What is the average number of references in a PhD thesis in the humanities? How many references on average are typical for a PhD Thesis?

More specifically, I'm looking for a comparison of the average number of references for an engineering PhD thesis and PhD theses in other fields.

I'm looking for references or data on the subject.

As alluded to in the comments, there is no generic "right" answer: the number will depend strongly on the nature of your thesis, the state of the literature related to it, and your personal scholastic style.  Nevertheless, in the spirit of engineering approximations, I will supply you with some rough guidelines.

As a lower bound, I would be startled if it was possible to place most theses within the context of pre-existing work in less than about 20 references.  In certain contexts such as an obscure corner of pure mathematics perhaps this might be possible, but in most cases work does not take place in a vacuum, and other people will have either used similar techniques or cared about similar problems in the past.
As an upper bound, I would be concerned with a thesis with on the order of 200 or more references that the student hasn't been doing enough work on their own original research and has been investing too much time and energy in building a literature review, rather than a thesis.  Again, there will likely be cases where a thesis with an extremely high number of references would be reasonable, but these are likely to be unusual.

Notice the extremely wide range and suspiciously round numbers in my estimates: really there is no "right" answer for how many there should be in general, but perhaps these will help with some initial first impressions in one's thinking.

For me, I think that the use of references should not limit the creativity of the Doctorat candidate. Rather, they should be that springboard that get them produce more than what they get as intake. Numerically, I expect to have each single reference to be equated with two pages of the candidate's work as a maximum. This would mean that a dissertation of 300 pages should not have used more than150 references. The number wil' vary according g to the length of the dissertation. The higher the number of references, the more limited the originality of the work and the poorer  the creativity displayed.


Is it normal to have no publications after 2.5 years in a PhD program? Background: I started my Ph.D two and half years ago in engineering/computer science field. I was pushed by my supervisor into a direction which he thought would be good (He switched directions and he knows nothing about the field, just because there were better prospects for getting grants). I never felt connected to the field and he never received any grants to study it.

I switched a year ago to a subject that I feel passionate about and started reading lots of literature. I have done some work and submitted (rejected at first, resubmitted and waiting).

So now I have completed 2.5 years in the program and no publications at all. I even find it very hard to find new novel ideas in my field as it is been actively researched for 10 years and it seems to me as if almost everything is already done but that is a different issue.
I am afraid I won't get enough publications in time before the Ph.D time limit expires.

Question:
Is it normal to be 2.5 years into Ph.D and have no publications?

I was in the exact same situation (also CS) and I would say that it is both normal and cause for concern. So there's no reason to take it personally, or to start worrying about your abilities, this happens to many people, but it is a situation that needs to be resolved. From now on, your number one priority should be to get a paper, put everything else on hold. Don't worry about getting enough papers, worry about getting one.

You have something under submission, so the odds are you'll get it accepted somewhere pretty soon. However, if you don't, I would recommend trying to find someone with experience who can coach you hands-on. Find someone who can read your draft in detail and tell you what needs to be done. 2.5 years with no publications is usually a sign that the supervisor is not paying very close attention, and it may be good to find someone who can pay close attention to you, at least for a bit. Getting a paper past reviewers is a strange, dark art, and it really helps to get some intense supervision for your first attempt.

edit after comment: Two further tips to help your situation:

Idea generation is a skill and you can work on getting better at it.
[1 2 3]. If you're not generating ideas, tackle that problem head-on. Don't think of yourself as a non-creative person, and don't blame your subject: there are always exciting directions if you look hard enough.
Try to write a collaborative paper, ask a postdoc or a fellow PhD in your group to do some brainstorming, and to find an idea that you can work on together. That way, the work becomes less lonely, and you have at least one other person who cares about it. It might be a little scary to initiate something like this, but if the alternative is working by yourself for the next 2.5 years, you may consider stepping out of your comfort zone a little bit.

I would say it can be normal to have no publications until you're done with your PhD, and then your dissertation counts as your publication.  There's nothing wrong with having no publications beforehand.  These are often obsessions for university Deans and perhaps Admin, but they are not directly connected with the pursuit of knowledge or a Doctor of Philosophy.

In other words one can pursue knowledge without publishing anything. Further, a lessor degree does not say that you are ready to publish and contribute your own work to the corpus of the Establishment -- that SHOULD be saved until after you are rewarded the degree.  The degree then acts as a badge you've earned as a member of the community.

Save publications for your career.  Better to focus on making your PhD count for something, so that when you do get the award, you have something real to contribute to centuries of knowledge accumulation in Academe.

[Edit:  for those arguing that it's accepted practice to dilute the publishing industry to meet your program's requirements, why don't you solicit your University to start the Journal for "Paper's Required towards my PhD".]


Paper unknowingly describing technical bias as if it was a biological phenomenon of interest Let’s take a very hypothetical situation. Suppose that a scientific journal (let’s use Scientific Reports for the sake of the example) recently published a paper that seems to be completely off track. By completely, I mean that the phenomenon described in the paper can be completely explained as a technical bias that has been ignored by the authors.

Some papers have an official means to address such concerns. For example, Nature has Matter Arising and Replies formats which can be used to engage in post-publication critics. The thing is, Scientific Reports does not seem to have such a mechanism.

I was wondering about the polite and efficient way to address such issue.

You have to live with the fact that academia is an imperfect system like any else and scientific knowledge underlies evolution. Seeing the bigger picture, in the long term journals that don't allow or implement criticism/replies on their journals papers will likely vanish.

Your (very hypothetical premise) is simply very wrong that you have to find a way to correct wrong/bad content (in your opinion) in every journal.

Technically, this is the same answer as Wolfgang gave, but from a bigger different perspective.

You can also see it like this: Scientific reports doesn't believe that in the long term negative comments on their articles help to avoid more the publication of falsehood than for other journals or just creates "editorial noise/extra-work" (unworthful extra-work probably being the main reason to not offer this option). Do you rememeber facebook offering a downwote button, now it's gone. Or look at stackexchange, upvote +10, downvote -2 karma. When you have scientific branches like biomed/psychology in which over 70% of studies cannot be reproduced, it's questionable if article replies overall and in the long term have much value as this evolution is driven mainly by affirmation, reproduction by other groups instead of scientific discussions in a journal, as the system to create true new scientific knowledge works differently, less efficient and theoretical than in branches like mathematics or physics, which is not surprising if you have a bit of interdisciplinary methodological knowledge.

If it is obvious to you that the paper has a strong bias, then either (i) you are wrong in your opinion, given that apparently all reviewers and editors missed the bias, or (ii) the bias will be apparent to everyone (except the reviewers and editors).

In the first of these cases, there is nothing for you to do except doing some introspection on how you could be so wrong in your assessment. Talking to colleagues  about the issue might help.

In the second of these cases, there is also nothing for you to do: The issue is obvious to every potential reader, so it's not necessary to point out. (You could, of course, try to point it out, but why rock a boat that everyone is already seeing as sinking.)


Saying no to miscellaneous administrative tasks as a Grad student In my university, graduate students under scholarship have to perform certain tasks like tutoring and grading. I have no problem with that since it is part of the contract.

There are also some miscellaneous tasks like offering to help out for a departmental party (takes 10 hours over a few days), or volunteer to bring some visitors around the school, etc. These are theoretically on a voluntary basis, but when no one volunteers the admin staff starts to get very pushy and "hard sell" people to volunteer. To get a sense of how pushy the admin can get, I recently had to reject the same task thrice (via email), with the admin getting increasingly curt and rude in their email. (The administrators are not professors, they are in charge of departmental duties including paying our stipend.)

