how to I keep a large number of students engaged (and participating) through repetition of lecture material? Ostensibly, the reason for having discussion sections is so that there is actual discussion.<issue_comment>username_1: I can say with 100% confidence that it will depend on the professor(s). That being said, you should expect to:
* Reteach all content. You won't actually have to, but you should of course be able to. Students often use discussion sections to ask questions they don't want to ask the prof for fear of "looking dumb."
* Give meaningful practice problems and explanations the students should familiarize themselves with for an exam.
* For some classes, actually lead a discussion of topics.
* Just use it for office hours.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: When I taught discussion sections (for calculus, at a large U.S. state university), the students always appreciated it when I worked homework problems at the board for them. (The homework sets were large enough so that we didn't get through nearly all the homework.)
My experience is that with discussion sections there is a little bit of a good-cop/bad-cop game going on; the professor is the bad cop and you are the good cop -- embrace and enjoy the role. Help them with their homework. If appropriate, look up the professor's old exams, find out what they are like, and work out similar problems in discussion.
In short, help your students get through the course.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/01 | 803 | 3,298 | <issue_start>username_0: I would like to distribute some of the materials related to my paper (such as source code) available online. I have the option of uploading them to my personal website or to a server in my institution, (or any better ways you suggest?)
I am concerned that if I upload it on the institution personal space, after graduating I won't have access to the server anymore or my page might be closed.
and I don't want to disappoint my readers by providing a link which may expire in a few years.
Personal website seems a good option so I fully have control over the materials.
I would like to know if there is any better option or online services recognized especially for hosting academic materials (here my code) which I can link them in my paper?<issue_comment>username_1: Try something like [github](http://www.github.com) which will provide not only a public place for storing your code, but also will give you version control.
Other similar sites exist such as GoogleDocs, FlipDrive, DropBox, ...
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I would suggest that if you are able to keep them up-to-date, a personal website containing a guide/summary of your works with GitHub (or similar) repositories to host code.
The benefit of this is that it allows you the best of both worlds. I would suggest that your personal site would be the "professional" portal to your academic papers etc, with blurbs / 'about me' etc while the source code and documentation being managed on GitHub (or similar).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: I would also recommend a combination, with e.g. the personal page pointing to other resources where source code, slides, presentations, pdfs are stored. Beside github (or other options where you can have both private and public repositories) I would also recommend [figshare](http://figshare.com/), where you can upload many forms of research output (data files, figures, manuscripts, source code etc). Each item will also get a doi, which makes them easy to cite.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_4: For hosting - anything which looks decent and has no adverts will be fine. For me there is little difference if it is hosted on institute's server or not (I know many serious academic sites with personal domains, or on some page farms). But there is a big difference if:
* it is clean and complete (good interface, you can easily reach to publications, affiliation, e-mail etc),
* it is up-to-date,
* it stays there (and don't end as a deadlink in a few years; if you move make it explicit; I hate guessing "which e-mail for which page seems to be the current one").
Beware that even if you host your server, it may became dead (as some setting change, or you forget to pay for the domain).
For code use things which are suitable for code storage, reuse and discovery. [GitHub](https://github.com/) and similar ones (e.g. [BitBucket](https://github.com/)) are the best places.
Also, for hosting you can use `gh-pages` (free, stable and relatively easy to use... when you already can use git). Then for example you can have your page in [Jekyll](http://jekyllrb.com/) ([an example](http://ivanzuzak.info/), and [on using LaTeX there](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/10987992/using-mathjax-with-jekyll)).
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/01 | 1,322 | 5,436 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm writing my master thesis at the moment in the area of cyber/computer security.
However, I'm having real trouble in keeping a good structure in the thesis.
What I mean with structure is that my supervisor has commented on several occasions that the order of subjects should be changed and that some parts should be switched or explained in less/more detail.
Although my supervisor has been incredibly helpful and has provided good pointers, I was wondering if the community here could give some ideas on:
**How to keep the structure of a thesis in line and what mistakes to look out for?**<issue_comment>username_1: Have a look at good masters theses and good PhD theses in your area to get an indication of the structure. Borrow a book from the library on structuring a thesis. In any case, the structure will look something like the following (with variation possible):
* title page
* abstract
* acknowledgements
* contents page(s)
* introduction
* literature review
* materials/sources and methods (or this can be part
of every chapter if these are different per chapter)
* themed topic chapters
* results
* discussion or findings
* conclusions
* references
* appendices.
[Source](http://www.vitae.ac.uk/researchers/1256/Structuring-your-thesis.html)
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Folk might have their own opinions on their favourite wording of the following sections, but here is a basic outline of the structure of a significant technical work, such as a thesis.
1. Abstract
2. Introduction / Literature review
3. Aims and Objectives
4. Methodology
5. Results and Data analysis
6. Discussion
7. Further work
8. Conclusion
9. Appendicies
10. References
I'm not going to express what the content of each section should be, because that will extend this answer too far.
My guidance for you is as follows: **try to tell the story of your research**. Lead the reader through your thought process. You could try posing your research as the **solution** to a **problem**, for example. Let's see how this works in practice.
You do some background reading - your literature review. You discover that there is an existing problem that no-one has answered, or their answer is lacking in some way. You express this in your introduction or literature review. You refine what you intend to do as a set of aims and objectives. You set out how you are going to achieve your aims and objectives in your methodology. You execute your method and report the results. You discuss your results and consider how you could improve your work. Then you draw your conclusions.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: Other answers have suggested outlines, but even with such an outline it's not always clear what is the best order to discuss everything (whether it's the choice of section or ordering within a section).
One approach I have seen used is to print out the whole document, cut out each paragraph, and pin them on a pinboard. Then it's easy to adjust the order of the whole document until the whole thing is coherent. You'll probably want to have a pencil on hand while doing this, because you'll need to adjust the text a bit to fit the order.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: As you've discovered, everyone has a slightly different suggestion. I found this really confusing when I did my MSc thesis. As I wrote more of my thesis, my supervisors kept tweaking the structure. The changes they made were definitely for the better, and I was satisfied with the end result. But I felt like I should have (somehow) known the right structure to use.
So...when I started working on my PhD, I did a bit of research into thesis structure. I really wanted to understand "the rules" -- not so I would follow them slavishly -- but so that when I did deviate from them, I would do so knowingly and for good reasons. I started by reading the guidelines from lots of major universities. I found some suggested outlines, but they were all just different enough (in the terminology they used and the order they recommended) to be really confusing.
Finally I found [this article](http://www.scribd.com/doc/193023424/Introduction-to-Thesis-Writing-pdf), which discusses different ways of structuring a thesis: *Thesis and dissertation writing: an examination of published advice and actual practice <NAME>. English for Specific Purposes 21(2):125 - 143 (2002)*.
From that article, and from other sources, I finally realised that there isn't "one thesis structure to rule them all". (It's not like the 5-paragraph essay that we learned to write in school!) Not only does it depend on your discipline, but *it depends on your particular research project*. Until all the bits are written, it won't be obvious what order they should go in. Even if you were an expert thesis-writer, you would probably need someone else's help to organise it so that it tells a coherent story. You're just too close to the project. (That's one reason why book authors have editors.)
So my advice is: Focus on writing, not on structure for now. You have a pretty good idea what you need to write, even if you're not sure where the bits you write will actually go. When your supervisor suggests a different order, realise that it's not because you "made a mistake". *Expect* that the structure of the thesis will evolve over time, as you write more of it.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/01 | 818 | 3,451 | <issue_start>username_0: Reading [this question and its answers got me thinking](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/10652/ways-of-developing-non-core-skills-during-phd-studies), once non-core PhD skills are learned and perhaps mastered, how can we make these achievements clear on a CV when applying for academic positions?
For example, my PhD majors in atmospheric physics and photobiology, but a significant part of it is in Android programming (the basis of the 3 published papers so far) and a few other skills not directly related to the major disciplines, but important nonetheless.
Related, would having peer reviewed published papers be considered as proficiency in the non core subjects without taking away the focus from the major disciplines?<issue_comment>username_1: What you put on your CV should be tailored explicitly towards the type of job you're applying for. If you're applying for a faculty position at a research university, putting Android programming would be a waste of time, but putting a significant grant you won would be appropriate. Likewise if you're applying to a position where teaching is going to be a large part of your workload, put as much about your teaching experience as you can. If you are applying for a quant position on Wall Street, you need to beef up the programming skills.
So really, the answer is, *tailor your CV to the job you are applying for,* and given that you are applying for academic positions, you should probably leave off the non-core skills altogether. That's not to say they aren't important, but they aren't important enough to list on your CV. If the situation presents itself during an interview, that's probably the place to mention it.
>
> Related, would having peer reviewed published papers be considered as proficiency in the non core subjects without taking away the focus from the major disciplines?
>
>
>
I'm not 100% sure what you're really asking here, but peer-reviewed research should be listed on your CV unless it is in a completely unrelated field than the one you're applying for. Don't list the paper you happened to get published in the English Literature Journal if you're applying for positions in photobiology\*.
\*Unless you happen to have written a piece on the writing of 18th Century biologists and how it affects current photobiology trends.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_2: I see no reason at all to leave any reasonable skill or ability off of your CV. Play a musical instrument? Won some medals in a sporting event? Program an android app? Have a black belt in a martial art? Add a section called "Other skills" or "Personal Information" and *briefly* list these skills. There are two reasons for this. First, it can help a potential employer think of you as a real person, perhaps someone they would like to know. Second, many skills can take years of dedicated practice to master; if you can master one such skill, then there is a good chance you can master whatever new skills may be required in the new job.
Here is an example from my life. Many years ago I programmed a video game (one of the old "text adventure" style games. I placed this on my CV, not thinking much about it. It turned out that one of the elder faculty conducting the interview had played that game and remembered it fondly. This alone certainly did not "get me the job," but anything that can smooth the way can be helpful.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/01 | 1,059 | 4,616 | <issue_start>username_0: Context: I intend to study mathematics and do research as a career. I am studying analysis and abstract algebra now and I shall begin my undergraduate studies shortly.
>
> Should I opt for physics as minor for better mathematical intuition?
>
>
>
I have been told my friend that physics may lend one intuition into a few mathematical structures though I am not sure. I can only think of differential equations as an example. In particular, please tell me if physics can serve as a source of motivation and if it is crucial enough.<issue_comment>username_1: There's a range of applications for mathematics around many disciplines. In the XX century, physics was definitely the biggest consumer of mathematics, from the photoelectric effect and the black body spectrum in the early century through nuclear bombs and space exploration of the second half. The XXI century looks to shape around biology and life sciences.
1. Physics leans heavily on PDE, real and complex analysis. Some areas may require abstract algebra, but they could turn out to be somewhat exotic (quantum Hall effect and other solid state physics stuff), and you would need to study physics for about 5 years to get to understand what it is if you are starting from ground zero. (School physics IS ground zero, in my books.) Until you know what Green's function is, there may be little point approaching physics for you.
2. Economics leans heavily on real analysis and optimization. There's some use of abstract algebra, although again to get to the areas where it is really needed (welfare economics, may be some very abstract macro), you need to get very deep into grad school in economics.
3. There's quantitative biology, in which separate fields may require way separate math tools: ecology uses some PDEs, while protein structure is computation that could be using abstract algebra, too, to describe the spatial structures (where it overlaps somewhat with material science).
4. Computer science is another big obvious consumer of mathematics, and abstract algebra is very immediately used in various codes. If you want to have an immediate gratification from having learned simple groups, you can go ahead and figure out how the PGP algorithm works.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: While essentially seconding username_1's points, I'd be inclined to make a stronger claim about the utility of looking at not-so-elementary physics. That is, in addition to all the "mechanics" applications of the 18th and 19th centuries, and Maxwell's late-19th century electromagnetism (which provided a huge impetus to ideas about vectors!), many aspects of quantum theory focused attention on differential equations which have proven to be important examples of mathematical phenomena, in addition to applications to physics. This important-example-intensely-studied phenomenon continued with Bargmann's and Wigner's studies on representation-theory of specific Lie groups, which provided the backdrop for Harish-Chandra's vast program. This specificity was in marked contrast to the "generalism" that mathematicians of the time were embracing, e.g., Weil, Godement.
I think it continues to be the case that physical considerations suggest very-specific examples meriting intense study... which provide test cases for "purely" mathematical ideas.
Witten's (and others') relatively recent "physics" programmes have had a large impact on algebraic geometry (moduli problems, mirror symmetry).
Although I'm also fond of the crypto application/motivations of algorithmic number theory, the breadth and depth seems not as great as the math-phys connection, although of course the elapsed time is much less than for math-phys.
(The optimization and math econ, and comp sci and category theory applications/connections are less familiar to me.)
Still, I must confess that I dropped an undergrad physics minor while studying mathematics, because it seemed dreary to me at the time. Partly this was due to my inability to see the *physics* ideas underlying the tricks to evaluate integrals, but perhaps partly due to the accidentally-dumbed-down viewpoint promulgated in the physics courses ... presumably aiming at "accessibility".
And, yes, there is a similar common risk/disappointment in mathematics courses that give up ideas for the sake of "tractability". The risk is that it gives the wrong impression.
(Yet, yes, sometimes I've been told that what seems to me insanely fussy detail-mongering is the very essence of mathematics, and that perhaps I insufficiently appreciate "proof".)
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/01 | 973 | 3,253 | <issue_start>username_0: I want to write something along the lines of:
```
For this I shall be using the foo library
```
And I wish to insert a link to said library, but I am confused as how to properly write the link. Do I insert it as a citation, a footnote, or just leave it there in the text?<issue_comment>username_1: I prefer footnote or in text. Others would also consider using a citation. Check your local style guide. Here is one possibility (<http://lib.westfield.ma.edu/webapa.htm>)
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: In my area (management), links belong in the references section (whether on a separate references page or footnote depends on the citation format) but generally you should not put links in your text.
If there are referencing system which use in-text links, I have yet to see them.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: If the library is important enough to be mentioned in the body of the article, I would definitely cite it. (If it's only mentioned in a technical appendix, I *might* consider a footnote sufficient.)
Indeed, many software libraries or packages aimed at scientific use may carry a request that you do so, typically accompanied by an example citation, like this one from the [R programming language FAQ](http://cran.r-project.org/doc/FAQ/R-FAQ.html#Citing-R):
>
> "To cite R in publications, use
>
>
>
> ```
> @Manual{,
> title = {R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing},
> author = {{R Core Team}},
> organization = {R Foundation for Statistical Computing},
> address = {Vienna, Austria},
> year = 2013,
> url = {http://www.R-project.org}
> }
>
> ```
>
> Citation strings (or BibTeX entries) for R and R packages can also be obtained by `citation()`."
>
>
>
If no example citation format has been provided for your software library, I'd suggest citing the library web page in the same general fashion, e.g. as in:
>
> * The Foo Project. (2013). *The Foo Scientific Library*. v. 3.14.15. <http://foo.org/fsl/>
>
>
>
or as in:
>
> * <NAME>. (2011). "A fast frobnication routine for Intel CPUs". [http://example.edu/~jsmith/frob/](http://example.edu/%7Ejsmith/frob/)
>
>
>
If the library has been formally described in a published article or technical report, it may also be appropriate to cite the article or report instead. In such cases, though, I would *usually* expect the library documentation to say so.
Ps. Here are a few earlier questions on the same or similar topics:
* [How do I reference the Python programming language in a thesis or a paper?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/5482/how-do-i-reference-the-python-programming-language-in-a-thesis-or-a-paper)
* [How to cite software documentation?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/9617/how-to-cite-software-documentation)
* [How to cite a website URL?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8098/how-to-cite-a-website-url)
* [How to cite a “product”?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8948/how-to-cite-a-product)
* [How can I ensure that my software is correctly cited?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/10001/how-can-i-ensure-that-my-software-is-correctly-cited)
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/01 | 605 | 2,550 | <issue_start>username_0: Based on @JeffE's suggestion [here](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/10658/how-can-a-senior-undergraduate-find-academic-journals-in-math-and-computer-scien#comment19585_10658), I see many CS researchers care mostly about conferences deadlines. Even when they want to read papers, usually they check the recent proceedings of different conferences.
Having a paper in IJCAI or AAAI for example, worth more than publishing in many ISI indexed journals with good reputation. I have no hard evidence for this but being in touch with CS research, I see little discussion about journal publications. why is that? is it *good* for the spirit of research in the CS field?<issue_comment>username_1: There's a reason CS folks cite when we obsess about conferences. The claim is that the field moves so quickly that conferences are more effective than journal for fast turn-around, and so better reflect the speed of developments.
I think this statement is partly true (conferences do have faster turnaround than CS journals) but misses the point entirely (there's no reason journals CAN'T have faster turn around time).
The real reason is the usual one. We got used to having conferences be the primary source of dissemination, and have no pressing reason to change. Having said that, the arxiv is more and more becoming the first choice of reading material and "hot off the presses" material, so I suspect that your question will become more and more moot as time goes on.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Just to add some points to @username_1's answer which already lists the most important reasons (at least in my opinion).
While it is true that brand new results are usually published in conferences due to their speed compared to journals (there's no reasons that journals couldn't be faster, but, as things currently stand, they simply *aren't*), there are still valuable papers to be found in journals.
The first type of papers I usually read from journals are **extended versions of conference papers**: once the author gets his idea published *fast* in a conference, if it is a Really Important Thing, there is nothing stopping him/her to take some time and publish a detailed version in a journal.
The other type is **overview papers** whose value is not in a vast number of new contributions, but usually are the first ones systematically putting a chunk of knowledge in the same place, and possibly giving a new view of already existing techniques/structures/whatever.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/02 | 1,511 | 6,443 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm looking into applying to present at a conference for undergraduates in mathematics this summer. When I apply, I have to either apply to give a talk (~20 minutes) or present a poster.
From what I've read on this site, it seems posters are often looked down on relative to talks, especially in mathematics. However, one advantage of a poster session is that I can have a back-and-forth discussion which is impossible in a talk. I think this is especially important for my research, since the computations in the subject are notoriously tricky and will trip up even experts if they aren't paying close attention to the details.
What are the relative advantages/disadvantages of each format? Which is a better way to advertise my research and network with other researchers in my field?<issue_comment>username_1: It depends on what you want to do. If you feel like at this point in your research it would be more beneficial to *converse* than to *present*, then I'd say that a poster session is the right venue for you. It's true that talks are considered a bit more prestigious than poster sessions, but you really should go with what you think will be more valuable for you, and for the conference attendees.
It's worth noting that you could always do a poster presentation this year, get the feedback that you covet, and then return next year to do a talk, and let everyone know how your research went over the subsequent year. That kind of progression is not a bad thing.
Also, if you are in the early stages of your research, it might not be ready for a talk. When I attend a conference talk, I'm expecting there to be some significant findings. Sure, talks might be more "prestigious," but, if there are some holes in your research, you could end up discrediting yourself. People aren't expecting the same level of maturity in the research during a poster session. So, as I said before, forget the prestige aspect, and choose what is more fitting based on your goals, and on what you have to share at this point in your research.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Space (time) for talks is often much more limited than space for posters. At the conferences where I've been (geophysics/atmospheric science), almost all on-topic posters were accepted (note that abstracts were not peer-reviewed) as is. For people applying for an oral presentation, either they were accepted as an oral presentation, or they were assigned to do a poster instead. It may be similar in your field; so try for an oral presentation, and if you don't get it, you may still be able to do a poster.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: From my experience impact of posters is way, way lower than of a talk. If you can get a single person listening to you for 20 min with a poster, it is much. Plus, usually, people are distracted (noise, people moving around). And before they can ask questions, they need time to learn what you are presenting anyway. So if you have a *choice* between talk and poster, the first is always a better option.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: Leaving aside the prestige issue for a moment, I get a lot more out of poster sessions than talks, both as a presenter and viewer. For the viewer, they can take in the information presented at their own pace, and ask for clarification if needed. If your audience gets lost during a talk, there is little chance anyone will interrupt as the talks run to a strict schedule. Good luck trying to regain your train of thought from the question session at the end. Talks are far too linear in my opinion. The discussions you have with poster presenters lead to a much better level of understanding I find, and there is a lot less inhibition in discussing the results.
All research should always be at a point for discussion. There is no scientific theory or research that should not need further discussion, at the level you get in a poster session. I have seen posters that present quite mature and significant research.
I regret to say that I have to agree that most researchers will see talks as the 'prestige' option, with posters a poor second. But this does not mean talks are necessarily better for advertising your research or networking.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_5: In the fore-seeable future, in mathematics the critical activity is giving talks, not posters. Thus, practicing giving talks, all the more if your subject has delicate technicalities, is critical. This is not at all any sort of argument against the communication aspects of posters versus talks, but a comment on professional expectations, for better or for worse.
E.g., gritty/volatile/delicate details need portrayal in more conceptual terms, ... or not at all. Even in talks, people often try to use overheads of some sort to zip through ghastly wastelands of unassimilable details... Don't do this. It just alienates and disenchants your audience.
In particular, I strongly think that the "in the moment" aspects of a talk are very, very good exercise for anyone thinking how to portray their work. The extreme case of a "chalk talk" is the best exercise of all, for mathematics, in my opinion, but it does tax performance and organizational, as well as conceptualizing, talents. But dodging the whole issue by the pseudo-resolution of "poster" only delays encounter with the genuine problem-to-be-solved, and doesn't add anything to a CV.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_6: **Talks** can be a way for you to reach out to a more senior audience, as many professors or senior figures may be present at a talk. However, your opportunity to actually interact with these figures is severely limited in the scope of the talk itself. *Sometimes* if a listener is interested in your talk, they may come up to you afterwards; alternatively, you can introduce yourself to a listener more easily if they heard your talk beforehand.
**Posters** are a better platform for you to reach out to a more junior audience, which includes under/grad students and postdocs, through professors can be present as well. Networking comes more naturally here as the nature of presentation is going to be one-to-one or one-to-few, and generally will leave a deeper impact on the listener (an uninterested listener will probably not come up to you in the first place).
If possible, **do both.** That way you can have the best coverage in terms of audience.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/03 | 886 | 3,921 | <issue_start>username_0: There is an argument in my institute that ISI journal publication incentive (in ISI journals only) should be omitted. However, the opposition, including me, believe that such monetary incentive would motivate young researchers who are low paid researchers to publish their work in ISI journals. I checked some of the international universities and found similar discussions tend to agree that incentive is necessary for young publishers and researchers.
What is the status in your institutes and to what extent do you think payment for ISI journal publication encourages researchers to work more seriously?
NOTEs:
1- Please consider that the focus is on legitimate peer reviewed ISI journal publication ONLY, not any other publications such as conference or predatory open access journals.
2- FYI, in Computer Science, publishing in a legitimate peer reviewed ISI journal takes from 6 months to 2 years. If a novice researcher can publish in 6 months, he/she is considered very lucky and brilliant.<issue_comment>username_1: There is one incentive: **publish or perish**.
Without publishing, young researchers will have a limited chance of a good career in academia. Without good publications, obtaining grant money will be difficult. Without grant money, you will be given more teaching duties and less chance to research. Without publications, you will not be granted tenure. You may end up with a teaching position, which is fine if that's what you want, but the chances of doing research will diminish.
Telling a long term story is perhaps a good way of motivating students.
We certainly don't pay them to publish, though they do get the opportunity to go to conferences to present their work, but only if they have work to present.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: >
> What is the status in your institutes and to what extent do you think payment for publication encourage researchers to work more seriously?
>
>
>
I've never worked in an environment with payment for publication, so my impressions are based on observing it from the outside. I'm sure it encourages publishing more papers, but publishing more papers is different from working more seriously:
1. Publication payments encourage mediocre submissions, since success is defined by having a paper in a certain type of journal, regardless of how good or bad the paper is. In many cases the optimal strategy is not to work hard on writing a few excellent papers, but rather to write as many mediocre papers as possible and then submit them repeatedly in a search for lenient editors and reviewers.
2. In addition to the quality issue, payments per paper create an incentive to break work up into [least publishable units](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Least_publishable_unit).
3. Publication payments complicate coauthorship decisions, based on how the money is awarded. If every coauthor receives a fixed amount, then it creates a financial incentive to add honorary authors. On the other hand, if a fixed amount of money is divided among all the authors, then it creates an incentive to remove less important but legitimate authors. (And if it's just the "first author," then that magnifies the importance of who that author is.) Either way, authorship is being decided based partly on financial pressure, rather than intellectual contributions.
Of course, all these issues are already serious problems in academia, with or without publication payments, but adding direct financial incentives just makes them worse. In addition, using a fixed formula heightens the tension by removing ambiguity. With hiring, one might worry that hiring committees will count papers instead of judging their quality, but at least some of them will prefer two great papers to five mediocre ones. By contrast, the incentives with publication payments are unambiguous, which strengthens their effects.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/03 | 2,064 | 8,721 | <issue_start>username_0: Since I've been using Mendeley to manage and extract metadata from my PDFs, I've come to notice that authors are sometimes denoted with all their initials and sometimes with just one. I assume this has to do with different journal's rules on denoting author's names. However, this makes a mess in my author list in Mendeley, as the same person may be known under two or even more names (e.g.: "Last, F."; "Last, First"; "Last, First M,"; "Last, First Middle").
If, for completeness' and tidyness' sake, I edit the author fields to always have the most complete name of the author available to me regardless the journal the author published in, I inevitably will change the way I cite them. For example, an article from a certain journal only uses the first initial:
>
> <NAME>. *Article Title*, Journal name, **x**:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx
>
>
>
After I have "updated" my authors, it is possible my citation includes also the second initial, i.e.:
>
> <NAME>., *Article Title*, Journal name, **x**:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx
>
>
>
So my question is: am I incorrectly citing the article when I include more complete information about the author's name than is given by the journal article itself?<issue_comment>username_1: I can see your problem but I am afraid you will have to live with the mess. The reason is that a publication must be referenced exactly the way it is published. The exception is that it is permissible to abbreviate first names to initials to adhere to the standard of the publication in which you intend to publish. It is, however, not allowed to remove middle names (initials) if they are part of the original publication, nor to add initials if they were not part of the original. I know many authors who have published under one and two initials randomly, but there is not much one can do about it.
Now, if you do it in your reference program, there is nothing wrong with that, but you need to make sure your changes do not migrate into published work that you write.
Just an example, [Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals:
Manuscript Preparation and Submission: Preparing a Manuscript for Submission to a Biomedical Journal](http://www.icmje.org/manuscript_1prepare.html) states:
>
> Some but not all journals check the accuracy of all reference
> citations; thus, citation errors sometimes appear in the published
> version of articles. To minimize such errors, references should be
> verified using either an electronic bibliographic source, such as
> PubMed or print copies from original sources. [The text then goes on to discuss retracted articles.]
>
>
>
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I disagree with the statement of "a publication must be referenced exactly the way it is published."
From [Knuth's Mathematical Writing](http://jmlr.org/reviewing-papers/knuth_mathematical_writing.pdf)
>
> In his bibliography Knuth has tried to keep his citations true to the original sources. The bibliography contains mathematical formulas, full name spellings (even alternative spellings when common), and completely spelled-out source journal names. (This last may be unusual enough that some members of a field may be surprised to see the full journal name written out, but it’s a big help to novices who want to find it in the library.)
>
>
>
This means that you can change reference, give full name of authors, give full name of journals. It may be unusual but it can be done and it is DONE. It is done by one of the most respected authors in the academy.
To answer your question:
>
> So my question is: am I incorrectly citing the article when I include more complete information about the author's name than is given by the journal article itself?
>
>
>
When you include more complete information, you are not doing anything wrong. Actually according to Knuth, you are doing very good job.
Therefore if your target journal does not have any rule about same reference rule, you should be perfectly alright.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: You should not add an initial that was not present in the original publication or expand initials into full names if the author used initials. One reason is the one username_1 gives, namely that the bibliography should reflect what was actually published. However, there's another reason I find even more compelling: respect for the author's choice of name.
Editing another person's name is presumptuous. Like many people, I have deliberately chosen the version of my name I use in papers, and I care about this aspect of my professional identity. What my passport says or what I'm called in person are irrelevant, and I would not be happy to have citations edited to use what someone else thinks is a better (or more formal, or more complete) version of my name than the one I chose to publish under. If my paper says <NAME>, then nobody has any business deciding I should be called <NAME> instead.
In particular, your desire for completeness or consistency should not outweigh the author's autonomy to choose their own professional name, and you should not overrule a deliberate choice. Of course, some people aren't picky about what they're called, and they may publish using several random variants of their name. It can be tempting to standardize the name for the sake of consistency, but you should avoid doing so unless you know the author wouldn't mind. If you don't know the author personally, it's hard to distinguish between an author who doesn't care and one whose preferences have changed over time, and it's not reasonable to rely on your own guess as to how to handle this. (For example, if someone adds an initial due to marriage, they might be displeased to see it retroactively applied as if it had always been their name.)
There can also be political aspects of naming. For example, some women publish under initials to avoid drawing attention to their gender. I'm not convinced this makes a difference, but who am I to unilaterally undo it by replacing the initials with identifiably female names?
To summarize, names can be a sensitive subject. Every paper comes with the names chosen by the authors at the time of publication. If you're going to modify these names, you'd better have a good reason.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_4: The problem is that authors may have legitimate reasons for wanting to use only initials. Maybe because of a clerical error, the same author is <NAME> according to his birth certificate and <NAME>, without the H, on his naturalization certificate. Maybe his name was misprinted as <NAME> on a widely-cited previous paper. Or maybe he intends to eventually be <NAME>.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: I would be very careful altering the form of the author names given in a publication. As others have stated, it is easier to trace citations if they match those given by the journal. It is also concern for consistency, especially for common names, it would be laborious to authenticate that these are indeed the same authors and not those with the same initials working in related fields across your entire reference library or bibliography.
It is also difficult to deduce "journal rules" from looking at a few articles as many cultures also do not have the custom of middles names. Although I have heard of Japanese authors also taking advantage of this to use their nickname as a middle initial to distinguish themselves from an existing author with a similar name (such as [Watal "Metal" Iwasaki](https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=oPHobJUAAAAJ&hl=ja)). Similarly, some people have geniune cultural reasons for changing their legal or pen name.
Another consideration is that authors may be *very deliberate* reasons for including their name or initials they way they have in a publication. Some people (including myself) are known by their middle name but publish under their full legal name (e.g., <NAME>). These do occur in prominent papers, such as [<NAME>](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/291/5507/1304) who sequenced one of the first genomes. Removing the middle initial may be problematic when attributing such people as it is important for their identity and to show that their work has been cited later.
If it is really relevant to your argument to link publications, I'd recommend mentioning that the articles are from the same author or research group when citing in text. It's far easier to remain consistent with citations exported from a reference manager and will demonstrate your critical engagement with the literature if you compare articles in this way.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/03 | 1,097 | 4,557 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm about to start my PhD. I feel I should try to plan my academic career; or set some general goals at least. The time line could be something like 5-15 years. The first years are easy to plan: study this, study that, publish a few papers etc. It gets more difficult to make plans beyond receiving the PhD. I think that if I don't know where I want to go with my degree, it becomes difficult to make decisions during the coming years: when to say *yes*, and when to say *no*. I know I don't want to just end up *somewhere* doing what other people think I should be doing.
How do you plan your career? How frequently do you update your plan and/or check have you progressed as you planned?<issue_comment>username_1: What I tell my students starting out is to make sure that they have *realizable* goals. Saying "I want to be a postdoc in field X in five years" is realizable. Saying "I want to work for Professor X at University Y on project Z in five years" is probably not realizable. Making sure you have a plausible goal in mind, and the ability to work toward it is incredibly important.
However, it's important to realize that goals and opportunities change over time. What you think you want to do now may not be what you want to do a year from now. So that's why it's important not to have goals that are too narrowly defined—otherwise, it makes it harder to change your mind later and still be satisfied with the way things turn out.
How often do you reassess goals? As often as you feel you need to. But you should also distinguish between the different ranges of priorities—short-range, mid-range, and long-range. Short- and mid-range should be reviewed on a very regular basis (weekly to monthly); the longer-range stuff at least a few times a year. But these are guidelines that work for me; you need to find a system that works for you.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Here is an advice I give a lot lately: given the state of affairs, make sure each you take a position (start a PhD, start a postdoc, etc.) that you want *it*, and not that you want what you expect to get *after it*. For example, if you take a postdoc that you don't really want because you hope to get a tenure track afterward, you have a great chance of regretting that choice a few years later. If you follow my advice, the worst that should happen is that you have fun with research for some years and end up frustrated not to be able to continue.
This advice is probably not that good for PhD in countries where it is a valuable diploma in the employment market; in France, outside academia you do little more with a PhD than without, and the advice stands (I know a few people that ended up high school teachers after a PhD they did not enjoy, that seems quite a waste).
That said, it means you should reevaluate your plans at least at each opportunity (starting PhD, end of PhD, next postdoc, etc.)
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: Some universities can help you plan your career, by describing what career paths are available to you, and what steps you should take to follow the path you want. I know this is particularly true in the UK, for instance Birmingham university has the following [career pathways](https://intranet.birmingham.ac.uk/hr/documents/public/career-pathways.pdf) (there is something similar at my university, but it does not seem to be publicly available).
For instance, some of the main paths are (in parentheses are only *some* examples are points that can be particularly useful to show):
* research-focused (where, for instance, showing that you can get some funding can be quite important)
* teaching-focused (where, for instance, showing that you can teach and supervise can be quite important)
* technician-focused (where, for instance, showing that you are very skilled in using your lab equipment can be quite important)
* admin-focused (where, for instance, showing that you can work with academics and manage them can be quite important)
* industry-focused (where, for instance, showing that you can address "real-life" problems can be quite important)
* others (where anything can be quite important!).
In my current university, you can have an official, annual meeting with your boss to talk about your objectives with respect to your desired path, and you can get support from a staff development unit. There is also a mentoring program, where you can discuss about your career with a senior staff member, usually not in your department, to avoid any "conflict of interest".
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/03 | 2,360 | 10,031 | <issue_start>username_0: I am a second year under-graduate student in mathematics. My school (3 years under-grad) has a great history of sending its under-graduates to top graduate level math programs of the US universities. However, I do not know to what extent top universities expect an under-graduate to have done graduate level courses.
The math courses I will have done in my under-grad are: Calculus I-II-III, Analysis I, Analysis II, Linear Algebra I, Linear Algebra II, Complex Analysis, Real Analysis, Intro to Algebra, Discrete Math, Introductory PDE, Stochastic Processes. I do not know if I will have done Topology and Number Theory as they are not offered in a regular basis.
So, my question to those who are studying or working in graduate level math departments is: Are there any specific (number or name of) graduate level courses that a student should have done to be accepted in top math schools for PhD? I know that many things other than the transcript would be considered by admission committee. But just looking at the transcript of an undergraduate, which graduate level math courses would the committee like to see in applicant's transcript?<issue_comment>username_1: **Disclaimer**: This is all vicarious based on professional mathematicians' advice (from MathOverflow and the like). Take these words with a grain of salt. . .
Graduate schools (especially the "top-tier" ones) judge more based on your ability to do research rather than your ability to get an "A" in a class or the quantitative aspect of your CV (referring to how many graduate-level classes you took). In other words, what matters most is your potential ability to become a producer of mathematics, rather than a consumer. After all, your PhD thesis won't come out from that (necessarily). So here's what I think you should be focusing on at the moment, for your final year (not in order of importance):
1) **Getting glowing letters of recommendation (at most 3) from professors who know you well. They'll probably be able to accurately asses your research potential assuming you've done some type of research project with them. If you have not, get to it. The key is to develop a close relationship with someone (or a couple of people) in your department who'll be able to get a good word for your potential as a research mathematician.** Try to look for someone whose area of research coincides with your potential speciality in grad school.
2) **Start on a research project (independently or otherwise) if you have not already ASAP. Something like a senior thesis. Research that result in publications look awesome but are definitely not necessary (I don't think anybody expects much out of undergrads). As long as admission officers can say "Hey, this guy/gal is motivated enough to do research on their own, and hey look at that work they're doing, there might be hope for them yet."**
3) **If you're planning to apply to places like Princeton, high GRE scores are preferred (shoot for the 90th percentile and above).** I hate to think of the admission process as a bureaucracy but just put up with it. Just remember, these exams are definitely important, but they are only one part of your application to be considered.
4) **Challenge yourself**, and keep your **GPA optimized** (I do *not* mean taking "easy" courses that just fluff up your GPA. Try to take the relevant math, which probably means at the upper or graduate-level). Though coursework at this point should not be your main concern (research should be), if you think you can handle it, and you think you'll have time for it, take a few graduate-level courses. Also, fill in the topology gap. Graduate admissions will look for a solid undergraduate background in mathematics (real analysis, abstract algebra, and topology are probably the "Big 3" for an undergrad to take, in addition to other classes). **note**: the fourth point seems repetitive now that I'm re-reading but I'll keep it like this for now for informative purposes.
Other qualities that'll help (more tongue-in-cheek than actual advice) is the ability to persevere and have genuine curiosity for whatever field you're going in when writing your personal statement. Do not puff up your application with courses just to "look good". General knowledge helps, but this is something you can do on your own time. Focus on optimizing your GPA and standarized test scores (GRE); most importantly, focus on establishing a professional relationship with a professor (letters of recommendation) and research. Other than that, good luck to you.
You may also want to browse these threads. I've pretty much reiterated most of the points, but you should still see their different points of view.
<https://mathoverflow.net/questions/15848/what-to-look-for-in-applicants-to-graduate-programs-in-mathematics>
<https://mathoverflow.net/questions/27299/on-starting-graduate-school-and-common-pitfalls>
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I am a professor in a top ten math dept. in the US. I have sat on admissions committees for many years, and talked to colleagues at other top tier institutions about admissions.
First: admissions is not done by a "bureacracy", or "officers". It is done by some subset of the math dept. faculty, who read the applications, including the letters, the GRE scores, the transcripts, and the essay, and then rank order them.
Second: To get to a top institution, high GRE scores are essential. These don't guarantee admission by any means, but if someone can't get high scores on this exam, it calls into question their understanding of all the basic undergrad math they've learnt. It's true that different schools (and different faculty members, even at a given school) place different weights on this exam, but doing well on it is something you have some control over in the admissions process (by preparing well), so it makes sense to do so.
Your GPA in your math courses is also very important. Presumably you are doing your best in your courses, and getting as high a GPA as possible. So there is no real magic to this; you just have to work hard at learning math.
Third: Assuming that your GPA and GRE scores put you in the ball-park of being a credible candidate for admission, people will read your letters carefully. So you want to get letter writers who can write about your achievements and abilities in as much detail as possible.
Fourth: No-one expects undergrads to have done real research; REU experience certainly helps, but one main reason for this is that it provides a way to meet professors who may get to know you quite well, and so can (hopefully) write a strong letter for you.
Fifth: Graduate courses certainly help, if your grade in them is good and meaningful. It is often the case that undergrads in grad courses will be given somewhat inflated grades out of sympathy on the part of the instructor. This makes sense from the point of view of not destroying someone's GPA because they took a challenging class, but an admissions committee will look for evidence that the undergrad really did master the material in the grad classes they have taken. One way to show this is to have the instructor of the graduate class write a (hopefully positive) letter.
Again, different schools have different expectations about what incoming students will know. At the absolute top places (Harvard, Princeton) essentially all the incoming students will know essentially all the material in basic graduate courses (measure theory and functional analysis, basic algebraic topology, basic commutative algebra, and so on). At other places this is not the case, but most incoming students at most top schools will be familiar with a reasonable percentage of what would be regarded as basic graduate math.
Sixth:
In terms of preparation for grad school, writing a senior thesis is great. It teaches you about a topic in much more depth than you would normally investigate it, normally leads to learning some grad level math, and also again builds a closer connection with a professor (your advisor) who can then hopefully write a good letter for you. And at a more fundamental level, since mathematicians spend most of their time writing about mathematics, this is pretty good preparation for that.
As far as applications to grad school go (rather than as preparation for succeeding in graduate school, where as I've said it's great), my sense is that the real pay-off for writing a senior thesis is the letter from the advisor.
Since this is a bit harder to quantify than entries on a transcript, often students are advised to take grad classes rather than write a senior thesis (if this option exists). I can see why this advice is given, but I do think writing a senior thesis (if you put your heart into it) is an invaluable mathematical experience.
A related option is to do independent study on a topic with a faculty member. Again, from the pragmatic point of view this doesn't do much for your transcript, but the benefits for your mathematical education are similar to those of writing a senior thesis, if you have a good advisor and take the independent study seriously.
Finally: Remember that there are lots graduate schools in mathematics. What I've written above more-or-less reflects admissions experience at top ten institutions, but obviously there are many more very good math programs out there, and they are not all as competitive as the top ten.
So overall, the most sensible thing to do is to work on learning as much math as you can as well as you can, and interacting with your professors enough that they know what you're learning and can write about it. I think the only things that are really worth thinking about in terms of "gaming" the admissions process are attending an REU or doing independent study or writing a senior thesis, something that gives you a chance to interact with a professor, and a specific topic, in more depth; and making sure you study well for the GRE before you take it.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/03 | 480 | 2,067 | <issue_start>username_0: Nowadays, since (almost) all of the submitted works are usually available in an electronic format (e.g. PDF or Word) besides the printed version, is it recommended to add an index to a PhD thesis in order to facilitate search within the printed version? Was it required in the past?<issue_comment>username_1: You may if you want to, but it is not generally required. Of course, check your local regulations. It is recommended to plan on having an index or not when you start, rather than adding it later.
Indexes were not required in the past, though check historical local regulations.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Ideally, I recommend having an index with hyperlinks (both from keywords on the text to the index, and the other way round). The difference with in-text search is that you select the most relevant occurrences of the selected words; this is especially useful with terms that you use at all pages, e.g. to point out where they are defined.