I plan to reject around 90% (edit: maybe 50-60% selectively, as there are some events that I am genuinely glad to help out) of such "voluntary tasks", and have already rejected a few, and accepted one. (I am a new graduate student) Will there be any negative repercussions if I do that (reject majority of the tasks)?

Most of the tasks require at most 10-20% of the students to help out (around 10 helpers out of 60 students). Some tasks just need a single or one or two volunteers.

(Edit: my personal background is that I used to be a "yes" person to the extent of burning out (previous experience not in school), hence I need to learn how to say no firmly to certain things. I have also discovered through the hard way that "yes" people get asked to volunteer more and more, few  actually takes into account that I am already volunteering for another event and may need a rest. )

Also are there any tips on how to say no, with respect to Academia? I may try a new strategy of ignoring such emails, the emails do "require" us to respond whether we can make it or not, not sure if ignoring such emails may be a better policy since I think that is what some students do.

Edit: I have found a personal solution is to read up on more self help books on assertiveness. Thanks for all the help (including sarcastic comments, which confirms my new belief that I should not care about what others think). Especially thanks to Professor Romik for restoring my faith in humanity. Hope this thread can help students facing similar predicaments.

Will there be any negative repercussions if I do that (reject majority of the tasks)?

Of course there is no way to say for sure whether there will be any negative repercussions if you keep rejecting those requests. However, frankly, it seems likely to me that:

You will come across as kind of an ass to the administrative staff, and that's not great at all. If your university is at all like mine, there will be a number of times when you need their support in, well, administrative matters, and you will be very low on their priorities list if you make it a point to never or rarely help them out.
You will come across as kind of an ass to the other students, who will surely notice that you never help out and they need to take on more of those duties as a consequence. You will invariably need their help at some point during your studies, and it's not unlikely that they will not be thrilled to help you out then either.
You may come across as kind of an ass to the faculty, which tends to notice if certain students are never volunteering for anything. The extent to which they care is another question, but it seems unlikely that they will consider this a positive attitude. In the worst case, somebody may remember this when the time for letters of recommendation comes up after graduation.

  Also are there any tips on how to say no, with respect to Academia? I may try a new strategy of ignoring such emails, the emails do "require" us to respond whether we can make it or not, not sure if ignoring such emails may be a better policy since I think that is what some students do.

If you really think you should keep on saying "no" to those things, it seems fair to tell the administrators directly that you are not available for volunteer work. They will likely be annoyed, but they will also be annoyed if you keep turning them down. I don't think there is a way to turn them down without annoying them in any way.

(and please don't start stringing together increasingly less plausible excuses - that's just childish)

yoyostein, let me start by reminding you (just in case you forgot - some of the other comments and answers certainly seem to be ignoring these facts) that you are a professional, serious person who came to graduate school to further your education and become a better person. Getting your PhD is a nontrivial task that requires a level of focus and dedication that most people are not capable of. It is a difficult and risky endeavor, and for some graduate students even a small misstep like misplacing one's priorities slightly by doing too much volunteer work, or too much of anything unrelated to their studies, can mean the difference between success and failure.

You are also an employee of the department. On top of all that you are a human being, and therefore deserving of being treated justly and respectfully.

It follows that, from an ethical point of view, the administrators at your department have no right -- I repeat, NO RIGHT; ZERO; NADA -- to require you to volunteer even a minute of your time, or to treat you disrespectfully (and certainly not to retaliate against you in any way) if you decline to do so. Conversely, you are 100% within your rights -- morally and ethically -- to refuse to volunteer. At the same time, refusing does carry some risks which you would be wise to evaluate and consider carefully before taking any action. I believe however, that if you resist the administrators' pressure in a respectful and classy manner, and if you are in the U.S. or a place with similar culture, then those risks would be largely mitigated, and you may even stand to gain newfound respect from your administrators and possibly the faculty and your fellow graduate students by asserting your rights.

In terms of what is the best way to respond to the pressure to volunteer, I can think of several possibilities which may be appropriate, depending on the nature of the situation, your personality and the personality of the administrators and other people in the department.

One suggestion is to respond to your administrator's recent request, in writing or in person if you feel more comfortable, with something like the following:

  "Dear [name of administrator],

  You recently contacted me for a third time with a request to volunteer
  to [insert activity] after I had already declined the same request twice.
  While I'm sure your request is well-intentioned, and sympathize
  with your frustration at the difficulty of finding graduate students who
  can help with
  this, I found the tone of your request somewhat disagreeable and
  disrespectful. I would like to remind you that I am a serious and
  professional person who came to the program to work on my studies,
  gain experience in teaching, and get a PhD. These are difficult tasks
  and I feel that I must focus my energies on them while in graduate
  school. Furthermore, the task of [insert volunteer activity] that you
  asked me to do is not within my core interests or competency. That
  being the case, you should know that although I love to help when I
  can, in the future I may decline some of your and the other department
  staff's requests for volunteers. Please feel free to ask me to
  volunteer anytime, but I ask that you respect my wishes and not ask
  more than once if I decline.

  Finally, I would like to raise a philosophical point. I assume that
  you are paid for your services and the department does not ask you to
  volunteer your time without compensation. However, myself and the
  other graduate students are often asked to volunteer our time. May I
  suggest that the department reconsider its approach on this matter? If
  you find a way to make the volunteer activities somehow profitable for
  us, whether it be by paying us directly or by other means (a small
  budget for pizza or for buying textbooks, etc.), I think you may find
  that you have a much easier time getting things done, and the culture
  and atmosphere of the department may improve. I'd be happy to meet with
  Chair [name of department chair] to raise these points with him if you
  think that would be appropriate, or you can mention it to [him/her].

  Sincerely,

  [your name]"

Contacting the administrator in this way is the least aggressive, and as such, probably the preferable way of raising your concerns. I think you may find that despite being rude to you, the administrator may turn out to be a sensible person who, if approached in such a thoughtful manner, will see your point and back off, and may even end up liking you more for your honesty.

If you are reluctant to speak with the administrator, another possibility is to ask a faculty member whom you trust to speak to the administrator on your behalf and raise your concerns with them.

In the event that these options didn't work or you think they are not even worth trying since the administrator is a really seriously incompetent or inconsiderate person, the other possibility would be to go to the department chair with your concerns. The chair is in charge of the administrative staff, and if he/she is a sensible person he/she will absolutely not tolerate his staff treating graduate students disrespectfully, and will instruct them not to pressure students into doing volunteer activities. A really good chair might go even further and put some serious thought how to correct these systemic problems with his department by addressing the philosophical issues I raised in the draft email message above. (Note: I am currently a department chair myself. Fortunately I am not aware of such problems in my own department...)

Keep in mind that contacting the chair is a fairly drastic measure so I would try other options first. The staff members do not like being criticised by the chair and may develop a grudge against you for bringing a complaint against them. Of course, that does not mean you shouldn't do it when there is no alternative.

If the chair is him/herself incompetent or a jerk, you may be out of luck. While there may still be creative ways to fight the unjust expectations of your department (contacting the dean or the graduate student union, organizing a mass protest, etc.), it seems to me that at this point the chances of success are very low and the risks start seriously outweighing the possible rewards, and that in that case you are better off simply accepting that you will occasionally have to volunteer for uninteresting duties, and swearing that someday when you are in a professional environment and in a position of authority you will treat people better than that.