If you think it ahead, it is not that much work to do (at least with LaTeX and the right packages). Otherwise... I remember a few hours spend with two other people on this question for a PhD thesis in biology, where the index contained both abbreviations and complete names of a lot of molecules.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_3: Whether its required is probably field/institution dependent. However, just for the sake of those who (we hope!) will be reading your thesis, **include an index**. Even in electronic versions, an index is a useful tool for the reader; it allows them to see what the author(s) thought important enough to index, if nothing else! And if your PhD thesis turns out to be good enough to be printed and bought by university libraries, you will definitely increase the ease of use for those who access the print version (and yes, some people, myself included, do still wander the physical stacks when researching!See [this book](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0618958428) for reasons why this is a good idea).
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/03 | 623 | 2,780 | <issue_start>username_0: What's the best method to understand the real concept that a paper is trying to explain?
Should one go through the paper as it is presented, from first page to last page? Is there a specific walk-through to understand it faster, such as first reading the result section, followed by the concept section, and then discussion/conclusion section? Is there a best practice to be followed?<issue_comment>username_1: If the paper is well written, then the abstract should tell you most of the story at a high level. Then the introduction should give more technical coverage again of the whole story – you should then know the problem and the results obtained, though not all the details. The remainder of the paper then will contain just the details.
Of course, most papers do not do that, so you may also need to read the conclusion, the discussion section, and perhaps any other introductory sections. In the end, you may need to read the whole paper before you get what it is about.
However, to really understand the paper, you will need to go through it very slowly, with pen and paper at hand, and try to replicate the reasoning/ideas given in the paper, filling in the gaps – possibly with the help of additional literature.
Not all papers need to be read so deeply. Reading just the abstract and maybe the introduction and conclusion should help you decide how deep to read the paper.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: NEVER READ A SCIENTIFIC PAPER COMPLETELY FROM START LINE TO FINISH LINE.
Idea is to get an understanding of what concept is presented in the paper
Open powerpoint/paper
1. Read abstract - Tells us briefly WHAT experiment WAS DONE and WHAT WAS FOUND. What specific results are mentioned - are they relevant to your research.
2. Discussion - Summary of important results and gives reasons based on conclusions and assumptions - Do you agree with the logic of the conclusions and are those useful to you
3. Introduction - Motivation and importance of the research and tries to sell the paper to the maximum. Provides some background information.
4. Results - Provides some raw data which can be related to your own research. Figures and Tables provide data in a compact format for easy understanding.
In figures - does the graphs make sense ? , what are the axis's used and does it mean anything ? Check the units used.
5. FINISH - I have a brief understanding of the paper and I have tried my best to cover all the relevant attributes of a scientific journal.
6. Check the references and see if they are related to the main concept of the paper in hand. Follow through.
Manage a reference library like [mendeley](http://www.mendeley.com/) to keep an updated list of the literature you reviewed.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/03 | 914 | 3,380 | <issue_start>username_0: Three papers on a new technique came out at almost the same time. They are all similar and introduce a new method that I use in my research by providing a range of examples of that technique.
Below are the dates the journals record it as received, accepted, first available online, and then the year of the official citation.
```
Paper# Received Accepted Available Citation Yr.
P1 2011-11-29 2012-06-21 2012-08-11 2012
P2 2011-12-12 2012-11-01 2012-11-08 2013
P3 2012-01-09 2012-08-30 2012-09-05 2012
```
* By order received: P1, P2, P3
* By order accepted: P1, P3, P2
* By citation year: (P1 P3), P2
Q: Should I cite all of them? I assume so. In which case, which order?
I would like to cite all three, since all are in reputable journals and their submission dates were so close that I assume all three did independent work and are deserving of a proper citation. I am not sure what order to cite them in.<issue_comment>username_1: Different journals have different ways of listing multiple references. I am used to see chronological order in which case P1/P3-P2 would be the order. I write P1/P3 because usually one does not keep track of chronology within a year (although it can (now) be done). It is otherwise common to put authors alphabetically within the same year. If a journal uses aplhabetical order as a basis then the order is of course different. P1-P3-P2 is of course the most straight forward way.
I would definitely put all three in, acknowledging their work. Citing only one of them may come across as not knowing the other publications and thereby the field.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: This could be a very delicate diplomatic issue. There might be three groups arguing over the paternity of the original idea. I strongly suggest citing all three.
As for the order, first of all check the journal guidelines. In my field, typically citations are numbered in alphabetical order in the bibliography; if it's the same in yours, then I suggest you to cite them ordered by their citation number (thus alphabetically), i.e., put them in the same bracketed list [a,b,c], with a
Ordering the references like this is a good habit to adopt exactly because of these attribution issues.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: You should **absolutely** cite all three papers, if they are all equally relevant to the work at hand. There's no logical reason to exclude one or more of them—even if there were (for instance) a flaw in the methodology, you could still say "introduced by paper X, and an improved version by paper Y" or something similar to that.
As for the actual order of citations, I don't think, in the context of a *single* citation, which order you pick. You could even pick alphabetical order, if that's what you thought was most appropriate.
Now, if all three were in development more or less simultaneously—which appears to be the case here—establishing "true" priority is somewhat more complicated. I would choose whichever order best fits the "flow" of the arguments you wish to make with these papers.
The most important thing, as I mentioned at the top, though, is that you cite the papers; everything after that is "author judgment," and is unlikely to be argued (unless one of the authors ends up reviewing your paper!).
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/04 | 1,028 | 4,289 | <issue_start>username_0: I gave a presentation on my PhD research at university last week, and it was criticised for lacking practical significance. A different comment suggested the presentation was not placed in context. Could somebody provide some advice on how to place research in context and convey its practical significance? How can I effectively assess who/what/where/when will see the benefits of my research?<issue_comment>username_1: Without knowing your actual field of research, here are some general pointers (by no means, is this an exhaustive list):
* Research and find other papers based on or is similar to your work, this will give a bit of a basis for the practical context.
* From reading of papers, try and define a gap where your research may help with.
* Ask your supervisor/advisor for advice in this, employ their help in defining the context.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Ask yourself a number of questions:
* Why am I doing the research?
* What problem am I solving?
* Why should anyone else by interested in this research?
* How can my results help solve someone else's problem?
The first two questions will help you understand what you are doing from your own personal perspective, as well as establishing the context of the work. The latter two will help you establish why someone else would be interested in your work.
In short, ask **What?** and **So what?** about your work.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: Definitely, your advisor is the person who should help you most with this question, so make sure you talk to her.
With this disclaimer, I would like to distinguish two things: the good and the bad way to justify the significance of your research. To be clear, good and bad are personal (but motivated) judgments and are not related with what will please people asking you that question, but with what is sane argument.
Let's start with the bad way:
1. this is the most important thing and most others are specialization of it: giving false but vaguely plausible reasons to study what you studied, hopping to reach other's expectations,
2. claiming applications that are often claimed in the area, or vaguely related but at best very long term applications (e.g. "my study of cell migration is crucial for understanding metastases, so it will help cure Cancer"; this works with any fondamental research in cell biology),
3. name-dropping (e.g. "<NAME> has studied this 20 years ago, so surely that must be interesting"),
4. generalization for the sake of generalization -applies maybe mostly to maths, but applies a lot there- (e.g. "Finsler geometry is a generalization of Riemannian geometry, so surely it is interesting").
5. lacking any clue (e.g. "My advisor told me to do it, so I did"). If you don't know why you are doing what you do, at some point you should find out or change subject.
Note that 1. is very, very often seen in grant application, and it might be impossible in some cases to apply successfully without resorting to this kind of argument. This does not make it a good argument; we should be as thorough in assessing the relevance of our research than we are in assessing our research result.
Now the good way:
1. this is the most important thing and all others are specialization of it: explaining the reasons why you where interested in the project, why you find it fascinating or interesting,
2. giving perspective applications *that sincerely did motivate your work*, either from start or that you realized during the research process. This may not exist, which is not (rather, should not be) an issue, at least in fondamental research,
3. placing your research in context: how it relates to what has been done before, to which previously raised question it answers, which previously held beliefs it contradicts,
4. explaining how it generalizes previous work *to meaningful, existing examples* (e.g. "My theorem on Finsler geometry explains such and such features of Hilbert geometry"),
5. explain the perspectives opened by your work (e.g. "if we believe this principle applies even more generally, then we can hope to use my methods to understand such and such important phenomenons"),
6. explain why it is fun (e.g. "look at this dancing corn starch: weird, huh?")
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/05 | 883 | 3,577 | <issue_start>username_0: There are some prominent summer schools in CS (ML in particular) like MLS (Machine Learning Summer School).
What is the impact of attending such program on academic careers? (or applying for graduate programs)
For example,
LxMLS (Lisbon Machine Learning School) this year has ~ 150 selected participants from all over the world.
The summer school offers the following things:
* Lectures (from basics to advanced topics)
* Lab sessions
* Talks
* Poster Session (based on which the students were selected)
Would it be a worthwhile investment of 1000-1200$ (Assuming I have the means to fund myself) or are such opportunities common and easily funded in US and I should be looking at not attending and saving money?
What else would this summer school bring forth for a recently graduated undergrad student?
Some of the summer schools have courses which can be treated as university credit equivalents. Is this true for all summer schools?
* Background: A student interested in Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing and has taken online courses in these subjects.<issue_comment>username_1: I'm a PhD student in my final months, I'm in a different field (geophysics), but I've been to some summer-schools that I found *very valuable*. One lecturer even stated that *summer schools are the best forum for scientific exchange*. The summer schools I've been to didn't have as many participants as yours, but still, besides from the obvious point of acquiring knowledge and skills, summer school permit you to:
* Meet and talk to senior people in your field
* Meet other students, who may be going to be the *future* senior people in your field
The bottom line is: **A summer school is as good as its lecturers are**. Look at the list of lecturers, and ask a senior scientist you know to look at the list. Are there many famous names? *Go for it*. Are those mainly lecturers who spend most of their time teaching at not so well known institutes? Then you can probably spend your time and money better elsewhere. Depending on what's included (lodging/meals/...) and on how long it takes, 1000$ is not bad, although of course it's better if you can find someone else to pay it for you ;).
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: $1500 with everything included? Sounds very good value.
Asides from the great value and the great opportunity for networking with like minded people, it is a great opportunity, through the networking and sessions, to be able to find your focused research interest(s). You never know where the contacts you make, and what you learn will lead you.
I did something similar when I was just completing my MSc - I went to a workshop/conference in Boston - what I learnt helped me refine my PhD research topic; the people I met, I am still n contact with and have helped me when I did not quite understand some topics.
Ultimately though, it is up to what you can afford in terms of time and money.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: >
> What is the impact of attending such program on academic careers?
>
>
>
Direct - very little (unless it is very selective and prestigious *and* the committee is aware of it).
But the biggest things are:
* how much you will actually learn and
* how much you will network.
The later is more important (always you can learn by yourself, and most of learning is self-learning anyway) but you cannot network by yourself. So if there are people from groups you want to apply - it will help a lot (and also: mean that the level seems to be right).
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/05 | 1,268 | 5,079 | <issue_start>username_0: Background - I am doing my PhD in atmospheric physics/photobiology.
Here is a scenario:
* The experiments are complete - the results are far better than expected
* Successfully got the computer program to work properly and have developed another
* Papers are published
* Much of the thesis is drafted
The light at the end of the tunnel is most definitely no longer an oncoming train.
But, at this stage, you just don't feel like working on the thesis, you do other things like cleaning, reading, watching movies - procrastination gets worse, and worse despite the submission deadline coming closer.
The procrastination resulting in more apathy towards the project, despite being fully aware of how much work has been put into the project, how much has been achieved and how little, comparatively, needs to be done.
What strategies are there to overcome this academic-apathy, particularly in this late stage of the thesis?<issue_comment>username_1: My suggestion would be to set minor distinct goals for each day but not overdo them, make them manageable. Mix boring chores with more fun ones so that the fun ones become a reward. This may seem a bit vague or even wooly. The problem I think you are experiencing is that while working on a PhD you get accustomed to stress and like many (myself included) a certain stress is needed to get something, and really the best, out of oneself. This phenomena, in my case, has only gotten worse, and I simply have a hard time getting anything done unless there is some pressure that gets stress levels up. But, with certain tasks it is possible to get stuff done by breaking it down into smaller pieces because if there is no overview or goals are too nebulous then it is not easy to focus on what to do in detail.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Here is what kept me motivated and got me through the last year of my PhD:
1. A comment from a professor that *the best dissertation is the one that is written.*
2. My advisor kept pushing me to get her chapters. I'm not sure where you stand with your advisor, but if he/she (and your committee as a whole) wants you to finish up, that can be motivating. If you want to push this angle, send out an email to your advisor and committee with your plan to finish -- that will help keep you working!
3. I had set a deadline for myself (as mentioned in point 2), and backed all my planning up to make sure I met the deadline. It sounds like you've gotten to the point where it is just the writing you have left, and I suggest setting up a schedule of when you will complete each chapter.
4. My deadline revolved around the job market -- I knew I needed to be ready to start at a job in August, so I knew I needed to be completely done by then.
5. I took breaks when I needed to. I treated myself to a day off when I got a chapter completed and sent to my advisor, and I had one weekly TV program that I watched religiously. Finishing a PhD is a lot of work, but it doesn't need to be soul-crushing (and soul-crushing work is bad for you, anyway!).
6. I really wanted to see the finished product -- I thought it was cool to have this giant, polished document, and that kept me tinkering on it.
Good luck!
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: Looks like a clear burnout sign. Instead of watching movies and cleaning. Get on a train and do something totally different. I think you are in this loophole and won't be getting out of it by doing the same stuff over and over (remember Einstein's quote). Normally you'll need just 3 days to reset your motivation. Things you can do:
* visit new places
* see new faces
* talk about anything else but your PhD
* rearrange your furniture (believe me, it helps. Your brain needs to forget old patterns)
* don't read, watch movies or focus on anything more than 15 minutes
* go shopping. Ladies do this all the time to get that confidence kick
Good luck.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: I am completing my PhD in 2 months, and had my own revelation on this subject last week, which is helping me.
My own procrastination is the result of a fear of failure and a fear of being mediocre. If I procrastinate, and don't do as well as I hope, I've then got the excuse that "I didn't really try". It was a revelation for me, because this is the very thing I've been telling myself most of my life after I don't do as well as I think I could do.
I have thus been able to accept myself, and my shortcomings, more readily now... which has removed a lot of the internal pressure to perform well. As a result I have found that I am able to work steadily. I will try my best to do as well as I can without too much pressure, and whatever the result, that will be okay.
The revelation in itself did not help so much... it was really the acceptance of myself as I am now that has allowed me to move forward.
A side benefit to this will be better performance, but that is no longer the goal.
If you can relate to this, then I suggest reading up on "Fear of Failure" on wikipedia.
Good luck!
Upvotes: 4 |
2013/07/05 | 2,581 | 10,671 | <issue_start>username_0: I see researchers working on their PhD calling themselves PhD Candidates, other call themselves PhD students. What's the difference between a PhD Candidate and a PhD Student?
According to two posters on the [WordReferences forums](http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1790323):
>
> This terms vary from university to university, usually a PhD student is granted the candidate status after completion of a “comprehensive examination”, which occurs sometime after the first year.
>
>
>
and
>
> Here in the U.S., a “Ph.D. Candidate” is a student who has completed all of the academic requirements for their degree, except their dissertation.
>
>
>
So this works in the USA and Canada I presume, because they have structured PhD programs where you attend courses as part of your PhD. Unlike most of the universities in Europe where a PhD student starts off directly with his/her PhD thesis. (Europe does have structured programs as well, but they are not as widely spread yet).<issue_comment>username_1: In Australia, (at least at my university), you start off as a 'Provisional Candidate'.
Then you complete a Dissertation Proposal - where you present a 20 or so page preliminary report and present it as a seminar to a group of peers - once passed, you receive a 'Confirmation of Candidature' then you proceed to complete the thesis as a 'Confirmed Candidate'.
This is usually done within the first 1-2 years of the PhD course.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_1: To expand on what JeffE said – "Every department is different.", here's an example from my university (a top UC school):
The math department is pretty rigorous and the "candidacy exam" is mostly a blackboard and chalk routine. They throw a bunch of stuff at you, poke holes in your proposal, make you sweat epsilons and deltas from all your pores before declaring you a "candidate".
The life/physical sciences departments require you to have a 20-30 page written proposal + a presentation on it + preliminary results (usually at least 1 journal paper) and your committee members grill you on the proposal.
In ECE/CS (applied, not theoretical), the labs/PIs are generally quite rigorous themselves and by the time a student is ready to take the candidacy exam, they've had at least 2 first author publications and 3-4 conference publications. At this point, their course is pretty set and the committee members don't generally feel like they need to say/do much (unless if there are serious flaws hitherto unnoticed). As such, the candidacy exam is more of a formality — no 30 page proposals (who reads them anyway?); just a presentation on the papers already published + future work remaining.
---
The bottom line from all this is — there are no standard rules/definitions/process involved in becoming a "PhD candidate". All it usually means is that "This person has shown an understanding of the fundamental concepts (on the day of testing), their proposal/work done is original and has potential and they've completed all course work/other requirements except for their thesis".
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: >
> What's the difference between a PhD Candidate and a PhD Student?
>
>
>
To someone outside your department, there is very little difference since people (i.e., prospective employers) just don't care about the terms. they want to know what you have accomplished so far.
To someone in a finite duration PhD (e.g., a "typical" 3-year UK PhD program), there is very little difference. It is simpler to just list your year.
To someone in a indeterminate length PhD (e.g., a "typical" US PhD program), it provides a nice milestone.
As other have said, the requirements to achieve candidacy vary widely between countries, universities, and even departments. That said, I think it is nearly universal (and that is going out on a huge limb in academia) that candidacy implies that the next "evaluation" will be on your thesis and apart from time limits or extraordinary circumstances that as long as you are willing to pay your tuition and fees the department will let you be a PhD Candidate.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: In some countries (e.g. The Netherlands where I obtained my PhD degree) you are not considered a student but a paid employee (staff) with the university. To discern between these, people sometimes translate their status to English using term "PhD candidate". Btw, this has nothing to do with the length of the program or your progress.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_4: I think Jaap's reply is pretty much spot on, i.e. paid staff (as in the Netherlands, Germany...) vs. student status (as in the UK, for example).
Personally, I prefer "PhD candidate" because people here are massively prejudiced against "students" (young, irresponsible, constantly partying...) despite the fact that I'm officially registered as a student rather than staff.
Just to make it clear that people are not obliged to use one thing or the other.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: I am surprised at this controversy and answers. When someone applies for a status, this person is called a candidate. If you apply for job, you may be called a job candidate. When you apply for the studentship for any PhD program, you can be called PhD candidate. Candidacy means intention of getting selected. We can have Presidency candidate, job candidate and so on. If a person applies for admission for post graduate program, the person will be called PG candidate. Any program PG or UG or PhD will have so many candidates, but all are not selected. Once selected the status becomes Student. Many universities still force PhD students to learn many aspects of PhD. After a program finishes and the student successfully passes the requirements or exams, the student gets a degree of PhD/PG/Graduation.
So the three stages for a PhD aspirant would be;
1. to get selected as a PhD candidate (some do not qualify this stage also as they do not meet the requirements of candidature, then
2. to get selected as a PhD student and, lastly,
3. to pass the requirements, stages and exam (viva) and be come PhD degree holder so that you can write PhD as a title in your name.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_6: At my institution (in the U.S.A.), you are considered a PhD student until you pass your qualifying exams. After passing, you are considered a PhD candidate.
The qualifying exam is usually taken around 2 years in the program, or after you have completed any required or recommended coursework. It consists of a written exam, which can be one or more questions from each of your committee members. The written exam at my institution is left up to the committee members discretion (the major adviser in reality), it can be open or closed book, very detailed, or more theoretical, 24 hour time period or maybe 1 month, even proctored by the committee member. The oral examination can also be anything. Committee members can ask very detailed questions or more theoretical questions. Preparing for the oral exam can be difficult, especially if you have members from other departments and backgrounds. For example, I have a Soil Scientist, Biologist, Fire Ecologist, Landscape Modeler, and Remote Sensing Specialist on my committee. They all asked very different question specific to their fields.
Three of my written exams consisted of about 8 questions and I was given 8 hours to complete. It was open book and not proctored. I took the exam from home. One exam was 12 questions and I was given a month (yes I sweated for a month!). They all asked very broad questions for the written exam to figure out which areas I had a solid understanding in, and which areas I needed improvement. The oral exam was basically 4 PhD's questioning (read interrogating!) me. They started with a few easy questions, but then asked more difficult questions from the areas I was not as knowledgeable in.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_7: At the university I attended in the UK, one was considered to be on provisional status until passing the viva, which was not only an oral "interview" but also included a thorough review of all research completed at that point, a 20,000 word critical paper, and a detailed thesis plan. After that point, the successful student was advanced to candidacy, while the unsuccessful student was awarded an M.Phil.and dismissed from the program. This procedure was standardized throughout the university graduate school regardless of department. For candidates, the only obstacle left was the defense of the thesis.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_8: PhD students should complete all the coursework before becoming PhD Candidate. After completing all the coursework, PhD students have to pass the comprehensive written exam (and comprehensive oral exam) to become PhD Candidate. The amount of rigor of comprehensive exam depends on department to department. Some department requires that you pass the comprehensive exam on all the four (or five) seminar areas plus the methods that you have taken. Others require that you declare your major area and pass the comprehensive area on only that major area plus the methods.
Department may also require you to come up with a framework for your dissertation topic before they grant you the candidacy status. Again, the variation exists between department in how they grant the candidacy.
Once your status change from PhD Student to PhD Candidate, you are no longer required to take courseworks. However, you should be enrolled in the pre-dissertation and dissertation hours (normally 24 hrs; 6 hours per semester to maintain full-time status) to continue your dissertation. You work with your dissertation chair and committee after comprehensive exam.
PhD candidate are also called Doctoral candidate, and ABD - All But Dissertation.
Upvotes: 0 <issue_comment>username_9: It can be different depend on region, country, university or even department.
In my department in a university in Taiwan, we need to finish all required credit course and submit one international journal as milestone to be qualified as PhD Candidate.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_10: When you see PhD CANDIDATE think he/she is a CANDIDATE for a job in their field.
Versus PhD student they are still a student learning their field of study.
In Texas public University you are a candidate when you pass all of your doctoral exams. Usually at this point you have already completed all of your course work. You are wrapping up your research projects, writing papers to be published, writing dissertation and looking for a job.
-Nick, Chemistry PhD candidate
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/05 | 1,176 | 5,164 | <issue_start>username_0: I am a new graduate student and I am about to start writing my first paper. Some of my adviser's other students have been working on similar topic to what I have been working on and he has been pushing us to combine our results into one paper. However, I feel my results could be a paper on their own. I want to start beefing up my CV so that I can get extra funding and, hopefully down the road, a research position but I am afraid that if I am only a coauthor on a paper it won't look as good as if I am the sole author (especially since I worked completely on my own for my section).
So my question is: would it be better to try and publish a paper in which I am the sole author or would it be better to try and publish a slightly better paper in which I have 2 or 3 additional coauthors? Do funding selection committees and the like give precedence to people with papers that they are sole authors over ones who have coauthors?
Edit: My field is math, in case this matters.<issue_comment>username_1: The way authorships count varies substantially between fields. You therefore need to figure out how things are in yours. Multi-author papers are commonplace in most fields today and in some (mine included) there is almost a negative to be sole author (it seems as if you do not collaborate). This view strongly depends on what kind of paper/study it is.
Anyway, benefits with co-authorships is that your name becomes associated with others. If it is only with your fellow graduate students, the value may be somewhat limited but if you are co-authoring with someone who is well known and respected, the value is much larger.
In your case, the way you have described it, it seems silly to put your research into another paper if it can stand alone. If the joint paper is likely to become a benchmark paper and get lots of attention, then being part of it may not be a bad idea. So you see that it really is a problem of assessing how you can optinise your gain from it as well as how much the science will gain from a colaborative paper where all parts are present. One way to resolve such issues is sometimes to write several papers where the group is present on all but where the first author varies so that your own work is accredited you but the joint effort is also acknowledged.
These kinds of decisions are always tricky and, in my opinion, depend on how the work can be divided up without losing strength and impact. You should definitely bring this to the table and discuss the options with your peers.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: You should really listen to what your advisor says. "...he has been pushing us to combine our results into one paper." That about says it. Your advisor knows what works and what doesn't work as a paper in your field. He also knows (presumably) about the scope of your work and how it fits into what you and the other students have been doing.
There is little downside to this. The importance of the paper to your career has far more to do with how well received the paper is than with how many authors there are. Having more authors means the paper is stronger, means you have a network of people to help rewrite and deal with any negative reviews you may get, and (as suggested in Peter's answers) it shows you can collaborate with others.
It would not hurt to bring this up with your advisor, make your point (ask your question), and see how the advisor reacts.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: The relevant questions should be: What have those other people done regarding your own research? Are their contributions worth adding them as coauthors? These are the questions that you should be thinking about. From what I read from your post, it seems to me that the other people did not contribute much to your research, and you feel that you should publish the paper on your own. What confuses you is "the dark side of the force:"
"Do funding selection committees and the like give precedence to people with papers that they are sole authors over ones who have coauthors?"
The thoughts that surround this question are very serious issues (c.f. the current ethical standards of academia), and you should think about it. I think the answer of the paraphrased question above should never be a determining factor on whether you should publish that paper on your own or with coauthors. You have to first form your own ethics depending on what you think is true/right/just, and pursue that direction regardless of the monetary/fundetary/titletary disadvantages that it brings within.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: I do not subscribe to single authorship. No man is an island. I strongly believe that there is power in team work (co-authorship) than single authors. You need to bring in different reasearchers from different faculties for you to have a QUALITY ARTICLE for publication.
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_5: It is better to have a single-authored paper than a joint-authored paper. But it's better to have a joint-authored paper than nothing at all. Given the difficulty of getting papers published, joint is probably the way to go here.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/05 | 1,049 | 4,654 | <issue_start>username_0: I have submitted a paper later that was reviewed by four reviewers. I submitted my revisions to all reviewers. Three accepted the review, while the last is still asking for modifications.
The problem is that the reviewer is asking to measure the performance of our work using performance metrics that were never taken into consideration before in the literature (and our problem is well studied - at 30 references !) ..
These performance metrics would require a complete Master Thesis.
Is it fair to judge a paper based on performance metrics that were not taken into consideration by the authors at the first hand ? (noting that none of the previous work considered these metrics) ..
I hate to say it, but the reviewer seems to be reading a paper about my problem for the first time ever, and some of the reviewer comments are contradicting.
Note: I am sorry if this have been asked before. I could not find any thing related.<issue_comment>username_1: Can you elaborate more how the discussion has proceeded? If I am under the correct impression, you don't have to agree with every reviewer nor do everything they suggest. Instead, you need to tell them that their comments have been *seriously considered*. You should be OK by writing the same statement that you wrote here: you disagree, your point of view is supported by previous research, and so on.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: In your question, there is no mention of an editor for the journal to which you have submitted your work. If you disagree with one or more of the reviewers, there is nothing remarkable about that; it is common, a review is an educated opinion about your work, supposedly based on facts. Normally you would provide an account for how you have met the comments (as you seem to have done) and in the cases where you disagree, you provide an account based on facts and reasoning why you think your way is better than that of the reviewer. It should then be up to the editor, not the reviewer, to decide whether your revisions make the manuscript acceptable or not. In some cases the editor will request a second round of reviews, this is normal, particularly if the revisions have been so substantial that the manuscript is quite different from the original.
This is what I see as a relatively typical way for a review process to take place.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: I agree with the other comments that it is ok to not satisfy the demands of all reviewers and that in the end the editor makes the call.
However, it is still possible that the reviewer has a good point that the other reviewers missed. It is entirely possible that common metrics in the field are problematic and that since the other reviewers are "from the field" (and so are you, for that matter), they just don't give it a second thought. I have encountered these kinds of situations before. Remember that **ultimately, you are the one responsible for what you write in your paper - not the reviewers or the editor**. Therefore, I suggest that you keep an open mind and think deeply if the reviewer has a point and how you want to address it and act accordingly.
I am just mentioning this since it is sometimes easy to become overly defensive and dismiss reviewer comments as bad judgement.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: If I may relay a piece of wisdom that was passed down to me many years ago, even if you are convinced that the reviewer is a complete idiot, it only means that your paper was obviously not completely idiot-proof.
If somebody managed to find fault on what you considered a trivial point, then the point may not be as trivial or clear as you think. Applied to your specific case,
you could show, in your manuscript, that the results shown are sufficient to make whatever point you want to make, and that other specific tests, i.e. the ones suggested by the reviewer, would not contribute to the result.
In any case, though, my first step would be to talk to the editor in charge of your manuscript. She/He will be making the final decision, so it makes more sense to discuss with her/him directly, and not engage in a lengthy -- and essentially pointless -- battle with an individual referee. In such cases the editor can usually tell you how she/he would like to see the referee's points addressed, and that will give you something to work with.
I also echo [username_3](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/10991/495)'s sentiment that, in the end, it's up to you. If the journal, via the referees and editor, makes demands that you cannot live with, then you can live without that particular journal.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/07 | 1,890 | 8,421 | <issue_start>username_0: About 5 months ago I submitted a paper to a journal. The editors assigned a reviewer. In the meantime I sent a couple of revised versions, which did not help matters, but the editor ultimately wrote back and asked me to complete my revisions and re-submit the document. I did that within a couple of weeks. The editors did not acknowledge receipt of this submission, but I did not want to ask for one since I felt I had already been pestering them too much. A couple of weeks later, I notified the editors that I wanted to post a couple of graphs from the submitted paper on a blog, although I hoped to make it clear that only a very small component of the whole paper was being posted on the blog. The editors did not respond to this notification. More than two months went by after the re-submission, and I sent a message to the editor asking for a status update, just to be sure that the paper was still being considered and under review. It seemed to me that a very simple "yes, it is still being reviewed", or "no, we have considered your paper withdrawn and it is not being reviewed" or something like that, would suffice. About 10 more days passed with no response, and I thought I would telephone the editor with my question, on the off-chance that my emails were not getting through. I left a message for him, and another week has gone by with no response. At what point do I take the non-response from the editor as a message that my paper is no longer under review and that I should re-submit it elsewhere? The journal is otherwise a reputable journal, and I would like my paper published there, but there are many others that interest me too. I feel like I made a mess of the whole process, and am to be blamed for over-communication and confusion, but am I not owed the courtesy of a response from the editor?<issue_comment>username_1: This depends on the journal, as there is no set time, in general, for journal editors to publish research. No doubt you have read up on the relevant sections that pertain to timeframes on the publisher's website - those are usually a guide. I have had a paper submitted and published online within 2 months and another took 8 months.
There has been, somewhat ironically, a research paper written about this: ["How Long is the Peer Review Process for
Journal Manuscripts?
A Case Study on Angewandte Chemie
International
Edition"](http://www.lutz-bornmann.de/icons/TimePeerReview5.pdf) (Bornmann and Hans-Dieter, 2010).
A very pertinent point is that as the editors are reviewing a lot of papers, they are under considerable pressure to reach quick publication decisions and that the majority of the time is waiting for reviewers to get back to them. This may go some of the way to explain why there is a lack of communication and the length of time.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: There are good reasons to expect communication with an editor to be slower than many other e-mail exchanges. Editors are busy, especially since editing may be a minor but time consuming part of their job. And responding to questions from authors often involves contacting referees, who may in turn be unresponsive.
I'd say that it's reasonable to wait a couple of weeks for a response to a timely request for a status update (two months after a revision strikes me as a bit early---I'd expect it to take longer---but not unreasonably early to ask for a status update). If it gets lost (for instance, the editor is waiting for a response from the referee, and hasn't remembered to tell you that's what's happening), a polite reminder and a few days to another week or so of waiting might be appropriate.
After that, though, you can rightly begin to worry that you aren't hearing back. If there are other editors, especially a chief editor, you can contact, I'd start there. I'd be very reluctant to unilaterally withdraw the paper, since that might cause complications if the editor returns and feels you resubmitted while it was still under consideration. Before resorting to that, I'd try to talk to one or two senior people in the field for advice about the specific paper.
(Just to emphasize, I'm talking about communication with an editor about the status of a paper. Of course the refereeing process as a whole can take a year or more.)
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: You are right in both that you have made a mess and that you should get a prompt reply.
First, to see what usually happens: A paper is submitted, the editor takes a look (reads) the paper to decide if it is appropriate for the journal and if it is ok then either sends it out to reviewers directly or assigns the papers to co-editors who will send it out. This process can vary greatly in length but will be on the order of weeks to a month depending on workload. Remember that editors usually work for free or with little pay and working out of their spare time. Assigning reviewers means contacting reviewers, waiting for their reply and in some cases getting negative replies. Each request might use up 2 weeks and so if you are unlucky it might take month just to get enough reviewers to accept the chore. Reviewers usually have something like three weeks to do the review (it will vary though) but often reviewers are not on time so a month can easily go by. Upon getting the reviews back, the editor has to scrutinize the reviews and make decisions on the recommendation to send back to you. Several weeks to a month are typical times for this depending on a situation. The editor will then contact you with a "verdict" varying from accept to reject through revisions. During all this time you will not hear much unless the journal uses an electronic submissions system in which you can usually monitor the progress yourself.
So, if you contact the editor with questions during the process, I would say it is fair to get a reply within at least a couple of weeks unless it is a holiday season. The fact that you for some reason submitted a manuscript which probbaly was sent into above process and then followed up by sending revised manuscripts which would have caused quite a lot of extra work for everyone concerned at the journal, was a mistake and would make me as editor really irritated. Don't send a manuscript unless it is completed. If you need to add or change anything wait until the manuscript is reviewed or withdraw it.
Despite the problems you may have caused, you are of course still entitled to get a response on direct questions. The fact that many months transpired without contact about your manuscript is not out of the ordinary but if you ask for a status update after 4-5 months, I would think it would only be fair to get a quick reply such as you mention. As a side point, a rejection is usually communicated quite quickly so a lack of contact is usually a good sign. Now, I do of course not know why the correspondence is slow, if it is the norm with the journal or if it is just an accident. As a final point I would say that even if you messed up, it doesn't entitle the editors to treat you any worse than anybody else. It is always difficult to know if sending additional mails will help, most likely not, but at some point, give it another month, then a response should have come forth. If not then another mail is in order.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: From reading this it almost seems like the paper is not actually submitted. By submitting revisions (via email? were you uploading them? withdrawing the original? submitting via the submission systems as if they were new submissions?) AFTER the manuscript had been sent out to reviewers, you threw a wrench into the system. The editor was polite and told you to resubmit a final version of the manuscript. They probably WITHDREW your original manuscript and pulled it from review. The clock now resets for this submission. How did you do it? Via email to the editor? If you did that, it is not submitted. If you have no acknowledgement email, manuscript number, control number, it is not submitted and probably not under consideration. I would not recommend contacting the editor further and log into the manuscript submission system and check the status of the manuscript. You will probably have at least one submission withdrawn by the editor, but it is unclear to me how you submitted the unsolicited revisions and whether they will appear in the system.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/07 | 2,480 | 9,952 | <issue_start>username_0: Recently two friends of mine have come back to Australia after having done 2 semesters of 3rd and 4th year subjects (about half mathematics) at different branches of the University of California.
They said that the tests would only ask questions directly from or similar to material covered in lectures and example sheets. If questions deviated from the lectures or example sheets very much students would complain to the lecturer. Thus, if one studied the example sheets enough they got an A relatively easily. They returned with A or A+ in all of their maths subjects, but they average about 75-80 for their maths subjects here.
In Australia, about 70% of the exam is usually like that. The rest are questions that we learned enough theory to feasibly do, but we hadn't seen that type of question before so it requires some level of cleverness to get it within the time limits of the exam.
My questions are
>
> Can anyone corroborate that the maths tests at american universities are actually like this?
>
>
> If so, is this well known and accounted for by the people who look at grad school applications from international students?
>
>
> How do they fairly evaluate the performance of international applications? How are Australian applicants generally viewed by them?
>
>
>
Edit: Chris's answer below seems to answer the first question by "not quite", which is what I expected I suppose. The other questions still stand.<issue_comment>username_1: >
> The rest are questions that we learned enough theory to feasibly do, but we hadn't seen that type of question before so it requires some level of cleverness to get it within the time limits of the exam.
>
>
>
The math and science classes I have taken at top tier universities in the U.S. have had these types of problems as a significant part of exams. As a caveat, those were also classes designed for math and science students. I have tutored students in non-math fields who have taken math and science classes that were less rigorous in that regard (e.g., "Calculus for Business majors").
Suffice it to say that as undergraduates progress deeper into their respective field, they will generally experience more challenging material on the exams.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Repeating a bit other remarks: in the U.S., exams in upper-division courses are usually designed by the individual instructor, and vary widely.
There *is* a tradition in top-tier places in the U.S. to "challenge" students on exams, and students seem to expect this, while, yes, in some local cultures students expect/demand exams that contain no surprises.
For that matter, it is not clear to me that "testing cleverness" is necessarily an important goal for timed exams. I am well aware that there is a huge tradition in which quickness and cleverness are construed as fundamental skills/talents. Certainly these are important for math contests, and occasionally useful in the practice of mathematics, but I don't think our classes *teach* these things, in any case. Thus, testing for quickness and cleverness is testing for something outside the course content. Thus, in many regards it is an irrelevant challenge to the students.
That is, substantial mathematics often has *genuine* complications and difficulties that exist despite examples and forthrightness, and it is sometimes (often?) counterproductive to create "challenging (surprise) problems" from material that should be straightforward.
But, yes, people on admissions committees are well aware of such traditions and their variations, don't worry.
For me, the letters of recommendation from math faculty are far more important than grades on the transcript, in any case. Similarly, the statement of purpose of the applicant tells much more than the transcript. And, one more time, the skill set relevant to surprise questions on timed exams becomes ever less relevant throughout grad school.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: >
> Can anyone corroborate that the maths tests at american universities are actually like this?
>
>
>
Some are, some aren't. Grading standards are heavily influenced by national and departmental culture, but ultimately they're entirely up to the instructor, **just as they are in Australia.**
But I expect that most upper-division exams in *strong* departments require enough mastery of the material (as opposed to memorization of examples) to answer a completely novel question that requires the same techniques. The key word here is *mastery*, not *cleverness*.
(I go further than <NAME>. Cleverness is not only inappropriate to test on exams; it's actually a *dangerous* habit to cultivate. My most frequent advice to students in my classes is "You're trying to be clever. Stop it. Just solve the problem, one step at a time.")
>
> If so, is this well known and accounted for by the people who look at grad school applications from international students?
>
>
>
Yes, admissions committees are well aware of significant differences between universities, both within the US and internationally.
>
> How do they fairly evaluate the performance of international applications?
>
>
>
Generally, by comparing them with other international applicants, preferably from the same country, if not the same university. In other words, exactly the same way we judge American applicants.
In my department, if we get an otherwise strong application from a university we've never heard of, we try to judge by the recommendation letters. But sometimes we just have to gamble, so we admit one or two of the very best students from an unknown university just to *find out* how good it is. If they do well, we admit more from that university later; if they do badly, we don't.
>
> How are Australian applicants generally viewed by them?
>
>
>
Well, that depends on the individual applicant, doesn't it?
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: You have two very different questions here:
1. how the international applicants are being treated, and
2. how are math courses being evaluated.
The site would have been better off if you split them, as they are conceptually unrelated to one another. Ah well.
username_3 gave [a good answer](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11010/739) regarding the former question. His answer seems generalizable, as I've heard of other departments doing similar things. The admissions committees usually try to identify the countrymate among the faculty of their university and ask them whether the school the applicant is coming from is a worthy one. It is more difficult to do with applicants from Kenya or Morocco than those from Australia -- most academics will know about [the top AU schools](http://www.go8.edu.au/) (and if they don't, I just gave them the link :) ).
For your latter question, there is no good answer as there are 4000 colleges \* 5-50 math instructors in each. Oversimplified hand-holding you described is typical of the intro classes where the students will bitch about the letter $\theta$ and the sign $\forall$ as they have never seen it before. This creates huge impediments to instructors in trying to challenge the more inspiring and better prepared students who have to be held back at the level of the rest of the crowd.
I had a British prof in my Stat program, and he said that the British exams are usually written so that 70% completion gives you an A. I.e., the instructor reasonably expects that the top students will get 70 out of 100 on this exam. His exams were like that. As the system down under is built after the British system, you probably have the same approach.
The silly American "grading curve" system is 90-100% for "A", the top grade; 80-90% for "B", the second best grade; 70-80% for "C", which few students want to get; 60-70% for "D", which is a very low pass, and often requires retaking the course. Students [want higher grades](http://www.rochester.edu/College/phl/gradechange.pdf), and do not hesitate to give lower evaluations to instructors who grade less generously, so the professors, especially whose main responsibility is teaching (vs. research on the tenure track), have the incentives to make the exams simple so that the students are happy. The system produces a lot of students with nominal "A"s who know little to nothing. Only the top 20 or so universities (arguably stronger than the Australian G8 schools) have stronger incentives to maintain the university reputation, and tell their profs to make the exams real. I would expect that the stronger campuses of the Univ of California system (Berkeley, UCLA, UCSD) would know better than just hand everybody an "A".