UPDATE: I see based on the votes that my advice is turning out to be extremely unpopular. Thank you all for the feedback. I concede that my suggestions are based on my fundamental belief that most people have a reasonably well-developed sense of fairness, and while this belief (and the general approach to dealing with conflicts that guided my answer) has worked very well for me personally, it may not necessarily be applicable to this situation, and carries some risks that the OP should consider carefully.


Telling a former supervisor you don't want to publish I graduated from my PhD in the middle of last year and have since landed a full time job in industry. Currently I'm pretty ran off my feet with work, but I'm also enjoying having free time at weekends to spend with my Husband.
My supervisor has been in touch pretty relentlessly about publishing some of my last results from the thesis (also saying that I "owe her" and it would destroy my future if I don't see it through). Now I'm happy with never going back to academia, and career promotion isn't my focus if I'm honest.
I've tried to cobble together a draft but it keeps getting ripped apart (she was pretty notorious when I was doing my PhD for brutal feedback) and I'm looking at it and realising I don't care about seeing this through... I don't appreciate the pressure from her, it's not truly beneficial to me, it's taking up my personal time and I have a lot of things going on with family difficulties lately.
I've always been a bit of a wimp with confrontation. So given all I've said about this how would you advise for me to tell my old boss I don't want to publish (preferably without triggering an intense vendetta)?

Keep it short and sweet:

Dear [her name],
Thanks for the reminder about our project. I thought about it some more, and for personal reasons I won’t be able to continue with the work. Since you have all the data I suggest that you pursue publication by yourself or with other collaborators. And, if it matters, I do not care very much about the issue of coauthorship, so whatever you end up deciding about who should be a named coauthor of the paper once it’s finished is fine with me.
Regards,
Gerilk

An important point is that, since you’re worried she will try to pressure or guilt-trip you, you should not apologize for or explain your decision. Manipulative people are expert at using every sign of guilt or embarrassment to pressure people relentlessly until they get what they want from you. I can almost guarantee it from experience: if you give her a reason — any reason — she will find some counter-argument to make that reason look invalid or insufficient, and will repeat this as many times as necessary with any additional details you add to your explanation, until you give in. Do not give her an opening to do this. A firm “no” with no explanation is the only approach that works with this type of person.
Good luck!
Edit: there’s been an extensive discussion in the comments about whether the email should mention the subject of authorship. To clarify, I don’t think it matters very much if you mention it or not. I included that part since, first, it seems factually true based on what you said that you don’t care about authorship; and second, letting the former supervisor know this eliminates one possible pressure point she will surely try to use to keep pressuring and annoying you in the hope of getting you to change your mind.
But if you prefer not to mention this, that’s pretty much just as good and won’t particularly affect the outcome.

Tell her to write it and put your name 2nd , or take all the credit with your blessing;  and also tell her that you have a life now and do not have time for her endless rewrite  demands.
Curious about what field this was in.  Sounds like some touchy feely subject as science and math should not be that hard to finish  after  tweaking  one draft.


Is it frowned upon to go to office hours as a graduate student? I'm a graduate student (PhD, first year) in physics, and there have been a few times where I just can't figure out something regarding the material/subject of the class. Normally I just tell myself that since I'm a graduate student, I better be able to figure it out myself without the help of the professor, or any other "higher-ups" in my department for that matter. This usually leads to success, but not without a fair amount of work. Sometimes the end of my problem seems to recede faster than I make progress, and I usually have other stuff to do, so I get really tempted to just ask the professor, specifically by going to their office hours.

My question is, is going to office hours in a graduate course seen as a bad or "inferior" in US grad schools? I'm obviously not talking about spamming the professor with impulsive and ill-conceived questions.

EDIT: Some people in the comments are saying "Well you're a graduate student, and there are office hours, so obviously you can and should make use of them." Life isn't as simply black-and-white as that. The focus of my question is on the unspoken, possibly subliminal, perception of going to office hours as a graduate student which, by its very nature, is not explicitly stated in "official" text (e.g. syllabi, student conduct guidelines, etc.). Such latent social phenomena are present in every situation and culture. Stated explicitly or not, general academic culture expects graduate students to become independent researchers. I was wondering whether this underlying expectation affected the perception of going to office hours as a graduate student, which by definition is a partial dependence on the professor. This topic is nuanced by the various ways in which one could "go to office hours" (e.g. fully prepared, unprepared, in-between, etc.) and by the variation in perceptions of those various ways. Therefore I think it's nontrivial and worth asking about.

Grad students who come to office hours with good questions that show serious engagement with the material (e.g. attempts to solve the problem themself) are generally seen as mature, hard-working students.

It is also a good way to get to know faculty in your department, which can be useful e.g. if you are looking for a research assistantship, or recommendation letters, etc.

Personally, when I teach, I like when students come to office hours with good questions - it helps me see how students are understanding the lesson, where common points of friction are, and thereby improves the quality of my instruction. It also helps them do better in the course, which is of course a goal we have in common. But, I enjoy teaching and engaging with students. Some faculty in my department don't like teaching, and don't like office hours - but even those faculty members don't look down on students who make (good) use of them.

I'll take a twist and talk not about office hours, but asking questions.

Sure, you could figure everything (or at least: a lot) on your own. It also takes time. In my opinion, even for a fresh PhD student, it takes too much time. So go and ask a question if you have someone to ask. Not necessarily a professor, a fellow PhD student or a PostDoc might also know the answer. If you are asking someone higher-up and would like to leave a good impression, invest into a search for a question.

So, rather than "how to do A?" ask "I would like to do A, but dunno how. I've looked into X, Y, and Z and they all seem not to fit. Could you help me out?".

The background is that most people in PhD and beyond, including your faculty, typically have seen things somewhat akin to your problem and might have an idea worth looking at. Conversely, esp. with peers, you might know something that might help other people.

At the end, harnessing knowledge of other people and collaborating with them on a range of topics would be more productive than trying to squeeze out a single answer while sitting in the ivory tower and meditating on the problem.

tl;dr: Talking to people does not hurt!


How to respond to "unfair to write English" comments? I teach mathematics and computing, for example, our department's discrete mathematics course. As is customary for that course, it's used as the first foray into formal mathematics, including a heavy emphasis on reading and writing proofs throughout the semester (required for both our math & computing majors). In response to difficulties I've seen students wrestle with in prior semesters, on the first day of the course I have a slide with this quote:

Writing Proofs in English
“The best notation is no notation; whenever it is possible to avoid
the use of a complicated alphabetic apparatus, avoid it. A good
attitude to the preparation of written mathematical exposition is to
pretend that it is spoken. Pretend that you are explaining the subject
to a friend on a long walk in the woods, with no paper available; fall
back on symbolism only when it is really necessary.” – Paul Halmos,
How to Write Mathematics

Now, the last few semesters I've done this I find that I regularly get pushback on this. For example, this semester I had a student write in the live online chat, something like, "This seems unfair to students who have poor English skills". And I've been kind of stumped for a short, solid response to that.
Note that I'm at a community college in the U.S., which is part of a large urban university, and about half of our student population is foreign-born. We have a TOEFL requirement for enrollment, but some students indeed have very weak English skills (I've had a small number that apparently needed every course lecture translated by a friend, and couldn't communicate to me directly).
My initial instinct is something like, "You enrolled at a university where the instruction is in English, and has an English requirement for registration, so no one should be surprised at this." But (a) that seems wordy and byzantine, and (b) misses the underlying problem that people are led to believe that math work is entirely deterministic symbol-pushing, such that some people pursue it precisely because they think they won't need strong language skills (in fact, some of our advisors explicitly say this to students).
Obviously, replace "English" here with "natural language" at whatever institution and location you might consider.
What's the best, shortest response to student criticism that "It's unfair to expect writing in English"?
Related from SE Mathematics: Why there is no sign of logic symbols in mathematical texts?