As an artifact of the grading curve, the instructors have to populate their exams with 70% of very simple problems to let the bottom students accumulate enough credit for their "C"s, and can basically afford only one or two problems on a typical 90-120 minutes test to distinguish between the top "A" students and solid but not the top "B" students. This all is a matter of habit and tradition. Some instructors try to override it by making the total sum of scores in the course to be 431 or some prime number like that, so that there will be an extra step for the students to convert their 301 score to the familiar 100% range -- and most will fail without a calculator, and won't be able to tell whether getting three extra points they can squeeze for a homework would change their grade to pass from 69.93% to 70.05% into the next letter category. Professors coming from other countries may sometimes bring their own evaluation ideas (as my British prof did), and those interested in teaching and learning devise their own systems -- I described mine [here](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/9064/739).
Best luck with your applications, rest assured that you won't have any issues with the US schools just because you say it "todie" instead of "today" :).
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/07 | 1,170 | 4,644 | <issue_start>username_0: I have a question particularly for the math professors here. I just finished my second year as a PhD student at a top30 University, passed all my qualifying exams, and I've begun working with an adviser in an area I'm excited about. Since the end of the Spring semester I've done a LOT of thinking, and I'm not sure academia is for me. The main issue is my perception of the time that will be required (in terms of hours per week) to get tenure. I have a wife and kids, and I just can't sacrifice the time spent with them, even if it means giving up something I love. I figure I could put in 40-45 hours a week, but then I need to be home. My first year of grad school, I put in 60-70 hours a week, and I certainly never want to go back to that. This last year, I've kept it between 40-50, and that seems about right for work/life balance.
So my question is this... am I correct in ruling Academia out for this reason? I had considering smaller colleges, but I'm looking to earn at least $60k and from what research I've done, I won't make that much.
My next question involves research outside Academia. Is there any place for research in combinatorics, asymptotics, probability, and analysis of algorithms outside of Academia, where the work-culture is a typical 40 hour workweek? I see a lot of research in other areas of mathematics that I'm not interested in (PDE's, Scientific/Engineering, Number Theory) -- but not really what I'm interested in.
So with all that, it seems to me that I'm not even sure why I would get a PhD anymore, other than it might open doors, but it's hard to stay motivated when there is no clear goal, or thing to work towards. My current thinking is just take some CS courses and learn some programming languages, get an internship next summer and perhaps leave with a masters after a year or so unless I can think of a very good reason to stay.
Any advice is appreciated!!<issue_comment>username_1: I've said this in another thread: if you are outstanding and *efficient*, you can do the work required in a 40-hour workweek.
An electrical engineering professor I know got through graduate school at MIT working 9-5 days with a wife and three kids (all born during school), and he was a shoo-in for tenure (and received it). *But*, when he was at work, he was *at work*--I never once saw him out of work-mode during the regular day, and he put us graduate students to shame with his work ethic. His efficiency and focus puts him over the top. I know I couldn't be that efficient every day, but he makes it a priority to do the best he can at his job (which he loves) and also for his family, and he's figured out how to do it within the confines of a typical working week. Granted, he is also extremely smart, but I believe his efficiency is as much responsible for his success as his brains.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: First, I think it might be a slightly dangerous misconception about extra-academic research or work supposedly being neatly contained in 9-to-5.
Second, yes, *efficiency* and *focus* matter a great deal, in any case. Perhaps harder to be efficient and focused if one's motivation or interest is compromised, e.g., by time conflicts, thus making the problem worse.
But is it necessary or possible to "separate" research thinking from everything else? At least for many mathematicians of my acquaintance, it is not only possible to keep a part of one's mind working, if quietly, on an issue, but it is necessary, if not quite inescapable. Indeed, I would tend to claim that entirely putting an issue out of one's mind for 16 hours then necessitates considerable "recover and restart" time when one tries to re-engage. Thus, deliberately putting work out of one's mind entirely can have a further, partly un-necessary, effect, of reducing the effective workday by another hour or two, and having that unpleasant restarting to "look forward to" each day. Obviously this reduces one's effective competence as well as happiness if it happens.
I might recommend thinking more how to *integrate* a work-life and family-life, rather than about how to control or contain one or the other. Conceivably it will become clearer to you that very many of the "long" weeks people spend in grad school are spent fairly ineffectively and needlessly unpleasantly, not just taking up time, but dragging one down psychologically, and producing a state incompatible with family-life, for example. But if/when one becomes more effective at the enterprise, it may be less unpleasant and less an obstruction to the rest of life, apart from literal hour-counting.
Upvotes: 4 |
2013/07/08 | 2,101 | 8,763 | <issue_start>username_0: When preparing my PowerPoint slides for a lecture, I often find myself wondering what to put as the final slide.
For presentations in industry, when not in a university setting, I often have a final slide which simply says "Thank you." The intent is to thank the audience for attending the presentation. However, this feels a little out of place in a university setting, especially where students may not have a choice of attending (well, the choice is attend or definitely fail).
So, I started using a final slide that says "Questions?" However, I recently read something indicating that a teacher should not ask if students have questions (the teacher should either ask a probing question to check for understanding or the teacher should simply expect the students to speak up without prompting).
It seems the final slide should somehow indicate that the slides are done and doing that with a content slide does not seem right either. I recently started using a final slide indicating what homework was expected of the students before the next class session (sometimes the slide simply says 'no homework'). This works several sessions into the semester once students see that every time the homework slide appears it is the final slide; however, it does not really work well at the start of the semester.
Returning to my question, what should I put as the last slide?<issue_comment>username_1: Take a cue from TV. Pretty much every serial show I watch ends with "next time on..." It is simple, not prone to misunderstandings like trying to be funny, and actually serves a purpose of indicating what the students might look at before they come in for the next lecture. This is how I wrap up my lectures even though I do not use slides in the classroom. (I like to juggle multiple columns of coexisting text on a blackboard instead.)
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: Following on what username_1 suggested, I often have the last slide as follows:
"The next event is (next topic/chapter)
Your training is (homework)"
I turn the last slide into an almost sporting type event. But it depends on your audience.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: You could consider making your last slide a **reminder** of what are the expected learning outcomes of the lecture, possibly with a link to other past, or future learning outcomes.
e.g.
In this seminar we looked at:
1. Differentiation, from **first principles**,
2. A **graphical representation** of differentiation, and
3. The **general formula** for differentiating a function f(x).
Next time:
1. Differentiation of trigonometric functions.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_4: Usually, a '**this is what you should have just learned**' bullet point slide not only sums up what your audience has learned, but also reminds them about topics/questions that have come up during your presentation. This is a great way *for them* to remember *and for you* to guide questions/following Q&A session along the talk.
Another approach that I personally like is a **collection of further resources** (or sources) that the audience can look up after your talk if they are interested into more details (or simply didn't have the courage to ask questions).
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_5: There is a golden opportunity at the end of every presentation that begins with the words - "if there was just one thing you should remember, it is ..."
By being consistent, you will (hopefully) have students waiting to hear what you think that is. Since it is a consistent closer, you'll be able to build on this time to hook your students in for getting ready for the next lecture, or provide a topic for discussion outside the class, or ...
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_6: I'm quite stunned that no one mentioned it here, but one great way to make a final slide is to put **references** or **further reading** on it.
Not only does it give you the opportunity to talk about an opening to a wide landscape of wonderfully interesting topics (often a lot more than the abstract material you had to present), but it also leave enough time to students to write down the references they find interesting.
And if you don't have a lot of references, you can combine the conclusion/summary with the references on the same slide, great effect too.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_7: I would do the same things as with scientific presentations: On the last slide I put a conclusion that consists of a few bullets of complete sentences and I read then out load as they are written down. This could look as follows:
* Any continuous function attains its maximum on any compact set.
* Any differentiable function is also continuous.
* The derivative of a differentiable function need not to be continuous.
After I read the conclusion I just plainly say "Thank you".
My rationale behind this is: At the end of the lecture/talk I want to carry the main points in clear words (and not some formulation which pops up in my head during lecturing). Also, I do not write but say "Thank you" because I want the focus on me and not on the slides with the last words. (And also I find it a bit strange to write something personal like a thanks when I could also say it…).
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_8: I end each (3-hour, once a week) lecture with a slide that says "next week". I let them know what we will be covering. For those who like to read ahead, and when we have a textbook, I'll tell them what chapters they might want to read. I remind them if they'll be getting an assignment, if an assignment is due, if some deadline is coming up, and so on.
Some of them start to pack up their stuff and make feet noises when they think the lecture is over. I actually tell them in week 1 that the lecture isn't over until they see this slide. There isn't anything important I need to say to it, so if the stampede drowns me out, those who care can read what is on the slide. And if there is no stampede, I can quickly summarize anything important on it and ask for questions.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_9: Here's one that hasn't been mentioned yet: **a call to action**.
My source for this idea is the youtube movie [5 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People by <NAME>](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJUblvGfW6w). One of the things she mentions is that when you want your audience to do something (like give you money or vote for you), you have to spell it out really explicitly at the end of your talk.
The way to translate this to lectures depends on what you want students to do after the lecture is over. For example, I recently gave some lectures on programming, and I really wanted the students to do some programming for themselves (so they could feel the thrill of coming up with something and creating it). I made the review slide, and the "questions?" slide, but then I finished up with three slides containing ideas for fun programs they could write with what they've learned so far (a games, a fractal drawing, a music program, etc).
I wasn't super hopeful that it would work, but recently a student came up to me and told me that he'd used one of the examples and created a similar program. And even if they don't do it, putting the idea in their heads that they could, might be enough in the long run.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_10: **"Therefore, What?"**
>
> <NAME>, himself a master teacher and long-time administrator
> in the Church Educational System, has a question he often asks when we
> have made a presentation or given some sort of exhortation to one
> another in the [council]. He looks up as if to say, "Are you through?"
> And then says to the speaker (and, by implication, to the rest of the
> group), "Therefore, what?"
>
>
> ["Therefore, What?", <NAME>, CES Conference on the New Testament, 8 August 2000, BYU](https://scottwoodward.org/Talks/html/Holland,%20Jeffrey%20R/HollandJR_ThereforeWhat.html)
>
>
>
Consistent with the "call to action" response, **most** of the learning takes place *after* a lecture or encounter in which great ideas are introduced. *Students should not be passive*; the only way they learn is by grappling with the ideas and experimenting on them on their own and putting them to work. A simple invitation to **ponder** until the next meeting and then to **share** insights at the beginning of the next class correctly places the burden of understanding on the students, and should provoke the best questions, discussion, and discoveries, and it prepares them for future encounters. It also makes the homework much more meaningful once they realize that they are in control and are **responsible for their own learning**.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/08 | 375 | 1,608 | <issue_start>username_0: I will be a second year math under-grad in September, and currently doing an internship at applied math research institute. However, my interest after my bachelors is to do PhD in pure math at a top math school. My question is:
How important would the recommendation letters from my current supervisors be while I apply to grad school? (Note: My supervisors are very active in their field of research, but are not quite famous.)<issue_comment>username_1: Take what I suggest with a bucket of salt and a sprinkling of bbq sauce.
1. The recommendation letters would indeed be very important, it certainly can't hurt to have the letters on hand, particularly as your supervisors are active researchers.
2. Is hard to answer, as it depends on the university. But, having said that, I would say that the admissions people would look on any research favourably, as well as the internship.
3. Is it possible to write or co-author a paper in analysis? Perhaps you could speak with your supervisors about how to combine the two, or to see if they can recommend another academic in that field that you may co-author with.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: Recommendation letters may also represent soft skills. Hence, they are important. Your personality is independent from your field of study, so there is little point in withholding recommendation letters - indicating what kind of person you are - to future supervisors (or committees) if you are going to spend the next 3-4 years working in a team or with a supervisor on a project.
Source: PhD Student
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/08 | 1,326 | 5,841 | <issue_start>username_0: A significant number of colleagues had their thesis defense in the past year and talking to them got me thinking about my own dissertation to come in about 2 years (I am approximately half-way through my graduate studies).
Based on my experience, the norm appears to be so that the focus of a PhD student shifts from initial getting-used-to-things, to getting-papers-out, do your coursework/teaching (if applicable), getting-papers-out (repeat)... until you are a couple of months away from the dissertation date, and you panic your way into writing your thesis. The panic then leads to stress and errors, which I witness with many colleagues.
Seeing as my projects are particularly detached from one-another, it would perhaps be good to start thinking about some structure, and perhaps even start jotting down some text; not long paragraphs but at least some bullet points on the points I want to mention, statements I want to make in my thesis.
Seeing that I am *only* half-way in, is this a reasonable approach? ... or am I stressing way too early? Does one *need to* leave the thesis writing to the end when the stress is maxed-out, or are there smarter ways to handle the writing? I imagine one drawback of starting now, is that I do not yet have the "bigger picture" but yet again, since the projects are not built up on one another, I don't know if it's a real issue in my case.
Any perspective on the matter is welcome, of course.<issue_comment>username_1: I think it is a good idea to start writing down parts of your thesis early on. You need to consider possible structures for the thesis as well so that you know what you might need to write.
Starting early will, however, not remove the need for significant efforts at the end because the thesis evolves and it is only when you have your last papers/experiments/equivalent done when you really know how the text will have to look. This means you should write down text early on with the clear understanding that this text will likely undergo lots of revisions. While this may seem like a waste of time, I have found it useful to have the thoughts down on paper, it also provides a sense of fulfillment, "that you are on your way". In some cases I have had to scrap the texts altogether and start over but I see this as part of the iterative process of scientific work.
By going through the iterations your text will improve and the last efforts will be ever closer to a final product than were you to start from scratch at the end. I went through this myself and I have seen countless students do the same. Being prepared and realising that much awaits ahead is just a realisation that must be clear. Going blindly into the final stages without having a grasp of what is needed is what causes extra and unnecessary stress.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: What many folk find difficult is recalling what they did at the start of their thesis work - the literature review. They come to start writing their literature review with all the experience of the in-depth, detailed analysis conducted during their research phase and have perhaps forgotten all those papers that they read, reviewed and used to fill in the background and inform their research.
I suggest that, right from the start of your literature review reading, make short notes about each paper, perhaps at the top of the first page. e.g. "Great introduction to the field, a bit basic though"; "Good for a thorough review of method X"; "Not relevant" etc.
This makes the job of sorting through your massive (!) pile of literature easier when it comes to setting out the path you took through it to come to your research idea.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: It is not clear from your post whether your dissertation will just mostly be a collection of your papers, perhaps with some filler material added, or whether it will require a substantial amount of writing from scratch. I've heard that publishing papers as a grad student and assembling them into a thesis is done depending on one's academic discipline, and perhaps depending on the university.
If you are just putting papers together there will be less work involved. Regardless, 2 months sounds like a very short amount of time to be writing a thesis in. Are you sure you got that right? I suggest you talk to other students who left it till late, and ask them if they regret doing so.
I would certainly recommend getting started on a draft immediately, if you haven't already. Things to keep in mind, depending on your area, is that heavily mathematical writing is very time-consuming. Computer calculations, writing software and so on, are also very time-consuming. I would also include graphs and figures in writing software. Figures, in my opinion, are best handled by writing code, making it easy to alter after the event, and giving the best results. Actually, graphs are a good thing to try to get set up early, because they can be a pain. Even if you don't have actual data to work with, you can use dummy data, as long as you know roughly what your final structures will look like.
If your work has significant components of either, you need to allow extra time.
You definitely don't want to be in the position of frantically debugging your code a month before your defense to get some important result out, for example. You should also not rely on your adviser(s) to tell you what schedule to keep. It is not their thesis on the line.
Two months before submission is the time for reviewing the thesis for errors, hopefully with the assistance of your advisor, and getting ready to hand it over ot the thesis committee. My impression is that the norm is to allow the committee some time to read it, like a month. They may not read it, but that is considered polite.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/08 | 592 | 2,429 | <issue_start>username_0: I've passed the disputation and am now preparing the document for the printing press and final submission. We're required to have a CV in the back matter of the dissertation, and I was wondering if it is a good idea to link to my LinkedIn profile in addition (perhaps with a QR code) because it'll be far more up to date than the CV in my dissertation.
Do you think this is a good idea? Are there any things I should consider when doing this?<issue_comment>username_1: This is a good idea, so long as it is not instead of a proper CV.
Just remember that links go out of date and QR codes will become outdated technology. So when LinkedIn goes out of business, the link and QR codes will be just be remnants of a time gone by.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Your question indicates that you want to use a link to your LinkedIn profile in your CV because "*it'll be far more up to date than the CV in my dissertation*." Are you suggesting that (a) you are going to include a CV that is not up to date, or that (b) your LinkedIn profile will be updated over time and that you won't be able to go back and edit your dissertation?
If you mean (a), then *no*, you need to keep your CV up to date and a link to an online profile will not work. Your academic CV should always be kept as up to date as possible and it should *absolutely* be updated before you submit it in an application or include it in a dissertation. If you are doing your CV correctly, it will include different information than a LinkedIn profile and there is a strong expectation that every academic will have one.
If you mean (b) and are just worried that an archival copy of your CV will be out of date, sure, add a link to LinkedIn or similar. My CV links prominently to my academic homepage on at a permanent (i.e., non-university) URL, which is kept up to date, and which includes a link to the latest version of my CV at all point. I include a date in the footer of my CV although folks will have a date in your dissertation. Personally, I think this is better than relying on a for-profit company and its URLs for posterity.
In terms of the QR code, I'd skip it. These days, almost everybody who reads the dissertation will read a soft copy. A hyperlink will be much more useful. I suspect that a QR code will just end up make the document look dated at some point in the rather near future.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/08 | 1,524 | 6,364 | <issue_start>username_0: As a future French PhD student (in Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning) that legally HAS TO write his thesis in French, I am a bit concerned about the fact that less people would be able to read it and it got me thinking: why do you keep reading articles in your native language, when some ideas you find might also be published in English?
1. To those who are not English native speakers, do you read articles in your native language?
2. If so, what is it that you find in these articles compared to English-written ones? Are you just looking for useful information for your own research or are you motivated by something else?
3. How would you cite these articles in your own English-written paper?
I understand that using one's own native language can be justified for some fields such as social sciences, but here I am asking about "exact" and computer sciences.<issue_comment>username_1: Your three-part question is quickly answered:
1. Yes I read articles in my native language
2. Almost never because very few exist except older ones (ca. 1960s and older) and possibly bachelor or masters theses.
3. I would definitely cite them if they contained anything useful
Your concern is valid, regardless of preferences, using a common language ensures better spreading of the science. This does not mean non-English science is in any way uninteresting but will obviosuly be harder to find and read. It will be up to scientists in that language to bring the research to general attention. A possibility with thesis work is always to publish it or parts of it in journals and then translated. In such cases nothing is lost (except time for the complete re-writing)
EDIT: This answer was written for the original question which subsequently has been changed, also in terms of focus.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: As a native English speaker who's working abroad, I am finally at the point where I can directly read the scientific literature in the local languages. However, in the past, I haven't hesitated to cite references in French (my "original" second language) when it was appropriate to do so. There are no challenges to do so, really, except making sure that you have the correct abbreviation for the journal title.
However, I would agree with the other posters that indicate that, today, scientific work needs to be in English if it is to reach the widest possible audience. Between the fact that a thesis gets nowhere near the number of "hits" as the papers that are derived from it, plus the fact that it's in a foreign language, and I would expect you to get very little in the way of citations for your thesis.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: Although this may not answer your question, I just wanted to say that I did my PhD in France and did not write my thesis in french. I just wrote a summary (about 3 pages) in french, the rest was a compilation of articles. Since a serious publication can only be written in english nowadays, translating it in french would be a waste of time.
You should discuss with your advisor and see any way to get your thesis published in english. I do not think any legal argument holds.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: 1. I don't usually read articles in my mother tongue. But I do regularly read articles in a language that is neither English nor my mother tongue (French, to be precise).
2. With regards to my mother tongue, the few exceptions are resources (articles, books) I received from some of my collaborators. I refer back to them purely for convenience. For French:
* there are (at least until very recently) still active research in my area performed by researchers who publishes heavily in French; to gain access to those results sometimes it is necessary to read the original articles.
* there is a large corpus of useful literature from even the mid twentieth century that still hasn't been completely distilled into English language textbooks. (For mathematics, this refers most to *particular arguments* used in proofs. Quite often the same *result* would be available in English, but using a different method of attack. But there are also cases such as [from outside my field] [The EGA](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89l%C3%A9ments_de_g%C3%A9om%C3%A9trie_alg%C3%A9brique).)
* translations may contain "errors". Sometimes it is good to go back to the original source.
3. I just cite them as I would any other source. Most style guides have sections on special rules for non-English and/or non-Latin-alphabet sources. Just follow them.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: * I do read scientific literature in my mother tongue (German).
For papers, that are mostly classics and not so recent. However, it is quite common in my field to write theses in German. And there are still serious and good scientific books as well as text books written in German, which I enjoy reading and citing as well.
* I'm also writing my thesis in German.
+ Main reason: My old university required that (would need to ask special permission for any other language). I changed university, but I'm not going to change the language as well.
+ The findings are/will be published also in English. So not having the thesis in English doesn't matter that much in terms of availability in English.
+ Second main reason: the thesis is the place where things are formulated in a less condensed manner than the papers. Such theses are good for teaching students who are usually not yet that fluent in English (applies to some kinds of foreign students as well!) nor in the subject.
* The same (more detailed, elaborate, less "it follows trivially" jumps of thought) is often true also for technical reports, which I read for exactly this reason (any kind of language I understand).
* I cite literature I read in any language I understood (which not that much more than German and English, as I'm not as fluent in other languages).
* For the books, there is sometimes an English as well as a German version. But of course I cite the version that I acutally read.
(If I'd be concerned that the English-only reader would not get from "Leary & Skoog: Instrumentelle Analytik" to "Leary & Skoog: Instrumental Analysis", I may put a note that points to the English version)
* Finally, how would you read and cite e.g. DIN 38402 A 51 if not in German?
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/09 | 631 | 2,478 | <issue_start>username_0: I have two Bachelor degrees and an MMath, not looking for any more degrees at this time, but I might be interested in taking some Japanese and Chinese language courses.
I'm working as a research programmer for a university in the US ([IU](http://www.indiana.edu/~uhrs/benefits/tuition.html)), and they offer the option of
>
> a subsidy toward the tuition costs, under Section 117 of the Internal Revenue Code.
>
>
>
What does this mean for me?
* Would such subsidy be included in my income, and would I have to cover for the taxes as if I have received all such subsidies as real money in income?
* What happens to the in-state / out-of-state tuition differential? I've moved from a different state for this job mid-summer, and might start taking courses right away in autumn.<issue_comment>username_1: **I am not a Lawyer or Accountant**, and if you really worry, you should ask one of those or at the very least talk to human resources at your university.
But, based on my reading of the [relevant law](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/117), part (d) [usually referred to, I guess, as Section 117-4] specifically states that if you are an employee of a university, then tuition reduction for you to take classes *at said university* should not count toward your gross income when calculating taxes.
The US code does not distinguish between in-state / out-of-state tuition.
*Caveat*: your local state laws may have different interpretation of "gross income".
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Again, *not a lawyer*, but from seminars I've taken and heard about from different people at different universities, the general rule is that things are taxable when you get a notification of a direct benefit from the university. In other words, if they send you a declaration that "we have paid X dollars as a tuition benefit," that may very well be taxable income. On the other hand, if it's handled internally as a bookkeeping issue—you get charged less, and some internal "fund" covers the "difference"—then there's no actual taxable benefit to be received.
However, it is not normally the case that tuition benefits are taxable. This is particularly important for graduate fellowships, because otherwise the fellows receiving the fellowship would be "receiving" tens of thousands of dollars in "gross income" and be responsible for taxes on that, even though they never actually get the money in the first place!
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/09 | 841 | 3,445 | <issue_start>username_0: As a non-native speaker of english, I often struggle with always finding new, well-sounding, non-repetitive descriptions for the same thing and I also, to be honest, find it a waste of time of always having to do something different. For example:
Section 1 describes the X while section 2 is about the Y.
The Z is explained in section 3 and section 4 refers to A. The next section is about B...
Is it ok to just copy the formulation of someone else (of course my X,Y,Z,... are completely different) and always use the same thing?<issue_comment>username_1: There is a fine line between copying and plagiarism. In general the answer would be no, copying would be plagiarism. However, with certain fomulations there may be limited ways to vary. If the text you copy has some intellectual value, the result of someones inventiveness more than just lining up words to form a sentence, then the formulation has intellectual value and should be referenced, not for th eEnglish but for its content. A trivial sentence is just language and it is not unlikely that one would formulate a sentence identically to someone else. We also learn language from looking at how others (who we believe are better than ourselves) may express themselves. This is not plagiarism.
So for me the critical issue is if there is content other than linguistics that is being copied, if so then plagiarism is round the corner. So as a final statement, I would say: better safe than sorry; don't copy stuff, try to use the linguistic formulation but write the sentence with your word. Learn grammar and speling by checking what others do and emulate, not copy.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: If in doubt, just repeat yourself.
One of the things that stands out about reading papers written by poor English speakers is the ugly contortions they go to in order to avoid repeating themselves. "X is about Y. Z is about W. A is about B" may be repetitive but it's perfectly understandable. I would suggest that you do this rather than attempting to copy the form of another writer, I'd also note that your assumption that you can simply lift the same form each time and have it look right may well be wrong anyway.
I realise this doesn't answer the question you actually posed but I think it deals with the question you need answering.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: Sentence patterns are *not* intellectual property; otherwise, every author who wrote "To X or not to X" would be plagiarizing Shakespeare. (They are "riffing" off of him, but *not* plagiarizing!)
The example you are citing is perfectly innocuous, particularly since you are not doing anything more than summarizing the paper contents. The only thing that would make it wrong would be to copy those sentences directly from someone else's work.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_4: No, your example is definitely not plagiarism.
More generally, you can refer to the book "Writing for Computer Science" by <NAME> (Second edition, p.65, Section Quotations) to decide when to quote and when to merely copy:
>
> "note that it is not essential to quote such a dull statement as
> (...); paraphrase, or even simply omitting the quote symbols, would be
> more appropriate. Omisission of quotation marks in this case is
> acceptable--that is, not plagiarism--because (this) statement is a
> natural way to express the concept."
>
>
>
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/09 | 1,015 | 4,000 | <issue_start>username_0: In the USA, if someone writes that they are "professor" with no other specification, does this mean full professor, or can it also mean associate professor? In other words, is associated professor a subset of professor, or is it a fully distinct category?<issue_comment>username_1: In the US, Assistant and Associate Professors are also titled Prof. X when being referred to formally. This is unlike in Europe and parts of Asia, where "Professor" is a title that can be used only if they're a full professor. Others are simply referred to as Dr. X (or Mr. or Ms. X, if they don't hold a doctorate).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: *I thought about making this a comment as it only refers to Australia, and your question is about the United States, but it got a bit long*.
The **Australian Context**:
* Professor is typically the top of the academic ranking hierarchy in the order: associate lecturer, lecturer, senior lecturer, associate professor, professor. Thus, professor means that someone is of the academic rank "Professor".
* Common general titles that cover all ranks include "lecturer", "academic", "researcher".
* In terms of titles, the basic rules are as follows (e.g., for Smith):
+ If of professor rank, "Prof Smith"
+ If of associate professor rank, "A/Prof Smith"
+ If of associate lecturer, lecturer, or senior lecturer rank and the person has a doctoral qualification, "Dr Smith"
+ If of associate lecturer, lecturer, or senior lecturer rank, and the peson does not have a doctoral qualification, "Mr Smith" or "Ms Smith"
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: It should be pointed out that, at least in the US, "associate professors" are a partially overlapping set with the class of "tenured professor," as many associate professors have tenure, but have not yet been promoted to a full professorship. So, there really is "associate without tenure" and "associate with tenure."
However, in the US, as user7691 points out, the correct form of address for any professor, regardless of type, is "Professor X." I would even include adjunct and emeritus professors in this group. If you're looking at a faculty listing and see just "Professor" *after* a name (or in a separate field), however, it's likely that the individual in question holds a full professorship.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: **Short answer**: if somebody from the US writes about themselves as a Professor, then it means a tenured full professor.
**Longer answer**: If you see the title "Professor" in the official university publication (e.g., department website), or in somebody's bio, self-description, or email signature, then it means a tenured full professor (the third, and the top, step in the [US academic hierarchy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_rank_in_the_United_States)... Instructors and lecturers can hardly be considered academics as they are treated as staff for hire and dismissal).
If you see "Professor" in somebody else's email, especially students' emails, or in the university newsletter, or in some other source that was originated from a person that is not so familiar with the academic ranks, and the hoops one needs to jump through to get there, then it may mean a broader use of the term to indicate an instructor in a university. Essentially, all the adjectives (e.g., an Adjunct Assistant Professor... essentially nobody) are getting thrown out, with only the affiliation with academia remaining in this use of "professor" word. Such a liberty may qualify as an insult to a British/ANZ Professor where the meaning is way more specific. American academics are used to the confusions, though, and let the vague understanding of the title slip when used by un-initiated.
I was getting emails addressed "Professor" when I was in grad school... I would roll my eyes -- can't the source figure out a difference between a Ph.D. student and a regular faculty? They come on very different pages on the department website...
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/10 | 1,897 | 7,793 | <issue_start>username_0: My university is starting a policy where graduate students need to pay for printing (10 cents per page) while It was free before. As a student coming from another university, I see it very weird policy. Actually, I am not aware of any university charges its PhD students for printing. I heard faculty members will be charged as well but at lower rate.
is freely printing a fundamental right for PhD students? If Yes, how to raise it?
is this common in other universities across the world (charging PhD students for printing)?<issue_comment>username_1: Here in Asia my university does not support any kind of 'free printing.' If (any) student wants to print a dissertation, an assignment, etc. they usually either print at home or they go to a printing store where their work gets printed and bound properly (for a fee).
Honestly, I'm a little surprised that some schools support students printing for free. First, it's not very eco-friendly. Second, it's wasteful. Everything should be left in its digital form.
That said, my school does tend to print a lot and they require students to submit printed copies of their assignments. Still, we should be moving towards less printing, not more. One way to do this is to add a disincentive to printing (having people pay for it).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: I finished my Ph.D. at a large state university. We could print 250 pages a month, and after that it was five cents a page.
I still remember being informed one month that I owed four dollars, and having to trek upstairs to find the right person to pay it to. It struck me as undignified and distasteful, and reflected a feeling among many of the grad students that the support staff were there to enforce rules, and were "not on our side".
This issue becomes especially salient if students are expected to print out worksheets, solutions, and other materials for TA assignments. If I had to pay for this out of pocket, given poverty-level graduate student wages, I would be quite resentful.
I believe that policies like this are relatively common, perhaps usually with some free monthly quota -- but I nevertheless urge you to oppose this policy at your university.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: I have been to graduate school (MS) in India (one of the better known schools) as well as graduate school in the US (PhD, also, one of the better known schools)
I have never heard of printing charges. We have always had **unlimited** printing. And I have really tested these bounds. :) Sure, there are reminders not to print more than needed in order to save trees but there is and to my knowledge never has been any printing charges in any of the schools that I have been to.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: We had unlimited printing through our department (Computer Science). When I taught high school, we also had unlimited printing and copying but we also had a copy card that counted down the copies -- when the card reached zero, we had to get it refreshed. I assume this was to keep us apprised of just how many copies we were making, but I don't think it ever slowed anyone down.
These days, I don't print much, but one of the best purchases I made was an inexpensive laser printer that cranked out lots and lots of pages with nary a whimper. The convenience outweighed the cost significantly. It's amazing what you can get these days, [e.g., duplex and wireless for $80](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/B00450DVDY).
If you can't get the policy changed, and are going to print more than a couple of hundred dollars worth of pages (2000 at $0.10/page in your case), I'd recommend a cheap laser printer (to print 2000 pages, it can cost as little as $80 for the printer, $15 for paper, and $45 for a high-yield toner refill).
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_5: I am at a university in Australia, at my particular University, I am entitled to approximately 200 printouts/copies before I need to pay, but the cost is not huge (less than 10c for a black and white sheet).
Just like what has been suggested here, this is a good way to eliminate waste. However, one could take this a bit further and suggest some limits may encourage students to be wiser in their research - only printing what is vital.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_6: >
> is freely printing a fundamental right for PhD students?
>
>
>
A fundamental *right*? No. But charging for printing borders on the ridiculous. – Printing is a *necessity*, not a right.
Think of it in economic terms. A PhD is a job (there are a few peculiarities, and it’s also part of a student’s education, but nevertheless you ultimately are doing a job, which consists of doing research). If preventing you from printing makes your job harder, the institute has a financial interest in removing that obstacle.
What company charges employees for office supplies? The concept is ludicrous. Why not charge them rent for their cubicles as well? Printing publications, drafts and reports for reading is simply a fundamental part of doing research – unless your institute sponsors ebook readers; and even then your PhD will probably involve filling out forms for HR etc.
If your institute suspects that printing is predominantly used for non job related purposes then that may be a problem that needs addressing (and the same goes if the institute suspects that printing could be reduced without impacting performance – lots of companies have tried paper-free offices but so far I haven’t heard of any resounding success, at least not in science). But charging students for printing is still unacceptable since it obstructs them from doing their jobs.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_7: Printing costs can add up to a *lot* of money in a hurry (recall that they include primer cartridge, maintenance on the machines, *and* people time to replace the cartridges and perform the maintenance). Various features such as color, duplex and transparencies cost more.
Depending on the discipline and the work culture of your department this can take a real bite out of the budget. When that happens the cost have to be contained *somehow*.
As other people have noted this generally involves tracking the number of print jobs and charging for some or all of them. Often students get a free allocation.
My most recent department had IT under a separate budget, and they charged print jobs to the work unit (high-energy physics group; attosecond physics group; Physics education group; the department for TAs; etc) who then did what they saw fit to get their people to conserve on it.
My work unit had a "don't print if you don't need it" culture and provided generous displays to help you get along without paper. We also tended to send *only the pages with figures* to the color print if we were printing journal articles (color cost ten times as much a B&W).
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_8: In our department (in the USA) you have 50 free pages per semester, 5 cents per page after. I used to think this is ridiculous so I asked about it. Our department used to have problems with students (undergrad or grad) abusing free printing in order to print out entire books, etc. Indeed, I am aware of students who do this at other universities.
Once a grad student joins a research group in our department, however, the research group usually has its own dedicated printer for its grad students to use.
Similarly, if you're a teaching assistant, you should certainly get free printing privileges for printing that is related to the job.
I will also point out that there are often ways to get around the printing regulator, and indeed this is done often in our department -- so in the end mostly the honest lose out with such a system.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/11 | 1,324 | 5,827 | <issue_start>username_0: Occasionally, my university gives me outside work to design courses for other teachers or graduate students. This includes course books and other complete materials so that teachers using them have little to prepare.
How do schools typically arrange the payments for course designs?
* Are course designs typically only made in a one-time payment, with intellectual property transferred to the university?
* Is it at all typical for course designers to ask to retain intellectual property rights and to receive continued fees for each semester that a course is used?<issue_comment>username_1: I think the main dividing line in cases as you describe would be between if you had your own company producing courses and "licensing" them to the university and being contracted as a consultant for doing what you are doing. In the latter case you are being paid to produce something for the university and in doing so waive rights to the product. I do not want to get into the copyright regulations because you will need to find out what the university and your contract says (and that may not be very clear). If you licensed a course, things would be different since then your license would state under what conditions the product can be used and you could ask for a fee every time the course is given.
The main unclear part of all of this is where the intellectual rights ([immaterial property](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property)) lie. I think you could produce a course under your current contract but retain copyright on materials in the course. Again you probably need the help of a lawyer to find out what is possible. Again you need t look at how the contract or university regulations stipulate such rights. If they do not then national or international laws apply.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Did you agree to design the courses before talking about payment? I don't know if you have any recourse at this point as there was never a contract in place. I would guess that had you inquired ahead of time, your superiors would probably have asked someone else to do it for free, as that is probably what they were expecting.
If there is a system in place for paying you for the course design, I would assume it would be a one-time payment with no residual payments, and you should work that out before beginning design. If you can work something out where you do get royalties down the road, that also needs to be in a contract, and I would be very surprised if you were able to pull it off (but good luck!).
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: As you changed the question to be more specific, I'll add a separate answer:
>
> How do schools typically arrange the payments for course designs?
>
>
>
At the universities I have been associated with, a course is designed by the professor that teaches it, or as a collaboration between multiple faculty that are teaching separate sections. Many times you will find that intro courses that are taught by multiple faculty are still independently created -- a Calculus I course can be drastically different when taught by two different professors even if they are teaching it during the same semester. I would not recommend this, but it is frequently done this way. Savvy students will try to take the section with the professor who has the best reviews. Depending on the school, this is one forcing function for better teaching, although not a particularly good one.
To answer the question (<NAME>'s comment notwithstanding), course design is generally part of the duties associated with being a professor, and no extra payment or duty relief is garnered. I have never seen a case where payment is given for course design at the collegiate level. That is not to say that it isn't done, but I haven't seen it. I have, however, seen many cases where one professor will give all class notes, homework assignments, and tests to another professor in order to build his or her course from those materials, but this is done out of good will and not for payment.
>
> Are course designs typically only made in a one-time payment, with intellectual property transferred to the university?
>
>
>
I have never heard of a royalty agreement for course design, and I would be very surprised if you could get such a deal. Universities do work out deals with textbook publishers for reduced rates on course materials if the book will be required for a class, but that is different from asking a particular professor/instructor to design a course.
>
> Is it at all typical for course designers to ask to retain intellectual property rights and to receive continued fees for each semester that a course is used?
>
>
>
No. The bottom line is that courses are (read: should be) mutable entities that change with the times, and with the person teaching them. This is not to say that there shouldn't be a standard for a course, but I find it hard to believe that a college or university department would hand an instructor a set of materials and dictate that the course must be taught exactly in accordance with the set of lesson plans, with the same materials. I am all for providing helpful materials for instructors (as well as standards), but dictating them removes the creativity from the act of teaching, and limits the ability to prepare new material for the class.
To get off my soapbox: if you can design a course that your department will buy lock, stock, and barrel, and then you can convince them to pay you each time the course is used, go for it. You'll have to convince them that the course will indeed be viable next year and the year after, etc., but they may be willing to buy your argument. My suggestion is to work out the best deal you can for a one time payment, and move on.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/11 | 1,146 | 5,005 | <issue_start>username_0: So the title question is not real clear so let me try to elaborate. I am currently 30 and a senior in college. I will be graduating this spring with a BS in Computer Engineering. The way my school is set up the Comp-Sci and Computer Engineering departments are together and the Electrical Engineering department is separate. I expect to graduate with over a 3.5 gpa (not wonderful) but have no research or intern/on the job experiences. I am looking at continuing on at this same institution with their phd program. My gre scores verbal 165, Quantitative 158. Their cut off is 146 verbal and 156 quantitative. I still need to talk with them and see how they utilize the gre scores and see if I need to retake the gre and up my quantitative score.
So from that mediocre beginnings I come to the grand finale. When talking with professors and otherwise looking/learning in my field. How do you find those areas that are new and pushing into the frontier. When I write a letter of intent and they want me to tell them what I want to be doing. Where do I go read up on the new stuff for my major. What are some all around objectives and methods that people use and then specific to computer engineering what are people reading or procuring their resources from.
What other things could I do in this last year that may help my chances of being picked?
As an additional question, Letters of recommendation would be coming from professors from within the department that will be doing the selection. Some of these Professors would be the ones heading my thesis committee(i think that's right). Does anyone have any experience they can relate where they went to grad school at the same institution that they go their BS degree from. I will have one outside reference as a peer mentor for our freshman engineering program but otherwise most of the professors have seen me go over the top in my work for their classes.<issue_comment>username_1: There are a number of other things that could be included in an application, assuming of course you have done these:
* Any and all publications, conference proceedings and seminars.
* Any tutoring you may have performed.
* Any other activities that demonstrate your work ethic and capacity to learn.
This is not an exhaustive list, but may be a start. Having said all this, my undergraduate grades were ordinary and I had no problem getting into postgraduate courses.
One thing that you need to do is speak with the admissions, professors etc of the institution you are intending to study postgraduate studies with.
I hope this helps.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: *Why do you think you should be admitted?*
The admissions committee will ask themselves: if this applicant has mediocre qualifications, why should we admit them? Why should we believe they will be successful? So, you should be asking yourself that question, and thinking about what your answer would be.
If you have a good answer to that question, that might tell you how to make yourself stand out: emphasize the parts that make you think you are well-qualified to succeed. Your application is a chance to tell your story and answer that question for the admissions committee.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: About your last question about moving from the undergraduate to the graduate programs at the same university. I have known well three people who did this. The first two, in a math program, had had mediocre grades/test scores but had very strong relationships with faculty members and were admitted to the graduate programs because the admissions committee knew the students beyond their grades/test scores. The third was in an engineering program and he was accepted at multiple graduate programs and chose for personal and some academic reasons to stay put.
Long story short, if the committee knows you personally and not just as an application folder that can make a huge difference in your chances. So take advantage of the fact that you know the faculty who are making this decision and talk to them.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_4: A 3.5 GPA is a good, but from your post, it sounds like you may need to focus on your letters of recommendation.
I would focus on my letters of recommendation. Three good letters of recommendation will likely remedy a good (but not steller) GPA, and average GRE scores. Especially if you are applying to the university you are currently attending, I'd focus on forging relationships with profs that you like, and getting as involved as possible in your department.
If you already are involved, kudos. Go to the profs that are your faculty contacts for the clubs/organizations you are involved in, and get 3 great letters of recommendation.
If you are in the US, you should also consider applying for a masters degree if you feel your application will not be strong enough. This will give you extra years to build your PhD application, and will set the bar a little lower for acceptance.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/12 | 1,131 | 5,182 | <issue_start>username_0: I am interested in a new fast moving field in which none of the professors at my university have an interest. I have even started to work on some areas that show promise in the current scenario.
As I am working independently, and this will be my first paper, do I have a reasonable chance of getting it published (assuming it turns out well)?
What mistakes should I absolutely avoid while working on this paper? (to maximize chances of publishing later on)<issue_comment>username_1: Your question contains three questions. Is it possible? yes. Do you have a reasonable chance? Probably less than any other researcher because you lack the training but not zero. What mistakes to avoid? Well, that is what research education partly is about.
Writing a paper involves many aspects, providing the proper background, explaining the research, putting the research in perspective and reaching proper conclusions. There are many mistakes that can be made: you do not show you know the field, you do not describe the methods/theory/experiments well enough, your discussion does not hold and your conclusions are not well founded. All of this can come from poor understanding or from not writing well. So as long as you can tick the boxes from the subject specific to the methodological including writing skills then you would stand as reasonable a chance as any. In the end there is likely only one way to find out, try.
You state that you work independently and that is all fine. But, in science we all benefit from having others read and comment on our work to improve it so your chances of success can increase dramatically if your writing can be read and commented on by peers (with at least a PhD would be recommended) to weed out problems and any lack of clarity.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: A small addition to username_1's great answer; your chances of publishing your work independently will most likely depend on your field and how you want to publish your results.
I work in biomedical research and the only "independent" articles I have seen so far are written by senior academics that either portray their "expert opinion" on something, or a literature review of a particular subject. Yet again, they are not independent there either (at least in some meaning of the word), but rather utilize the resources of their affiliations and many years experience in the field.
If you are into some sort of CS research, I suspect there will be more options in terms of publishing your results, and there you might have a better chance in getting published.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: Practically speaking, you may be sufficiently well equipped for performing the research and writing it up. But, as others have mentioned, you almost certainly lack experience and understanding of the field to explain *why* you did it and what impact your work has.
And most experienced researchers are able to spot some common issues in the presentation, even in topics they do not know much about.
Corollaries:
1. You can publish, and I would absolutely encourage you to try. Mighty oaks from little acorns grow.
2. It is a lot easier for a student to publish a research paper solo rather than to publish a literature review, although the latter is also commonly done - as a part of a thesis project and under supervision.
3. One potential issue might be presentation. You should enlist some help to review the article before sending it to a journal.
4. Another could be a flawed experimental design (if it is experimental research we are concerned with). This is what training is for, and it is hard: very few can get it right, much less first try. Do not let that discourage you, however: this is where practice and feedback are especially helpful. More on that point later.
5. Yet another issue does not have to do with research but with the submission process. From personal experience and communications, it could be an unexpectedly enormous roadblock. Suppose you read enough literature, and you also got an interesting result and wrote a paper about it, and this paper looks no worse than what you see out there... Now what? Teaching you the process of picking a journal, submitting a publication, and interacting with its editorial office and reviewers is yet another role typically assumed by an advisor. You may or may not find this problematic, but if you end up struggling, again, enlist help.
Now, to expand on the experiment design... One piece of advice I could give you is this: before doing anything, pretend for a moment your experiments showed very favorable results, the best you could plausibly imagine. Try to describe them; do they make for a convincing case? If not, this is a bad, bad design; figure out what is missing. Do not underestimate this pitfall, it is far more common than you think.
Then, consider what happens if the results were very weak, sitting firmly at the previously established baseline. No improvement at all. Could you extract any knowledge from that? If not, this is still fine, but consideration should be given, especially as the experiments get more and more laborious.
Good luck!
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/12 | 3,410 | 14,343 | <issue_start>username_0: What are the ethics of publishing (on the web, etc.) peer reviews received for a paper? Does your answer change if the paper was accepted or rejected?
I am specifically interested in the "one-shot" case typical of computing science conferences, without rebuttals, where there is no or limited dialogue between an author and the reviewers.
This is quite distinct from [Can I publish the reviews I write?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/647/can-i-publish-the-reviews-i-write) as here I am talking about reviews I have received, not those I have written - the reviews' authors retain their anonymity, and presumably the paper would be included alongside those reviews.
Vijay's response below includes a summary of much of the other responses and my comments on those.<issue_comment>username_1: In the journals where I have been invloved as editor, author or reviewer (except in ones where the review process is open on the web), the implicit understanding has been that the communication is closed between the author-editor-reviewer. I have not seen any explicit rules stated by these journals to control against any such public dissemination but I have not looked for it either. I think that, particularly in cases where it is not explicitly stated that reviews are public, posting reviews without consent from the reviewer would be similar to publisihing someone private letters wihout consent. It is not illegal but ethically very distasteful. I do not think it matters whether or not the review was anonymous. Whether the paper was accepted or not would not matter either. I would consider posting without consent just as bad under all circumstances.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: This might be related to your question: <http://www.peerageofscience.org/>
The concept is that 1) you peer-review your paper *before* submitting it to a journal, 2) peer-reviews are peer-reviewed, 3) participating journals send you publication offers if they like your paper, 4) you may submit your peer-reviewed paper to any journal you like
I'm not sure are the reviews public themselves, I did not use the site yet, but at least there are peer-review scores appearing on the main page
Upvotes: -1 <issue_comment>username_3: As argued in the answer by username_1, it is ethically not acceptable to publish peer reviews that you receive for your paper, and I agree with that.
But there is also a legal aspect to it. The review is an intellectual work and as such will typically be subject to copyright. And that holds even if you don't know the author. So publishing a review will be a copyright violation, unless you get permission from the person who wrote the review.
If you want to highlight bad review practices, instead of just *publishing* the review consider *citing* from it. The actual difference may be marginal, but from both a legal and an ethical perspective, you should fare much better with this approach.
And my answer doesn't change depending on whether the paper is accepted or not.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: The ethics are the same as publishing any other communication that is assumed to be in confidence: if the content contains critical information about an illegal activity, you may (depending on the nature/severity) be morally obligated to turn it over as evidence to an appropriate party; if it is otherwise urgent or critical for others to be aware, you may be morally encouraged to find a venue to publicize it (as "whistleblower"), and in pretty much all other cases, you should keep in private.
You can complain to editors and others responsible for the conference or journal; you can commiserate with colleagues and try to find out whether this is systematic or not. But trying to shame reviewers in public is very unlikely to accomplish any valuable goal. (It may provide a satisfying revenge at the cost of other of your goals; I encourage you to think very carefully before deciding that this is worth it.)
There are all sorts of reasons you might have a bad review (covered in other answers); assuming one that makes you the most angry and/or feel most self-justified is a very natural reaction, but probably isn't the best way to a productive conclusion.
Instead, when you find things like this, you are probably much better off applying to other conferences, publishing in other journals, and maybe quoting (anonymously) the worst parts of the review in a blog or somesuch explaining why you're no longer going to whichever conference or considering publishing in whatever journal. There are options in some fields for publishing with open reviews (the Frontiers life science journals, for instance).
Publishing the full review and naming names is a good way to make people angry, make other reviewers not want to review your work, and to not get anything to change. Adding your voice (and papers!) to existing movements that seek to improve the peer-review process is much more productive, even if it's not as viscerally satisfying.
To be completely clear about the ethical implications: you are breaching the trust of the editor(s)/organizer(s)/reviewer(s) that reviews are confidential information. Breaching trust makes people less likely to trust you in the future, and is (in most ethical frameworks, including intuitive ones) unethical unless perhaps there is a very compelling case why this must be done. In your situation you have not articulated such a compelling case, especially given that are a variety of other avenues to take if you're actually concerned with the quality of the reviews. If you are working in academia, presumably you know how to quote tiny sections of a full work to make your point--that's much more acceptable.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_5: If the question is "Should the author publish the reviews he got for his paper(s)?", then I'd say no (**maybe** with some exceptions, but this would have require a per-case discussion). I believe the other answers have more or less covered that.
But, if the question is "Should the journals publish the reviews?", then I believe it would be both ethical and useful to publish the final positive reviews, and I have several reasons for this.
First, giving a positive review is like giving a positive grade on an exam. The person doing so should stay behind his "verdict" with his professional reputation. The review is one of the results of the work that the researchers do, so publishing positive reviews doesn't seem to me much different from publishing the results of the research in papers.
Second, and quite related to the first, I've read some really crappy papers, with nonsense, obvious errors, misquotes, etc. Reviewer cannot "catch" everything, but some of the papers get bad enough that it is obvious that the reviewer didn't do his job. If the reviewers knew their names would forever be publicly associated with such paper, I believe some of these might actually try to do their job.
As for the negative reviews, I see no point in "shaming" the author if his paper was too bad (in whatever way) to be published. If this was not the case, but the reviewer is to be "blamed" (i.e., for misunderstanding the paper), the issue can be resolved with the editor, or the paper can be submitted elsewhere, again giving no reason to make the negative review public.
One might argue that the negative review is also like *publishing the results of the research in papers*, but I see it more like a failed research, which is not something that one usually publishes.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_6: Let me add some data points to this discussion. Some items below are about discussing reviews and editors in a public forum and not about publishing reviews.
* [<NAME>](http://people.inf.ethz.ch/jteubner/index.html) makes available the reviews to his papers [online](http://people.inf.ethz.ch/jteubner/publications.html). I do not know him but I have heard from someone who does that he said he has not received negative feedback about doing this. Maybe you can ask him for more information.
* [<NAME>](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/) has published reviews in [Opinion 87](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/Opinion87.html) and for his paper [Automatic CounTiling](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/RefTipesh.html).
* <NAME>'s [Opinion 61](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/Opinion61.html) is about rejections and accountability (it has a response from [Luca Trevisan](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/fb61.html)) and his [Opinion 81](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/Opinion81.html) is about rejection and snobbery.
* [<NAME>'s mail to D<NAME>](http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~zeilberg/fb77.html) about some material Zeilberger published online. This is only tangential to your question, but I think it's good to keep in mind that when you go down the road of open publication, you should be ready for others publishing material about you or your reviews.
* [The Writings of Leslie Lamport](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html) chronicles in very direct terms the stories behind his papers including some notes about editors and reviewers (for example papers [62](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html#clocks), [122](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html#lamport-paxos),[129](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html#lamport-types), ).
* In The Writings of Leslie Lamport [Paper 132](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html#lamport-fairness) he talks about having written an '*unkind review*'.
I have been meaning to publish my reviews for multiple reasons and I am glad to see that other people have been thinking the same and some have done it. I do not think the result or answer should depend on whether the paper is accepted or rejected. If reviews are published, I believe that one should also publish the version of the article that was used to make the reviews. Otherwise, the reviews are like quotations taken out of context. If there are coauthors, one should obtain their permission first, or at least include a disclaimer that you are publishing your reviews on your behalf only. As an example of a disclaimer, see [Lamport's page](http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/lamport/pubs/pubs.html):
>
> Some of the stories read like complaints of unfair treatment by editors or referees. Such cases are bound to arise in any activity based on human judgment. On the whole, I have had little trouble getting my papers published. In fact, I have profited from the natural tendency of editors and referees to be less critical of the work of established scientists. But I think it's worth mentioning the cases where the system didn't work as it should.
>
>
>
The notification of acceptance is usually signed by the editor of the venue, even in the case of anonymous review, so one should ideally obtain their permission if you will reveal who the editor is. The same applies for reviewer permission in signed reviews. I cannot tell whether people in the links I give above obtained editor permission first so there may be precedent for not doing so. Publishing reviews intended for private circulation still takes them out of context. I would add a disclaimer that the reviews and notification letter were written as private communication and if published without permission of named entities, I would note that too. The latter is in case your intention is to protest the status quo by subverting standard conventions.
I haven't answered your question because I don't have a clear answer. Publishing reviews is not conventional academic behaviour. Doing so can be construed as unprofessional depending on how you publish them and what additional commentary you add. Calling it "unethical" seems a rather heavy handed judgement to make. There are things an anonymous reviewer can do that are clearly unethical (steal research, suppress publication, circulate the manuscript) or questionable depending on context (force citations, comparisons, reject without reading, write ad hominem reviews etc.). There is very little an author can do to wrong a reviewer that is remotely comparable and publishing a review does not seem remotely on that scale to me.
There are multiple reasons to publish reviews including accountability for all parties involved (including authors) and as a form of protest. I believe this intent is important to consider because forms of protest do subvert what may be considered acceptable behaviour. A useful thought exercise might be to put yourself in the reviewer seat and ask if you would be fine with similar treatment. I would not have an issue if the reviews I have written were made public (even if I knew that [stylometric techniques](http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~dawnsong/papers/2012%20On%20the%20Feasibility%20of%20Internet-Scale%20Author%20Identification.pdf) could be used to identify me). I do not think all reviewers feel that way.
Finally, let me point again to [<NAME>ner's page](http://people.inf.ethz.ch/jteubner/publications.html), which comes across to me as a model of how to publish reviews while retaining professionalism and dignity.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_7: As said before, publishing reviews breaks convention but this, in itself, does not make it unethical. Publishing anonymous reviews does not really affect reviewers—reviewers could do much worse to authors than what authors could do to reviewers. (See Vijay's answer for examples.)
In my opinion, the confidentiality of reviews is to protect the author: the fact that a paper got submitted remains confidential prior to publication. Thus, authors may considerably rework their paper after receiving peer reviews, resubmit to another conference or even completely abandon it.
Reviewers are protected by their anonymity -- such that a young researcher can openly state his opinion about the paper of a renowned academic without fearing bad consequences. I'd assume even stylometric analysis cannot reveal a reviewer's identity without doubt.
Despite all that, publishing reviews might still be regarded as unprofessional, depending on circumstances and context.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/12 | 716 | 2,221 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a senior college student and start to read papers for my final year project. I find phrases like " Chinn et all (1982)", "Garley et al(1978)" and "Chun and Seymour (1989)". When I type those phrase in Google Scholar, its results are not relate to graph theory at all.
I'd like to know how to find papers from this phrases accordingly: )<issue_comment>username_1: The way that I perform searches like this in Google Scholar, is to not only type in the citation (such as your examples), but also the main topic in inverted commas.
For example, if I take one of your examples:
>
> "<NAME>, 1989" "Graph theory"
>
>
>
9 times out of 10, I find the article I am after (and more often than not, I find several more relevant papers).
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_2: Format `Chun and Seymour (1989)` means that there should be a full reference in the bibliography (at the and of the article, chapter or book; or sometimes in the footnote).
In case if it is missing, you can use [Google Scholar](http://scholar.google.com/) with
```
author:Chun author:Seymour
```
then in the options set date range to `1988 -- 1990`.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: I don't understand why people recommend searching Google Scholar or Mathscinet. Just try typing
```
<NAME> (1989)
```
in Google. There are no obvious hits. But since it is supposed to be about graph theory, try typing this into Google:
```
Chun and Seymour (1989) graph theory
```
and the fourth hit is
```
Handbook of Graph Theory, Second Edition
https://books.google.co.nz/books?isbn=1439880182
<NAME>, <NAME>, Ping Zhang - 2013 - Mathematics
[ChSe89] <NAME> and <NAME>, Graphs with small bandwidth and cutwidth, Discrete Mathematics 75 (1989), 113G119. ... Chung and <NAME>, Jr., Triangle—free graphs with restricted bandwidth, Progress in Graph Theory, ...
```
so it looks like you should look for this:
```
<NAME> and <NAME>, Graphs with small bandwidth and cutwidth, Discrete Mathematics 75 (1989)
```
googling which yields [this pdf](http://www.math.ucsd.edu/~fan/wp/smallband.pdf) as the first result.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/12 | 1,148 | 4,572 | <issue_start>username_0: If I have understood correctly, most people doing their PhDs do their best to avoid any teaching duties while in their programs. However, I think I might *want* to do some teaching too. Of course, I have a hidden agenda. I would hope that:
1. Usually, (good) skill to teach is required later on your career, when applying for tenured positions. I would receive good experience.
2. Giving lectures related to my research topic might get someone interested about it. I could delegate some minor (boring :-) part of my research topic for someone to do as his/her master thesis.
Am I hoping too much here? Any experiences?<issue_comment>username_1: Teaching (being a teaching assistant) happens to be a requirement of my PhD program, and there's an option to teach more than two semesters, with your PI's permission.
If you're interested in teaching while doing your PhD, I'd recommend applying to programs where teaching is required (I did, for this reason). If this isn't common in your field, you could try applying at universities known for undergraduate teaching: they are more likely to allow you to teach as part of your PhD.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Most doctorate programs have some amount of teaching/ta/facilitator/etc as a requirement of the program. Some people try to do more, some try to do less, but unless you're working in a research lab (with its own endowment :-) expect to do some teaching.
1. Re 'good skill': if your goal is to find a tenure track position then yes this would be good experience. Assuming that you enjoy teaching, and who here doesn't *grin*, this would be a good opportunity to enhance and refine your teaching skills.
2. Re 'lectures on research': be careful here. Odds are that any teaching roles you would be offered at this point in your academic career would be pretty low level undergraduate type stuff. Depending on your area of research you might also run into some problems 'presenting' un-vetted data. There are always exceptions to the rule but I wouldn't expect for you to be teaching anything so specific that your research would come into play. YMMV but that has been my experience (since you asked).
3. Suggestion: Be careful with overloading your schedule. Teaching is one of those jobs that finds a way to embed itself in many aspects of your life that you didn't expect. For example: I expected to spend my middle years sitting on the porch reading books with my wife, not reading term papers. Oh well. While it is good to gain experience you don't want to spread yourself too thin and suffer an impact to your research (remember, the reason you're here in the first place :) or your personal life.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: Concerning your first point, teaching is a major component of most academic jobs, and in fact is the main part unless you're a superstar, so you should at least try it to see if you like it. I thought I'd hate it until I tried it my senior year, and it was incredible and changed my life. I love to research and have published several papers, but teaching is the reason I want to be a professor. So try it out!
On another note, your PhD institution will probably be much more gentle and helpful if you have any difficulties, while a postdoc or other 'real job' will expect you to already know what you're doing. So you should try teaching now while you have a safety net.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: >
> most people doing their PhDs do their best to avoid any teaching duties while in their programs.
>
>
>
Some people. I'm not even sure it's "most". At any rate, many many people do not try to avoid teaching duties, and a sizable fraction even make it a point to do quite a lot of teaching.
>
> Am I hoping too much here?
>
>
>
No, you aren't. In fact, your hopes are in line with what I would consider basic ethics and norms we should be reinforcing in Academia. I suggest that you not also hold on to these expectations, but try to imbue the rest of the system with them: Your colleagues, the teachers in charge of courses, the students, and the administrators which you're in interaction with. Thus even if that's not the reality right now, you would be helping *making* it the reality.
>
> Any experiences?
>
>
>
Well, not exactly referring to your points, but I'll say I found teaching to be a very psychologically-rewarding activity, and it's what I remember perhaps the most fondly from my Ph.D. days. Now I'm post-doc'ing and don't get to teach - and man, do I miss it!
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/12 | 688 | 2,974 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a PhD student at a reputable institute in my country. I joined the group of a supervisor who is good at experimental and not so good in analytical front. I also have a co-supervisor who's good at analytics and numerical stuff. Neither know my research problem well.
Initially I had lot of difficulties in understanding the problem. I was a little slow in understanding the analytics. They told me to do lots of stuff here and there. All of them failed. Now I'm in my third year, supervisors are asking me "Are you really interested in your problem, or do you want to leave the course?".
Leaving course mid-way does not make sense for me. But without getting much help from supervisors and working on my own is manageable. Sometimes I get mentally disturbed by their attitude. How do I cope with these supervisors who talk so crazily and seriously at this point of time?<issue_comment>username_1: I would suggest you to write a preliminary research findings report to both of your supervisors.
In the report, explain what you have done in the past two years. State the facts. Don’t point the fingers. You describe what you have tried and why they failed. Don’t make it too long. Refer the details to the notes and the data stored somewhere else. The final section of the report is your plan to tackle the problem further.
The purpose of the report is to let them be aware of the efforts you have spent. It documents the lessons learned. With the report, your supervisors and you would have more understandings about the problem you have been working on for two years. Bear this in your mind, it is likely you would know more about the problem when you write the report.
The report will answer their questions, *Are you really interested in your problem?* Yes. *you wanna leave the course?* No. But you need their help to finish it. If they tell you they can’t help you after they read the report, then it’s time to either change the research problem or find yourself another supervisor(s).
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: It would be interesting to know what is the subject or area of your research project. After 3 years, there has had to have been a passion to carry out the goals. Follow your dreams. You could be on to something that will help humankind so really take a bit of a breather and handle any doubts of your own. Visualize the future for a moment by seeing a DONE goal that you would enjoy with the same passion moving forward and having a team with you to help out. Sometimes debugging a project can be like watching grass grow. Find things similar to your dream and make a list of successful actions and put those back in and knock off trying to cope. A new strategy and approach to the supervisors will help rekindle their enthusiasm for you as it was in the beginning. Take the project back to where you were doing well. What happened just after... that is all that needs an adjustment.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/13 | 1,068 | 4,543 | <issue_start>username_0: My situation is the following: I have a very productive but not respected advisor. By productive I mean that he has published a lot, and with not respected that his work is not cited by anyone except himself (his top paper has 20 citations, 15 from himself).
I will get my master's degree in 6 months, so I need to decide where to do my PhD. To be honest I don't know is my advisor doing real science. Am I judging his career too hard? At least I would not hope to be in the same situation as he is after the next ten years. Also, he demands me to do things exactly as he wants, so I have been thinking this issue a lot.
If you think I should not continue with him, can you tell me what kind of publication record I should demand from my advisor?<issue_comment>username_1: One of the issues you need to consider is how far along the advisor is in his career. If he is a relatively junior faculty member, then a lack of citations is not necessarily so serious, if they're being published in high-quality journals respected in your field. However, if he's getting a lot of publications in low-tier journals, that could be a sign of a bigger problem. If the faculty member is more experienced (and has been working a long time), this is very much a red flag.
I might recommend that you not continue with the same advisor, but this is only partially motivated by the quality issue. Another thing to take into account is that you should be preparing yourself to have a variety of educational experiences throughout your career, and that means working with multiple people, and on more than one project. If you have only one advisor, you will have only the experiences you've gained working with that one advisor, as well as only have learned the philosophical viewpoints associated with working with the one advisor.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: The first question you should answer is: what do YOU want? Then: Where are your interests within your field? Are there opportunities ot develop elsewhere? Are there any reasons not to move?
These are of course personal question than can only be answered by you yourself. As fo rthe advisor, well 20 citations does not sound like much at all, depending of course on how senior the advisor is. I do not think that the publication record is necessarily the best criteria for selecting a graduate school, the quality (reputation) of the department and university is probably more important. It may be wise to visit and talk to other students about the conditions as well, if that is at all possible.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: There are reasons for setting aside the issue of your potential PhD supervisor's publication record for the purposes of deciding whether to carry on working with him - these reasons are set out in other answers.
**You also need to think about whether your - or any - potential PhD supervisor's working habits is a good fit with yours.** When considering whether to continue with specifically this supervisor, you comment as follows:
>
> Also, he demands me to do things exactly as he wants, so I have been thinking this issue a lot.
>
>
>
So - is this a good thing for you, or a bad thing? Was that working relationship a positive or not? You mention that you've been thinking about this a lot, and I urge you to be clear about the answer in your own mind before you commit to a PhD program. Perhaps working like this was okay for a MSc project; I suspect that it could well be a problem during a PhD.
What were the experiences of other PhD students in this regard? Did they all have similar feelings regarding how he manages the research of his team?
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: "Also, he demands me to do things exactly as he wants, so I have been thinking this issue a lot." I too had an issue with authoritarian education.
A group can own a great deal so long as the individual members of that group, here and there through the group, do not have as their sole and only goal (pronoun, capital) *I* alone must have, *I* want the power of the group, *I* want this, *I* want that. You have to feel that way, you see, if you haven't go confidence in the rest of the group. If you can't have confidence in the competence of your fellow students, then you have the necessity of taking the job on your own back.
A teacher can provide data or facts, but one worth their weight in gold, is one that has the student learn but is respected for thinking for themselves by guiding them to apply the data.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/13 | 878 | 3,558 | <issue_start>username_0: Okay, I'm in a nasty situation. I'm about to receive my master's degree in two months. Also, I am a third author on my advisor's paper, and the paper is completely awful and full of mistakes. Contradicting results not reported etc., it has it all. The thing is, my advisor *will* take it personally if I give comments that would put him to a bad light in front of the other co-authors. Very probably, he would let his anger to be seen in the evaluation of my master's thesis.
Really, I have no idea what to do. Should I be quiet, hope the paper gets rejected, and then RUN FAST, or just write a long email about every error there is? Which one is less harmful? I really don't want my name on that paper, nor a biased evaluation of my master's thesis.
(For background, my previous advisor left the university about 6 months ago, and then I got this new one. So, I could probably get a letter of recommendation from the previous advisor.)<issue_comment>username_1: I would not say that this situation is totally hopeless, here are some suggestions as to how to approach this situation (remember, these are just suggestions):
* If you are not comfortable having your name on the paper, ask for it to be removed - is it a requirement for the completion of your Masters?
* Perhaps ask your previous advisor to co-author a paper with him? Certainly ask for a letter of recommendation as he would have had the most contact with you.
* If you see errors, then it is important for them to be corrected. I understand your concern with regards when it comes time to defend the thesis - if this concern is major, then perhaps speak confidentially, to the Dean about your concerns.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: Your name is on the paper; you should be able to take a look at the draft, and suggest improvements.
>
> The paper is completely awful and full of mistakes. The thing is, my advisor will take it personally if I give comments that would put him to a bad light in front of the other co-authors.
>
>
>
Okay, there are two ways to address this. You can pubically say, "This paper is awful and full of mistakes," paint your advisor in a bad light, and face his ire.
Or, you can take each of the mistakes, and tactfully offer an improvement. That is, you could privately say, "I think the paper might have a better chance of acceptance if we made these changes."
In other words, don't edit as a critic; rather, put some work into the paper as a co-author.
There's a fine art to editing work in a way that isn't off-putting for the primary author. People tend to get defensive when their writing is critiqued – it's a very natural reaction. However, if each of your suggested changes is offered constructively, as an improvement to an initial draft, rather than an indictment of it, you stand a better chance of incurring thanks instead of wrath.
On the other hand, if the paper is so bad that it's not salvagable, then I'd suggest requesting that your name simply be removed from the author list.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: You wouldn’t be asking this question if, instead of errors on a document, your dilemma involved a source of personal injury, such as a hole outside the front entrance folks could fall in and never crawl out of! (Facetious I know, please accept my apology.)
Aren’t you asking “At what point should I point out errors?" Below that arbitrary point I find errors acceptable, above that point, prohibited. Unfortunately, our conscience doesn’t come with a warning lamp. :)
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/14 | 734 | 3,224 | <issue_start>username_0: I have an idea for a website, which I'm afraid may land me in trouble. I want to create a website where students from the university I attend can submit exams that they took (with scores of 90% or above), and they will be publicly posted on the site for other university students to utilize and study from. However, would this cause any violation of academic dishonesty rules? Would the professors try to hunt me down and get me suspended from the institution?<issue_comment>username_1: This depends greatly on your university policies. It could result in some serious formal problems for you which could haunt you for a long time.
Regardless of the policies, I think it is simply inappropriate to do this without the teachers' permission. While I do take extra care to never re-use questions on my exams, others do not and they could easily consider the exam their intellectual property. Whether or not there is any validity to their claim is not really the issue. The fact is that some will feel this way and because of those feelings they will be very unhappy with you.
I think a better solution would be to offer a prep site where previous questions are analyzed and then new questions are proposed which are similar but not identical - that is they would depend on the same knowledge base and thinking skills. There should be no reason a teacher would complain about this (in fact, I would think the teachers would be quite happy about this as it would help students to better prepare for the exams).
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Of course, we don't know what your university's academic dishonesty rules say. But in most cases they are pretty broad, and there is probably a clause that could be interpreted to include your website, if your university's authorities decide to do so. I think the odds are good that there will be at least one professor who is upset enough to push them to do something about it. They might just try to get you to take the site down, they might try something harsher. There's no way to know.
In general, I think most professors are aware that students may be informally sharing their exams with one another. For that reason, they usually change exams from term to term, and if they reuse questions, do so only after several years. However, some may be startled to see it done as systematically as you propose, and try to stop it.
I am not a lawyer, nor do I know your local laws, but posting an exam on your website would probably violate the copyright of the professor who wrote it (unless you have his or her permission). This would be another avenue someone could pursue if they wanted your website gone.
Finally, professors could try to prevent their students from posting their exams on your website. For example, they might stop letting students keep their graded exams. Or, they could add a line to their syllabus that "you may not share your graded exams with anyone", on penalty of failing the course or academic dishonesty sanctions. This could not only deprive your website of material, but also make it so that students can't even share their exams informally anymore, which I assume is contrary to your goals.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/14 | 1,943 | 8,121 | <issue_start>username_0: I know one can get a Bachelors degree online. Can one do the same with a PhD (I refer to fields which don't need specialized equipment like Math or CS, for example).
At first glance, it should be easier since your doing almost independent work (you don't really need tests).
Are there such programs?<issue_comment>username_1: Most PhD programs that I am aware of have "residency requirements"—that is, you must be registered at the university and in general physically present in the department for some period of time. However, most PhD advisors that I am aware of in disciplines in which people can "work remotely" do allow their students to "telecommute" if necessary. For instance, if a spouse gets a job far away from campus, and daily commutes are no longer a realistic option.
That said, the idea of a purely online PhD strikes me as highly unlikely to work out—because the nature of a PhD is fundamentally different from a bachelor's, in that it is a research degree, not a coursework degree. You are learning to become an independent researcher, and I don't think the online format translates well to that goal. There's too little direct interaction with other researchers. You'd definitely be independent, but there's no guarantee that you'd learn how to do research.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: The only way I can see anything remotely like this is if you are external - similar to the way I did my Masters - I was in Tokyo, and my university near Brisbane. However, I still had to present a seminar each year on campus.
As username_1 states, there is often a residence requirement.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: I did my PhD as a part-time external student from a reputable university.
I am unsure if this is any different from an online mode because I did not have to be physically present on the campus. Additionally, I mostly communicated with my supervisor via email.
This arrangement worked well for me because I did not want to resign from my job and also the university was at least three hours drive from my place of work. (I did go there occasionally to get a 'feel' of being a PhD student!)
There were however some requirements like two seminars that I had to present and a few face-to-face meetings with my supervisor. They could all be negotiated, depending on my circumstances as a full-time employee (e.g. video conferencing etc).
The drawbacks were that it took double the time to complete the PhD (which is expected for a part-time external student) and there was no network of fellow students etc.
So, if you want to do a PhD online, chose a university which has a solid reputation as a distance education provider. The university I chose was the leader in this field.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: Yes, you can get a PhD online from a reputable university. I think that most universities would waive nearly all "residency" type requirements when presented with a body of completed research that well surpasses the minimum requirements for a PhD and a sum of money. I would guess that proving the Riemann hypothesis and donating a building would get you a PhD from your choice of university.
More realistically, the question then becomes how does one complete a body of research that well surpasses the minimum requirements for a PhD in the absence of ever attending the university. This actually happens quite frequently with industry based PhDs. Similarly, it is also possible, but difficult, to complete PhD level research without any supervision.
Finding someone at a university who is willing to mentor you online while you do your research will be much harder. While a purely online student can provide all the tangible benefits mentors receive (publications and grant applications), the best mentors enjoy mentoring and they will receive very little of the intangible benefits.
I would consider mentoring an online PhD student. I would even consider funding such a student. That student would have to demonstrate to me that they can provide me access to research that I would otherwise be unable to do. For example, access to unique and proprietary industry data or a rare subject population. They would also have to convince me that they can do the work purely online.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: YES! If you google "phd by published work" or "PhD by publications", you will find many universities offering such a way of graduating.
Basically, you do your research with no time pressure, with or without colleagues, with or without a mentor (it is better to have a mentor though and colleagues are fun!). You publish your work in scientific journals or books. When you are ready, i.e. an amount of published work equivalent to a regular PhD student, you submit an application to your university. A committee will decide wether or not the body of researches is sufficient or not. And that's it!
A more complete answer can be find here
<http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/416988.article>
and here
<http://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/resources/phd.html>
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_6: There are many schools that offer a PhD (or other Doctorate degree) online.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
*please note I am speaking only of US schools.*
While many are considered degree mills, others rise above this and offer quality education. Still further, many traditional universities have online PhD programs.
The question one should be asking is 'will a PhD completed online be of value, or of as much value of a traditional on campus brick and mortar PhD?'
The answer is highly situational. First, the 'quality education' part. This is determined by accreditation.
Degree mills (where you just pay money and get a degree) are not respectable in the slightest. They are generally not accredited or accredited by a dubious agency. It is a vanity purchase and means nothing of value to anyone of discerning character. They should be avoided at all costs.
Second up is Nationally Accredited. These are actual accredited schools and recognized by the US Dept of Education and are held to some standards. You will have to do the work. You will buy textbooks and it will take you several years to get done. These degrees are often sought by working professionals that do not have time or the ability to go to a campus and compete a residency requirement. In many cases, they are just as rigorous (hard) as a traditional PhD, and in others, much easier.
Third is Regionally Accredited. These are usually state schools that are offering a PhD online. Many are very good schools, others are not. It will depend on the program itself. generally, most people regard regional accreditation a bit higher than national.
Accreditation is the first thing you should look at and find out who the accrediting agency is and if they are legitimate.
The other part of this question is residency. Can the degree be completed 100% online. Some schools will have no residency requirement at all. Every course may be completed online and any exams may be taken at a testing center near you (often a library or local school) with a proctor. Others may require a short residency of a few weeks or a single semester. In between them is a 'weekend residency' where you travel to the university for a few days, at one or more times through out the program. These often take the form of workshops or seminars.
There are various combinations of these traits in hundreds of schools.
To provide an example, the University of Missouri offers several Online Only PhD programs, here is one of them:
<http://online.missouri.edu/degreeprograms/architecturalstudies/phd.aspx>
Many universities recognize that online education is an effective medium for learning and that not everyone can travel or dedicate time to living on campus. With some research, you are likely to find a PhD program available online that suits your needs. Pay careful attention to accreditation and any residency requirements and you may find a path forward that suits your needs in higher education.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/14 | 1,192 | 4,811 | <issue_start>username_0: I think that many unpublished theses are available in libraries etc and reading relevant theses is a normal part of research and does not involve asking the author's permission. But suppose a humanities PhD student has seen a thesis title (2008, so presumably in electronic format), that is relevant to their PhD subject and they want to read the thesis but unlike most theses it is not available in the student's libraries or online etc, probably due to the author's geographical location. The author is now a lecturer with a page on the university website. Should the student just email the author and say "Hello I am a PhD student in your field, can I please see your thesis?" Is this a big deal? Are there any do's or don'ts in making this request?
Thank you...<issue_comment>username_1: A PhD thesis is usually a published work, and is normally archived in a university's library. Almost all dissertations are available via reprints. So you could ask your own library how to order a copy of the thesis.
Alternatively, as you suggest, you can contact the author directly. As Anonymous Mathematician suggests in his comment, you can ask for a copy of the thesis, but you should definitely explain *why* you're interested in the thesis. However, it may be possible—and even more so for a humanities thesis—that the author is currently preparing it for publication, and may therefore be reluctant to share it via electronic means. However, it is just as likely that they're willing to share it.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: If you are worried about contacting the author directly, the [ProQuest Database](http://www.proquest.com/en-US/catalogs/databases/detail/pqdt.shtml) might be a place to start if the person whose dissertation you are looking for has already graduated and submitted to the final copy the their university, which appears to be the case in the scenario you mentioned.
In most countries once the dissertation is submitted to the university it comes into the public sphere (still copyrighted but its existence and content can no longer be thought of as private) so there should be no problem with contacting either the author or the Library of his or her PhD institution and requesting a copy politely.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: I don't think it is a big deal, unless as discussed in other answers they have reasons not to respond, however "Hello I am a PhD student in your field, can I please see your thesis?" is maximising your chances of not getting a response. Remember you are asking for a favour from a busy stranger you need to give him a reason to treat you as worth responding to. Write a polite, well-subjected, but not too long e-mail, e.g.
>
> Subject: Request for a copy of your PhD thesis
>
>
> Dear Dr. X,
>
>
> I am writing to you today to request an electronic copy of your thesis
> - "Boring yet strangely intriguing title".
>
>
> My name is <NAME>, I am a PhD student at the university of stuff
> and things. I have seen your thesis referenced by XX and I was
> wondering whether you would be willing to send an electronic copy of
> your thesis to me so that I can read it as it seems relevant to my own
> work in blah and bimble.
>
>
> Thank you for your time,
>
>
> Yours sincerely,
>
>
> <NAME>.
>
>
>
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: In my field in the social sciences, scholars are divided into "article people" and "book people," depending on the nature of their projects (and of course, many people work on both, but there are differences in preferences and focus).
Oversimplifying a bit, article people tend to write their dissertations on something like a 3-paper model, where they combine published or publishable articles, and add on a front and back end. The book people simply write, for their dissertations, something that looks like a book.
The issue that the "book people" have, is that it generally takes longer to actually turn the dissertation into published book through a contract with a proper academic or university press. (and in my field, unlike what some of the previous posters said, a dissertation is NOT considered "published," it is considered an "unpublished dissertation manuscript" and should be cited as such.).
Because these book projects take much longer to complete (often will take a whole 4-5 years more), many PhDs working on books request a "dissertation embargo" with their school library so that their dissertations will not be made public immediately.
If you are having a hard time, finding a recent dissertation, this embargo might be the reason. You can of course email and ask the author, but some are worried about getting "poached" and other issues regards to dissertations that are being developed into proper books.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/14 | 868 | 3,525 | <issue_start>username_0: Actually I have been working like a Computer Science lecturer, part time, in a couple of universities in my country. Main problem is that those universities are only worried in finances, but not in academic productivity. So that is why almost all the lecturers, my case included, are assigned only lecturing hours, but with no time to make research.
The main problem that I got is that love to make research. Sometimes I come with an idea, and it happened 3 times already, that because of the time I cannot write a paper; so that somebody else has published (in other country, of course) my main idea. I think the phrase "publish or perish" is well suited for me at this moment.
I have started to feel frustrated about this. I still have other ideas for research papers in the field and even for making a couple of books in collaboration with other colleages abroad, but I don´t know where to start.
I seen a lot of Professors that publish like maniacs, and I would like to know if there is a way to increase my productivity in the academic field. How should I distribute my time?. It may sound silly, but I feel that 100% of my time is dedicated only to lecture pretty boring undergraduate stuff. Any advice? Mostly of people that are researchers and are in this field, so they have experience about this.
Thanks<issue_comment>username_1: Would you be willing to **move to another university?** It would be challenging, but possible. My hunch is that if your school does not value research, and if that's really what excites you more than teaching, then long term **it will probably be hard for you to be satisfied where you are now.**
If you do want to move, then I suggest that you **focus on establishing a reputation in some small area**, and also that you try to **make contacts** with researchers at other universities who are working in the same area that you are. I must say that my **collaborations have hugely impacted how much I've enjoyed doing research**. I am at a school that values research, but even there I have not found many people to work with, so most of my collaboration is with people elsewhere. We work a lot by email. The email allows us to get some momentum, so that when I do have a chance to visit one of my collaborators, often we can be fairly productive in a limited time.
Two things that I love about collaboration: (1) my coauthors often have great ideas, and our papers end up much better than if I had written them myself and (2) it's a lot more fun working with someone, and it's easier to stay encouraged. So that's what I recommend that you aim for. If you want to know how to squeeze more research time or productivity (just working by yourself) out of your current schedule, then I recommend that you follow the advice of aeismail and consult a Personal Productivity site.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: I think these two posts by a Canadian scholar could give you a few answers: [to improve your intellectual productivity](http://lemire.me/blog/archives/2012/08/24/to-improve-your-intellectual-productivity/) and the older one [the secret to intellectual productivity](http://lemire.me/blog/archives/2008/08/19/the-secret-to-intellectual-productivity/).
Among the tips he gives:
* have luck,
* meet people who have truly compatible goals and interests,
* use a divide-and-conquer strategy (i.e. break down your task into small and easy chunks of work),
* focus on producing value,
* enumerate all possible solutions to a problem.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/14 | 823 | 3,415 | <issue_start>username_0: I've been working as a statistician in the marketing world for two years, and I have an M.S. in applied math. I want to change industries a bit (maybe epidemiology or engineering) and I also want to live overseas (ideally, a job where I'd live in one country for a few years and then move on to another).
So, my question is: to accomplish these life goals, does it make sense to get a PhD? Or, is there some other route that would be more beneficial?<issue_comment>username_1: A doctoral degree is a credential signifying largely that you are capable of doing independent research at the highest possible level. It is not, in an of itself, a ticket to working in a particular industry or in a particular location any more than a bachelor's or a master's degree. In fact, PhD holders may have substantially more challenges in those aspects, because the additional qualifications make them unattractive for many positions in conventional businesses and industries. (You are unlikely to find a PhD working in a sales division of a multinational conglomerate, for instance.)
The reason to get a PhD is because you are interested in problem solving and doing original work. If this doesn't describe your motivation, I would recommend against pursuing a graduate degree, because it will be a very long few years of your life which are *not* guaranteed to achieve the objectives you've laid out.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: A PhD in statistics is more flexible and useful that PhDs in some other areas.
The usual issue with PhDs one hears about is that one becomes over-qualified for non-academic work once one has a PhD. Additionally, there is a lot of time spent getting it.
However, statistics is intrinsically an applied science, and one that is in big demand across lots of areas, because it can be applied to lots of areas, unlike most academic disciplines. Specific anecdote: I was once told by a Statistics Professor that the head of a clinical trial is required to have a PhD in statistics (by the NHS, possibly). I don't know if this is true, but it sounds like something that is probably true. As he put it, this creates jobs for PhDs.