For writing proofs, full knowledge of English is not necessary. Most proofs can be written using a single tense. It is sufficient (and often advisable) to keep the structure of sentences very simple; that is very similar to how logic statements are written using math notation. Arguably, this exercise requires students to use only a small and simple subset of English level. Most students are expected to have it by the admission requirements of the course they signed on.

I've had a small number that apparently needed every course lecture translated by a friend, and couldn't communicate to me directly

If they can't communicate in even the most basic English, I have a difficult time understanding how they could pass TOEFL to begin with, unless your university's entry mark for TOEFL is in negative territory.
Anyway, you seem to think that this is something that's your responsibility and something you can and should do something about. It's not. If students are coming into an English university, with courses taught in English, then they had better bloody well be able to keep up with the English that the instructors are using.
The simplest way to explain this is by turning it around on them, so:

What's the best, shortest response to student criticism that "It's unfair to expect writing in English"?

"If I had chosen to study at an institution that uses <student's native language> for instruction, and I lacked a fundamental grasp of that language, would it be valid for me to claim that it is "unfair" that I cannot understand the instruction being given?"
If they answer "no", they have defeated their own argument.
If they answer "yes", get them to articulate why, because either they are just being difficult, or their reasoning will be unsound and easily defeated.


How to identify predatory publishers/journals What are the best strategies for assessing if a journal is a "vanity" or "predatory" journal that should be avoided (both for publishing in and reviewing for)? For example, how would one go about determining if a journal/publisher belongs on Beall’s List of Predatory Open-Access Publishers?

First, you should probably publish in the same venues that you read and cite.  Presumably those are reputable.

Now to describe low-quality vanity publishers.  Two essential characteristics are:

The publication of very low quality material.  This is usually immediately recognizable to any expert.  Sometimes it's obvious to anyone; for example, read this abstract.
A business model in which the author (rather than the reader) pays the publisher.  Of course, this by itself isn't necessarily indicative of a low-quality publisher (think PLoS).   But low-quality publishers can't make money off of subscriptions, since they provide no content of value.

Additional common characteristics of such publishers are:

Mass e-mails (spam) to academics, especially when the recipients include researchers in unrelated fields.  These e-mails may request submission of conference presentations, papers, or book manuscripts, or may contain invitations to journal editorial boards.
A high number of prominent typographical errors in text attributable to the publisher.  For instance, at the beginning of this article "abstract" is mistakenly spelled "abstarct".

There is an established framework for researchers: Think. Check. Submit.

  Think: Are you submitting your research to a trusted journal? Is it the right journal for your work?
  Check: Use our check list to assess the journal.
  Submit Only if you can answer "yes" to the questions on our check list.

The resource is available in over 40 languages as of 2018. If you want a more personal summary of such criteria, see qsp on why you don't need a list.

Note that an analysis of the numbers shows that The "problem" of predatory publishing remains a relatively small one and should not be allowed to defame open access. Researchers are generally smart enough to not fall in obvious traps; what's left is mostly problems with peer review which exist anywhere, but mostly in journals with scarce transparency.


Can studying in a good place hurt your application? I have the following situation in mind: consider two people A and B, who are roughly "equally good" in their field and do their bachelors in the same university - a small, not widely known insitution. Then student A stays there for his/her Master's, while student B chooses to do his Master's in a more prestigious place.

At the end, they both apply to a PhD at some competitive place. Coming from a "modest" university, where he easily stands high above the average, student A is highly regarded by his/her professors and so manages to get very good recommendation letters. On the other hand, student B studied in a place where students of his level are more common, and so he doesn't impress his professors as much, and they don't speak so highly about him in recommendation letters.

Do you think that scenarios like this could actually make student A seem a better candidate than student B in practice? In this sense, could studying at a good university hurt your career in the long run? Or would the prestige of the university where student B studied (as well as possibly the prestige of the professors who wrote recommendation letters about him) make up for the more modest recommendation letters?

As others have pointed out, anything can happen.  Of course if you are at the weaker M.S.  school, emphasize your class rank, etc.  But my Bayesian estimate is that you (one) are better off at the STRONGER school.  It will challenge you more, move you more etc.

Don't try to be a big fish in a small pond. Go out in the ocean and compete with the Great Whites.  Consider Arnold Schwarzenegger.  He didn't stay in the cowtowns of the Steiermark.  He went to Muscle Beach in California.  "New York, New York...if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere."  Be a playah.

Note:  if there are other reasons, family, weather, economics, pedagogy, etc. that you (one) prefers the easier school, fine.  Of course what matters most is the student, not the school.  If you have the goods, you can prevail anywhere.  But all else equal...go to the harder school.

Just a point of view, but hopefully explaining what is behind the pick.

In my opinion B has better chances -

If you have to select one of 2 - do you take student A who came with grade A from a wood'n grass college behind the 7 hills that nobody has ever heart off in the big city - or do you prefer B who comes with grade B - but from one of the top 5 universities in the field ...

Think the decision is rather obvious who will get invited for an interview by the friendly HR manager.


A staff member was rude to me in an email and made me look bad in front of other members of the staff. How should I handle this? Due to some unfortunate miscommunication, one of the staff members at a university felt like I did not meet one of my obligations.

The staff member sent me an extremely rude email that happened to include other members of the department who I happen to know personally. The fact that the email was extremely condescending makes it seem like the staff member was trying to make me look bad.

Several months ago I received an email outlining some obligations. About a week ago I received another email explaining that I did not have to do one of those obligations. (Fortunately, it turned out to be something that was relatively simple and could be done at any time.)

Because I did not think I had to do the obligation, I did not do it. If the staff member would have clarified what they said, I would have been more than happy to do it. It also turned out to be something extremely simple.

Instead of clarifying, they sent an email that said "I did your work for you" and "here is what I said several months ago to prove that you knew you had to do this" but did not mention where they said "you do not have to do this".

The email was extremely rude and condescending. I would have been able to let it go if they did not include the other members of the department in the email. Now I am not sure how to respond. My thought is that they just forgot that they said I did not have to do the obligation.

I am not sure how to handle this. I have ideas along the lines of asking for an apology, clarifying the situation and explaining that I felt they were extremely rude, or forwarding the entire email chain to higher members of the department.

If I do decide to ask for an apology or clarify the situation, I can't decide whether or not I should include higher members of the department or who in the department I should include.

It sounds as if your co-worker was extremely rude, and owes you an apology, but pointing those things out in so many words is rarely productive. Instead, I would use something like the following template with a reply-all:

  Hi John, there seems to have been some misunderstanding. From your
  email of January 28th (copy attached below), I understood that I was
  no longer required to feed the departmental axolotls - if I misunderstood this, could you please clarify what was intended?
  Anyway, thanks for fielding it on this occasion.

At that point, if your co-worker is a sensible person who was just having an off day, they will offer an apology without further prompting. If not, well, your other colleagues can form their own judgement based on the relevant facts.

edit:

re. whether it's better to respond to the CC list, or just in private: you certainly have a right of reply in the same venue, but whether it's advisable to exercise that right depends very much on circumstances.

If the alleged omission is sufficiently trivial ("you didn't wash up the teapot yesterday!") then "John" has already made themself look silly just by making a big deal about it, and it's not likely to harm your reputation, so I'd just let it go. The annoyance value to others from prolonging the thread outweighs any need for reputation control; cf. the old adage about wrestling with a pig.

At the other end of things, if leaving the allegation unanswered could harm your professional reputation ("you didn't label the poisons cabinet/feed the research animals/complete the grants proposal due next week"), and if "John"'s allegation might seem plausible to the recipients, then it becomes important to rebut it in the forum where it was made. You don't want a dozen co-workers believing that you're a menace to their health or their work.

Leaving aside your own reputation, it might be important to reply for other people's sake. People take their cues on acceptable behaviour from those around them, and bullies often bully more than one person; for either of those reasons, it can be beneficial to see bullying behaviour promptly challenged.

Because workplace culture varies so much, it might be wise to seek input from colleagues at your institution - they can probably tell you better than us whether people take your co-worker seriously.

I think I'd wait a bit.  Eventually one of your colleagues who received a copy of the rude e-mail will mention it to you.  Then you can shrug and say, "Actually, in a later e-mail, she said I didn't have to do that, so I don't know why her panties are in a bunch."  At this point your colleague is apt to give you clear advice on whether the incident will hurt your career in any way.  If not, you can let it go. If so, he can also give clear advice on damage control.

But I think that it's likely that the colleagues copied on the "extremely rude" e-mail already think that her actions were inappropriate.  Someone may have already mentioned it to the chairman/supervisor.


Providers of fake DOIs? How to find and check providers of fake Digital Object Identifier (DOI) numbers? What are the consequences of using fake DOI numbers? How can I know is DOI number actually fake?

DOIs are registered and managed by Registration Agencies appointed by the International DOI Foundation. All registered DOI numbers resolve through https://doi.org/ - if it doesn't resolve it's not a DOI. A DOI can be applied to many different things so the fact that content has a DOI doesn't say anything about the quality or validity of the content. There's a blog post about this - https://www.crossref.org/blog/dois-unambiguously-and-persistently-identify-published-trustworthy-citable-online-scholarly-literature-right/

Attempt to resolve the DOI digitally. If the number doesn’t resolve then it doesn’t currently identify a digital object adequately.

Do you mean “how do I identify DOIs resolving to objects that are academic garbage, lack peer review or a publisher exhibiting academic standards of review prior to publication?”


How do I get a professor at a different institution to read my essay draft? I would like to send a draft of mine to a specific professor. I would be very interested in his comments, however, I am not a student at the moment, so I am not at his institution nor at any other.

Is there any way for me to send him my draft in an email and introduce myself, without sounding rude & incredibly in love with myself? I believe that asking s.o. to read a 5.000 - 10.000 word essay is maybe a bit much? I have no idea how to phrase this or not come across as very demanding and arrogant and I am incredibly concerned.

This is a classic example of what’s been dubbed the “XY problem.” You have some actual problem to which you’ve decided that emailing this professor is the solution and you’re asking about your solution.  But I’m quite confident that getting a professor at another school to read a draft of an essay is not the correct solution to any problem.  You should not be emailing your draft to a professor at another school and no advice we can give on how to email this person is going to make your plan work.  Instead, you should ask a new question about your actual problem.  What kind of essay is this? What kind of problems are you having with writing it?  What kind of help are you looking for?

First of all, visit the official website of famous university and get the details of professors working there.

After reading their profiles, choose the most appropriate professor who can help you out for your topic. Quite often, there will be email address or telephone number of the professor. You can straightly contact him/her asking your need. If there is no contact detail of the particular professor, you can contact the university and collect the details.

No professor would reject your request because professors have social commitment to extend help to all who seek it.


why do academics write peer reviews? I do not understand what good it does them. A professor said it gives opportunity to read papers he would not read on his own. I am sure there is more to it but I do not see what they gain by participating in peer review process. It takes time, it is not paid and not even publicly acknowledged. Why do they do it?

I think academics are paid to perform peer review, in the same sense that they are paid to do research.  I don't have a boss telling me what to research and paying me when it's complete; rather, my university expects me to perform research that is judged significant by my peers.  In the same way, my university expects me to perform peer review.  In my annual reports to the university, I report my research outputs and I report the journals for which I have performed peer review.
You may argue that my continued employment and promotion depends more heavily on my research than on peer reviewing, but the same could be said when comparing any of my service or teaching duties.
The bottom line is, academia is a gift economy, and if you want to be part of the community, you're expected to do peer review.

When I asked the same question, the answer was "control and public relations". While the second one is obvious, the first is a little more subtle and evil. Having someone's else paper in advance it allows you to:

establish a "give and take" relationship with peers you want on your side. anonymity is easy to break, if you want to and know what is going on in other researchers' offices.
slow down the publication of a peer by dragging the review process or demanding additional science to be performed, especially if they are scooping you.
get a sniff of what's going on in someone's else plate, thus granting you a head start that might be useful if you want to attack the same field.
indirectly control the quality of a journal to reduce its score. In some universities, the current score is used to evaluate the paper production of a researcher to grant him funds. If you can have an effect on the overall quality of a journal, this will reduce the total score of a researcher's past effort, and give an edge to someone else to get more funds.


Should I decline a request to tutor a class I will be taking? I am a first semester master's student. A professor has sent me an e-mail with an offer to tutor a bachelor class (this would be a paid job). I do not know him personally but he told me in his e-mail that I was recommended to him by a professor whose class I took this semester.

Now here is the conflict: I did my bachelor's at a different institution and in my country, it is normal for universities to require students who switched institutions to take 1-2 bachelor classes in the first semesters of their master. Among the classes I am required to take is the very same class the professor offered me to tutor. As a tutor, I would be teaching exercise classes and grading other student's solutions to the problem sets.

Can I decline this offer for the above reason or could it be seen as making excuses? I do want to pursue a career in academia so I am afraid that this could be misunderstood as me not being willing to tutor classes or do work for the deparment in general.

You need to tell the professor. I would suggest that you tell them you want to tutor the class and believe you have the skills and knowledge, but that you are being required to take the class for credit. Then ask if it might be possible for the tutoring to satisfy the requirement.

I think it is not rare, especially for courses that are cross-listed as both undergrad and grad courses, that one of the grad students is the grader for the homework, and even has office hours.  Typically, that grad student is the advisee of the professor and he's fulfilling his stipend responsibilities at the same time.

As long as you fully disclose, there's no problem.  (I'm in the U.S.)


A student keeps using a native language while asking questions in the class when the course is taught in English I am assisting a statistics course in a university, and my main job in the course is conducting problem solving sessions. The course is taught in English, and students interact with me in English. However, there is one particular student who keeps using their native language. Whenever he does that, I reply in English, hoping that he would start using English. But he doesn't.

I am sure that everybody does understand what he says because all the students are from the same part of the country. But I find it quite awkward. On the other hand, I feel that if I request him to use English, he might take it offensively, or he might not be able to express what he wants to say clearly. Should I simply ignore this particular case and move on? Or should I tell him somehow? If yes, what is the best way to convey this?

If you want a non-confrontation approach, simply repeat the question in English before answering it.

Hearing the translation may help the student in question see how to phrase their questions in English. It also give a polite hint that the question should have been asked in English.

You may ask to the student that helps you to translate the question to English language. I think that's a kind way for help people to start talking in another language.

After a few days he will start to ask in English and your request, won't be necessary.


Students staying hours past end of office hours Background: I am a fourth year math graduate student working as a TA for an introduction to proofs course with a focus on analysis.

I really enjoy the teaching component of my position as a graduate student, but this semester I feel as though students are taking advantage of my generosity.