With computers being used more and more, and lots of data being created that needs to be analysed, new methods need to be invented to handle all this data. This is the kind of quasi-research work which is quite well suited for someone with a PhD.
Areas like data visualization and graphics are quite hot right now. Having a PhD in an area like that will probably not hurt you. See [<NAME>'s thesis](http://had.co.nz/thesis/) for example.
Of course, it is possible to get a PhD from a Statistics Department without learning any statistics, for example if you write a Probability (Mathematics) thesis. You probably don't want to do that.
My personal experience (I have a Statistics PhD) is that to get an interesting work, even in industry, a PhD is helpful. Much of the work so-called statisticians do is to mindlessly apply standard algorithms from some software package to data using things like SAS, and then package up the (machine produced) results. If you have a functioning brain, you don't want to do that.
BTW, it seems [such questions are not on topic at stats.sx](https://stats.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic), but you could ask people on chat there - perhaps point to this question.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/15 | 8,613 | 36,767 | <issue_start>username_0: This question follow's JeffE's comment [here](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/11137/what-are-the-benefits-of-getting-a-phd-in-statistics#comment20522_11139):
>
> In most industries, a PhD has negative value.
>
>
>
I am curious about what potential negatives there may be with having a PhD, particularly in industries. For example, my PhD has applications for image sensors, and the potential of working in that field is appealing—would having a PhD be a potential barrier? Would it be a case of how explicit the practicalities of the PhD can be made? Would this make any difference?<issue_comment>username_1: An important issue associated with having a PhD is that many "traditional" routes into industry are effectively closed off.
For instance, a chemical engineer with a bachelor's or master's degree could take a position in just about any corporate division of a major company—they could work in production, sales, research, or just about any other field, with corporate training providing the requisite skills needed to do the job. By contrast, someone who holds a PhD will simply not be considered for these positions, as they are too specialized, and too far above the requirements for such a position. Any hire into such a position would probably not offer a sufficient "return on investment" to be worthwhile.
It would also be difficult to cross-train for "standard" management positions, as while a PhD does offer some supervisory experience, it's more useful for research-based organizations than industrial positions.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: It has been a positive for my CV. It gets me interviews that I wouldn't normally have got in a variety of organisations and positions. I have a PhD in computer science - my CV/PhD has got me interviews at banks/biotechs/multinational retailers (I screwed up some of the interviews but that's another problem :-))
I have never had a problem being overqualified - most employers would rather this than the opposite I imagine.
>
> PhD has applications for image sensors
>
>
>
I think it will be viewed as a major positive by any private company working in this or related fields.
A PhD shows you know a particular field very well and also have a number of transferable skills - self motivated, working independently and in a team, management, teaching/tutoring, communication (public speaking and journal articles).
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: From my personal experience of questions asked in interviews for non-academic jobs, presumably the assumption is that someone with a PhD did this as a cushy option rather than going out in the "real world" of competition, responsibility, long hours, tight deadlines, office politics etc.
Academics are also seen as removed from financial considerations, with their head in the clouds, ignorant of real world issues, pondering on the philosophical rather than the practical (rightly or wrongly - this can be the perception).
An actual I was once asked was, *"Can you handle the pressure of a commercial job?"*
Another obvious answer is that your PhD does not represent commercial experience. While you have some additional research experience, if your job is not to do research, then this is not seen as much of an asset. Rather you are viewed as behind in your age group by 3-4 years in experience but will probably want the same salary (if not higher).
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: Though a Ph.D is not necessarily a disadvantage, depending on the field and the nature of the Ph.D, it may also not be as competitive as the equivalent number of years in industry.
Think from a perspective of a hiring dev team leader who needs a good systems engineer *yesterday* to help integrate some obscure API from a vendor into their product. You're choosing between a pile of resumes.
On one, you have a candidate who has 3 years as a junior engineer in a company that worked on image sensors, 2 years of work as a systems developer II, and one year as a lead developer on a computer vision project. He's delivered seven projects in total and has worked in a highly cross-functional team of hardware and software engineers, salespeople, and on-site support staff. The products he worked on brought the company revenue of $86.3 million dollars over seven years.
On another, you have a candidate who has done 6 years in a Ph.D and 1 year worth of internships in total. He's worked on a computer vision project and has contributed a novel algorithm to solving "Line tracing under low UV light conditions" (I made that up, I have no idea if that's a real problem in computer vision), and has written six publications. He also has taught a course on 3rd year systems programming and has TAed robotics three times.
While they are both good candidates, chances are that unless you need someone who does "line tracing under UV light", the first candidate might be more attractive. Less training, less having to work with that person to integrate them into a product-based flow, proven record of delivering product and making sales, etc...
I personally feel that the "disadvantage" of a Ph.D is more about opportunity cost than an actual disadvantage. In many cases, the culture of academia vs. industry are different enough that it's like switching fields even if the technologies are similar. Basically, someone with 7 years actual work experience has enough to basically go from a new grad hire to a project team lead, whereas someone with 7 years of Ph.D is proven to deliver in an academic setting but not in a for-profit product-based one. However, at the same time, there are many industries that want to have Ph.Ds on their staff as well because they are long-term, deep thinkers who are rigorous and detailed.
Upvotes: 8 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_5: I have a PhD in pure mathematics, and the only employers that were interested in me were Epic Healthcare (desperate for anyone they can get a hold of with the affordable care act changes) and universities offering postdocs. Other positions, such as a Boy Scouts position I applied to, told me I was overqualified or misqualified. I programmed video games as a teenager; a lot of companies were willing to interview me based on that alone, but I would be forced to start from the bottom and work my way up, which isn't bad, but you're asking whether a PhD is worth it, and in such a situation, it would certainly not be worth it.
On the other hand, my time studying for my PhD seriously improved my writing skills and analytical thinking skills, and I think that that would help me as a programmer to learn quickly and get promoted. But there's no point in a math PhD for any job besides teaching or a focused job at a national lab/NSA.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_6: *What are the potential pitfalls of having a PhD?*
It depends. I believe **the closer your PhD research is to applied research, the better your industry job opportunities would be**.
Those PhDs who have been doing basic (pure) research tend to have problem with industry job hunting because their skills/knowledge are not **immediately usable** in industry. It is simply not cost effective for industry companies to hire them. They need to be re-trained to get them to do real practical jobs. Don’t forget one thing, private companies are for profit.
On the other hand, those who have been doing applied research **could have readily available** skills/knowledge for the employers to use. They naturally have industry jobs lined up for them.
We can see two examples right here. User16371 has a PhD in pure math. He has trouble in finding private industry jobs. username_2 probably has done applied research, he has many job interviews. Whether he will get a real industry job soon is another matter.
As in your case, I think you’ll have a good shot if your research is more toward real application. I am absolutely no expert in image sensors. But, I can imagine that if CT scan manufacturers can use your skills/knowledge, you should be able to find a good job in matter of months. Here, a good job means high salary – a barometer to measure how good an industry job is.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_7: In my field (bioinformatics, systems/computational biology) if you don't have a PhD you practically don't exist on the map, but yet it's a very research oriented field.
I can imagine a couple of issues where a PhD might have a negative effect on the attractiveness of a candidate, while none of the below are prove-able facts, they are directly based on my experience (myself, people I know, etc.)
* **Overspecialization:** In many industries being overspecialized might hurt more than it helps. You might get stuck on obscure case scenarios, or obsess about rigor before anything else. Likewise doing research might have an effect on having a more abstract, rather than practical, way of thinking. Most of us don't really "deliver" a product.
* **Jadedness:** Those 4-6 years spent doing research is likely to have caused some self-doubt, questioning yourself. In my experience most people that go corporate after uni live in a state of blissful ignorance, compared to their classmates who've gone on to pursue PhD studies. (yes, I might have exaggerated it a bit but the point is still valid I believe)
* **Attitude:** While this might not be the general truth, in my experience people in the academic world is much more laid-back than corporate world. While most of my old classmates are expected to be at their desk at 7 or 8 sharp, and expected to leave latest by 5 to avoid working overtime, I can practically show up and leave whenever I feel like. What my boss cares about is whether or not the project progresses as we have decided. A potential employer might be wary of such "bad habits".
As I said, not a factual answer but I hope it provides some insight, anyways.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_8: Ph.D. is a mismatched degree for industry. A typical industry employer wants to find smart, witty people with (1) sufficiently high level of specialized skills who would be (2) productive in the existing company environment, and (3) would be able to balance the initiative based on what they know vs. following instructions when a project needs to be pushed in a specific direction and completed by a given deadline.
Out of these, the Ph.D. label only provides the evidence that you are smart, addressing (although still only partially) the requirement (1). Mid- and upper-level technical positions, especially in research departments, would require Ph.D., so there is a qualification issue of door-opening (or rather not opening if you do't have the degree). In many situations, though, the narrow specialization of the ["Line tracing under low UV light conditions"](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11167/739) is irrelevant for most practical purposes, and the employer would rather want to see a person who can tackle a wider range of light conditions and frequency spectra.
The Ph.D., however, fails to deliver on all other counts. On the second aspect that I brought up, doctorate programs do not teach people and business skills, and most programs even won't touch say computer skills if you are a biologist or may be even a mathematician. It is up to you as a grad student to self-teach project management, version control and all other team-work, productivity-increasing stuff. On the third aspect, the overqualified Ph.D.s may have a tendency to roam towards their own interests, and provide beautiful solutions for narrow problems, as that's what they are used to be doing in academia. Sometimes, though, you just have to shut up and format the Excel report. A decent solution that is delivered on time is MUCH better than a perfect solution delivered two months too late. Academicians are not taught to make these judgement calls of timeliness vs. depth (although the pressure to submit this now before the competitors do is often present in many lines of research) or cost vs. what the client expects (and grad students usually have no idea regarding how to budget a study; most professors also take the zero time cost of their grad students for granted, but that's not how the real world operates).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_9: A PhD degree tells that you can work independently on your own, that you are able to critically decide whether a particular method in a textbook is good or not. PhD holders are needed in industry though in small amount. Industry needs them as PhD holders have been trained to bring innovations and make a field advance. Whether the PhD research field was narrow or not, the skills that you developed while tackling your PhD work will help in many different fields. For example I hold a PhD in a field other than dealing with computer science and yet during my PhD studies I had to choose between a plethora of programming languages available and I learned Object-oriented programming and code re-use. The skills that I have thus mastered in software engineering can be applied to any field that I will work in the future where computer programming is involved.
As one answer pointed out, during the PhD studies you have doubts about your own capabilities. It happens as you may be tackling a problem that has been here for a long time and your analyses over several months are revealing that you are nowhere close to make any new discovery. You may be the best of your batch in your Bachelor degree or be the best of your MSc batch but that is no guarantee that you will be successful in doing a PhD degree. I have seen many intelligent friends putting an end to their PhD studies as after a year or two they see that they cannot handle the stress of not being able to produce any tangible output. PhD studies are not about scoring good grades at exams. You do not have to know equations by heart; You are not sitting for a 3-hour written test to answer questions that are based on your textbooks. No, you are on your own with some support from your supervisor. Your supervisor is here to offer advice but it is up to you to decide what you want to do and convince the funders and other partners of your ideas. You are the one choosing the textbooks and other publications to read. Reading 200 books on the subject rather than say just two is never a guarantee that the PhD studies will be successful; What is required is to think beyond these textbook equations and come up with new ones, with new analysis techniques or with new algorithms that are universally applicable. When you are learning an equation, you are learning it very deeply and then you realise that how much you didn't know about that same equation when you were a Bachelor degree holder or an MSc degree holder. At lower levels, you are only taught what you need to know in order to solve some specific problems.
Doing a PhD degree means that you are excellent at managing your time. You have advanced courses to read, you have some teaching and administrative work to do, and you have to handle your research work with confidence. So you find yourself waking up at night and start doing some analyses by hand or on the computer as you think that you are on the verge of finding some good results which have escaped you for months. You work the whole night and if in the morning you see that you are not getting anywhere, you still have the courage to wake up and go to your office at the University. It is only someone who has done a PhD degree who knows the hard work and patience that is required. So this is why PhD holders will always get the attention of a recruiter who himself/herself is one.
Someone with an MSc degree is limited in his/her own thinking. Every PhD student who has taught MSc students knows this. While an MSc student can perhaps think of one or two methods of tackling a problem, a PhD student or a PhD holder knows many more methods and knows also which method may be the best depending on the situation at hand. This is why in industry, the top posts among researchers are filled by PhD holders. This is because people with the best brains, and who know a whole range of techniques and methods are needed to innovate. This is also why in some countries PhD students are required to read advanced courses since they have to know more than what MSc degree holders do. Among these courses, there may be pedagogy-related courses. But pedagogy courses are only here to improve communication skills and understanding of the audience. Isn't this true? So such a PhD holder with pedagogical skills has learned how to deal with people around him/her of various intellectual levels.
There is the idea that PhD holders do not have business skills. Well, it depends on what you are doing at work. There are lots of successful smaller companies in engineering created by PhD holders. Even during the PhD studies, the PhD student is aware of the funding that he/she has and so he/she finds tools and equipment and software that the budget will allow. Similarly in industry, a PhD holder will use the least resources to get the job done as he/she is very much familiar with costs of equipment and software in his/her field. Would a company not want this PhD holder who already know how to manage the money? A PhD project normally lasts for five years or longer in some cases; This shows that the PhD holder can manage a project spanning over a long period of time.
Business skills can also refer to interaction with other people regarding the scientific research. Many PhD students have to establish cooperation in academia or in industry either at the national level or at the international level. The supervisor may help in this but finally it is the PhD student who decides with whom to work. So the PhD student has to be aware of how much information to divulge to the new partners and how mutual benefit can be achieved. So this demands business skills. Would an employer not want such a person around him/her who knows how to collaborate and negotiate with others? Thus the PhD holder has gained business skills not through books but through real-life experience.
A PhD holder is also someone who can defend his/her ideas successfully in writing or orally. Publishing in very good journals is tough and defending the PhD thesis at the viva can last for hours. Being successful at the viva shows that you are mentally very stable, and are able to withstand pressure and all kinds of irritable questions one after the other for a long time.
A PhD holder after so many years of hard work has already built his/her own toolbox. Just as a carpenter who has to sharpen once in a while the tools that he/she uses daily, so does the PhD holder the same. A PhD holder cannot sit idle; He/she has faced lots of obstacles when for example deriving new equations during the PhD studies, and in his/her free time after getting the PhD degree, he/she will come back to these equations and think again about those obstacles in order to find ways not to meet them in his/her future career. This is what I am doing in parallel with my job.
Yes indeed PhD holders always tend to look for the best solution(s) to a given problem. This is not an indication that he/she will take time to do the job in industry. No, the PhD holder has developed his/her own toolbox as I said before and will be very efficient at finding the best solution(s) in a reasonable amount of time since he/she knows which method works and which does not. It is true though that PhD holders will tend to be accurate and reluctant to use faster algorithms that are not robust. Whom do you trust: A PhD degree who will make the right calculations though perhaps taking a bit longer or the one without the PhD degree making the calculations really fast and present the results to you using fancy colours?
When starting the PhD studies, a PhD student will have to sort of see everything around him/her with new eyes. Anyone who has read *The Loss of the Creature* from *The message in the Bottle: How Queer Man is, How Language is, and What One Has to Do with the Other* by *<NAME>* will get the point. The PhD student at the beginning of the studies has to unscrew his/her brain and put it aside in order to get rid of any preconceived ideas and replace with an empty brain that is ready to let the PhD holder see beyond the tip of his/her nose so as to make independent progress in a field.
Remember that a PhD holder is a systematic person who does not run from a difficult problem. If the research that he/she had been doing in the PhD studies was not difficult, then the PhD project would not have existed in the first place. Most PhD projects are open. This implies that the PhD student is given a field to work but outputs and outcomes of the work are yet to be known. It is up to the PhD student to think about the strategy to adopt and which path to follow after consultation with the supervisor. After a few years of hard work, the outcomes and results obtained may be very different from what were expected in the beginning of the project. When the research is taking a different direction, sources of funding may change. It is up to the PhD student and to the supervisor to motivate for the change so as to convince the funders of their new research direction that could bring better insights about the original problem. In contrast during a normal MSc thesis project of about six months duration, the project is well structured by the supervisor so that the MSc student is able to finish the work in a timely manner. The MSc holder is working along a well-structured path and is most of the times sure to succeed in the thesis work. But such is not the case for the PhD student. There is no guarantee of success in the PhD studies. So we see that a PhD holder is someone who is very mature and who can embrace failures and successes equally.
A PhD holder is someone modest enough to know that the path of learning has just begun. To get a PhD degree is to have been able to reach the top of the mountain, and realise that there is still much to see and learn. It is thus obvious that persons with MSc degrees who haven't been at the top of the mountain do not recognise how much PhD holders know. So the best prospects of securing a job in industry is to make sure that your future boss also has a PhD degree.
To answer the question about potential pitfalls of having a PhD, I would say none. A PhD holder knows where he/she stands in life and he/she knows what it takes to succeed. He/she is not afraid of failures and of setbacks as he/she has been used to them a lot during the PhD studies. The only mistake is to work in industry under a boss who is not a PhD degree holder; The boss will not recognise the strength and value as well as will not understand the mindset of the PhD holder. Where the boss can only see one or two problems in a given situation, a PhD holder will see many. Communication between the PhD holder and such a boss will hence suffer.
Work experience cannot replace educational qualification. At a job interview with an interviewer holding a PhD degree, you will be asked if you know or do not know something. You will be asked about future changes that you consider might take place in your field of expertise. You will share valuable experiences and talk about limitations of existing tools, algorithms and software. It is only those interviewers with less educational qualifications who will lay emphasis on previous job experience.
And always remember that today most PhD works are applied research; This means that PhD projects are created in order to solve problems that industry face. If industry would have had the necessary skills to solve all their problems, then PhD projects would only be started by Universities alone and the projects would all be dealing with fundamental research. But this is not the case. Doing a PhD degree these days means that the PhD student is gaining much industrial experience as he/she is acting like a bridge between academia and industry and he/she is reinforcing the link between the two. He/she is pinpointing out the obsolete methods that industry is clinging to and is helping industry adopting more reliable methods as a result of the PhD work. What is important is that the PhD work is original. This word "original" has changed meaning over time. Centuries ago, it meant to have a PhD work that builds upon some original concepts which are firmly rooted in place whereas nowadays "original" implies that your PhD work is not someone's else work.
Doing a Ph.D. degree is not for the faint-hearted; You need nerves of steel and you really learn how to manage the vast amount of information that you gather in your research. The successful Ph.D. student is the one who can *recover* the knowledge already out there and make improvements for the betterment of the society. Doing a Ph.D. degree requires great sacrifice and commitment. This is why it is appropriate for a Ph.D. holder to work with people who also have earned one. But I agree that the level of Ph.D. degrees do vary around the world; A Ph.D. degree spanning over a five-year period with advanced courses to read and with teaching activities should be the norm.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_10: **IMHO I believe the answer to this question is “it depends.”** In industry, the answer will always be around demonstrating what value you can bring to the table, and accordingly, why a customer should pay a premium for that. I would highly recommend talking to professionals in the field(s) that you want to eventually leverage your PhD into, and get their opinions on the value of their PhD’s to help you understand how you can flourish in your chosen specialty.
Let me caveat this however by saying the following: I do not have a PhD, but I find the endeavour personally and, depending on how well you can translate your PhD into economic value, professionally, very worthwhile.
Now, I am an Engineering and Project manager in the oil and gas industry, and have nearly 12 years’ experience in the production and management of engineering for projects greater than $US 1Bn. My largest project was over $US 40Bn, and I have worked with, and been served by, many engineers, scientists, and other technologists of many disciplines.
I have encountered many people with PhD’s in that time, most of whom were good people to work with. Almost to an individual, no one ever cared to emphasise their PhD, and in many cases, most chose to suppress it in favour of demonstrating the value delivered on previous projects and engagements that mattered to my needs as a manager or client. Most of the professionals with PhDs who we were paying real money for were not actually delivering any services or products that was connected to their PhDs. However, they were specialists in their fields, and their PhDs were almost always related to their chosen specialty. So if you had studied a PhD in geology or civil engineering (very common), then it would make sense for you to leverage your PhD into a geotechnical engineering firm where you would often be marketed to your client as, eventually, a Principal Geotechnical engineer or similar. This is a specialised role, with a narrow scope (same applies for any discipline), and if you are actually good at your job, you will be high in demand around town. Clients, whilst not necessarily paying an above-market rate for you, will likely insist that they “want you” as part of the delivery team because you are known to be credible at what you do. The PhD itself will have very little to do with that, but you will be rewarded if you are able to translate what you learnt from the PhD into delivering a service your clients will pay real money for. I have had these kinds of people work for me before, and I would seek them out again, but they never emphasised their PhD to me. In fact, I’ve worked with people who were exceptional at what they did, very highly regarded not just in my country but in others around the world, who didn’t have a skerrick of post-graduate education.
If you were to study a PhD (in Psychology say) and tried to leverage that into a non-related field (like management consulting), then the question of value will be even more poignant for you. In this instance, you would likely be relying on the “general” skills that a PhD would afford you (not that they are trivial by any means), and again, you would need to demonstrate to a buyer of your skills that your PhD provides greater value than someone else who may have more direct industry/ field related experience. Firms and industries where these generalised PhD-related skills might be valued (e.g. some investment banks, blue chip corporate strategy companies) are open to candidates with PhD’s but again, you would be required to demonstrate how your PhD translates into products and services your customers want to buy, and even pay a premium for.
I can appreciate the dilemma of someone contemplating the study of a PhD as it is, indeed, difficult to truly understand what kind of value you can demonstrate to a buyer at the end of it. username_5’s narrative is a fine account of the individual kinds of skill that a PhD can develop, but in industry, I would treat such skills as a given. Moreover, Brian’s description over emphasises the individual skill component, and is notably silent on other critical individual, team, and other “corporate” attributes that are necessary for success in industry. Brian mentions time management: again, this is something that I would expect a graduate engineer to be well on top of by their first or second year in work, so why, as either your manager or your client, should I expect this to be a differentiator for you? Especially given that you’ve invested some three or more years of your life developing this skill! Likewise, Brian also mentions being able to see many possible solutions. Creativity is a valuable thing, but in my industry, this must be executed with discipline, and applied with the necessary soft (emotional intelligence) skills to translate ideas into solutions that can be implemented successfully within a corporate risk and financial framework. I have often come across so-called “experts”, some with PhDs, who waste a lot of peoples’ time and money with ideas that are insensitive to the corporate, political, project and commercial realities surrounding them, and this often harms their reputations. Understandably, their ideas are not implemented, and these kinds of insensitive people are not hired again. Finally, the other skills that Brian mentions (project and cost management, business skills) are fine but these are carried out on a small scale. My question is: clients will pay for demonstrable experience, so how are you going to convince your future employer or client that they should pay good money to entrust you with a project or business that may exceed your PhD undertakings by a factor of thousands, if not tens or hundreds of thousands, or millions?
So my question is: why should I, either as your manager or your client, be prepared to pay a premium for your skills from a PhD when they can be honed by someone else working “at the coal face” in a demonstrable way over the same amount of time as your PhD? This question will vary depending on your industry. In my industry, real value comes not with the PhD, but your demonstrated experience in delivering valuable services and products, over a sustained time, to real customers. In other, very highly specialised industries, the PhD may serve as an entry point, after which your work performance will likely prevail.
I’ve really emphasised the “economic” aspect of the PhD in my response, and I tender it not to discourage you, but to help you to think very deeply about why you wish to do one before you decide to take the plunge. If you do decide to do one, then I wish you to do so with your eyes open, and, most importantly, sincerely wish you the very best of success with it, both personally and professionally.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_11: One of the potential pitfalls of having a PhD (or indeed any exceptional qualification) is that many managers, being insecure in their positions, will not hire someone whom they perceive may be capable of under-mining their authority and usurping their own position. For a well-managed post-PhD career, unless you are a star in your field and with wise, benevolent guides, it is important to understand about people and power in organisations. I strongly recommend reading a serious academic book on the subject such as, for example, [Organisational Behavior by "Huck and Buck"](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Organizational-Behaviour-Dr-Andrzej-Huczynski/dp/0273774816). Such a book will provide a more objective overview of social reality than a collection of personal anecdotal musings. That is not to say that the latter are without value as food for thought and context-specific indicators.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_12: PhDs, although highly educated, are not suitable for most of the commercial and non-research related jobs. Not because they can't do those jobs, but those jobs can also be done by someone else without a Phd.
Furthermore, if the management have no Phd themselves, they wouldn't believe in the importance of the Phd title.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_13: From a non PhD perspective, in some fields PhDs are percieved as theorethical entities, far removed from the gross practicalities of thereal world, who sit in cushy ivory towers and try to answer essential and fundamental questions like the ubiquitous : "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?"
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_14: username_4's answer is good, but there is also the pitfall:
Getting Ph.D. is an education for research(/academia). Industry needs them as R&D specialists. Your Ph.D. is useless for any company not requiring that special knowledge you have. Ph.D. only shows devotion to that special knowledge. It signals for them that you may be unmotivated to do their monotonic day-to-day business.
Thus it depends on the Ph.D. you have. If it is not business/operations research/industrial engineering/etc. generalistic, there is a high change that your Ph.D. is worth only for a few companies in R&D (but for those companies, your knowledge can be vital).
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_15: It's probably a unique problem and not related to the industries in which you're referring but:
In my field (clinicians - PAs, NPs, their international equivalents), a master's degree is considered the terminal degree one needs. While a few PhD programs exist, graduates from them generally get the eye roll. This is one of the potential pitfalls of having a PhD.
The title afforded by the degree (Dr.) puts the holder in a position at odds with the jargon of the industry. Using your title identifies you (in the minds of patients and other providers) as a physician (MD/DO), when in reality you are a clinician. This creates numerous issues of misrepresentation, litigation, etc.
It is a similar problem created by clinicians who pursue doctorates in public health, health administration, etc. While they've rightly earned their title, it can create (sometimes deadly) consequences.
It's a similar problem to that which arises with MD/PhD holders. The MD/PhD holder is generally more PhD than MD in terms of their capabilities as a healthcare provider. If you want to practice medicine, holding a PhD is not the way to do it.
If you don't need the degree to do the job, then you don't need the degree for the job. That's the line of thinking.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_16: From my own experience this is mostly true.
I have a PhD in Environmental Engineering. I tried to find a job in the industry doing process design for water treatment coupled with R&D. Interviewed a few companies and nobody wanted me. I did my homework, worked with a career coach with interview preparation, and had an internship with a local utility to gain experience (after I finished school, $20/hr). They simply did not want me. One of the interviewers hinted "we want blank paper", at which point I knew this interview was fried. Similar jobs went to MS's of my friends, who got multiple offers from consulting companies as well. I also connected with a few veteran professionals in the field and they admitted this industry usually reject PhDs unless they have a remarkable connection / already did stuff with the hiring managers. At the end of the day I landed a government job which had a strict scoring system in their interview process and PhD happened to be a plus, not minus.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/15 | 618 | 2,651 | <issue_start>username_0: I am moving from one job to another (postdoc to tenure track) this summer and I have papers in several stages of being written, these go from handwritten notes with all the necessary arguments to under revision at a journal. All the papers will have my new contact information put on them but where is the line for changing affiliation? It seems obvious to me that the one that is still in the handwritten notes stage will get the new affiliation and that the ones under revision won't. So somewhere in between is a line.
Where is it?
There are some similar questions so far (see [here](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/9731/academic-affiliation-which-to-choose) and [here](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/1078/is-it-acceptable-to-publish-a-paper-using-an-affiliation-with-a-former-employer) but they do not seem to be quite the same situation since I am not changing fields and the appointments are not concurrent.<issue_comment>username_1: It is not necessarily clear cut. As a principle I would say that the affiliation should be where you have done most of your work. It is, however, also possible to use two affiliations and set your new location as "present address:" (or affilaition). After all, the affiliation serves two purposes. For a university (department) it means something becomes associated to them. For you, though, it means people can find you if they have, for example, questions. So, using the double affiliation, if it is possible, might be a good idea in the grey zone. Otherwise, I would stick with "where you did most of the work", however you wish to define it.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: I would argue that it's a question of resources—if you have used resources (equipment, personnel, computers, financial) of both institutions in executing the paper *before its initial submission*, then you should list both institutes as supporting the work.
On the other hand, if the core of the work—both research and writing—were done at the old institution, then the new institution should only be listed as a "present affiliation," rather than as a "co-sponsor" of the work.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: Your name and affiliation are listed on publications to identify you and to facilitate contact. Thus, I believe your new institution should be listed, rather than your old. Your old institution can be credited in the acknowledgements. Given that any affiliation listed might become outdated, you can also list your personal email address and your personal website URL. (A personal domain name and web hosting are very cheap.)
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/15 | 326 | 1,282 | <issue_start>username_0: Do US universities offer Graduate Paid Internship programs in CS/CSE?
That is, studying MS in CSE while working as a paid intern in a company, which is arranged by the university itself?
If yes, do they have any age limit?<issue_comment>username_1: 1. Yes.
2. Yes.
3. I don't know but I don't think so.
Remember though that such "internships" are also known as "research assistantships" or "summer research assistantships" and will generally not be advertised outside the university or department because there are usually more than enough ready and available folks.
I have done something similar in the past but only because I know the professor personally and he offered me the position after a few conversations with him.
Upvotes: 0 <issue_comment>username_2: Yes, US Universities do offer Graduate paid internship programs in CS/CSE.
It is called Curricular Practical Training/Optional Practical Training.
But each university is different in accepting your CPT/OPT.
You need to have a job offer in hand, check with the DSO of the university for the dates within which you need to apply for your CPT/OPT.
You need to be atleast 18 years i guess.
For more information you can look this up : <http://www.ice.gov/sevis/practical-training/>
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/15 | 1,117 | 4,776 | <issue_start>username_0: A simple question:
>
> What qualifies as a research publication?
>
>
>
Two criteria spring to mind:
1. **Peer-reviewed:** The article has gone through some form of formal peer-review process.
2. **Dead-tree proceedings:** The article has been published in a bound collection of thin sheets of dead tree.
In terms of exceptions to 1., many book chapters do not rely on a formal peer-review process but are generally considered as research publications and listed in author bibliographies. Similarly, some may consider arXiv, etc., as publications and counting towards h-index counts.
In terms of exceptions to 2., various workshops (esp. in CS) publish on-line through systems like CEUR or informal web-site proceedings, are peer-reviewed and contain in-depth technical material. As online publishing becomes more commonplace, criterion 2 will grow weaker and weaker.
Is there something else I'm missing?<issue_comment>username_1: Your criteria are close, but (at least for computer science) not quite right.
1. **Research:** the paper must describe a novel contribution to some field of inquiry. Whether a paper makes a novel (and correct and interesting) contribution is often determined through formal peer review, but not always. Peer review is almost always a formal requirement for a paper to "count" for purposes of formal evaluation for promotion and tenure, but not necessarily for building one's reputation as a researcher. (It's quite common for breakthrough results in theoretical compute science to be announced and discussed in blogs *months* before they undergo formal peer review.)
2. **Publication**: The paper must be, at least in principle, accessible to the public. Two reasonable prerequisites are that the paper has a DOI, and that it is published either in a serial with an ISSN or in a book with an ISBN, but one could make a reasonable case that PDfs on researchers' personal web pages, blog and newsgroup posts, and even StackExchange answers are "publications". (Certainly there are fields, like chemistry, in which journals will not publish anything that has previously appeared on the web, on the grounds that it is "already published".) There is absolutely no requirement that the paper be printed on dead trees to be considered "real".
In particular, I would classify most ArXiv preprints as "research publications", despite the lack of peer review and the absence of dead trees.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: The Committee on Publication Ethics ([COPE](http://publicationethics.org)) has summarized a standard for responsible publishing for authors ([pdf](http://publicationethics.org/files/International%20standards_authors_for%20website_11_Nov_2011.pdf)). Although this document does not define scientific publication explicitly, the requirements are implicitly understood by reading about the demands set on an author of such a publication.
The [Council of Science Editors (CSE)](http://www.councilscienceeditors.org) (quoted by <NAME>, 2012, p 19) provides the following definition
>
> An acceptable primary scientific publication must be the first disclosure containing sufficient information to enable peers (1) to assess observations, (2) to repeat experiments, and (3) to evaluate intellectual processes; moreover it must be susceptible to sensory perception, essentially permanent, available to the scientific community without restriction, and available for regular screening by one or more of the major recognized secondary service.
>
>
>
This means that, for example, abstracts, corporate reports do not count as scientific publications. It should be added that review papers of course count although the wording of the definition may not make that clear at first.
<NAME>. & <NAME>., 2012 How to write and publish a scientific paper. Seventh Edition. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: This is borderline opinion-based, but I would use this definition:
>
> A research publication is any readily available artifact which has passed peer review.
>
>
>
I would exclude non-reviewed book chapters and arXiv etc. preprint submission.
Unlike username_1, I would include peer-reviewed work which is not novel. In my experience (and according to some bibliometrics), review articles are among the most influential research publications, and they are not novel.
Unlike username_1, I would not require that the artifact be "descriptive," have a DOI, ISSN, or ISBN. For example, an abstract sculpture that was peer reviewed and displayed to the public could be credited to an art professor in a similar way to a journal article. Peer-reviewed source code and database entries should also be counted.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/15 | 1,022 | 4,290 | <issue_start>username_0: A friend of mine is pursuing a Masters course containing a research dissertation as part of the curriculum. He has done a lot of work on his topic (both studying of existing literature as well as tried out some new methods) but none of them have given interesting results. So, what should his thesis describe? Or does he need to succeed in order to pass?<issue_comment>username_1: A criticism I have heard of European entrepreneurship (vs. US) [is that bankruptcy for start-ups is too heavily stigmatised](http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-12-1354_en.htm). People are less willing to take risks and start-ups are rather more conservative in their outlook than their American counterparts. Thus American start-ups tend to fail more often but, subjectively speaking, foster better innovation.
It's a compelling argument.
Similarly, in research, publishing or otherwise achieving degrees through negative results is important:
* It fosters an innovative environment where people are willing to try new things
* Publishing non-trivial negative results ...
+ ... informs people from making the same mistake;
+ ... could be extended or fixed by third-parties towards a better solution;
+ ... **stops people from the hype that it so common-place now where even if their results are negative, they feel the need to add an artificial positive spin to get published.**
So in summary, I would say that even if the results are negative, if they are non-obvious or if there's some experience to be gained from them, that should be still be fine.
>
> but none of them have given interesting results.
>
>
>
But what do you mean by "interesting" results? Do you mean positive results? Negative results are often interesting too.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: This depends on the program, the committee, the advisor, and the student. To give some anecdotes in both directions:
I have a friend who was a graduate student for a young professor who was just setting up his lab. My friend never performed any novel research, published few peer-reviewed articles, and for the most part did much more work setting up the lab environment than should have happened. Towards the end of his 5th year, he took his publications, white papers, and other documents, stapeled them together, and called it a thesis. He graduated no problem.
A different friend of mine was diligentily working on a single research problem for a few years and didn't find any results. Push came to shove, his committee wanted to see progress on one particular area, and six months later, when he didn't produce, he left with a masters.
Two separate stories, two separate universities, two very different programs. Long story short, if you think you're heading towards a situation like this, talk to your advisor and committee members and see what you can do. Do note that in these situations you can often take a minor finding which does not directly address your central theme and present it as your major contribution to the field, as this can serve to demonstrate your proficiency in research.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: I'm currently in the middle of planning a master's project that is "high-risk," in the sense of the idea that we're going to try out is a relatively novel idea, and we have no idea if it will actually work or not.
As a "hedge" against this, however, we need to do some methodological work that will support this idea. This work, even if the main idea doesn't pan out, still has relevance within the field, and therefore in and of itself would represent a sizable enough "core" of work that the thesis would be considered successful, even if the "hypothesis" doesn't hold.
In addition, I believe a master's thesis doesn't need to reach the same standards of "advancing the state of knowledge" as a PhD thesis. It should show the results of a project, but it need not be nearly as comprehensive or represent as great an advance as a PhD thesis—in part because of the relative amount of time involved.
What would perhaps be especially helpful here is if the student is able to analyze *why* the various efforts tried haven't panned out. That could make for a significant finding in and of itself, at least as far as the thesis is concerned.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/15 | 1,150 | 4,910 | <issue_start>username_0: I have recently come across a paper that copy-pasted entire paragraphs of one of my papers which is already published in an international journal. This paper appeared in a journal which is not very popular, and I did not get a courtesy citation.
How should I proceed with this? I was thinking of reporting the issue to the editor of the journal where the paper appeared but then I thought that it may not even worth the effort. On the other hand, I still have this in my mind since this is clearly unethical behaviour.
What would you suggest?<issue_comment>username_1: I would definitely contact the chief editor of the journal and place the evidence before him/her/them. Plagiarism should not be taken lightly. There is a tendency to be lenient when it comes to self-plagiarism of non-critical parts of the text, for example, parts of methods sections (in experimental work). Regardless where one draws the line, copying sections of text verbatim from others is a clear breach to me.
Anyway, it will be the editor's job to pursue the matter after you made the point. If the journal belongs to a publishing house they may receive legal help to deal with the author. If the editor does not react and there is a clear publisher behind the journal it may be relevant to bring it up a level. If you have someone in your university working on copyright issues, perhaps at the library, then you could also talk to them. They may be able to provide further assistance and help evaluate the case.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I don't think you should let it slide.
1. Contact the editor-in-chief of the journal where the offending paper appeared, and explain the situation (with the citation of your paper). If they do not respond, or do not adequately address the matter, "name and shame": spread the word that this is not a journal to be taken seriously. You could also contact the publisher, as username_1 suggests.
2. Contact the editor-in-chief of the journal where *your* paper appeared. They have an interest in protecting the work of their author, and may have more leverage in dealing with the offending journal. If, as is common, you transferred your copyright to them upon publication, they may have a legal interest as well.
3. Consider contacting the author of the offending paper, and/or their department chair or dean.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: I have experienced this first hand as well (twice) - not a very nice feeling at all.
Asides from contacting the editors, as has been mentioned. I would also inform those in your research network as to what has happened, for 2 reasons:
* so they are aware of what has happened, just in case they wonder why your research has gone elsewhere.
* so they are aware of the unethical behaviour of not only the offending author, but of the journal that allowed the plagiarised article to be published.
Members of my own research network let me know of both instances when I had been plagiarised (the second time was just within 48 hours of this answer). As with many academics, we have a zero tolerance for plagiarism, so we inform all in our research group for the reasons above - essentially, looking out for eachother in an academic sense.
The last point may seem harsh, but (for what very little my opinion is worth), I find that plagiarism is a deliberate and wilful act of intellectual theft - laziness and even ignorance are not valid excuses. Both the offending author and the journal that let it pass are just as guilty.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: I think that you should send an email to the following persons:
1) To the person in charge or program committee of the journal in which your work has been plagiarized. Be prepared that you can stump upon some frisky person who would like to deny any responsibility about this actions, but at least you state your point that what is that person doing is completely wrong.
2) To the author who make the plagiarism action
You mentioned that the journal in which they plagiarized your work is not well known. Well that is one strong reason why you should communicate with them. For the following reasons:
* Sometimes those small conferences and journals want to start to build a reputation, so consider that you will be helping them in that task.
* Also they can get a grasp about the quality of reviewers that they actually have in their staff. In some occasions the reviewers only pass thru the article very quickly, but actually do not check if there has been some plagiarize on it. Do not get me wrong, but a lot of reviewers do that, and most of the discovered cases of plagiarism in journals or conferences has been discovered by external persons to that environment; like in this case.
So in both cases, you will end up teaching some research ethics to both: the cheaty researcher and the careless journal.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/17 | 538 | 2,083 | <issue_start>username_0: I've published a paper in [viXra](http://vixra.org) and I would like to know if someone else cited it anywhere, but I don't know how. Is there a kind of global index for citations? Does it include “alternative archives” such as viXra?<issue_comment>username_1: Try using [Google Scholar](http://scholar.google.com). There may be field-specific indexes too.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Most established academic journals are indexed in what are logically called “journal indexes”. These indexes commonly record all publication metadata, and usually also include a record of all citations. Such indexes are thus called [**citation indexes**](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citation_index).
Now, the problem with viXra is inherent to its “alternative” nature: it is most definitely not indexed by conventional players (Web of Science, CrossRef, PubMed, CAS, etc.). You thus have two ways of looking for citations to your paper:
* [Google Scholar](http://scholar.google.com/) includes content from viXra in its results (see [this search](http://scholar.google.fr/scholar?q=The+Lady+in+Baghdad&btnG=&hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5)’s first hit, for example). It probably also records citations of such articles, but the quality of citation matching is limited by Google's heuristic algorithms. They're good, but not as good as DOI-based mechanism that commercial databases nowadays employ.
* A regular web search with you name, or the title of your paper. This is not as automated, but it may give good results as to who is citing your work, especially if this is one of your first papers and you don't yet have a large web presence.
*(Obvious caveat: if your name is <NAME> or <NAME>, web search will not help much.)*
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: Vixra is indexed in Microsoft Academic Search, as of Aug 20, 2019. While potentially not as useful as Google Scholar, it does provide a similar portal; of course, Google itself also indexes Vixra papers (but not Google Scholar, which only apparently indexes the citations.)
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/17 | 641 | 2,564 | <issue_start>username_0: I will finish my 4 year bachelors program next year, in a total of 5 years.