As is typical for a TA in the math department at my university, I hold a couple (in my case, two) office hours per week, plus additional availability via appointment.  My office hours are nearly always occupied, which generally pleases me.  However, my students nearly always stay well past the point when my office hours are supposed to end, even a couple hours worth in most cases.

In addition, I tend to spend nearly all my waking hours at my office, so I have no problem meeting with students at a wide variety of times.  They are well aware of this, and several of them have requested frequent appointments that do not coincide with my office hours.  Again, the main issue here is that these appointments often last much, much longer than an hour.

I understand that the material of this course is challenging, and I am glad that my students desire to improve their abilities.  However, their behavior is seriously impinging upon my ability to progress in my research.

What are acceptable avenues for reaching a compromise between my need to progress in my work and my desire to assist my students?  So far I've considered the following:

I've attempted to subtly imply that I would appreciate less consumption of my time, but I don't want to discourage their eager approach to their work and they don't seem to be getting the hint.
Alternatively, I could lie about having meetings, other appointments, obligations, etc, but I would feel wrong doing so.
I could obviously just tell them that they can't stay late because I have other work that I need to perform, but again, I don't want to directly shut them down.

Ultimately, I would love to find some systematic way to decrease the strain that they place on my schedule.  One trick I have utilized is the deliberate scheduling of an office hour immediately before the taught class, since both me and any students have to leave at that time to go to class.  Are there other things like this I could do?

I'm not merely looking for a solution for this semester, because I'd like to prevent this problem in the future as well.

You don't need a "trick" to solve this problem. They're staying past the end of your scheduled office hours because you have been tolerant of this so far. (I suspect they completely missed your subtle hints.)

It sounds like you have made it too easy for them to use you as a crutch, rather than doing the work on their own and then coming to you with specific, focused questions. (Very much like this situation.) It's not good for you and it's not good for them.

At the end of your scheduled office hours, say (with a smile):

  Thanks, everyone, for coming! Don't forget that if you need extra help, you can also schedule an appointment with me.

You can do the same thing at the end of a scheduled appointment:

  It seems like we made some progress here. If you realize you still have questions after working on this some more, you can schedule another appointment.

Then if you need more of a reason to usher them out the door, grab your jacket and announce that you're going out for some coffee/air/exercise/something to eat.

If you think students are using office hours productively and genuinely need more time with a TA, consider letting the course instructor know - perhaps he/she should hire another TA to offer extra support.

If you're just a pushover by nature, you may need to either find a different location to hold your office hours and additional appointments, or find a different location to do your own work.

Is the course too difficult for the students at their current level?

If not, just get the student unstuck about a particular question or stumbling block, then say, "I think you're well on your way now, off you go.  Have fun!" If the student is reluctant to leave, say, "I have full confidence in you.  You will be fine.  Let me know if you get stuck again."  Then walk out to the bathroom or the water fountain.

I love user21280's idea about fostering collaboration among students.  You can facilitate this by grouping two to four students at a time for particular questions, and after a little bit, suggesting they get together for regular study group meetings.  You can also take a page out of online teaching and get everybody into a google group talking to each other.


What's the difference between "academic staff" and "research staff"? For example in Cambridge website of math department, it lists University Academic Staff and Research Staff. What is the difference?

In the UK academic staff and research staff are typically used to circumvent funding regulations that limit many fellowships to individuals who do not have, nor have ever had, a permanent academic staff position. The fundamental distinction is that academic staff are on permanent contracts and research staff are on fixed-term contracts. Academic staff generally are on teaching and research contracts, but some can be on teaching only or research only contracts. I have never meet a member of research staff that wasn't on a research only contract.

Things get hazy because often research staff have two contracts. A fixed term research only contract and a permanent research and teaching contract dated the day the research only contract ends. If they then get a different fellowship, they tear up the research and teaching contract and get a new one with the new date. This allows them to continue to be research only and qualify for fellowships.

While there are obviously differences across institutions, looking at the provided pages for Cambridge, every member of academic staff I looked at had a academic rank (e.g., lecturer or professor) and non of the research staff did.

The tenure track is not really a thing in the UK anymore. Permanent contracts usually come with a 3 year probationary period. The requirements to pass the probationary period could be as little as do not screw up, but could also have publication and funding requirements. I am not particularly familiar with the publication requirements, but they are likely focused on the REF framework. Departments generally have a group For non-academic staff on fixed term contracts that have most of the same privileges as academic staff. Often this is the Research Staff group, but sometimes RAs and post docs get dumped into the research staff label. As I said above, these select non-academic staff people on fixed term contracts often have a permanent contract waiting for them if there is a lapse in their funding so for all intensive purposes they have tenure.

Research staff in this context are mostly people who don't have permanent positions, rather they have fellowships that last x number of years or are hired post docs on projects. Hence the general age difference between the two groups.


I got the same referee report from two different journals My coauthor and I submitted our article for publication to one of the best journals in our field. After a long time of review, we got a rejection decision by the editor based on the referee report which we received. After that we wrote to the editor and explained to him/her that the referee arguments to reject our paper are wrong and provided point by point evidence to support our conclusions.

However, the editor did not accept our arguments so we then sent our paper to another journal which is also among the best in our field. After waiting for considerable time, we got a rejection decision from the second journal and the same referee report as the first journal. I repeat the two reports which we received from two journals are completely identical! We have asked the editor of the second journal for explanations why we got the same report and so far we have not heard any reply.

Based on these facts, we believe that our paper is being rejected for some unknown personal reasons not clear to us rather than objective reasons connected with our work.  In between the two submissions, we have revised our paper based on the first journal referee report.

Have your ever experienced such a situation?

How should we behave in this case?

UPDATE:

Based on some comments below about this post, I want to express my opinion in more details about this issue. I am an expert in my working field and have reviewed several papers too. However, if somebody is asked to review the same paper more than once from two different journals, it is ethical that the referee rejects to review the paper and gives the possibility to another referee to do it. The referee can have an option to explain to the second journal editor the reasons why he/she rejected the paper initially and also point out the comments which he/she received back from the authors through the first journal (as in our case) that his/her conclusions might be wrong.

As a reviewer, when I get asked to review a paper the second time I will see whether my comments from the initial review were addressed. If not, then I will submit the same review. Why should I update my review if the paper has not been updated?

Getting the same reviewer is a very common occurrence. Perhaps in your situation the reviewer is misguided. However, when re-submitting a paper you should make every effort to address previous reviews.  And, in any case, legitimate issues raised by the reviewer should be addressed. Even if you think the reviewer is confused, you should seek to clarify the confusing points. They may be confusing to others too.

In your position there is probably not much you can do other than write to the editor explaining the situation. The best argument you can put forth is to explain that all of the points in the review have already been addressed in the submission. That makes it look like the reviewer didn't read it, which means the editor may side with you.

Just ask editor for another reviewer, saying this is second journal you have had same individual block the paper.  If a new reviewer blocks it again (and you really think the review would weaken the paper), just drop to a lower prestige outlet or even Arxive.

It's a little strange that you don't mention how the other reviews went at first and second journal (how many were there and did they recommend publishing)?

While I think the reviewer should have notified editor that he had rejected paper before with identical review (for one thing editor might want a new opinion), I don't see any point in getting into this.  Just ask for a new review (is a reasonable request, especially if other reviews have been positive.)