I had failed many many courses in 2nd year and my cgpa was around 2.4
Then I had that enlightenment and decided to become an academic. Since then, I have increased my cgpa to over 3.5 and turned all F's to A's. For last 3 semesters I get averagely 3.9 gpa each semester
I still have some C's in few courses from 2nd year and instead of graduating this year, I will graduate next year.
I have managed to boost my cgpa amazingly after such things but I want to know if this extra year will cause me any trouble during Ph.D. applications.<issue_comment>username_1: This sort of thing should be explained in the cover letter. This trend is pretty common; freshmen enter college ready to party, realize halfway through that their grades are actually important, and then buckle down and do good work for the rest. You simply need to state that, despite your initial behavior, you are fully committed to your education. Given a 3.5 GPA at the end, I don't imagine you would have too much trouble.
Do note that this will vary as a function of the universities to which you apply; some may take a harsher view than others. Still, you have a good explanation for the one bad year, so it shouldn't post too much of a problem for you.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: PhD programs do not just look at your GPA(well they do look at it, though!). They want to know that you will be a successful candidate. They put more weightage on your research experience and its novelty. They would look at your research interests that you have mentioned. They want to know that you can bear the stress of the PhD life. They want to see what is your career orientation, what do you intend to do with a PhD degree in hand. They want to see how you and your research would help in the progress of their program and institute as whole. They want to make sure they aren't wasting their resources in a bad investment(you) which is avoidable.
Show them that you are worth it. If you can prove that you will be successful in your PhD, you will get it. People have good and bad times. Good times are good, no one questions them. The question is how did you and how well did you handle the bad times.
You brought your your GPA up again, which is a good sign. Make sure it doesn't gets neglected. Mention the bad times and its challenges that you overcame, in your cover letter/personal statement/essay.
If you really want it, you will get it. Good Luck! :)
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/17 | 2,392 | 8,819 | <issue_start>username_0: Many academic journals have copyright policies which forbid authors (possibly for a finite embargo time) to make their papers (either preprints, accepted manuscripts, or camera-ready versions) freely available (either on their personal websites or on repositories such as the arXiv). **How tightly enforced are these policies? Are there known cases of publishers pursuing legal action against an author for posting copyrighted academic papers?** Or would such cases normally be dealt with private requests to cease-and-desist?
[This answer](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/9968/820) seems to indicate such cases are rare, but there could be privately-dealt with cases that are not visible. Or is there a large body of public-repository-published papers that possibly / probably / demonstrably have been publicly posted in breach of a copyright policy?<issue_comment>username_1: Fully agreeing with [eykanal's comment](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/11193/how-tightly-enforced-are-open-access-embargoes#comment20639_11193), I can provide the following thought on reasons: as with all copyrighted materials originating from commercial sources, it becomes a business decision on when and how to hunt down those who break the rules. If some authors put their manuscripts out on their own web sites it is probably not worth the expenses to prevent it. If everyone did it systematically, I am sure things would look different. If publishers see a decline in subscription rates from libraries due to the fact that authors make stuff available, then I think we will see something akin to what happened with downloadable music. For a publisher, an author is also what makes the business go around, so hunting authors may not be a good business practice. But, with more and more published work being made available in formally illegal ways, I am sure it is only a matter of time before clamps are tightened. So it is a bit like teasing a sleeping bear, fine until it wakes up (and I do not mean "fine" as in agreeing with posting material illegally).
In addition to putting the published paper online, it might be worth noting that in many if not most cases, it is perfectly legal to post the original manuscript (before review and typesetting) on the web since this is not the copyrighted material that is in the publications. Unless you have signed off on immaterial rights you still have the rights to that original work.
The bottom line is it is illegal and many probably do not really understand what they have signed when they published their papers.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: One data point:
I am a mathematician, and I have never heard of this happening to anyone.
Many mathematicians post preprints on their website and to the arXiv, and it is somewhat common for mathematicians to also post scanned copies of the published journal versions of their older papers.
Ethical judgements may vary, but I am unaware of any authors who have suffered negative practical consequences for this, or even who have been asked to remove their papers.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: Update: Here's the new text of the German [UrhG §38 Abs (4)](http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/urhg/__38.html):
>
> Der Urheber eines wissenschaftlichen Beitrags, der im Rahmen einer mindestens zur Hälfte mit öffentlichen Mitteln geförderten Forschungstätigkeit entstanden und in einer periodisch mindestens zweimal jährlich erscheinenden Sammlung erschienen ist, hat auch dann, wenn er dem Verleger oder Herausgeber ein ausschließliches Nutzungsrecht eingeräumt hat, das Recht, den Beitrag nach Ablauf von zwölf Monaten seit der Erstveröffentlichung in der akzeptierten Manuskriptversion öffentlich zugänglich zu machen, soweit dies keinem gewerblichen Zweck dient. Die Quelle der Erstveröffentlichung ist anzugeben. Eine zum Nachteil des Urhebers abweichende Vereinbarung ist unwirksam.
>
>
>
rough translation:
The author of a scientific work
* which was produced during scientific reseach that funded at least half by public money and
* which was published in a periodical that is issued at least twice per year
retains the right to make the *accpted manuscript* publicly available
* after an embargo period of 12 months from the date of the first publication
* as long as this is not for commercial purposes.
The source of the first publication must be given.
This right is retained also in case of a complete copyright transfer to the publisher of editor.
Agreements on this topic to the disadvantage of the author are void.
I guess the non-commercial clause will raise some questions and difficulties.
---
old answer:
Here in Germany, the parliament (Bundestag) actually [voted to change §38 UrhG](http://dipbt.bundestag.de/extrakt/ba/WP17/524/52444.html)
to (among other changes):
>
> Einführung eines unabdingbaren Zweitverwertungsrechtes für Autoren von mit überwiegend aus öffentlichen Mitteln geförderten Beiträgen in Periodika 12 Monate nach Erstveröffentlichung;
>
>
>
rough translation: *introduction of an unalienable right of secondary use\* for authors of contributions to journals which are mainly supported mainly by public grants 12 months after the primary publication*.
\* I'm not quite sure how to translate "Zweitverwertungsrecht" - it is the right for secondary use/exploitation(?) of a work. Meaning that agreements that the publisher get the exclusive rights to the work will be valid in Germany only for 12 months, thereafter the authors have the right to make these papers publicly available.
The new text does not yet show up (the voting took place only 2 weeks ago) in the law texts in internet, it will become [§38 (4) UrhG](http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/urhg/__38.html).
While this still means that only papers with public funding are covered, and the embargo period may be annoying, I see this as an important step into the right direction. And it definitively means that there won't be any possibility for publishers to enforce anything after a year if a German author made the work publicly available.
In any case, our version of the "fair use" rights mean that I'm always allowed to send single copies of scientific papers which are needed for collaboration to my colleagues. So within the first year after publication, you'll still have to email me for the paper, but thereafter, you can blame me for not making the manuscript available e.g. via arXiv.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: Here is one event that can qualify as such. In 2011, [<NAME>](http://r6.ca/) submitted a paper to the ACM Workshop for Generic Programming 2011 after having submitted it to the arXiv under a Public Domain licence. At press time, the printer asked O'Connor for a letter of permission from the ACM *in lieu* of an exclusive copyright transfer which he could not grant. Although he had informed the conference chairs of the arXiv upload when he submitted, and they were OK with it, ACM legal refused to publish the paper as it was "already published." The paper is only mentioned briefly in the proceedings in a note:
>
> We note that one of the papers presented in the workshop is not included in the proceedings. This paper, ‘Functor is to Lens as Applicative is to Biplate: Introducing Multiplate’ by <NAME>, is accessible as [arXiv:1103.2841v2](http://arxiv.org/abs/1103.2841v2) [cs.PL].
>
>
>
This is explained in more detail in O'Connor's blog post [The ACM and Me](http://r6.ca/blog/20110930T012533Z.html).
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: This seems to be changing. A recent article in the *Washington Post*, [How one publisher is stopping academics from sharing their research](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/12/19/how-one-publisher-is-stopping-academics-from-sharing-their-research/) (2013-12-19), describes a recent 'spree' of takedown notices sent by Elsevier to Academia.edu, the University of Calgary, the University of California-Irvine, and Harvard University. This seems to be a new development:
>
> The letter to Harvard identified 23 articles that it requested be taken down from University-hosted pages in mid November. "We had not received takedown notices for scholarly articles before this, as far as we know," says <NAME>, the Director of the Harvard Office for Scholarly Communication and the Harvard Open Access Project.
>
>
>
Academia.edu, which is a for-profit company, and also a competitor of Elsevier-owned Mendeley, got about 2,800 requests.
This story is also covered by [Wired](http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-12/17/elsevier-versus-open-access) and [The Chronicle of Higher Education](http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/posting-your-latest-article-you-might-have-to-take-it-down/48865).
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/17 | 664 | 2,889 | <issue_start>username_0: I was thinking about submitting one of my papers in [arXiv](http://arxiv.org/) or [www.optimization-online.org](http://www.optimization-online.org/) and hence I was just wondering if mentioning the same in my CV would be appropriate. Is it done usually? If yes, how should I actually mention something like this in my CV? Kindly guide me (I have no previous experience in publishing papers and I'm an undergraduate student).<issue_comment>username_1: This only pertains to mathematics since that's the only field I can speak for, but there it's normal for people to list preprints on the arXiv in their publication list or CV **making it clear** that it is listed as a preprint. I think people understand perfectly well that there are long lead times on getting things published.
That said, I would say that you should think carefully and get advice from more experienced people in your field before submitting to a preprint archive. At least in the case of the arXiv, once something is posted, it can never be taken down.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Putting non-peer reviewed publications on your CV is perfectly fine, but you should be aware that for research-oriented jobs and admission to academic programs you will be primarily judged by your peer reviewed publications. I have seen CVs that separately list peer-reviewed works and non-peer reviewed works, and sometimes the non-peer reviewed works are simply listed as "technical reports."
If you believe that the papers you write are worthy of being mentioned on your CV, then list them. But don't think that by putting a bunch of low-quality non-peer reviewed works will do you any favors when looking for work or when applying for academic positions (whether graduate school or employment). Obviously, you should avoid putting them on your CV if you are doing so simply to demonstrate that you can write a paper.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: Depends on your field. If in it arXiv is not popular, make a separate list named "Preprints".
If it is popular (i.e. people are expected to post on arXiv along with sending to the journal), then it is common to have a single list (where, naturally, papers from last months or a year are only on arXiv, other - both have the journal reference and arXiv ID). If older papers are peer-reviewed then it is somehow implied that the new ones are likely to get into journals/conferences as well.
However, if you have only arXiv preprints (e.g. as you are only starting your career) it is not implied that they will get accepted. Anyway, listing them is way better than listing nothing - just make a list of "Preprints".
In any case putting preprints may give you an edge - especially if your preprints are related to research they are interested in (for me, quite a few times, they were a starting point of a specialistic discussion).
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/17 | 508 | 2,190 | <issue_start>username_0: I have searched the literature and I'm now have all the papers I need.
I'm reading the papers at the moment in order to write a lit review. I would like to know some strategies to read them, should I read them from first page to last page? or should I read specific sections only?<issue_comment>username_1: I really recommend that you start reading the Abstract, by that way you can get rid of some papers that would not be so valuable for your work. After that try to get a quick glimpse at the theoretical background, just to catch if there is some background that you are actually missing and you will need for understanding the article fully. Take your time to read the experimentation part and feel free to jump to the conclusions.
Remember that you do not need to read some articles from the first page to the last page, except in some ocassions. There will be some sections that you can clearly jump e.g. the theoretical part, if you have the enough background.
Upvotes: 1 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: The objective of reading/review academic papers is to critically analyze research studies.
Critical reading is basically a process where you ask yourself questions as you're reading, such as:
* *What was the objective of the research study?*
* *Did the researchers accomplish this?*
* *Why or why not?*
* *Why is the study important?*
* *What are the implications of the findings?*
* *How does this paper contribute knowledge to society?*
* *Do I want to borrow an idea from this paper?*
* *Do I believe something can be improved?*
Answering those questions will help you figure out what you've read and why it was relevant to you and the research study you'll end up designing. It can also help you as you target each section, it's not always clear cut the order in which you'll read the paper critically.
Now that you know what to look for, how you organize those notes is up to your individual preference. There are many options available: hand written notes, digital notes, laptop, ipad, etc. I personally like to use a matrix format with different fields, such as objective, method, findings, theoretical model, etc.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/17 | 418 | 1,787 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm weighing all my options before the fall application and I wanted to know if it is possible to take out loans in the US as an international master's degree student.
Any tips where to look?
Best I've seen are private loans with an American cosignatory. Is it really the extent of loan options for an international? Do universities extend loans to their students or help in getting private loans?
Cheers<issue_comment>username_1: Yes check with your universities Student Services Department. Most of the universities also give you scholarships provided you have some good scores in GRE/TOEFL or whatever they require. Banks also give Student loans to International students provided you have a credit-worthy US-Citizen as a Co-signer.
But most of the international students are eligible for scholarships.
Good luck.
<http://www.edupass.org/finaid/loans.phtml>
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: Try to check (email) with the offices for international students and scholar that in some universities also handle financial issues for foreign students. They will give you the best options. If you're willing to do research or teaching work, I'd suggest you to personally contact Faculties or graduate program secretaries that may have such options for you. In some universities, most national and international grad students are under teaching or research assistantships, have tuition waived and monthly stipend, and this also build up their cv. This may not apply to specific degrees such as MBA, but if you're in science, technology, education or engineer, it is likely that you can find assistantship to support you.
It may be too late to find an assistantship for the fall semester, you can consider to start next spring as well.
good luck!
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/18 | 1,076 | 4,877 | <issue_start>username_0: I had submitted this paper of mine to a reputed springer journal some time back. There are reasons for me to believe it is a good journal although it has an impact factor of only 0.941 since most of the original work on the problem ( I will describe that in detail below) I'm working on was published in that journal. A few days back I received a decision from them which said that they wouldn't be considering it for publication and this was the reviewer's comment - "*I am afraid i do not see a contribution by this paper valuable enough for publication in the Journal. Neither regarding the problem setting nor regarding the solution method any new insights are provided*".
Now, I do admit that my work isn't something path breaking or completely novel (I shall give a detailed description in the end). What I have essentially done is that I have used existing algorithms and techniques and have applied the same on the specific problem I was working on and have got significant results (please see the complete detail of the problem in the end).
So post rejection I have actually been in a complete dilemma on whether I should actually try publishing my work again with some other journals and I have also begun to wonder if journals actually accept such work. The problem is that I have no prior experience of publishing papers and I'm an undergraduate student. So it would be really nice if someone could help me with this.
---
**More on the Problem:**
The problem I have been working on is the Traveling Tournament Problem. So what I have done here is that I have taken existing techniques and algorithms for this problem and I have applied it to a very popular sports league in order to schedule it. And doing so has actually given me some "significant"(?) results like reduction in the travel distance in this league.
I am also pretty sure no one has actually worked on this particular league before, so this would be the first instance of the same.<issue_comment>username_1: In publishing there is a phenomena called "me too" publications (see for example Day & Gastel: How to write and Publish A Scientific Paper) where one takes existing methods and apply them to a new area, data set, whatever context is applicable. Although not wrong, these types of studies usually do not contribute much new knowledge except resulting in the understandng that the method(s) work in (yet) another circumstance.
What can then be done? As I alluded to initially, there is nothing really wrong with such studies. What is necessary is to convince the editors and reviewers that by applying the method(s) to the new area, you have actually achieved something new (in the sense of scientific discovery). For example, applying a formula to a new set of numbers is not a discovery unless the new numbers themselves contain something that can be set apart from what has been done before. So it boils down to what might sloppily be called "packaging"; you need to package your study so that it is evident what new discovery is achieved. It is not sufficient to just say that it is a new data set but you need to convince that applying the method(s) to the new data set shows results that expand our horizon beyond the obvious and also be explicit why one, for example, would not expect the result you obtained (or equivalent).
I have deliberately kept this answer as general as I can because the issue you bring up applies to many if not all fields. I would give the manuscript a hard work over and really think about what truly scientifically (intelectually) new aspects you bring forth. It may be that your writing has not been clear enough to bring the message through. It may be that you are too involved to see the bigger picture that needs to be explained to others. Or, in the worst case, it may be that your study is too trivial. Avoid falling into the "me too" trap, it easily happens and the remedy is usually to make sure the perspectives of the study are re-written carefully to highlight the core research problem to be solved.
So to answer, yes you should try again unless you find you are stuck in "me too" land.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: username_1s answer is good. I would like to add something specifically on the venue.
If you develop or apply a new method, submit to a journal that focus on methods.
If you apply an existing method to a field where it hasn't before, submit to a journal that focuses on the application. This can be very enriching, perhaps nobody in this field thought of using this method before, maybe they didn't know it existed. Such a paper can be rather short and won't be prize-winning, but can certainly be publishable.
So, perhaps all you need to do is sit with your advisor and reconsider the venue where you're publishing, in addition to some *packaging* as username_1 describes.
Upvotes: 4 |
2013/07/18 | 665 | 2,746 | <issue_start>username_0: I notice that coming up for tenure/getting tenure is often an opportunity to move to another institution (even if tenure is granted). How does this work in practice? Is it common for assistant professors to formally go on the job market the year that they are up for tenure? Do they do it only informally, by asking around? Do schools just make offers to up-for-tenure APs without prompting?
I'm curious how this works, because it seems that often times these moves are worked out shortly after tenure decisions are made, so it seems like they must have been in the works before hand.
I'm most interested in highly ranked US based research universities.<issue_comment>username_1: This is a manifestation of game-playing, and is completely understandable once one starts thinking in such terms.
For example, if a person is in an excellent situation to get tenure at their current institution, they are probably in an equally good position to get other jobs, perhaps with tenure.
Another feature: if a person has done good-enough work that they've got outside offers, this can set in motion the getting-tenure process at their current institution.
(Shallowly enough, the "best" certification of one's academic virtue is outside offers.)
At the same time, I think most up-for-tenure assistant profs in the U.S. are not really looking for outside offers as they come up for tenure, so even if they could generate them, they'd not try. For that matter, despite the "rewards", many people find this game-playing obnoxious so don't do it.
To answer another part of your question: yes, most formal job offers only arise after informal inquiries and back-and-forth, because... as with high-school dating... getting turned down is embarrassing. :)
The people who are interested in gaming the system continue to do so after tenure, typically...
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: I cannot think of any assistant profs in the US who did not actively go on the job market when they were coming up for tenure. This seems to me to be reasonable behaviour even if you have no desire to move because
* Getting tenure at your current institution is a bit of a crap shoot.
It is obviously influenced by how good your past work is, but there
are a lot of other factors at play. The success rate is not
particularly high.
* I also believe, although have no data to back it up, that having a
tenured offer from one university increases your chances of a tenured
offer from another university. This of course could be correlation
and not causation, but I am not convinced.
* Being up for tenure is not a black mark on your CV, being turned down
for tenure and then going on the job market opens up a big question
mark.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/18 | 994 | 4,480 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm in the very beginning of my scientific career, so I don't yet know the standards for (systematic) reviews very well. I feel I don't have so much experience that I could publish my own research in good journals (I have now just two conference papers), so I'm considering to pay close attention for 6-12 months in other peoples' works.
I have a clear research question, but given the massive amount of related papers it's difficult to choose which ones to pick. Of course, I will select papers related to my research question as the first criteria. However, could I narrow the range of included papers more by
* publication date (e.g. only take papers published during the past five years),
* impact factor or citation count,
* type of publication (conference, journal),
* sample size (e.g. number of subjects)?
Or, if not these, what criteria are commonly used? I guess the answer is different for reviews and systematic reviews, so please cover both if possible. thank you!
EDIT: I'm considering this so that it would be possible to try publish my results.<issue_comment>username_1: I do not find any of these points very relevant. The publication date couldbe useful if your topic is such that older references are indeeed obsolete.
To write a review you want to collect papers that describe your topic as well as possible. A review is usually a good point for others to see the depth and breadth of a subject so being complete is usually a sign of quality.
Given that you have a topic, you need to consider how you should organize your information. Is there any new that can come out of the way you organize your review? A review is not just a collection of older results, you need to provide a synthesis. Often the outcome is to made limitations in older work visible or to identify gaps in knowledge or point at directions for new development. Depending on what the purpose will be you may end up chosing papers differently. However, often you do not know the structure until you have read enough and come to realize how the knowledge in th earea is distributed.
So for me there is no real difference between review and systematic review. A review is simply a way to orgnaize and sort older information in a new way so that new patterns emerge and hint at directions for further research or other forms of new ideas.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: The point of a review of a field or subfield (IMHO) is to **tell the story** of the development of the field, leading up to explaining **what are the major open questions?** and **why are they important?** Often (though not always), you should focus on **big ideas** and which developments they have lead to.
If there was a sequence of 10 papers that repeatedly applied roughly the same ideas to larger data sets, because they got bigger and faster computers, that is probably not very interesting, and something you will likely gloss over (or completely omit) from your review. So you need a way to determine which are the *most important papers* and start with those.
**It's hard to write a review before you know the field.** Here are a few possible ways to get that knowledge quickly:
* Read an old review in the same area. See which papers it claims are foundational, then check to see which more recent papers cite the foundational ones. Iterate.
* Go to lots of seminar talks and see which results always get mentioned in the introduction. Start by reading those papers.
* Ask a more senior student or faculty member where to start.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_3: In health related fields there is a huge difference between a review and a systematic review. The point of a standard review is to summarise an area of research possibly identifying areas of future research, but not necessarily. A standard review is often conducted in conjunction with a meta analysis or leads to a meta analysis to determine if a particular Patient population is helped by an Intervention more than a Comparison intervention on a set of Outcomes. This leads to the PICO search strategy. There are a number of different frameworks by which systematic reviews can be conducted. A Cochrane review is one such system. There is a whole field of literature associated with conducting systematic reviews.
The goal of a systematic review, and a review in general, is to find all the relevant papers. If you want less papers you need to narrow your question. PICO can help with this.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/19 | 1,010 | 4,540 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm designing a leadership development program for a graduate college at a research university. As part of the project, I've designed a summary sheet which each participant will receive. The summary is designed to give them an impression of their overall leadership development. It includes an "overall leadership score," which is currently shown as a number on a 1-10 scale.
My intent is for all students to begin the program at a baseline level of 5. Students who demonstrate multiple positive leadership traits will raise their score above a 5. Students who show a lack of these traits will lower that score.
However, I'd like to replace the 1-10 scale since it will be difficult to keep the baseline or average score of 5 from being equated with a 50, an F, etc. For the same reason, I've avoided the use of a letter scale.
Does anyone have suggestions on an alternative grading system that is well suited to this type of grading task? I'm also trying to find something that won't be too discouraging for students whose leadership scores are below average (seeing a 0 or an F would not get the right message across).<issue_comment>username_1: I do not find any of these points very relevant. The publication date couldbe useful if your topic is such that older references are indeeed obsolete.
To write a review you want to collect papers that describe your topic as well as possible. A review is usually a good point for others to see the depth and breadth of a subject so being complete is usually a sign of quality.
Given that you have a topic, you need to consider how you should organize your information. Is there any new that can come out of the way you organize your review? A review is not just a collection of older results, you need to provide a synthesis. Often the outcome is to made limitations in older work visible or to identify gaps in knowledge or point at directions for new development. Depending on what the purpose will be you may end up chosing papers differently. However, often you do not know the structure until you have read enough and come to realize how the knowledge in th earea is distributed.
So for me there is no real difference between review and systematic review. A review is simply a way to orgnaize and sort older information in a new way so that new patterns emerge and hint at directions for further research or other forms of new ideas.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: The point of a review of a field or subfield (IMHO) is to **tell the story** of the development of the field, leading up to explaining **what are the major open questions?** and **why are they important?** Often (though not always), you should focus on **big ideas** and which developments they have lead to.
If there was a sequence of 10 papers that repeatedly applied roughly the same ideas to larger data sets, because they got bigger and faster computers, that is probably not very interesting, and something you will likely gloss over (or completely omit) from your review. So you need a way to determine which are the *most important papers* and start with those.
**It's hard to write a review before you know the field.** Here are a few possible ways to get that knowledge quickly:
* Read an old review in the same area. See which papers it claims are foundational, then check to see which more recent papers cite the foundational ones. Iterate.
* Go to lots of seminar talks and see which results always get mentioned in the introduction. Start by reading those papers.
* Ask a more senior student or faculty member where to start.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_3: In health related fields there is a huge difference between a review and a systematic review. The point of a standard review is to summarise an area of research possibly identifying areas of future research, but not necessarily. A standard review is often conducted in conjunction with a meta analysis or leads to a meta analysis to determine if a particular Patient population is helped by an Intervention more than a Comparison intervention on a set of Outcomes. This leads to the PICO search strategy. There are a number of different frameworks by which systematic reviews can be conducted. A Cochrane review is one such system. There is a whole field of literature associated with conducting systematic reviews.
The goal of a systematic review, and a review in general, is to find all the relevant papers. If you want less papers you need to narrow your question. PICO can help with this.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/19 | 1,337 | 5,716 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a junior looking for insights on intro to academia. My GPA is considered low (~3.2), but I believe I have a reasonable understanding and experience in the field I'd like to study and would like to try to submit a paper to a conference to aim for top-10 CS grad schools and see if I really have research interest and potential.
I'm not sure what I should expect and how to plan for the next 1~2 years. Grad school applications are usually due before the spring semester, so I have roughly ~1.5 years to prepare, right? I noticed that the first deadlines for a lot of conferences in the field are between April~June. Will I have enough time to write one? How long does it usually take to publish a first research paper?
I'm planning on asking professors if I can join a project when the semester starts (or ask for a review when I write one? I'm not sure what the options are). I wasn't planning on going to grad school until recently, so I'm not very familiar with this process, and I'd like to hear what you think.<issue_comment>username_1: First things first -- generally, you do research with the intent to learn something and/or to solve an open problem, not with the intent to publish a paper so you can get into graduate school. This relates directly to your question:
>
> Will I have enough time to write [a paper]?
>
>
>
Without knowing what you're planning on researching, or how it will turn out, this is unanswerable. Writing a research paper for publication isn't as simple as saying you're going to do it -- you have to have a legitimate problem to work on, the tools and ability to produce a novel contribution regarding that problem, and the drive to make it happen. Then, of course, you have to actually write and edit the paper, put together any graphs or other figures that demonstrate your contribution, find a suitable conference (or journal or workshop, etc.) to publish the paper in, and then actually submit it by the deadline.
All of that said, your idea to ask professors about joining their research groups is a good one. With this plan, you have the potential to:
1. Find out if you enjoy and have the temperament for research.
2. Get mentorship from a professor, grad students, or other more experienced undergraduates.
3. Find out what problems are interesting and worth pursuing.
4. Practice the steps of going from idea to published results.
Once you find a professor to work with (and again, I suggest phrasing your request in terms of why you are interested in computer science research, and not on the means to getting into graduate school), you will start getting answers to the other questions, like what specific conferences you might want to shoot for. Obviously, it behooves you to plan ahead in order to meet conference deadlines, but until you start the research, you won't be able to determine whether you will eventually have enough good results to put together a paper.
As a general guideline, it would not surprise me if you can find a good problem to work on and submit it to a workshop or conference within a year and a half. You might also be able to work on an ongoing project and end up as an author on a paper or two that come from this work. Good luck!
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: >
> *How long does it usually take to publish a first research paper?*
>
>
>
That question depends on a lot of factors. Here are a few of them:
* What is the significance of your research?
* How much of your research is unique, novel, and relevant?
* Will other computer scientists be interested in your findings?
* How well can you write? How well can you organize your paper?
* Where do you intend to publish?
Some conferences and publications are more competitive than others. (Put another way, some have a lower acceptance rate than others.) Much of that depends on who sponsors the conference or publication.
First, you have to do the research (this is not trivial). Significant findings need to come from that research (this doesn't always happen). You have to write that in a way that will appeal to the community (the community can be rather fickle sometimes). Lastly, you have to find some venue where the work can be presented (it's not always easy to find a good match).
If a paper gets rejected, it could be because:
* The research doesn't report anything new or significant
* The research doesn't report anything of interest to the community
* The paper is poorly written
* The paper doesn't cite other related research, leading to a credibility problem
* There simply wasn't room for your paper in the publication, or it wasn't a good match for that venue
Getting back to your original question, you might be able to publish in a year, if everything goes very smoothly. However, that's a huge "IF." Even established researchers can spend years getting ready for a publication, only to see it be rejected by a committee.
Publication can be a long and arduous process, with plenty of opportunities for obstacles, setbacks, and dead ends. It can be very hard to estimate a timetable, particularly for a first-timer going from start to finish.
Your best bet might be to see what's going on at your university, and see if you can get involved with an established, ohgoing research effort. Before you do that, it might be worth doing a self-evaluation first, so that you're prepared to tell a faculty member what you can offer the research team. For example, perhaps you're a crack programmer, and a research project at your institution needs some software written, in order to complete an experiment or simulation. That might be a more realistic way to get started as a researcher.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/19 | 926 | 3,960 | <issue_start>username_0: I made a really stupid mistake. Me and some other graduate students were playing Dungeons and Dragons in my lab after hours (9 pm) this summer and we each opened up a beer and the cleaners called the cops on us. I think I'm going to get an academic censure because of it, which means I think that it will go on my transcripts. This is the only case of my misconduct, and I feel really stupid that I did it. My question is will this greatly affect my ability to go into a PhD program? I joined this masters program as a stepping stone, and have done very well academically and with my thesis in this program. I'm worried that all the progress I have made will go away because of one lapse of judgement.<issue_comment>username_1: I would do everything I can to prevent this going on my transcript. The first thing I would do is write a letter of apology to the cleaning crew for my misbehaviour. Do not approach the cleaners directly, but rather through their boss. Then I would contact the head of the MS program to explain what happened. While waiting for that meeting I would schedule a meeting with an alcohol counsellor so I could demonstrate I do not have a problem drinking. You may also want to enrol in a workplace sensitivity training course.
I cannot recall seeing an application with anything like this before. I don't think people would really hold it against you and you could explain it in your cover letter. That said graduate school admission is competitive.
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I don't think you need to worry unless there's something more to the context. Drinking a single beer in a computer lab seems pretty harmless; the university might legitimately object to the risk of spilling your beer, but this should not be a career-ending mistake. On the other hand, drinking in a chemistry lab could be a very serious safety violation, especially if you were tending to an experiment during the game.
Assuming the only problem is a technical violation of the "public consumption" rule and that you retain the full support of your letter of recommendation writers, I doubt it will do you any harm even if it does end up on your transcript. You should look at your transcript before applying to see exactly what it says. You can then include a few sentences somewhere in your Ph.D. application addressing this issue and explaining that the "academic censure" was only because you had a single beer in a campus location not specifically permitted. This is very important, because to me the term "academic censure" sounds more like cheating or plagiarism.
Assuming you aren't applying to Brigham Young University or KAUST, I can't see why anyone would care about this sort of technicality. It would lower my opinion of the university, rather than the applicant. (On the other hand, if there's more to the story, such as safety violations, then you'll have to work harder to sort it out.)
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: Daniel’s and Anonymous’ answers are great, and I want to emphasize that they are not mutually exclusive. I’ll also add some tidbits:
1. Fight as much as you can to avoid it getting on your academic record. It may not matter much for admissions later on, or it may, you can never know for sure. It sure is easier if there is nothing to explain. You can tell the admission committee that “it was just a single beer”, but that's still just your word: all the official information they have is less informative and, probably, scarier than that. Also, being known from the start as “the guy with the beer-drinking record”, even if you get the position, may not be so good.
However: fight nice! Don't create stronger hostility than you already have…
2. If it does get on your record, be upfront and address it straight on in your cover letters. Doing so, people may not care so much. If you aren't upfront with it, they will definitely not take the risk.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/19 | 973 | 4,303 | <issue_start>username_0: Is it advisable to have a professor from a university look at your paper before you submit it to a journal, since they might want partial credit? and would it take the journal a longer time to referee your research paper if you have no affiliation?<issue_comment>username_1: The question is a bit vague since you have not provided your own level of education or within what framework you do research.
Since it is generally possible for anyone to publish a paper, you will not need to go through an academic. It may, however, be a very good step to take since essentially no-one can write a fault-free paper and if you do not have the experience or research eucation, you will find it almost necessary to stand a chance with a journal. Such a "review" will most certanly weed out any major problems with your paper. A problem here may of course be that your inexperience may make the task to improve the paper very time consuming (again, not knowing your own background makes it difficult to assess what help you may need) and hence make persons less likely to take on the job.
The journal will as I can see ot spend more or less time your manuscript than they would any other of similar quality. If the journal accepts it for review (general quality check) it will be sent out to reviewers for more careful scrutiny (scientific quality check) after which the paper is recommended for either revisions or is rejected. none of this would be different in your case unless one taes into consideration that you may not be as fluent in scientific writing (which means rejection is more liekly than otherwse).
So a good plan is to try to contact persons at an academic institution, present your work and see if they would consider helping you. It is not certain you will be helped because your manscript will be extra work done in addition to everything else. If you cannot get help then you can hopefully try to submit the manuscript anyway, but I strongly recommend you to spend time looking at how papers in the field are written and also pick up a good reference book on scientific writing to make sure you avoid basic mistakes.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: I'll try to answer you two specific questions:
* *“Is it advisable to have a professor from a university look at your paper before you submit it?”* — **Yes, if you have no previous experience of publishing papers** (as a principal author). Academic publication is a game with a set of written rules and some non-written expectations. You can find the rules indicated on the publisher's webpage (guidelines to authors, editorial policy, etc.). If you have read a good number of papers, including many papers from the specific journal (or conference, or …) you are submitting to, then you may have inferred some of the non-written expectations. But otherwise, having someone to help you with the more formal part of academic writing will enhance your paper's chances.
* *“Is it advisable to have a professor from a university look at your paper before you submit it?”* — **Yes again, if you do not have a very good understanding of the field, its advances and its directions.** To be somewhat brutally honest (and in line with paul’s comment): from experience, newcomers to research, or to a specific field, have a natural tendency to reïnvent the wheel or overestimate the impact and novelty of their work. It's okay, judging these correctly involves a very good grasp of the overall field, both in-breadth and in-depth.
* *“Would it take the journal a longer time to referee your research paper if you have no affiliation?”* — **No**. For two articles of the same quality, with an unknown author, I don't think the presence of an affiliation would impact review time.
---
*Edit to answer question in comment: “Would a professor who reviews the paper want credit?”* — **It depends** on the amount of work required and the ethics of the person you ask. If reviewing the paper requires significant amount of time, especially because there are many faults with the paper that need to be fixed, you could see that there must be incentive for the professor to invest in it. In all cases, **[discuss this issue upfront!](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/authorship)**
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/20 | 1,421 | 6,086 | <issue_start>username_0: I am attending a university with a mediocre mathematics department. The courses at my school cover fewer topics and are less challenging than the same courses at top universities.
* How can I avoid becoming behind in coursework compared to students at top universities?
* How can I ensure that I am competitive when applying to mathematics graduate school?<issue_comment>username_1: Read as many mathematics books, lecture-notes, and published articles as possible. Not just "textbooks". Not just "undergraduate textbooks" as these contain very little substantive mathematics.
Even if your faculty people are not stellar mathematicians, they surely know some advanced mathematics and can give you guidance about what to read. Uninformed self-study can be a huge time-waster so you will want some direction to be productive and your mathematics faculty will be the best & most available people to provide you with productive guidance.
Definitely talk to faculty to get guidance! This can be done officially through a "reading course" or "directed study." It can also be done informally through frequent check-ins with interesting questions. Either way this will enable those faculty members to write excellent letters of recommendation about your *interest* and *motivation* based on your capacity to appreciate the things you will have read and your perceptive questions.
It's not so much whether *you* (as a novice) can handle random questions, which novices rarely can, but whether your sensibilities are heading in the right direction, which would be manifest in your *reaction to* substantial mathematics.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: >
> How can I ensure that I am competitive when applying to mathematics graduate school?
>
>
>
Be a student member of a professional mathematics organization, such as the [Mathematical Association of America](http://www.maa.org/), the [American Mathematical Society](http://www.ams.org/), or the [Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics](http://siam.org/) (even if you are not based in the USA). This will help you be up to date with recent developments.
Try submitting some answers to problems posed in publications like [The College Mathematics Journal](http://www.maa.org/publications/periodicals/college-mathematics-journal/the-college-mathematics-journal) and [Crux Mathematicorum](http://cms.math.ca/crux/). Publication of your name in the solutions section might help you in your application to graduate school.
If possible, attend at least one conference in mathematics. This will let you interact with students and researchers in other schools.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: Have you heard about <NAME>'s story? If not, I would suggest you to Google for it.
Had you asked about other disciplines, my answer would be different. However, your major is math, I think top university or not does not matter much.
All you have to do is to study hard. That's it. We are Internet age now. You have all kinds of resources available online. Our sister sites, Mathematics Stack Exchange and MathOverflow, can be very helpful to you. I myself am a retiree. I learn quite a lot from them.
Bottom line, study. Good luck!
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: As a student who just graduated from a school whose math department is outside the top 50 and going to graduate school in applied math, I offer the following advice:
Definitely get to know your professors well so they can write recommendation letters for you. One way to do that, as username_1 mentions, is to take reading courses with professors.
It is important which classes you take: For pure math want to have at least taken classes in algebra, real/complex analysis, and topology. Note that if you plan to go to graduate school in applied math, you would want to take classes in programming, real/complex analysis, numerical linear algebra, ODEs/PDEs, and numerical analysis. Also ask your professors for advice on which classes you should take. The classes I have listed are just the bare **minimum**. By junior/senior year, you should be taking graduate level math courses if you plan to apply to the very best graduate schools.
Research: Although I cannot speak for pure mathematics, if you are planning to go to graduate school in applied math, try to do research with a professor at your school or a summer REU.
GRE: Most Ph.D programs in pure/applied math will require that you take the Math Subject GRE (which is not the same as the general math GRE). Although recommendations will have the most weight on your application, the subject test should not be taken lightly. In order to prepare for it, re-do problems from your calculus and linear algebra textbooks. For the other 25% of the topics on the subject GRE, look for problems in textbooks. Also try the practice tests online.
Something I really wish I had done as an undergraduate would have been to study material ahead. For example, if you were going to take real analysis in the fall semester, I would find a real analysis book in the summer and try to work my way through it by doing as many problems as I can. Doing this will make classes easier and you learn the material much better.
And if you didn't know already, <https://math.stackexchange.com/> is an **amazing** resource for students learning math.
Good Luck!
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_5: One thing that makes the top schools "top" is that they only admit the students who would get a great education anywhere, even if they had to go outside channels to find additional resources -- get involved in research, take the most serious classes you can, do additional personal projects that stretch your skills, take advantage of cheap student memberships in professional organizations, take advantage of the library including any journal subscriptions they're getting, read some of the past Masters' theses if your school keeps 'em available and well indexed...
As <NAME> misquoted, "Life is like a sewer. What you get out of it depends on what you put into it."
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/20 | 888 | 3,663 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a rising senior at a Chinese university. I'm really interested in pursuing a master degree (as a stepping-stone to a PhD) in the US.
I do not know what "Minimum Requirements" for admission really mean. [For example](http://www.amsc.umd.edu/join_us/),
>
> Applicants should have at least a B average (3.0 on a 4.0 scale) in an undergraduate curriculum which includes a strong emphasis on mathematics.
>
>
>
My undergraduate school applies a mixture of the British and Chinese grading systems. While 4.0 represents a perfect average, less than 5% of students have an average above 3.5, and only about 25% of students achieve a 3.0 (I do not know exact number).
Do minimum requirements like the one above mean "if you get grade lower than 3.0 in any grade system, do not waste your money on applying," or something else?<issue_comment>username_1: Essentially, this means that they would prefer applicants to have a B-grade (3.0 out of 4.0) minimum as an average of their final results. However, having said that, if you get less (by not too much), I would still apply.
I would also advise to include details of other relevant activities (research activities and initiatives you may have done), any and all publications and any professional memberships.
Upvotes: 0 <issue_comment>username_2: In general, yes. If your grade is well under 3.0, you may be wasting your money for the application fee. Your application may be filtered out by some secretary.
However, I would strongly recommend you to use other criteria to determine which schools you want to apply. You want to consider the programs and the faculty the schools have. If they have the program you are interested in and the professors you would like to go with, then go ahead to apply no matter what. You never know.
Another factor is the school you'll graduate from. Many admission commitees are aware of the different standards that different schools use. They understand that 2.9 from school X may be actually better than 3.5 from school Y. If you can afford to the application fee and you really like that school, go ahead try.
Other factors such as TOEFL and GRE scores, recommendation letters and research potentials are sometimes even more important than your GPA.
Good Luck !
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: No direct conversion of grades is possible between various systems. So, you will have to argue your way into their program, by presenting your results in the best light possible and making a convincing case that you would fulfill their requirements if you were in their system. *Because in the end, your application will be judged by people, not computer*. At least if you make it clear that your system is quite different.
One of the ways to do it is, as you started to do, by comparing percentiles: figure out what their grade requirement equals to in terms of quantile, and start from there. “I am in the top 25% of my school, which is equivalent to a grade of XX (based on these official statistics)”. That sort of reasoning.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_4: This belongs more as a comment than an answer, but I lack sufficient reputation to comment.
In my experience (based on programs I applied to in my field), the listed minimum requirements are well below the de-facto requirements of the program. This is definitely field specific, though.
The above comment was based on applying to American universities, coming from an American undergraduate and graduate background. In your case, you should be able to convince them on the application essays of why the listed gpa doesn't tell the whole story.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/20 | 391 | 1,571 | <issue_start>username_0: If I wanted to check how competitive it is to get into a school's PhD (or MS/PhD track) program, what should I look at? For undergraduate, I usually search for the incoming SAT/ACT scores and the acceptance rate, and I found that pretty reliable. Is there something like that for grad schools?<issue_comment>username_1: Although not entirely accurate, due to the high variability of individual applicants and admissions committees, UT El Paso created an "Acceptance Estimator" for Computer Science applicants. The Estimator provides an ordered list of schools the applicant is likely to be accepted to.
[UTEP CS Acceptance Estimator](http://www.cs.utep.edu/admissions/)
My gripe is that it largely ignores the most important component of one's application: Research Experience.
This Estimator is designed to help you find schools that match up to your skills, and by no means is 100% correct.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_2: I am not aware of any absolute measure for this. However, you can have a general idea by:
1. Some schools provide last year(s) statistics about their programs
(usually in the prospective student section). For example, program A
has attracted X number of applications and Y applications were
accepted.
2. Also, some programs have a fix limit (i.e. due to number of equipments available) for number of applications to be accepted.
3. Sometimes online admission results like the one in [Grad Cafe](http://thegradcafe.com/survey/index.php)
give you a sense on how strict the school is.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/20 | 426 | 1,712 | <issue_start>username_0: I always read phrases such as "empirical data" and "empirical study." What does it mean when a study is empirical?<issue_comment>username_1: A good definition from [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_research) is
>
> Empirical research is a way of gaining knowledge by means of direct and indirect observation or experience. Empirical evidence (the record of one's direct observations or experiences) can be analyzed quantitatively or qualitatively.
>
>
>
Another good resource is [EricDigests.com](http://www.ericdigests.org/2003-4/empirical-research.html) is a further resource that goes through in detail the steps to empirical research, the 7 that are defined from that link are:
1. Randomisation
2. Control
3. Reliability
4. Validity
5. Implementation of Treatment Variable
6. Analysis Issues
7. Implementation issues
(The full details are on the 2nd link - too much to fit here)
Hope this helps answer your question.
Upvotes: 3 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: In computer science, this terminology is often used to indicate that an algorithm has been run on real (or simulated) data sets, and observations are made as to how it behaves (how fast does it run, does it solve the problem correctly, and so forth). The experimental procedures are usually not so much of an issue here, because the testing environment can be so well-controlled (i.e. you can generate infinite amounts of random test data).
This is to be contrasted with analyses which are based on mathematical proof, i.e. proving that your algorithm has certain behaviors (e.g. proving it is always correct).
Some times you will see papers in between these two poles.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/21 | 2,398 | 10,051 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a westerner doing my PhD in an Asian country. While writing this I've just finished my first year, but I'm getting so fed up with my academical environment that I decided to move my PhD.
One of the reasons why I went to Asia is that I'm in a technological field. Now a days with all these Asian countries up-and-coming, developing innovative products, it felt like a good moment to ride along on their train.
In the last year I'm experiencing major difficulties with my advisor and I'm not sure whether it's because of cultural differences or just me. Let me highlight some of the major issues:
* When I did my masters, my advisors were actually people who gave me advice. My current professor is somebody who gives orders instead of advice. The big problem with that is that there's usually no room for persuading him with counter arguments. As stubborn as I'm, it usually ends up in me ignoring what he says.
* There seems to be a big difference in how I approach weekly meetings. I make a selection of what I investigated during the week and decide myself which direction I go into and thus what I eventually present to him. It seems that he wants every direction thoroughly investigated and presented to him so that he can make a decision about the direction eventually.
These and other reasons, I don't think it makes people better. It won't let people think for themselves when they are just following. I got the comment last week that he thinks that my output is too low, but in fact I'm making the most progress, I'm just not presenting as much as everybody else because I make my own decisions upfront. I noticed that I intentionally not share everything with him anymore, because he always manage to turn everything upside down in one hour per week and ends with "just do it." Like he always creates the strangest and most complicated experimental designs (e.g., 3x3x3) with factors that I don't think are related. I just want to perform a simple 2x2 design and deepening it more and more based on the results. It just feels very odd that somebody who only gets involved into a project an hour per week gives orders about the direction.
Well the thing is that I seems to be the only one who thinks this is not normal. Since I always hear those stories that doing a PhD is always tough and sometimes makes you hate your advisor, I'd like to know where the problem is. I don't mind toughness, but it needs to serve a goal. Before I'm accepted to a different PhD in another country, I'd like to know if I'm getting in the same situation. If so, I don't think a PhD is the right thing for me then.<issue_comment>username_1: **The quality of your relationship with your PhD adviser is one of the biggest factors in determining your quality of life during grad school.** I strongly encourage anyone in your position to consider switching advisers (which it sounds like you're doing).
I don't know what field you're in, so I can't authoritatively speak to "the way it goes" in that field. However, speaking as a mathematician, there are a wide range of management styles. Often, even the same PhD adviser will manage different students differently, depending on their abilities and desires.
Some schedule a weekly hour meeting without fail; others say "come see me when you have something". Some coauthor most of their students' papers, some rarely do. Some students, like you, feel micro-managed. Others wish their adviser gave them more attention and cared more about their research.
My adviser essentially let me pick all of my own research problems, which was what I wanted. It took me longer to start publishing than some other students, but I also felt well-prepared for life on my own after grad school.
So in short, stubborn micro-management is not "just the way it goes"; rather it's just the way it goes when you're working for a power hungry egomaniac. Run, don't walk, to find another adviser!
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: Since you are a westerner in Asia, I'll add my thoughts.
There are all types of advisers in Asia but there are a greater percentage who expect you to shut up and do as you are told, and just say 'yes Teacher' and get the job done as instructed. In the west, this is not as common. This issue is part of the Asian culture. Of course, you can find exceptions everywhere and if you dig, I suspect you will be able to find an adviser in Asia whose style matches yours.
My advice would be to be careful before choosing an adviser and try to find someone who you can 'sync' with well. As username_1 said, that relationship is a very important one for you. If you cannot find an adviser with a suitable style in Asia, then you should consider returning to the west where you will not have the underlying cultural conflict.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: In addition to other good points made, and seconding the idea that one's relationship with one's advisor is very important, and agreeing that one must learn to think independently ... :
It is also important to have an advisor in whom one has confidence, and who is not merely a sounding-board or yes-man for your own ideas. Of course, some people are jerks, but hopefully when a senior person disagrees with a beginner, the beginner can see good reason to take this as profoundly good advice in itself.
That is, for example, good advice from a more experienced person can help a beginner avoid pitfalls, avoid re-inventing the wheel, ... even better, avoid well-known failures-to-invent-the-wheel. Good advice can save a lot of time and energy.
True, in some regards it's best to experience various failures, to relive them, first-hand, as a process to better understand what *does* succeed. But there is a cost, which can be high, including professional embarrassment. Ideally, a good advisor helps avoid this.
In my own direct experience, I have had a few PhD students who were convinced (or hoped?) that I was seeing or making things more complicated than necessary in their projects, ignored my cautionary advice, and publicly-professionally embarrassed themselves considerably. I would say this was unfortunate and completely un-necessary, and certainly represents a big waste of time and opportunity. (To have the opportunity to give a presentation and inadvertently use it to embarrass oneself is a sad irony.)
So, ideally, one's advisor is not merely "older", but also "wiser" about not only specific technical details, but perhaps methodology, and about folklore, especially dangers and traps.
Also, sometimes, if one fails to convince someone else, one should consider the possibility that one's argument is in fact unpersuasive, rather than that the audience is stupid. :)
No, I don't think "obedience" or "compliance" are high virtues, and I do not recommend obedience for its own sake. Rather, a subtler relationship with "advisor", that may superficially resemble "obedience", but in reality is more reason-based, is seeing/believing that the advisor's experience gives them wisdom which will help *you*. If you can't see that in an advisor, then they won't be able to help you, either in "objective reality", or else in your perception, and it hardly matters which.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_4: It is better if an advisor can give you useful advice and guide you towards both interesting and promising research topics. Ideally, your advisor would understand how to make you release all your work potential, but you cannot expect that from him/her. There are a lot of different situations, nonetheless there are a few universals that do not vary a lot:
1. First, you can be sure that your advisor will be somewhere between 'simply not there' and overactive. There are students who cope well with an advisor who is completely absent, because it gives them absolute freedom. They are probably a minority. Indeed, others feel good when their advisor greets them each morning with a few kind words. **In order to find a good match, you need to determine how much time you want your advisor to spend on your case. So you need to find out how busy he/she actually is.**
2. Then, **one can generally expect from an advisor to be firm and polite at the same time**. You might change your mind about your work, about your discipline, and even about him/her, so that steadiness is required as he/she is your reference point. For that reason, you may (temporarily) hate your advisor and/or overreact to comments and criticism made to your thesis.
3. I would say that **another factor is about your feelings and your instinct, as your advisor will more or less be your mental punching bag** because the major part of what you think about the work you do together and will/should be left unsaid. Most students forget that their advisor is just a person who is exterior to nearly everything they do, because one cannot generally help building an interior (mental) representation of this person as time goes by. So **you have to ask yourself if you can imagine live with this person in your head during 3+ years.**
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_5: After finishing my PhD and getting a tenure track job, in my opinion, the following are necessary criteria for selecting an advisor as you transition from your masters into your research phase:
1. They are invested in your success and "care" about you. This is numero uno.
2. They have time and are willing to spend it with you and to do *some* of the real work. It is your job to do *most* of the real work.
3. They are generally available for you to "pop in" to their office to resolve a small or large roadblock.
4. They are still publishing papers in / close to the field you are doing your thesis / 3-papers in.
5. If you care about getting an academic job, they have placements under their belt and know some people in the community who are hiring new assistant professors. Placements demonstrate they understand the game. Knowing people means the hiring committees will listen to your advisor's letters and phone calls.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/21 | 778 | 3,212 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm beginner in research and I'm doing my PhD. I would like to know why when I read a paper I worry as if I have exam tomorrow and I have to prepare for it. How can I ignore that feeling and increase my productivity?<issue_comment>username_1: We cannot tell you *why* you are worrying: the best person to understand the *why* is you. But we can tell you that there is no need to worry. Reading a paper is one of the everyday tasks of research, and while it is an important part of the job, you will have plenty of time to learn the ropes. If you're a beginner, just read through the paper, takes notes of the main points you understand, and the points you don't understand that seem important. You can then research those, or ask to your advisor or colleagues.
In the end, reading papers is a statistics game: there are very few papers that are so crucial to your own research that you positively have to understand every single last idea and word in them (I would say, less than 10 during a PhD). Most of the time, some ideas are usefuls, some are not, plus there is a lot of redundancy between papers… I used to be quite scared that I would have missed some important paper in the bibliographic search, but quite frankly it's rare for an important idea to exist in a single place and never have been reüsed or quoted.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Perhaps one little "therapy" often relevant is to try to remind yourself that *you* are the authority in reading papers critically, and the goals are about *progress*, not evaluation of *you* by some third party.
It is understandable that "school" has left one with an excessively paranoid concern about being attacked, being "checked-on", being examined, being doubted, and so on. Indeed, "school" often includes exaggerated measures that express very clearly an antagonistic, adversarial attitude of "teachers" toward "students". Naturally, many negligent students are able to ignore this pressure, while students who were already doing the right thing are the ones who feel that somehow they're not doing enough. A similar dynamic exists in many human enterprises.
So, again, the thing to repeat to yourself over and over is that now *you* are to function as an authority, *you* are to assess these papers. The point is *not* so much any more someone *else's* assessment of *your* "performance" (often on meaningless, contrived, artificial tasks).
In particular, the common "teaching-examining" devices of "trick questions" should be forgotten. When encountering a new idea, don't immediately be worrying how someone could use the idea to trip you up, but, instead, what *constructive* use *you* could make of it. In particular, if it does not (at least for the moment) seem useful to you, then don't spend a lot of time on it just for the sake of self-defense against trick questions! Nevertheless, one should often keep a "pointer" to seemingly useless ideas, because their utility may be discovered only later.
But don't study things whose utility seems null. Move on, just keeping a "bookmark", so if/when something percolates into your head later, you can go back and look a second time.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/21 | 1,353 | 5,232 | <issue_start>username_0: I just thought that I would put this question out here because I am currently working on a [meta analysis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-analysis) of a particular research question in my field (HCI/information science). Moreover, this question is new and has not been answered in very detail so far.
I have done most of the usual ways described in other resources as follows:
1. I have done a comprehensive review of the relevant literature pertaining to this particular research question. This is a new area and the number of **directly relevant** papers are ~<50. I have also compiled an exhaustive bibliography of the **indirectly relevant** papers in this area. That number is ~<150.
2. Out of this set of **directly relevant** literature, I have identified 23 quantitative empirical studies, 14 qualitative empirical studies and the rest are theoretical pieces/position pieces/framework papers.
The challenge I am currently facing is how to meta-analyze the data. In HCI, it is not common to freely distribute empirical datasets (although signs of change are imminent in the atmosphere. :)) and I have sent out polite emails to the relevant researchers inquiring if I could have some manner of access to these datasets. The rate of response is ~50% so far in responding to my email but only about ~5% want to actively share their datasets.
Therefore, the only other option (that I can see right now) is to compile, summarize and make sense of data and results already reported in the qualitative and quantitative papers.
I was wondering if any of you experienced (*and also not-so-experienced* :)) academicians/researchers had any insights into how to actually go about doing a meta analysis from the bottom up.
The main online resources which I have been using so far to tackle this problem is given
* [www.statistical-solutions-software.com/what-is-meta-analysis](http://www.statistical-solutions-software.com/what-is-meta-analysis/),
* [www.wilderdom.com/research/meta-analysis.html](http://www.wilderdom.com/research/meta-analysis.html),
* [www.psychwiki.com/wiki/Meta-analysis](http://www.psychwiki.com/wiki/Meta-analysis) and
* [echo.edres.org:8080/meta/](http://echo.edres.org:8080/meta/).
Please do note that I am not expecting any detailed step-by-step "*spoonfeeding*" response. Pointing me to some helpful resources is fine. In addition, personal anecdotes or valuable experiences will be really appreciated.
Thank you for taking the time to read this question.<issue_comment>username_1: Good luck to you. I'm trying to do something similar and found that few HCI papers publish enough summary statistics to conduct a proper meta-analysis. Indeed, a lot of the time, their stats seem quite sloppy.
I've styled my analysis similar to two review papers I found. One from the HCI area as well (Dehn & <NAME>, 2000) and one from a bit more outfield (Jones & Gosling, 2005).
Neither is a true meta-analysis, but they get as close to formal as I think it's reasonable to get when an actual meta-analysis is simply not an option.
* Dehn & <NAME> (2000) [The impact of animated interface agents: a review of empirical research](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1071581999903257)
* Jones & Gosling (2005) [Temperament and personality in dogs (*Canis familiaris*): A review and evaluation of past research](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159105000997)
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: One take on this, regardless of field, is to create a framework to place the existing research in. Perhaps you have two dimensions, colour (red, green, yellow) and smell (sweet, sour) - and you review all the prior literatures and place it into your framework 'buckets'.
What this is really doing, and why you want this in your dissertation, is setting up your contribution. By classifying all the prior research, you will have (hopefully!) identified a hole, which your work is going to fill. So... choose your buckets carefully!
ps, I realize this is not a statistical answer - but I hope this is of use, or perhaps sheds some light that will help you see a useful way forward.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: One note, besides the very helpful ones you have already gotten. While you have embarked on a "meta-analysis", which often has the very specific goal of producing a single (or small number) of summary estimates for an entire field, you should not view having to fall back on writing "just" a systematic review as a failure.
Instead, "the literature in this field is incapable of being statistically summarized in its present state" should be viewed as a finding in and of itself.
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_4: I really second the use of the Cochrane Collaboration website for meta-analysis and systematic review.
Another good resource is the [PRISMA checklist](http://www.prisma-statement.org/Default.aspx) which is often used for journals and reviewers in health fields when evaluating papers. PRISMA also has good guidelines for how to format/present your included papers and create a flow diagram of your review process (again, often required in health-related journals). Good luck!
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/22 | 822 | 3,419 | <issue_start>username_0: I recently got rejected from quite a few grad schools. Will this make it harder for the faculty at these schools to take me seriously if I interact with them?
In particular, I'm interested in having a particular professor at the school I will be attending as my advisor. However, until a few month ago, he was a professor at a school I got rejected from. I'm afraid that he will refuse to work with me, knowing that I wasn't qualified for the graduate program he was recently at.<issue_comment>username_1: I got hired as a postdoc at a university which had rejected my graduate application.
And not just that. When I started, I realized that they had made the right decision. The background level of the first-years was uniformly and substantially higher than what mine had been when I started. I would have gotten creamed.
You will have the opportunity to prove yourself in your first year. Do a good job, and any weaknesses in your application will be quickly forgotten.
Good luck!
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: I find it hard for this answer to not be:
>
> It depends on the professor.
>
>
>
**However, do not listen to the [imposter syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imposter_syndrome).** Focus on your accomplishments, not on perceived failures. So you did not get into program A. The reasons you did not get into program A could be anyone of a long list of unknown and unknowable factors that have nothing to do with you. The number of applicants to program A may be so large that you were not excluded because you were not up to snuff but because you were one of a large number of very qualified applicants. Maybe the chair or members of the admissions committee are lazy, negligent, or perhaps just overwhelmed - and thus your application was not even examined. Perhaps your application was lost by the bureaucrats before it ever got from the dean's office to program A. Think no more about program A.
You did get in to program B. Focus on success at program B. The professor you wanted to work with moved from program A to program B, so there must be something better about program B. Consider the fact that you were accepted at program B and that the professor you want to work moved from program A to program B to be indicators of a good chance of success at program B.
The only way that working with this professor will not happen is if you don't pursue it. If you worry yourself out of trying, you guarantee your failure.
Unless that professor was on the admissions committee, there is a fair chance that professor may not have even be aware of your application to the other program. Even if that professor was on the committee, he or she may not even remember you. Depending on the school and/or discipline, there may be hundreds of applicants. Even if that professor knew about your previous application, he or she should be professional enough to ignore it. If not, then maybe you don't want to work for that person.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: It could work in your favor. You and the professor have a "common enemy."
The professor left Program A, and certainly for a reason. Maybe Program A was "narrow-minded" about the professor, and about you.
The professor landed at Program B, which had the "good sense" to also select you. The latter probably works more in your favor than the rejection from Program A is likely to hurt.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/22 | 1,047 | 4,325 | <issue_start>username_0: Please forgive the rambling intro...
Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are all the rage when people write about teaching. So many articles have been written about MOOCs killing universities while others complain about the attention. Some have even discussed some community colleges using MOOCs with the classroom teacher filling more of a tutorial role using MOOCs for the bulk of their material.
As I reflect on my own classroom experience (as a lecturer) I find that a lot of my time is spent covering the basics while it would be much more interesting to focus on higher-level concepts. However, in the end, I have only a certain number of hours in the class with my students. If I have 60 hours and it takes 50 hours to cover the basics, there is little time remaining to cover much in the way of higher-level ideas.
So, I've been considering assigning MOOC videos as homework and using class time as discussion time, much the way one would using the case method. While [my experience with the case method](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8855/undergraduate-not-doing-homework-case-method) has not been fantastic, I'm not ready to give up on it yet.
**My question is:** What is the best way to integrate MOOC videos or other videos as part of the curriculum? Are there any major pitfalls that I should consider before completing my plan for the coming semester?<issue_comment>username_1: I got hired as a postdoc at a university which had rejected my graduate application.
And not just that. When I started, I realized that they had made the right decision. The background level of the first-years was uniformly and substantially higher than what mine had been when I started. I would have gotten creamed.
You will have the opportunity to prove yourself in your first year. Do a good job, and any weaknesses in your application will be quickly forgotten.
Good luck!
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: I find it hard for this answer to not be:
>
> It depends on the professor.
>
>
>
**However, do not listen to the [imposter syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imposter_syndrome).** Focus on your accomplishments, not on perceived failures. So you did not get into program A. The reasons you did not get into program A could be anyone of a long list of unknown and unknowable factors that have nothing to do with you. The number of applicants to program A may be so large that you were not excluded because you were not up to snuff but because you were one of a large number of very qualified applicants. Maybe the chair or members of the admissions committee are lazy, negligent, or perhaps just overwhelmed - and thus your application was not even examined. Perhaps your application was lost by the bureaucrats before it ever got from the dean's office to program A. Think no more about program A.
You did get in to program B. Focus on success at program B. The professor you wanted to work with moved from program A to program B, so there must be something better about program B. Consider the fact that you were accepted at program B and that the professor you want to work moved from program A to program B to be indicators of a good chance of success at program B.
The only way that working with this professor will not happen is if you don't pursue it. If you worry yourself out of trying, you guarantee your failure.
Unless that professor was on the admissions committee, there is a fair chance that professor may not have even be aware of your application to the other program. Even if that professor was on the committee, he or she may not even remember you. Depending on the school and/or discipline, there may be hundreds of applicants. Even if that professor knew about your previous application, he or she should be professional enough to ignore it. If not, then maybe you don't want to work for that person.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: It could work in your favor. You and the professor have a "common enemy."
The professor left Program A, and certainly for a reason. Maybe Program A was "narrow-minded" about the professor, and about you.
The professor landed at Program B, which had the "good sense" to also select you. The latter probably works more in your favor than the rejection from Program A is likely to hurt.
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/22 | 2,885 | 12,320 | <issue_start>username_0: [This other question](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/11294/mooc-video-integration-into-classroom-schedule) is about assigning videos as homework and [this one](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8855/undergraduate-not-doing-homework-case-method) is about what to do when students do not do their homework. However, there is another question to ask which is similar, but I think different, from these two.
If you have a class of 70 students and you assign some homework on which you will base the following class, and 40% of the students do not do the homework, that subsequent class becomes quite unmanageable. If you proceed as scheduled, the 40% will be lost, they cannot contribute, and eventually become distracting for the rest of the class.
If you do not run the class as scheduled, the students who did the homework the first time will see there is little benefit of doing the home and little cost of not doing it. For this reason, in the past, I have been quite strict. Students who did not do the homework get kicked out and marked absent (too many absences and they automatically fail the module). The problem with this approach is that kicking 40% out leaves me with a very high failure rate and in the end I just end up taking time which would otherwise be free for me to do as I wish and I must dedicate that time to these students who failed (for whatever reason).
So, I find myself in a difficult situation. Kicking students out hurts them but hurts me too. The problem is that I value my time much more than they value theirs so it ends up hurting me more than them. If I don't kick them out, my schedule gets destroyed.
How can one find balance in the classroom when a large percentage of students do not do the homework? Is there a way other than simply removing large chunks and failing them? Is thee a more enlightened way?
**Important Note:** In my modules grades are pass/fail - I do not have the option to simply lower their grade.<issue_comment>username_1: Well, you've stumbled upon a key and age-old pedagogical issue, and one that doesn't have an easy answer. I would urge you to find an "80%" solution (meaning, don't try to solve the problem completely), and then work to within the parameters of that solution. Kicking out 40% of the class isn't tenable for your long-term job security, I assure you. Assuming your question is in regard to a collegiate class, then you do have the option to fall back onto
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> this is your education that you're paying for, so it's up to you to take it seriously, which means doing the work.
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As a first-order solution, you can make sure that not doing the homework will affect their grades significantly so that they do fail, and then let them know this on the syllabus, on the first day of class, and regularly. Students who do not do the work will feel the pain when they receive their final grade. You also have proof (no completed work) when parents and administrators come with questions.
What this solution doesn't solve is the group that
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> eventually become distracting for the rest of the class.
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This is possibly the hardest part of the puzzle. I have four suggestions:
1. Re-organize your class so that those students cannot be distracting. If large-class participation is the issue, then start forming smaller groups, and give the participating members the ability to police the disruptions (e.g., have each group grade individual members' participation).
2. If possible, find a way to weed out those students *before they arrive in your class*--you may be able to do this via a more strict prerequisite requirement (e.g., certain classes, or certain grades within previous classes).
3. Make the homework more manageable. On the one hand, this seems to be giving in to the problem, but if they're not doing the work and have a reason other than "I don't want to," then there may be a way to give different assignments that they will attempt.
4. Find out what classes they've had previous to yours, and ask the instructors of those classes whether they had the same issues. You can get a lot of good information about certain groups of students by talking these sorts of issues over with other faculty. If you do find a faculty member who successfully dealt with those students, ask for suggestions, or, even better, ask if you can observe a couple of classes to get a feel for the types of strategies that teacher uses.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: If 40% of the students aren't doing their homework, and you rely upon students doing homework for your pedagogy style to work, then something is seriously wrong.
You have two options:
(1) Make homework dramatically more appealing.
* Put much more effort into the homework--make it fun! E.g. calculate strain on an iPhone screen instead of a aluminum sheet; don't have someone read a novel but rather ask key questions about it such as to list all the times some character/historical figure expressed defiance against the state.
* Institute quizzes that are drawn directly from the homework. Do them practically every day. Staring at a blank sheet of paper and not knowing what to do is a lot more uncomfortable than hearing you babble about something incomprehensible.
* Change the grading scheme so homework is most of the grade (if you're allowed).
(2) Make homework dramatically less necessary. (Note: usually not an option for mathematics.)
* Do the key problems on the board in class instead of assigning them as homework. (Assign a similar problem as homework, possibly after you've done it in class.) Not possible for literature review, of course.
* Rely upon in-class participation instead (if you have the personality to make it work, and the homework is of the right type).
* Don't make the learning environment one which requires the students to do the homework in order to understand most of the next lecture. Lecture on the important points, review at the end of one lecture and the beginning of the next, and go on. They might not develop their skills at doing problems, but at least they'll have some hope of following for a while. Probably won't work with literature, but almost everything else can be quite successful.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: Here's one idea you could try: Have the students go to the front of the entire class, and either solve a problem on the board, or else explain something from the homework assignment.
Your goal would be to create an activity where anyone who completed the homework should have no problem completing the task, but those who did not do the homework stand a good chance of struggling mightily.
Make it an in-class game of sorts by pulling names out of a hat.
If students come unprepared, at least they will be more nervous and less casual about it. Perhaps that might increase your participation rate.
You might also do something like this: any student who doesn't turn in an assignment gets their name written down on five more index cards, which are subsequently added to the hat, thereby sharply increasing the likelihood that they will get picked in future classes. Make sure the students are well aware of that practice.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: Your approach of kicking out the students who didn't do the home work is rather draconian, and while seductive as a zero-tolerance policy, is likely to cause more harm to you than good.
Is there a (strong) positive correlation between student completion of homework and final grade for the overall module/unit/paper? If so, I suggest that you appeal to the students' self-interest by showing a plot of this correlation to your students at the beginning of your course, and throughout the course.
Regarding what to do during class, I would make frequent reference to the homework along the lines of, e.g.
* "**If you attempted the homework exercise**, you would know why this line of the derivation follows from the previous line so I'm not going to go into it here. This sort of thing often comes up in exams.",
* "**The homework exercise was** the first part of a past exam question relating to this topic. We're going to explore the topic in more detail now",
* "**The homework exercise asked you** to think about why this next piece of argument might be flawed."
What I am advocating is a policy where you strongly advise students to complete the homework, so that they are in a better position to understand the material and which appeals to the student's desire to pass the exam/test.
Completing the homework is not a necessary prerequisite to understanding the material of the present lecture, but would be very very useful to the students indeed when it comes time to revise for the course.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: I doubt that many will agree with me, but this is what I would do if I could:
(1) If someone can't participate in a class because they haven't done the homework, just ignore them and continue the lesson. If they get lost, just tell them that would have been learned if you had done the homework, and move on.
(2) Don't kick people out of class if they haven't done their homework. (But do kick them out, of course, if they become disruptive because they keep asking about things they should know already.)
(3) Calculate their grade however you will. But allow an "alternate grading" that emphasizes midterms, finals, and other tests; on the grounds that if they get a good grade there they obviously know the material; even if they hardly show up and/or never do homework. Those who choose this alternative should also face a short oral exam to ensure they really understand the subject matter and haven't just memorized the details without being able to show how they got there.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_6: **I sympathise with your predicament, but disagree with your methods.** One thing that strikes me as strange about this question is that you appear to be sufficiently in control of the class to be able to remove 40% of this cohort from the classroom, but you worry that you are insufficiently in control to prevent these same people from disturbing the class if they are present. I would have thought that if you are sufficiently authoritative to do the former, then it should be possible to allow people to stay, but prevent them from disturbing others. In fact, I would have thought that this would be substantially *less effort* than going to the trouble of physically removing almost half of the class.
The reason to raise this incongruity is that (at a tertiary academic level) it is generally a good idea to present the students with resources to learn, and let them decide whether or not they benefit from these resources. It is best to grade students on merit rather than effort, and a student who is able to master the material should not fail the course simply because they have declined to learn it in the manner you have specified. University students are adults, and they should be expected to make use of the provided resources in whatever way that allows them to learn the subject, with knowledge being the final test.
Removing students from the class means that they are denied one of the resources for learning the material, on the basis of having eschewed another resource (the homework). Moreover, the fact that a student can fail the course via these "absences" means that a student who is able to learn the material through self-study --without doing the homework-- will nonetheless fail, even if they have mastered the subject matter. With the greatest of sympathy, this strikes me as a case where the instructor is testing compliance rather than knowledge.
It might be worth exploring whether there are ways that you can allow students to remain in your class without letting them disturb the class for others. This might mean imposing a moratorium on *asking questions* if you haven't done the homework, but even then, that is less of a loss than being required to leave (and then marked absent and possibly failing). This approach would have the benefit of allowing students to learn from the resources that they determine to be worthwhile to them, and to be directly exposed to how difficult it is to follow your class when they have not done the homework.
Upvotes: 0 |
2013/07/22 | 1,148 | 4,857 | <issue_start>username_0: We are at the moment designing a document which we can hand out to Bachelor and Master students to give them a general idea on how to efficiently write a thesis. We also do this to make correcting easier for us. We are working in the field of cell biology. A thesis in our field is usually structured like this:
1. Abstract
2. Introduction
3. Materals and Methods
4. Results
5. Discussion
6. Acknowledgements
What we've come up so far is the following list of best practices. This is based on our experiences with previous students and our own theses.
1. You can already start writing your materials and methods (M&M) section during your regular lab schedule. This will save you time later on.
2. You will have discussions with your supervisors on your results, in which you will decide on what to include in your thesis.
3. Start by making the figures for your results and a corresponding caption.
Lay out bullet points of your results. Afterwards, start writing the text around these bullet points. After finishing, send this part to your supervisor for proofreading.
4. Proceed with the discussion. Again, lay out bullet points, but this time, before writing, clarify each point with your supervisor. This will prevent you from having to rewrite large parts.
5. Continue with the introduction and, if you haven’t written it yet, M&M.
The introduction should contain everything the reader has to know in order to understand why you did what you did and what the results mean. Be brief and clear.
6. Finalize by writing an abstract (“Zusammenfassung”). This has to be written and edited very carefully because it will be the part most people read. Your thesis also needs to include an english abstract which is an exact translation of the german one.
7. Don’t forget the acknowledgements (“Danksagung”). This is the second part everyone will read, and it’s extremely unpolite if you don’t have one. It doesn’t have to be formal and can be personal.
My question: Is there something important missing and would you recommend things differently? Maybe you could elaborate how you handle this in your lab.<issue_comment>username_1: This is impressive, very impressive.
The only thing I can suggest adding is a point for students to continuously update their bibliography as they proceed with their research. Alongside this, they ought to continuously include the subsequent in-text references on each part they paraphrase.
Perhaps, and this is a bit of an 'out there' suggestion, but maybe suggest that the students upload drafts to a plagiarism checking program such as Turnitin.com on a regular basis.
Hope this helps.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: I think your list looks great, but I would suggest adding a couple of "soft" recommendations; e.g.,
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> If you are struggling with a certain topic, idea, or way forward, ask for assistance as early as possible after you have exhausted your ideas. Do try to solve problems on your own, but don't let that take too much time that you fall behind.
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I don't know much about the cell biology field, but do your papers normally have "Related Work" sections? I assume they must also have a References (or Bibliography) section?
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: For me, the difficulty was that the research part was too interesting, so I ended up writing papers, trying new techniques etc., but neglected the thesis writing. If you have students like me, *make* them to write some parts of their theses before they are *allowed* to do more research in the lab.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: It is a very good set of advice. There are two very practical areas that seem unaddressed and that are, in my experience, somewhat… *problematic* with some students:
1. **Proof-reading**. Find someone, other than yourself, who will do a final proofreading of the thesis for language and clarity. Not necessarily someone from your field, but checking typos, missing figures, acronyms that are never defined, that sort of stuff… That person should not be you, because when you've spent so much time writing the thesis, you won't even see these details any more when you read it.
Also, check with your supervisor what are his expectations regarding proofreading/corrections. It depends on your university and the supervisor himself, but in many cases they will want to read it themselves, and possibly offer some remarks and corrections.
2. **Scheduling**. You are aware of the submission deadline, but mind that the final stuff takes time. In particular, if your supervisor has to read it, make sure to give him enough time to do so. So, start with a clear set of intermediate deadlines, and if you start to miss them, take action! Nothing's as bad as procrastinating ’til the last day thinking *“I can still write that in 24 hours if I get to it”*.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/22 | 1,195 | 4,644 | <issue_start>username_0: I have submitted a paper to a journal 2 and a half months ago. Its status remains "With editor". From your experience, is this normal? If not, how should I deal with that?<issue_comment>username_1: The turnaround time for a paper submitted to a journal is dependent on the journal and the time it takes to have for the editor to receive the feedback from the reviewers and for them to review the reviews. I have had to wait 5 months for feedback, some have to wait far longer.
Have you read what the turnaround time should be? This information is usually available on the journal's author information website.
Upvotes: 0 <issue_comment>username_2: The time frame you mention sounds long to me. But having said that, there can be several reasons why this is the case. I assume that the journal you have submitted to uses an electronic submission system?
Reasons can be:
* The journal is crowded with papers
* The editor(s) has/ve difficulties finding reviewers for the paper
* The time frame is "normal" for the journal, "with editor" includes review time.
I suggest you try to figure out how long the time from submission to accept/reject (turnaround time) is for the particular journal you submitted to. If it is possible to see more details that would be good but knowing the average turnaround time allows you to assess if 2.5 months is long even for this journal.
Since I edit a journal I can mention our time frames as an example:
* Choice of editor 10 days
* Choice of associate editor 10 days
* Chose reviewers 3 weeks
* Reviews 3 weeks
* Editor decision 3 weeks
* Revision 3-6 weeks
* Editor evaluation 3 weeks.
This puts the theoretical turnaround at 18-21 weeks (around 5 moths). What usually makes significant delays are reviewers not returning reviews on time and authors not providing revisions on time. But the bottom line is that for me 2.5 months is long and if you suspect your paper is held up too long you should contact the editor.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: Expectation of review time and time taken for the editorial decision vary widely depending on the field.
In my own field, chemistry, 2.5 months is about the time when people would start to send an email to the editor and ask about the status of the manuscript. A [review of the reviewing process for Angewandte Chemie](http://www.lutz-bornmann.de/icons/TimePeerReview5.pdf), one of the field’s flagship journals, shows a median “submission to editorial decision” time of 5 weeks, with an average of 6.8 weeks. I recommend this paper, because it's full of statistics, and contains many links to data and reviews for other journals in various fields:
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> How Long is the Peer Review Process for Journal Manuscripts?
> A Case Study on *Angewandte Chemie International Edition*
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> <NAME> and <NAME>
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> Chimia **2010**, *64*, 72–77
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You can find plenty of similar statistics for journals in various fields, by a simple web search: [biomedicine](http://sharmanedit.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/submission-to-first-decision-time/), [medicine](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14602513), [statistics](http://www.biometrics.tibs.org/carroll.pdf), [philosophy](http://www.andrewcullison.com/2009/09/journal-review-time-comparisons/)… This confirms my initial point that **review times** (and thus author expectations) **vary widely on your field and the specific journal**: the average review time in the *Journal of Philosophy* is 12.6… **months**!
---
*Edit:* oh, and I have to disagree with your comment below Peter’s answer… ***“with editor”* most often includes the time spent in review**. I would say *always*, because it has never been any different in my experience. Many web submission interfaces actually don't allow you to know the internal changes of status between the editor and the reviewers (apart from the American Physical Society system, where you can track every correspondence the editor and reviewers have exchange)
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: One of my papers took well over two *years* to get published, thanks mostly to two review periods lasting around 10 months (IIRC). So 2 1/2 months is not that outlandish.
But it does not hurt to ask politely about the status of your paper! It may be well down on someone's list of things to do, and a polite reminder that you are interested in its fate may be all that's needed to bump it up near the top. Presumably, if you ask, the editor will give some indication as to approximately when reviews might be ready, and then you'll know when to send another polite reminder if nothing has happened.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/22 | 1,629 | 6,879 | <issue_start>username_0: I am an undergraduate mathematics major, entering my fourth year. I plan on applying to graduate school, but I have not yet taken the GRE exams, and there a few key courses (Topology and Algebra in particular) that I have not taken yet, so I am hesitant to take the Advanced Math GRE too soon. (If you're wondering why I haven't taken Topology and Algebra yet, it's because I was trying to secure a CS degree, which sidetracked my mathematical studies last year. It was a healthy branching out experience, and one that helped me realize my true academic passion.)
My main question: *what is the perception of students who take a gap year between their graduation and starting graduate school?*
I think I will take the GRE tests this fall, a) for practice and b) if I score high, then I might as well apply sooner rather than later. However, I ask this question to gauge how much energy I should put into preparing for the tests this fall. If I hear, "You should really do your best to avoid any gap in your education," then I will work my butt off in preparation for the tests. But if I hear, "It's totally okay take a gap year before going into graduate school," then I would give myself more freedom in terms of my non-standardized-exam studies, extracurriculars, and in general social activities. I figure the answer to this question won't be as cut-and-dry as I hope, but any advice would be appreciated!
Just to clarify, my gap year would not consist of me sitting at my desk taking practice GRE exams all day... That would be a pitiful use of my time. I definitely plan working either as an intern or a research assistant at a successful organization. It seems like the general consensus is that taking time off is okay, and potentially beneficial, assuming you actually do something in that gap.<issue_comment>username_1: When I was looking into this for a former student of mine I spoke with the head of the graduate program at the US Top 20 program I was working in at the time. He actually viewed a gap year as a good thing. His rationale was that students who had held jobs and managed to live for the gap year were more likely to have the work habits useful in graduate school.
When it comes time to write your applications you just have to remember to explain how that year has made you a better candidate for their program. It might not be more math that you've learned by it may be maturity and a renewed sense of purpose. If you chose to take a year off do something worthwhile and don't just study for exams.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: It is entirely fine to take a year off before starting grad school. Many graduate students do this (I include myself among those who did it and were accepted in top university in the UK (no arrogance intended)).
Professors or Admission committees do not focus too much on the gap between the time when you finished your undergraduate studies and when you applied to a graduate program. However, some care must be taken as I explain in the following list:
* It also depends on the combination of gap-years and what-you-did on those years. For example, it is fine if you take a year off to explore the Amazon rainforest and learn T'ai chi ch'uan. However, if you rest for many years and you did nothing to improve your CV during this time, that may look suspicious to an Admission committee. This is because many people apply to a graduate program in order to get funding while they find "something else".
* If you take more than 2 "sabbatical" years but you did something to improve your CV, that may even be appealing. For example: working for the private sector, teaching, attending some special courses, doing (provable) research on the area of interest ...
I have come across 60+ y.o. graduate students.
* TOEFL and GRE tests are typically valid for 2--3 years, then you can take them as soon as you feel capable of getting the required score. This would also put some pressure on you in order to avoid the common procrastination.
In conclusion, it is fine if you take a year in order to clarify your ideas, gather all the requirements, and improve your CV. An advice from my personal experience: be careful with these "gap-years", they are a double-edged sword. They could either increase or decrease your chances of getting accepted in a graduate program, depending on what you do during these years.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_3: I had a gap of 1.5 years between finishing my (second) Master's and applying for a Ph.D. in statistics... a total gap of two years between my latest graduation and starting the Ph.D. In these two years I was working as an economist (my second degree) in a government think-tank, so it wasn't a totally irrelevant experience. If you sustain an income through say tutoring math (which appears to have an infinite demand, although may be poorly paid), and take advanced classes in the mean time, this only showcases you as a person dedicated to the selected field who wants to do it despite the real life challenges. +1 brownie point!
I did not have a chance to evaluate an application with such gaps when I was a prof, but I can tell from my teaching experience that the older the student is, the more responsible they are. So if anything, I would view "out of the box" students jumping straight from BSc to PhD as less qualified than somebody who's been out there for a little longer, and knows what they want from their lives. But that's just my personal take.
When I was applying around (1999-2000), there was no point in pushing it at all unless you'd get the perfect GRE math score, which was not that difficult to get (probably 50% or so of applicants did). I heard though that the test was made more demanding and better discriminating.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: On the one hand it might be beneficial for your application if you take your time to study for a this test in terms of a better score.
On the other hand, if I would be the person reviewing the application, I would rank your score subjectively lower if you have this gap, since I would assume that you stayed at home and studied for the test. And Grad School applications are not that much high-throughput like undergrad application, so there might be a chance that the person, who will end up reviewing your appl., will think so too.
I find these GRE tests stupid anyway. They really depend on how much time you spend on preparation. In my opinion, the tests are easy enough to just pass them if you passed your undergrad, but on the other hand you are competing against other applicants for the higher score.
For me, but I am not the person who decides, a good internship or other other topic-related projects (e.g., founding a website like reddit if you are a computer science applicant) would count 1000x more than this stupid test score.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/23 | 606 | 2,589 | <issue_start>username_0: I have read and heard conflicting opinions on this topic, and would like to see what some of you have to say, particularly related to CS.