How to address Phd dissertation committee members in email? I am in the process of notifying my PhD dissertation committee (already formed)on the proposal exam. I would like to send an email to all of them and now I am confused as to how to address them. Should I address them as committee members or Professors ABC, PQR, XYZ or Sirs, etc. What would be the best option to address them:

Dear Committee members
Dear Committee
Dear Professors ABC, PQR, XYZ
Respected Sirs
Sirs
Dear All

At my place, they are called SRC (Student Research Committee) members, so that makes the acronym more usable. I always started my emails by writing:

  Respected SRC members,

The SRC members part additionally makes the context clear (in addition to the subject of the mail). I prefer Respected to Dear, and while that may (or may not) be culture specific, it never hurts to shower respects on these people, unless of course, they explicitly ask you not to do that.

Additionally, I deliberately avoided Professors. Even though these committee members could generically be addressed as professors, one of my SRC members was technically still not a Professor, but an Associate Professor. While the distinction might be a bit over-strict in this context, I preferred being technically correct too. (That might be a nerdy, personal choice.)

Hope that helps :)

Good morning,

OR

Good afternoon,

are good choices for formal group email messages.


What is the difference between a school and a department? Some universities have a School of Something and some a Department of Something. Are they identical and just two common terms for the same thing, or they are different in the university structure?

My impression is that a School is generally larger than a Department. Probably, school is an academic unit between department and faculty. Maybe, a faculty has a few schools, and each school hosts some departments.

The term school and department are going to mean different things at different institutions. Generally speaking, the term school refers to a larger unit within a university than department and many schools will contain multiple departments. For example, Harvard University contains a School of Public Health (and other schools) which contains a Department of Epidemiology (and other departments).

That said, names are often not even used uniformly or consistently within universities. For example, at the same organizational level as the School of Public Health at Harvard is the Faculty of Arts and Sciences which runs both Harvard College and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. My current university uses the concept of an academic "unit". Many units are "schools" (e.g., the School of Public Health or the Information School) but others are not (e.g., the College of Arts of Sciences). There is also an organization within the university called the Graduate School which cuts across and oversees  work in different units and schools.

Sometimes, smaller "schools" will not contain separate departments. Sometimes, a large department in a large school might be larger than entire schools elsewhere in the university! Sometimes, the terms might be used interchangeably. In many other cases, they won't. In some cases, one or both terms might not even be used at all!

School is a specialized one, which caters to only the studies beyond UG i.e Graduate and Doctoral one. Schools generally do not have UG studies

Deptt caters to dominatingly UG studies as well ....


Would a professor write a bad letter of recommendation? I asked a professor from my online graduate degree to write a letter of recommendation. It was when I first started looking at graduate school, so was not prepared with what you would usually want to give a professor, especially one you had never met in person. The exchange went like this

Me: "Dr. XXXXX,

I was a student of yours at XXXX from 2011-2014. I will be separating from the military in the fall and am looking to pursue another Master's degree in Food Science. I hope to fuse this with my work at XXXX and my previous biochemical engineering degree in order to work as an R&D chef focused on Nutrition. I was wondering if you wouldn't mind endorsing a letter of recommendation for me. It would be a great help in my application process. Thanks so much for your time."

Professor:
"Yes, I will be happy to provide a letter of recommendation to you. Please, let me know specific details and whom it should be sent to."

Me:
"Thanks so much for the quick response. I'm actually looking at colleges right now, but as soon as I get them narrowed down I will send you the contact information. As far as specific details, is there anything you are particularly looking for? Or should I just include the classes I attended that you taught? GPA? The focus of my studies? Once again, thanks so much for your help. I really appreciate it."

Professor:
"I do not need any additional information. Let me know when you need letter to be sent."

Is this basically, you didn't come to me prepared. Now you're getting a bad letter? Or maybe my record was looked up and showed something bad? I got all A's in the classes and was the supervisor of my capstone project which was also an A. Since then I've sent  my resume and some facts to work off of as well. Communication had been normal since then, usually a quick response with short replies. I feel like I may just be being paranoid, but I figured I'd get some unsolicited opinions on whether it's worth the risk (if there is a risk) to use his letters.

The professor is a Dean at the college and has been exposed to my work the most. I've contemplated possibly asking politely what happened during that exchange, but I can't for the life of me figure out how I would even approach that. One letter has already been written and submitted to a school.

I would read these responses as: "I am happy to write you a letter of recommendation, I am busy, and just want know where to send my letter".

As a professor, I get literally hundreds of emails everyday, many of which, like yours, I want to reply to, but I don't have time to write elaborate or detailed responses. I read the responses you got as terse but professional.

If I am approached by a student I don't feel I can write a good recommendation letter for, I usually tell them this, and suggest they ask someone else. I think this is common practice.

Be very pleased this instructor is willing to give you a recommendation letter. If you are super curious what he will say, ask him for a CC sent to you, to put in your resume file. Just in case you change your mind and chose another school. You won't have to bother him again since you have a copy of the letter and can just forward it. It may work different for school ref. Letters but every Supervisor etc. I have every asked for a reference sent me a copy anyway.


Is it acceptable for a professor to tell male students to not think that they are smarter than female students? The situation occurred  in the first lecture of an undergraduate course in a STEM field at an university.

The professor said that there are less than 20% female students in the class, while the usual ratio is 40% (across fields and different academic degrees). The topic was brought up to "discuss microaggressions", such as letting female students do the easier tasks in group work. It should be noted that there is no selection of students for the field of study at the university (apart from a high school diploma) and AFAIK there also is none for the course.

Then the male students were told to "not think they are smarter than their female neighbor", that "your female neighbour not asking questions does not mean that she is not following, maybe she is a lot smarter than you think" and that the professor is much better at the field than all of the male students (the last part was told with a smirk, not sure if it was a joke or a sign of satisfaction) and it was finished with a "GO GIRLS".

These main reasons why I find  this offensive/disrespectful:

The students were viewed and addressed primarily through the lense of
group membership, and not as individuals.
Replacing "male" with any other group makes the statements offensive or absurd.
While the instructions to not look down on/patronize female students
are correct, they are (in my view) indirect accusations of sexism.
The contents of the talk, which took 5-10 minutes, were not related to the lecture and thus
were a waste of time for students. The issue might be important, but I was there to learn different contents.

Is my view justified? Is such behavior acceptable for a professor? Should I let the professor know the way I feel?

(edited this answer to consider some points raised in the comments and try to address OP more constructively)

Yes, it is acceptable for a professor to work to counter the effects of gender discrimination.

Yes, it is acceptable for a professor to warn a male-predominant class to not discriminate against women by giving them the "easy" tasks.

The professor is not accusing you as an individual of sexism, they are pointing out researched ways in which women are discriminated against, especially in STEM areas where women are under-represented.

Although your initial reaction was that this was a waste of time, I think you can use this experience and the feedback you get here as an opportunity to reflect - it seems from your comments that you are open to this.

I'd suggest you try the implicit bias test from Harvard, I was surprised by how much implicit bias it showed that I have. Some research has shown that people who take this sort of test are more introspective about their own biases afterwards. Even if you show little bias on that test, it may be instructive to see how much bias is seen in the population as a whole because people tend to underestimate bias experienced by other groups.

I don't think having implicit bias is something that reflects poorly on any individual, it's more of a product of society. What reflects on individuals is whether they try to become aware of the biases experienced by others and how their own implicit biases might influence their behavior.

I think your professor was trying to point out some of these biases to make students in the class more aware of them. It seems unlikely to me that any men in the course would literally think to themselves "Let's give the women the easy/secretarial tasks in group work!" (and if they do, they are probably never going to be convinced otherwise) - instead, they might accidentally do it by simply not thinking. By simply thinking about it more, and even by asking this question here, it seems to me like your professor was successful, even if you ultimately decide that you disagree with the approach.