Does earning two bachelor's degrees as an undergrad, considering all other things equal, provide any advantage over another applicant? That is, saying that this person earning two degrees is still able to participate in quality research throughout their undergraduate degree and is not slave to the curriculum.
Would, say, a MechE/CS student maintain a leg up applying to a CS program related to robotics? A Math/CS applying to theory-based CS? Does it vary between fields?<issue_comment>username_1: A double degree/major (or even a minor) makes it easier to see what areas a candidate is interested in. Understanding this, along with the relevant classes taken, can be useful in assessing the research potential of a student (which is really what PhD admissions committees are trying to do). Apart from making my job a little easier, the way I look at it is if I have two identical candidates, which you never do, apart from a single class and this class leads means candidate A is a double major and candidate B is a single major, but I think the class candidate B took is more valuable then I will go with B. That said, there is no formula for admissions so things like this come down to the individuals on the committee.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_2: >
> Would, say, a MechE/CS student maintain a leg up applying to a CS program related to robotics? A Math/CS applying to theory-based CS? Does it vary between fields?
>
>
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All else being equal, **YES**. Speaking specifically for theoretical computer science, I am much more likely to recommend a PhD applicant for admission if they have a strong mathematics background. A second major is not the more important thing, though; majors are just administrative hurdles. I look for *which* advanced math classes the applicant has taken, how the recommendation letters describe their mathematical ability/maturity, and how fluently they use mathematics in their research statement.
Yes, the effect varies significantly between fields. For example, my robotics colleagues are much more likely to recommend applicants with strong **mathematics** backgrounds, and my software engineering colleagues are much more likely to recommend applicants with software industry experience.
Of course, as Daniel points out, [ceteris](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceteris_paribus) is never [paribus](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceteris_paribus).
Upvotes: 4 [selected_answer] |
2013/07/23 | 3,593 | 14,171 | <issue_start>username_0: What is the typical amount of vacation time, per year, during a PhD program in the United States. I am particularly interested in 1. PhD programs in the physical sciences, and 2. PhD programs at competitive, research-focused universities.<issue_comment>username_1: I'm not aware of explicit policies regarding vacation time during a Ph.D in the US. This is likely because in the US, the Ph.D is viewed as educational, and not as a job.
As a student, and now as a professor, vacation time was always an informal discussion between advisor and student. This is of course ripe for abuse. A job in the US usually grants 15 days of vacation (not counting weekends) per year, but in my experience that's MUCH less than what you might effectively get as a Ph.D student (in computer science) but might be comparable to what you get as a Ph.D student in the physical sciences.
Unfortunately, I don't have personal experience with physical science programs, but via my wife and other friends I've seen that physical science programs are fairly rough on vacation. This is partly because you need to be around to tend to long-running experiments ("the flies died!") and partly because of the nature of lab work and the much more intense style of lab-based science.
My recommendation would be, once you have some options, to ask students in the programs you're applying to, working with advisors you're interested in targeting.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_2: Well, this is dependent on a lot of factors:
1. Your advisor. He/she controls a good part of your life (and probably pays you out of a grant), so vacation time goes through him/her. I've seen advisors who begrudgingly let students take a couple of weeks off in the summer, to those who don't keep track and their students seem to be on vacation all the time. I've also seen advisors who mandate some vacation time to avoid burnout. (and all of the rest of the answers should be caveated with "and if your advisor allows")
2. Your workload and motivation. Get your work done (e.g., paper submitted, TA duties done, dissertation chapter written), and you can safely take a week or two off.
3. School schedule. While graduate students don't really stick by a strict semester/trimester/quarter/summer/etc. schedule, it more or less dictates when you can take vacation. I never took more than a day or two off during Spring Break, and my summers were strictly time to get more work done (or to teach a summer class).
4. School / department policy. Departments sometimes regulate time off, but I'd say that is rare, as vacation is, again, left up to the advisor.
Despite the low pay, you are an employee, and you need to abide by the rules set by your employer (either the school, your advisor, or, possibly, your fellowship rules). Sometimes students don't get paid during the summer, and it is easier to take vacation.
The bottom line is that if you are taking too much vacation, you are delaying getting your research done, and that can have ramifications on when you graduate, how your research progresses (and if you get scooped!), and what your advisor thinks of your work ethic. Should you take time off? Yes. Should you be greedy and think it will be like undergraduate school where you get three or four months off a year? **No.**
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: To add some personal experience from two different systems to the other answers (username_2 and username_1; which I fully agree with).
The way this is handled clearly depends on where you are (I realize you are asking about US). In Sweden PhD students have a certain number of days (weeks). This is regulated by laws. However, a problem with trying to regulate vacation is that not all students or projects are alike and in the end you, as a PhD student, is responsible to complete your work in time (advisors obviously also have a role to facilitatet this). So in "my" system the stipulated vacation may be a blessing in disguise if taken very literally. The important point is that one must plan ones own time and that includes taking time off to reload batteries and rest. A difficulty is to balance these issues.
My own experience when I was a forreign graduate student in the US was that I really got a lot of work done during holidays and spring breaks when most people were away. I do not remember having any major vacation time but I always had days off for doing anything that could take my mind off graduate school (not that I was bored, I just felt rejuvenated by it). So managing time is more imprtant than having a long vacation. As I saw it grad school was my chance to get somewhere so it was worth working for.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_4: They are two ways to answer/interpret the question.
**The first is: how much time are you "legally" entitled/required to take**
The answer to this question will vary across country, university, and even how you are "employed" within a university. Even if this could be answered in general or for you specific situation, I am not sure it is helpful given the second interpretation.
**The second is: how much time do PhD students actually take**
This seems to me a more relevant question and is similar, if not identical, to: [How hard do early-career academics in the United States work, really?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/8542/how-hard-do-early-career-academics-in-the-united-states-work-really). I believe that N-of-1 type answers are meaningless since I know people who takes zero vacation days and I know people who take in excess of 60 vacation days. The Sigma Xi society surveyed post docs and found that they take 12 vacation days a year on average. I provided details about this study in this [answer of mine](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/8543/929). I am not sure to the extent to which the vacation habits of post docs and PhD students are similar, but this is the only population study I am aware of.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: I'm working at a very competitive research university in physical sciences this summer as an undergraduate research intern. I asked a few of the PhD students i'm working with, and they told me that they get a maximum of two weeks off per year, not including one week that everyone gets off for Christmas. Thus a lot of them take their two weeks in addition to Christmas (a lot of internationals here don't care about Christmas much) to get an effective 3 week vacation.
Like others have said, it will depend entirely on your advisor. The PhD students I've talked to have told horror stories about one advisor in particular who wouldn't grant a PhD student an extra two days off to get married, because it would have put him over two weeks for the year. Others generally don't care as much as long as you get your work done.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_6: Having done a PhD in the United States and then come to Denmark to do a post-doc, I can say that this is going to depend on a huge number of factors. In the US, during my PhD, many of my colleagues seemed to be on vacation all of the time (many of them did not finish). But, my advisor never took vacation and I, accordingly, worked on his schedule. I never took vacation and was always "on email," etc. when I was away for whatever reason. We had no guarantee of vacation other, I guess, than national and university holidays, but most people work from home (or in the lab) during those times any way.
In Denmark, however, this is completely different. Everyone in Denmark is guaranteed five weeks of paid vacation every year and even in academia, people use it seriously. Because it is July, all faculty and graduate students in my department are gone. Literally all of them and they are not on email and claim to not work, most for a three week holiday abroad.
So, in short, this is going to depend on a lot on country, department norms, and your advisor's style/expectations.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_7: **Disclaimer:** \**n=1*\* at a research university
I can give you a reasonable estimate of the vacation hours as I am a current PhD student in the US, not in the physical sciences but in the computing sciences. At my institution (*Cornell University*), I can **officially** take **14** days off in the year when I am fully funded. This is what is **typed** on my funding letter which I receive at the beginning of every semester.
In practice, this depends upon your adviser. I have been fortunate enough to work with wonderful people who do not care how many days I take off as long as the work has been done according to their expectations. For instance, I took 2 months off in Dec-Jan last year but then I had finished my personal involvement in all the current projects and had submitted relevant papers for publication.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_8: As a Ph.D. you really have to rely on the 'mood' of your PI, or other circumstances: For example, I know a person who had to go back to China for a month to get his visa renewal.
But I think at least 1 week off for traveling during the summer is something that you could expect if you don't have an extremely strict PI.
Besides that, there is the Xmas week where the university is officially closed and you don't have to show up.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_9: In addition to the other informative answers, I can't help but comment that (truly) one might ask oneself how/why this becomes a question at all. Of course it is a reasonable question, but it potentially hints at some aversion to one's "work".
I know others might disagree strenuously, but my own quite sincere and considered opinion is that academe is not a good career choice if the "job" is substantially oppressive or in any way "something to get away from". The reason is that quite a few people, your competitors, really love spending time at "the thing", and although of course "more hours" does not mean "more production", that kind of sustained engagement... and *affection*... does seem to enhance productivity and efficiency hugely.
That is, an academic job should be the kind of thing that one \_does\_not\_need\_ a vacation from, any more than one needs a vacation from eating or sleeping. Of course this is just one "ideal", but it is certainly the ground for my own life as a mathematician. That is (at the other end of one's career) when people ask me when I'll retire, regardless of exactly what I say, my thoughts are that it would be silly to stop accepting good pay for what I'd be doing anyway. :) :) (And, I add, for probably 12+ hours a day 6/7 days a week, and at least several hours every day of the year. I feel ill if I can't find a way to think about mathematics at least a few hours every day. If necessary, it seems that insomnia provides an opportunity...)
One may view this as a silly ideal, and my own experience as a bit of a caricature, but I think it is worthwhile for a potential academic to juxtapose such ranting with their own inclinations. E.g., if one can't feel an irrational affection for one's projects... it's time to consider other options.
So: vacation? I don't *like* the conventional notion of "vacation" (where you stop doing what you do ordinarily), any more than I'd like a vacation from eating or sleeping. Seriously. Yes, this creates some degree of conflict with family.
The worse conflict would be if one really does want to get away from one's (academic?) work. If so, then all the people who aren't necessarily as able as you, but who love it, will be zooming past you while you are on vacation. This is probably not just a "scare story", considering my personal observations over 40+ years.
Thus, conceivably, if you really think in terms of "vacation" from tasks that are not ... enchanting... then the real conclusion is that you should think about other possibilities.
(I thought that this ... arguably idealistic/extreme... viewpoint needed some representation.)
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_10: **Short answer: around 4 weeks (20 days)**.
---
Okay, given the number of anecdotal answers given, let's try to do something different and find some hard data… It is rather easy, because most institutions have explicit vacation policies posted online.
* Princeton graduate school (which I think fits your stated criteria) has [Guidelines on Student Vacation Time](http://www.princeton.edu/gradschool/academics/policies/student_vacation_time/), which say:
>
> graduate student degree candidates may take up to (but no more than) **four weeks of vacation**, including any days taken during regular University holidays and scheduled recesses
>
>
>
* Caltech Graduate Studies Office [states](http://www.gradoffice.caltech.edu/current/vacation):
>
> The Institute policy is that graduate students are "entitled to two weeks' annual vacation (in addition to Institute holidays)." […] There are 11 Institute holidays this calendar year […] In total, graduate students are entitled to **21 vacation days per calendar year**. These days do not accrue from year to year.
>
>
>
* MIT's policy for [Graduate Students](http://web.mit.edu/policies/8/8.3.html) is the following:
>
> […] observe normal Institute holidays and are entitled to **two weeks of vacation with pay** if their appointments are for the full calendar year. Their vacation schedule must be approved by their supervisors
>
>
>
* GeorgiaTech's [policy](http://www.mse.gatech.edu/sites/default/files/Graduate_Handbook%20_MSEpre-2011v2.2.pdf):
>
> **Two weeks vacation** and all official Georgia Tech holidays are allowed during each calendar year. Advisors must be notified of all vacation time and absences. Mid-term and intermission breaks are not vacation days unless scheduled as such.
>
>
>
In summary, vacation/holiday time ranges from 4 to 5 weeks at the institutions listed. It should be noted that the above are the actual vacation policies, so real-life situation might be different: less strict, if your advisor is understanding and it doesn't impede your work; more strict, if there is a [negative culture in your workplace](https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/5005/2700).
Upvotes: 4 |
2013/07/24 | 3,255 | 13,620 | <issue_start>username_0: I am new to teaching. Recently I was given the opportunity to teach at my own university (I am currently doing an MPhil from my university).
If a teacher fails to control his students once, he wouldn't be able to control them until the end of semester.
This is my first time in teaching and I am afraid that my students would get out of my control. They wouldn't listen to me, would misbehave and wouldn't let me give my lecture without interruption.
Please advise me the best way to keep my cool and prevent my students from getting out of control.
**EDIT:** I have not started teaching yet. I'll be starting my classes from next week.
**EDIT2:** The students are Bachelors students. I don't actually want to control them. I just want to maintain discipline in my class. I want to prevent misbehavior in my class. I have seen students not listening to new teachers and just pass the whole lecture passing comments.<issue_comment>username_1: Well, as a high school teacher, I have a few tips that may be of help (and I will clarify that having taught undergraduates before, I found from experience that a lot of these still apply on a regular basis):
1. Set the groundrules from the first lesson, calmly lay out your expectations for effort, behaviour, homework etc, be sure these are consistent with the rules of the institution and most of all - stick to them.
2. Don't shout, it will turn into a shouting-contest that the teacher can not win and places too much 'power' (via attention) in the hands of any unruly students.
3. Be consistent in all that you do.
4. Remember - you are the professional, I have found that displaying knowledge that extends the curriculum gets the students engaged.
5. Be helpful, firm and fair - be friendly, but not a 'friend'.
6. Don't be afraid or ashamed of asking colleagues for help, or for them to sit in and critique a lesson. I am 14 years into teaching and I still do this.
7. Be aware that external issues may affect in class behaviour, this would be a reason not an excuse for any misbehaviour.
8. Enjoy the class, be enthusiastic in the subject, the class and the profession.
These are the ones that come to mind.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_2: They will certainly not remain disciplined if you will give the impression of fear and confusion. Your revealed weakness (of mind) may give them negative impression that might make them courageous for misbehave etc.
So, first and above all, don't be fearful and increase your confidence level.
You should also check what possible disciplinary actions your university may allow to take against miscreant students. But definitely, it should be the last tool you may use.
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_3: First, realize that the main reason they might misbehave is the same as every one else, whether they are 4, 14, 24 or 94 years old: **they will be distracted if they are not interested**, bored. Conjectural factors surely also play a role (if it's nap time, for example), but if you get them interested you increase dramatically your chances of having a well-behaved audience.
Now, with regards to exercising your authority on a crow, the principles are again pretty much the same for 4 years old and 20 years old:
1. **Immediately assume a position of authority.** You have to be convinced that you naturally assume this authority before you go to the class. It derives from two factors:
a. By naming you a lecturer, your university gave you authority over the lecture room. Be ready, but not overly eager, to exercise it.
b. This authority also derives from your skills and knowledge: you are an authority on the topic you are lecturing. To maintain this, you have to be prepared to teach your topic.
2. **Be consistent.** Lay out a set of rules, explain them, and enforce them. They have to appear justified and reasonable to the students, so that you can enforce them if need be. **Always put things back in perspective**: why are we here, and how this justifies what I do.
To give an example: I always start by explaining that “I will not shout, because my voice doesn't allow me to go through the whole lecture shouting. Thus, if the noise level meets the point where I would need to shout, I will simply stop lecturing.” Standing there, silent, is a very effective way to lead the group to self-discipline (“hey, guys, shush!”). If necessary, I will remind them that even if I cover less material, the exam still covers the whole planned curriculum…
3. **Be pragmatic.** If things are going bad for some external circumstances, be prepared to make a justified exception to the rules, for the benefit of everyone. For example, if it's Friday afternoon and all students are exhausted from a week of exams, giving them 10 minutes off in the middle of a two-hour lecture might lead to overall improved productivity.
But most importantly, realize that **while first impression is important, it is not *“do or die”***. Even as an experienced teacher, sometime you will underperform a given day (because you're tired, because you're not committed enough to this specific topic, because …), but there is nothing you cannot correct later.
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_4: For university students, you could point out the obvious - that they are no longer at school, and things are done a little differently here. Classroom discipline is essentially an implicit pre-requisite, which should have been learned at school.
Primarily, they will be expected to behave as adults. This means showing **both** their lecturers **and** their fellow students the respect they deserve and pay silent attention to the lecturer.
In conjunction with expressing this view, I have seen the application of the policy that, if there is prolonged disruptive behaviour from any student or group of students, following N warnings, the lecturer will simply walk out of the class, return to his/her office and wait for a/the class representative to apologise on behalf of the class.
Getting the approval of your line manager of this policy is recommended before you follow it. Telling the students up front that this is how you will deal professionally with class disruption will give you the confidence to actually execute the policy, if needed. You will know that you have a plan in place, the students know that plan, you know you can follow through with your plan as required.
Peer pressure is your ally, here.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: When I first began to teach, nothing I *said* would make the students behave. It was only when I *acted* did students start to behave. For your first semester of teaching, I recommend that you *strictly follow all the rules* your university has on disciplining students. This includes sending them to the office of student affairs, filing disciplinary cases, giving failing grades for an activity or for the whole course, and so on. It is important that your response be quick and consistent. Again, *you do not have to say anything,* you don't even have to warn them or remind them of the rules. Just implement the disciplinary measures quickly and consistently. Act as if it's no big deal to you, as if you've been doing it your entire life so many times that it has become second nature to you.
If you do this, trust me, you will have *absolutely no problems* with discipline during the next semester.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_6: Just to point out one thing the other answerers (especially [F'x](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11357), [Damien](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11354) and [username_4](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11361)) haven't mentioned, do **encourage and reward any *contructive* interruptions**, like asking questions about the subject you're covering or, even better, answering questions asked by other students, pointing out any mistakes you may have made or letting you know if the material you're presenting has already been covered in another class.
One of the best things that could possibly happen, as far as engaging your students to learn is concerned, is having a spontaneous on-topic discussion between students emerge in your class. If there's any chance of that happening, you definitely should encourage it, even if it's cutting into time you'd planned to spend talking about something else. You can always make up for the lost time later.
Of course, the size of the class matters here. In a class of 10 people, you can just let the discussion unfold naturally; in a class of 200, you're going to have to hand out turns for speaking and make sure you don't let a discussion between a small group of students drag out so long that others get bored. Just try to do it without sounding dismissive.
How is all this relevant to maintaining discipline in class? Well, the thing is that **the #1 cause of classroom misbehavior is boredom.** (The #2 cause is probably the mistaken belief that you *have* to misbehave in class to be "cool".)
On one hand, the more your students get to engage in the teaching process and to guide it towards things *they're* interested in, the less bored they will be. On the other, if your students *are* getting bored, **you'll want to know about it and find out *why* it's happening**: Are you going too slow or too fast? Do they find the material you're presenting irrelevant? Or are they just too tired and unable to concentrate? The best (if not the only) way to know that is to encourage your students to provide you with honest feedback whenever they have trouble following your lecture or find it uninteresting.
Another trick that may help is to tell your students up front that **attending classes is voluntary**, as long as they understand that anything they miss will still be on the exam. If they don't want to stay in the classroom, it's better that they leave than get bored and distract others. That way, you'll get rid of the students who are bored because they already know the subject, as well as, hopefully, some of those who just feel like they *have to* misbehave. (The latter group may flunk the exam, but that will at least hopefully teach them a lesson for the next time.)
(If you do this, it's a good idea to post a detailed lesson plan in advance, and maybe make your lecture notes / slides available, so that students who choose not to attend can check if they'll miss, or have missed, anything they didn't know already.)
You should also encourage your students to **come ask you after class if they feel like they're not keeping up** or if there's something they just don't get. Not only does that give you a chance to help them over their stumbling block and to keep up with the class, but it also provides you with useful feedback on your teaching. If you find a lot of students getting stuck on a specific critical issue, you may even want to announce a change in your lesson plan and use the next lecture to focus on that point until you're pretty sure everybody gets it. Just make sure to keep asking for feedback as you do it.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_7: There are so many great answers here already but I do feel there is one important point which is not covered which needs to be. Before I get to my point, I will just say that being a good teacher requires you to get it all right, not just get most of it right. If you let one thing slip (like classroom management) your teaching can end up being extremely ineffective which will be reflected in the final grades of your students.
The point I want to add to all of the others already mentioned by others is to engage the students. I don't mean just making it interesting (that is also extremely important) but you should actually make the students do as much of the work as you can (read up on Active Learning). The more you can get the students actively working on the subject of the class, the less chance there will be, even for those who are quite advanced, to become bored (thus turning to their friends or their phone).
Group work is extremely helpful (perhaps the most helpful) but there are plenty of plenty of other ways to consider. The key point is to keep them actively focused on the class at hand so they will not focus on something else.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_8: Lots of great answers already but there are a few things I haven't seent that I think are important.
Establish **eye contact** with your students to engage them and show them that you are paying attention to them (and check if they're paying attention to you).
**Walk the room**, use the whole space. If you stay in front all the time, people think that can get away by sitting in the back and spending their time texting. You don't have to warn most of the time, just using the space helps to establish your authority.
If you think a student is starting to get bored and distracted from what you are saying, find a question pertaining to the topic and **call on them** to answer it.
**Use humor**. If I'm trying to start a class and some students won't stop talking to each other, I'll either just get into their conversation in front of the whole group and link it back to class somehow.
The only times I've had to do more serious discipline, it was mostly because someone had a real behavior problem (problems managing their anger, etc.) In those cases, most students will be glad that you will put the other in their place because they're likely to be disturbing the whole class.
Most schools I've taught at have new teacher workshops and there is always one about class management. I would look into it, it can't hurt!
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/24 | 1,428 | 6,394 | <issue_start>username_0: I have recently received a response for a paper submission. The paper expanded on a conference presentation, and it was submitted to the journal special issue related to that conference.
All three reviewers recommended acceptance (one "definite accept", two with "minor changes") but the editors chose to reject the paper "in light of the reviews" without any additional reason.
Why might the editors have chosen to do this? Is it OK to ask them for an explanation of their reasoning, or even to ask them to reconsider?<issue_comment>username_1: First, a note: **the editor** (or editors, or editorial committee) **is solely responsible for the decision to publish or reject** a submitted manuscript. Reviewers are often (not always) called in and their reports provide help to the editor in evaluating the manuscript. But, at the end of the day, it is the editor who makes the call, so the situation you describe is possible and not necessarily unethical.
It is, however, **very unusual**, both for the editor not to follow the unanimous recommendation of the reviewers, and even more so not to explain their rejection any further. You can definitely (and, in my opinion, *should*) **contact the editor** to:
1. express your surprise at the rejection, given the contents of the reviews;
2. ask whether it may have been an administrative error (with the nice streamlined web-based editor interface, a simple misplaced click might have lead to the current situation);
3. if the decision is deliberate, ask the editor if he may expand on the reason behind the rejection.
Of course, be professional and polite.
---
If after contacting the editor you are not satisfied with the answer, the only way forward is to appeal the decision to the editor-in-chief or the full editorial board. Details on how to do so should be found on the journal's website. This should not be done lightly, but if you do not get a decent reply from the editor, it seems warranted by the facts of your case. You may, however, want to consider sending the manuscript to another journal, as it will take much less effort than the appeal…
Upvotes: 7 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I fully agree [with username_1](https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/11366) but would like to add the following. As stated editors are free to make the judgement they see fit with the journal reputation in mind etc. However, an editor should also weed out manuscripts that do not fit the journal's scope etc. already before the review stage. It therefore seems even more strange that a manuscript reeives such a drastic result from a seemingly good response from reviewers.
Another issue is that reviewers provide comments directly to the editor. It is thus possible that the review seems good but the reviewer may voice some concern that he/she feels the editor must act upon and which they therefore cannot voice in the open review. The editor can react to this. I would still expect the editor to then provide more open concerns so as to provide you with feedback.
All in all username_1's suggestion to contact the editor is the way to go. Describe that you do not understand the resulting "verdict" and that you would like to get more feedback so as to possibly improve a seemingly already good manuscript or possibly be given the opportunity to revise for a new final decision.
Upvotes: 4 <issue_comment>username_3: I should also point out that one issue could be related to being submitted to " journal special issue related to that conference".
While that is the perfect place for the paper, keep in mind that in a regular issue, an accepted paper appears in the first issue which has space. For the special issue, all papers must appear in that issue. If the editors ended up with 5000 pages of accepted articles, they had to trim them down and reject some despite the good reviews.
As your paper had good reviews, it should probably be easy to publish it in some journal, maybe the regular issues of the same one?
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_4: Remember that the editor can have more information than the reviewers and is concerned not only with the scientific quality of the paper. For example, impact and interest is a major factor for some journals.
For example, it is possible that a similar paper on this subject was submitted at the the same time, and the editor decided to send both the papers to review. Upon receiving the reviews, the editor decided to go with the other paper.
Another scenario would be that the editor learned about a different paper (even in a different journal) which will be published in the near future and lowers the impact of your results.
These things can happen in high profile journals, and it does not necessarily mean the editor is doing something unethical or is acting on personal likes/dislikes.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: I have a few potential scenarios in mind beyond just "They don't like you":
* As username_2 said, reviewers usually get a space to address just the editor, rather than the author, and in those comments there might have been a reason to reject your paper. Perhaps the reviewers suggested it's really not a good fit for the journal or something along those lines - the paper itself might not be flawed, but its submission to this journal might be. Yes, that sort of thing should show up in the review itself, but reviewers are imperfect people just like the rest of us.
* The editor might have made a "Is this a priority?" judgement call and rejected the paper - "in light of..." phrasing might just be journal boilerplate. Don't underestimate the capacity of boilerplate language to generate confusion.
* The journal's publishing schedule might just be full for a very long time, and so they may be rejecting anything below "My god, this *must* go in our journal".
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_6: One possibility is that the editors felt the paper was marginally relevant for their journal. In that case, they might want to publish the paper if and only if it was exceptionally strong, which would allow it to overcome the relevance concern. Three mildly positive reviews wouldn't be enough in that case; but if the editor had seen three highly positive reviews, they would have accepted.
From the author's position, this is annoying, but it makes sense from the editor's viewpoint.
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/24 | 706 | 3,131 | <issue_start>username_0: Who can apply for research grants in Europe? Are there some degree requirements? Can students (undergraduate/graduate) apply for research grants? I know that the answer surely depends on the institution giving the grant, but I assume there are some general requirements, formal or informal. If you know (or even better, are) a student who has received a research grant, please tell how difficult it was. To clarify, I'm not asking about funding to do some degree, but funding to establish new research projects.<issue_comment>username_1: Rules will very strongly depend on the funding institution you're applying to, and even on the details of the grant program. Eligibility criteria are listed in each funding program, so go check up those programs that are of interest to you. Even restricting to “in Europe” doesn't help much, because Europe is a large continent with very heterogeneous research (and funding) institutions.
Regarding students (undergraduate or graduate), the only types of grants I can think of are:
1. grants to fund your degree; for example, getting a fellowship that would fund you during your PhD
2. grants that encourage international collaboration and exchange; e.g., the [Chateaubriand fellowship](http://www.france-science.org/chateaubriand.html) to spend some months in a French lab, or [JSPS fellowship](http://www.jsps.go.jp/english/) for short stays in Japan.
A student is expected to devote his efforts to the project for which he is employed, not to bid for new research projects on their own. Thus, I don't think you can get funding for a new research project of your own, until you are an independent researcher.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Institutions
------------
Most grant programs target *institutions* - while a grant proposal will generally be prepared by a particular principal investigator (and possibly their team) according to their individual research experience and research goals, and the grant evaluation might place a large importance on their CV and individual publication history, in these programs the grant application has to be submitted by a qualified institution, and the grant will be awarded to that institution, not to an individual.
Furthermore, many grant programs require *multiple* institutions to apply - e.g. Horizon 2020 calls tend to require consortiums representing multiple EU countries; various grants for applied research require a participation of both a research institution and an industry partner, etc.
Individual researchers
----------------------
There are some types of grants that are targeted at individual researchers, e.g. [European Research Council](https://erc.europa.eu/funding/starting-grants) or some post-doc programs. However, the general assumption is that the doctor's degree is the basic qualification showing that someone is qualified to do independent unsupervised research. The grants tend to be quite competitive, so a PhD degree by itself is nowhere near sufficient, but it's a basic 'table stakes' requirement that's mandatory in almost all (or all?) research grant programs.
Upvotes: 2 |
2013/07/24 | 1,121 | 4,875 | <issue_start>username_0: This question is prompted mostly due to a `Numerical Methods and Computer Programming In MATLAB` course I took this summer ([textbook](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0470565152)). To summarize the course it's basically methods for solving linear, nonlinear, and differential equations and systems of those equations, and learning how to program the respective algorithms in MATLAB.
I'm a fast learner for most topics. I already have programming experience, so that half of the class was no challenge. The mathematical concepts I grasped quickly, and as a result most of the lectures were too slow for me. This isn't anything new for me, I often have this issue.
The bulk of the homework problems given were standard book problems and had no real significance or relation to the application of these methods. There were one or two problems that were applied and those were great, but to be honest I have a problem doing homework and have had it for around 20 years now (since grade school). I understand the importance of it, it's rarely (if ever) difficult for me, but it bores me and I have no motivation to do it. It doesn't help that now I work full time with a wife and 1.5 children, so there is a small window in which I even have to fit this homework.
A couple of weeks into the course I thought perhaps if the homework was more interesting somehow (puzzle-like, application problems (aka story problems), etc) then that would be better for me, but I didn't know how to approach the professor about this. Long story short the bulk of the grading is homework and I'm not doing as well as I could be. It's likely too late for this class, but how would I approach this in the future? It'd be torture to have to continue down this road.<issue_comment>username_1: You can try to make the homework interesting on your own. This is a roundabout way around the problem, but it's worked for me in the past.
I had a Space Propulsion class that resulted in a lot of rather tedious homework, even when I wrote the solutions in MATLAB. By the end of the class I was writing programs that allowed you to 1. vary the parameters of the problem, and 2. Show a graphical visualization. If you're writing Diff EQs, try adding the ability to vary the constant parameters, add a vector field graph, and put it all in a nice GUI.
If the teacher/TA spends any amount of time grading the homework (some classes I've taken, they simply make sure you attempted the problem), then they will probably appreciate the time and effort. I got extra credit for a number of my homework submissions that I did in this way.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: Why not just ask? Maybe this seems naive but if you approach the professor and say, honestly, you don't feel you are doing as well as you could or even should be, they would be willing to discuss that; a student taking an interest in their learning is a valuable thing. You can state your desire for creative questions, and ask if the professor has any recommendations for outside material, or has some of their own. I can't imagine any professor being anything but delighted at the prospect of a student being self-aware of their performance hurdles and seeking more advanced knowledge in the professor's field.
Upvotes: 5 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: Not challenging enough homework problems is not a good excuse to not do them. The homework is necessary when taking programming/math courses. You need to do them so that you know how to crawl before you learn how to run.
You must finish the homework to prove to yourself and your professor that you already know the basics and you're ready to learn the advanced materials. You take the finished homework to your professor and tell him that they are too easy for you and you want more so that he can give you more interesting problems to work on. Professors would really like the students like you because they know they have good and eager to learn students in the class.
I suspect you're in the wrong class. It probably is offered to the students who do not have strong math background as you do. (This is not unusual. I had personal experience that students in my programming class did not know what logarithm is.) In the future, check with the department to make sure the course contents fit into your level of knowledge before you take them so you won't waste your time and money.
Best wishes!
Upvotes: 2 <issue_comment>username_4: Instructors have to strike a balance for the group as a whole, which will always leave some students over-challenged and other under-challenged. Having a chat with the instructor about what else you might be doing is not a bad idea, but in general, students that are ready for more are usually also able to find good challenges for themselves. Certainly in this age of the internet!
Upvotes: 1 |
2013/07/24 | 1,903 | 7,903 | <issue_start>username_0: I'm a postdoc and a guy who used to be a part of our group dropped by today and said repeatedly that he wanted to collaborate with me and that he's too busy with other commitments to do any work. I suggested a project where he could write up some of his recent experiences in the area (I know of a publication that did something similar to this that we could use as a framework and am working with another man in our group on this), and he had no interest in that saying instead he was more interested in the data analysis I'm doing.
The message I got was "I don't have time to do anything, but I want to be a co-author".
He was "generous" enough to say he "doesn't need to be the first or second author".
How would you handle that?
During my PhD I had one of my supervisor's former students do this to me. He got 3 publications out of me, which he didn't understand well enough to present at a conference (he insisted that I create slides for him and write a word-for-word script for him to deliver - the conference was in his area of the world). I eventually put my foot down and refused to have him as a co-author again (my supervisor was pushing to put his name on a 4th publication, I think she wanted to help him get tenure and / or was repaying some debt to him with my work).
I don't want to spend time trying to defend my work from people who didn't contribute putting their names on it, but I'm not sure the best way to get rid of him. My PI thinks quite highly of him.
I'm going out with my PI casually for dinner tomorrow and am planning to bring this up and ask him to be explicit about his authorship policy (my PI reserves the right to determine authorship of work from our lab). I don't want to seem whiny, but also don't want to spend time / energy worrying about this.
Am I overly anxious about this? Maybe it doesn't really matter as long as I'm the first author? If that's the case, I'm tempted to just put everyone I know on it (I don't want to reward this guy for being obnoxious).<issue_comment>username_1: Your situation sounds messy. I think most will agree that the basic prerequisite for co-authorship is intellectual contribution to the manuscript . To add authors for thanks is common but really not a practice to endorse. If someone comes to me and asks to be a co-author, the obvious response would be: "What will be your contribution?" If there is no clear contribution other than, say, "Read the manuscript and provide input" then the answer should be "No, thanks". In your case, it sounds as if there is no major point in even having a discussion.
In fact, your case reminds me of a colleague of mine who ends up in all sorts of strange situations. His problem is that he is too nice and does not know the word "no". I realize it may be hard to set up strict rules for these things if your immediate surroundings do not subscribe to them, but I think you should know that you have solid grounds for being more strict about adding unnecessary co-authors or letting people into a project without a clear picture of why.
If you are first author on a paper, it seems to me you will also be the person deciding how the work should materialize. I think you need to make your own mind up where you want to draw the line. you will benefit of making a decision on how you want things run. If you want to deviate from this later on, then it is still your decision and no-one else's. I think this is what you (and most of us) really want - to be in the driver's seat. So follow your instincts, they seem sound to me.
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_2: I am not a postdoc but a current PhD student. Strangely, I have had a couple of similar instances in the recent past.
Just say a firm **NO !**
If he is a former member of your group and has nothing to intellectually contribute to the current project, then he does not deserve authorship.
I would definitely bring it up casually with your PI and make it clear to him that you do not support a person being a co-author if he does not or has not contributed to the project significantly over its life cycle.
Saying a clear "**No!**" usually works. :)
Upvotes: 5 <issue_comment>username_3: Sometimes, a firm "NO" is not the best option.
I believe it would work to say NO but your PI wants to "drive the car" and you don't want this to generate a conflict.
If her wanting to "drive the car" was not legitimate, I think a firm NO would be the best solution.
Otherwise, I think the best choice is to bend. BUT, there is a big BUT: THEY are in demand and you should turn this into your own advantage:
Think of a compensation, a leverage that could be useful to you... And try yourself at a polite negociation exercice...
Or maybe... Mention something like "expedient co-author" in your publication...
Upvotes: 1 <issue_comment>username_4: As others, I would say that you should say "no". However, I have something to add: this is not merely about the request of being freely a co-author being annoying. It is about ethics. Not letting someone that contributed significantly to a paper be an author is universally seen as unethical;
it might be less clear that letting someone not having contributed significantly to a paper be an author is equally unethical, but it is.
Notably, it gives her or him an advantage in evaluation, promotion, tenure and more importantly recruitment that his or her competitors will not have.
In conclusion; not saying "no" is unethical... to many people you probably do not even know, but unethical nonetheless.
I have to add another point there : this is a delicate situation as you are not completely in charge, and as a postdoc you have to handle things gently to have good recommendation from your PI. Being to rigorous about something that people may think costs you nothing can lead you to an impossible situation, so be careful, think ahead the point up to which you are ready to be flexible, do not act offensively, do not corner your PI but let her ways out. For example, you should definitely explain how wrong this would seem to you, but you should not blame her right from the start for asking you this.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_5: In addition to the excellent answers that you already got, I'd like to point out two things.
* There are criteria lists for authorship, see e.g. <http://www.icmje.org/ethical_1author.html>.
You may want to look up a specific guideline for your field.
* While I agree with the "say a firm no" side, this may not be possible in - due to the local "power structure", or also because real life things are usually not as clear as one sentence in a stackexchange question suggests (in that case even possibly not advisable).
I've found a "Contributions" section in the text where for each author is listed what exactly they contributed very helpful in situations where people were unclear about coauthorship and position in the author list.
If there's really just "<NAME> did not contribute anything" that should a) be embarrassing enough for A. Uthor, or b) the supervisor or, as a last resort c) reviewers/editors to insist on having neither the name in the author list nor the sentence in the contributions. For the less clear cases it allows readers will to judge for themselves, and in any case I found that explicitly writing down the contributions can do much for the clarification and thus also make decisions about authorship much easier.
* Last but not least, what about approaching the problem from the opposide side at the dinner: telling your PI that you're afraid the guy's not going to do his share in the work. That you had similar experiences previously, so your alarm at that is quite shrill. What your PI recommends what should be that coauthor's exact part of the work and what the PI recommends to ensure that the guy is actually doing his share?
Upvotes: 3 |
2013/07/25 | 742 | 2,924 | <issue_start>username_0: I have been advised that I should include the peer reviews in my CV, particularly when I am applying for academic/research positions. I am not too sure how to go about this, thus my questions:
* Is it ethical to include the full details? I would imagine that as reviews are anonymous, this would be a no-no.
* Should I just say something along the lines "Reviewer: Journal name"?
Also, what section of the CV should this information be included under?<issue_comment>username_1: As I see it the reviews are, unless explicitly stated otherwise, a communication between you and the editor and authors. If you make the reviews public you probably need to ask the other parties for permission, if nothing else so for politeness. I therefore suggest anonymous listing.
I personally have an entry in my CV which tells how many reviews I have made since (in my case) 1995 and then lists the journals for which I have made such reviews. As a side-point, I do the same for reviews of proposals I make for large granting organisations such as NERC (UK) and NSF (US). I do not see any point in, say, providing details on suggestions for reject/revisoions/accept. In the end the number of reviews (also per year) is what shows your experience and provides credit.
You should also look at the question [Can I publish the reviews I write?](https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/647/4394) and [Ethics of publishing received peer reviews [duplicate]](https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/11097/4394) for different views on making public reviews in different ways.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: I believe you may get some tips from the answers to a question of mine on this very site: [“Do you list journals you have reviewed for on your CV?”](https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/3540/2700)
As for myself, I list the peer-reviews I have done in a **“Administrative and collective duties”** or **“Community involvement”**. Or, in a short CV which doesn't have such divisions, I put it with the broader **“Other skills and activities”** section (i.e. not teaching, not research projects).
What I include is:
* list of **journals** for which I act as reviewer (*“Regular reviewer for many chemistry journals, including …”*)
* **funding bodies** (NSF, private trusts, etc.) for which I act as expert (including, e.g., NSF division, but not the exact programs)
* **evaluation committees** on which I sit
It feels obvious, but it's always worth repeating: **do not include any confidential information**, such as titles or author lists for reviewer papers or projects. I think it's safe to list the number of reviews performed for each outlet if you want (but I don't do it).
Upvotes: 6 [selected_answer]<issue_comment>username_3: If you are compiling a CV for a job at a University you should make sure to include whether or not your journal entry was refereed. This adds weight to the entry.
Upvotes: -1 |
2013/07/26 | 581 | 2,169 | <issue_start>username_0: [This question](https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/11398/starting-a-mooc) prompted me to wonder what compensation comes with teaching a MOOC. Most of these seem to be sponsored by universities, but my university doesn't offer them and neither did my PhD institution so I have no first-hand experience on the instructor-side.
Obviously, most participants do not pay for them (some do, I guess, but I have no idea how many and they're obviously paying much less than university tuition). So, it seems unlikely that teaching such courses pays for the instructors time.
Thus, I ask: does teaching these come with compensation of any kind? Salary/bonus? Teaching load reduction? Release from service? Teaching assistants for the courses? I'm interested in compensation either from one's university or from the MOOC provider (Coursera, Udacity, edX, etc.).<issue_comment>username_1: As @JeffE said, every department is different. There is remarkably little information available on the compensation offered to the instructors teaching the courses. A quick search revealed [this article](http://science-and-food.blogspot.com/2013/06/on-super-professors-and-mooc-pushback.html) which states that [this professor](https://plus.google.com/103171251377160188790/posts) at Duke University doesn't receive any compensation for teaching MOOCs, including no reduction in teaching load, or any teaching assistants. See also [this scathing article](https://plus.google.com/103171251377160188790/posts) which states that professors teaching MOOCs are grossly underpaid--no hard numbers anywhere though.
Upvotes: 3 <issue_comment>username_2: It's a matter of contract (or agreement) between the teacher and her employer. Options include:
* no compensation, no appreciation for the job you do
* encouragement in the form of teaching load reduction, or financial compensation
It could also happen that the online course provider would directly pay the teacher for her time, but that odds not happen (as far as I know) in the current model of MOOC, where the course provider deals directly with institutions rather than individual teachers.
Upvotes: 2 |
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