Carter, A. J., Croft, A., Lukas, D., & Sandstrom, G. M. (2018). Women’s visibility in academic seminars: Women ask fewer questions than men. PloS one, 13(9), e0202743.

Cheryan, S., Ziegler, S. A., Montoya, A. K., & Jiang, L. (2017). Why are some STEM fields more gender balanced than others?. Psychological Bulletin, 143(1), 1.

Kaatz, A., Gutierrez, B., & Carnes, M. (2014). Threats to objectivity in peer review: the case of gender. Trends in pharmacological sciences, 35(8), 371-373.

Lerback, J., & Hanson, B. (2017). Journals invite too few women to referee. Nature News, 541(7638), 455.

Monteith, M. J., Ashburn-Nardo, L., Voils, C. I., & Czopp, A. M. (2002). Putting the brakes on prejudice: On the development and operation of cues for control. Journal of personality and social psychology, 83(5), 1029.

Swim, J. K., & Sanna, L. J. (1996). He's skilled, she's lucky: A meta-analysis of observers' attributions for women's and men's successes and failures. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22(5), 507-519.

This sort of an approach is becoming increasingly popular as a way to fix the gender imbalance in academia. Gender discrimination is a problem that exists almost everywhere in society, including in academia. So, this is obviously a problem that needs to be addressed. The professor cannot be criticized for addressing this issue in class, but one may question if this is going to be effective. If the professor is concerned about social dynamics among students affecting female students adversely, then that suggests that one should not organize group work where such effects can manifest itself and compromise academic results.

The bigger picture is that Western countries where efforts to curb gender discrimination have led to a lot of success when it comes to getting women in leading positions in industry, still perform quite poorly when it comes to curbing the gender imbalance in academia. As pointed out in the linked article, the more gender equal a country is, the bigger the gender gap is in academia, despite a lot more effort to promote women to choose STEM subjects:

The article puts forward some ideas to explain this that I personally don't find all that compelling. I.m.o. it's better to study the case of the Soviet Union where the participation of women in science was an order of magnitude better than in the West. The way the Soviet Union differed from the West was that as a communist country, job security was not an issue. Also, the educational system was much better than the Western educational systems.

So, the reason why today we have such a huge gender imbalance in science is because we've organized science within a capitalist framework. Society doesn't value science all that much, this leads to quite a lot of pressure pushing people away from science. One important issue is that job security is a problem for quite a long time into a scientific career. Both women and men are affected by this, but all we notice is the difference between the participation of men and women, which is just the tip of the iceberg. Long term job security tends to be more important for women than for men in determining career choices. Also gender discrimination will have a far greater effect when job security issues are also at play.

If society makes more room for science by making available more funds, then this will lead to more jobs in science. Scientists will have better job security, this will go a long way to get far more women (and also men) into science and keep them there. Women are then affected more by these issues because long term job security tends to be more important for women than for men in determining career choices. Also gender discrimination will have a far greater effect when job security issues are also at play.


Are there any aspects of PhD work that do not translate well to distance learning? In another question about distance PhDs (Do any schools offer teaching or research assistantships via distance education?), I received several comments noting that PhDs on-line are of inferior quality to on-campus PhDs. If what is seen of PhD work from PHD Comics is accurate, PhD students seem to spend much time working independently. So, what aspect of a PhD cannot translate to the on-line format? What aspect of the process cannot be effectively conducted via E-mail or any of the other various forms of on-line communication?

A general answer is that a lot of PhD training is informal: it involves things that are taught by example, by osmosis, by noticing someone doing something wrong and correcting them (or right, and praising them). This kind of informal training is much more difficult in online interactions. Some examples are given below...

One specific aspect that does not translate well to online learning is the cross-pollination of ideas via proximity.

A big part of training PhD students involves putting a bunch of smart, talented, hardworking people together and letting them learn from, motivate, support, and bounce ideas off one another. A prerequisite for this is proximity; you just can't have the same kind of interactions over email. Some research centers are explicitly designed to encourage this. At the Bell Labs facility in Murray Hill, NJ,

  Some of the hallways in the building were designed to be so long that to look down their length was to see the end disappear at a vanishing point. Traveling the hall’s length without encountering a number of acquaintances, problems, diversions and ideas was almost impossible.

(Source: New York Times)

The research center I currently work in was built with a long hallway with this in mind, specifically to foster collaboration between students in different groups!

Another thing that does not translate well is learning scientific communication and mentoring skills. As a PhD student, I have many chances to practice speaking about my work to other graduate students, professors, and undergraduates. I also get to mentor M.S., B.S., and high school students in my lab. These skills are much more difficult to learn over distance.

A third thing that does not work well over email and Skype is learning the etiquette and standards of the field. This is something that isn't explicitly taught (usually) but that students are expected to pick up by osmosis from spending time with other academics and others in their field.

I have completed all of my college from bachelor's to doctorate via distance education. In all cases, I sought out to make friends with others also in school and routinely hang out with them. If you do it right, the online learning experience can be extremely beneficial in terms of networking, collaboration, and all the "informal" training that happens in a non-traditional program.

However, unless you are viciously self-motivated and have a drive like no other, a distance education program will not prepare you in the same way that a traditional doctoral program will. This has both positives and negatives. For example, you are not part of a traditional experience and are now an anomaly in terms of who you are and what you bring to the table, but at the same time you probably have 4-5 years of professional experience (assuming you worked the whole time) that you have been applying to your academic life throughout your program.

For me, it's not that it's more beneficial or not, but rather that I see two types of doctoral students out there: traditionally trained ones who hit the professional world with a lot of intelligence but less wisdom, and non-traditionally trained ones who have a more balanced amount of intelligence and wisdom. I think it would be difficult for a non-traditional doctorate to specialize fiercely in a field and become the spokesperson for, say, a specific methodology or something, but that doesn't mean that it's impossible.

I have met people with degrees from traditional training who are completely unreliable and not worth the salary they think they command, and then I have met people who have been stellar performers in their field and have a non-traditional education to make themselves a more well-rounded person. In the end, you get out of something what you put in to it.


Letter of Recommendation from English Teacher for Math Ph.D. program? I am a Japanese undergraduate junior student who is thinking of applying to graduate programs in Mathematics in the U.S. and the biggest problem for me is the Letter of Recommendation. I am planning to ask a teacher of my English class for one of my LOR because my senior who went for a grad school(Engineering) in the U.S. did so.
My intention is that she can prove that I have sufficient English skills to study in the U.S.

However, from what I have seen on the Internet, no one seemed to do so and all of LORs have to be from people in relevant fields. Is getting a LOR from an English teacher for Math Ph.D. program good or bad?

Knowledge of the English language is often a hit-or-miss requirement, i.e., either you have a recognized English qualification (TOEFL, IELTS...) and you can study there, or you do not have it and you cannot study there. In many institutions, this is checked by administrative personnel, independently of the selection committee.

Having better English knowledge than other applicants who also have the qualification will in most cases not give you any advantage over them. The selection committee (or the prospective PhD professor, depending on the location) will almost exclusively consider your qualifications in your research field when deciding whether to admit you.

I would recommend trying to obtain recommendation letters from people that can say good things about your skills in your field.

Ask the professors who know you very well and can speak of your ability to succeed in the program.

P.S. I got into the grad program I wanted. I had 2 LoR from the field and 1 from non-field. The strongest letter would come from my non-field professor who knows very well about my work ethic and passion, and what I can bring into the program.


COVID-19 - how do I navigate this situation with my advisor? I am a Master's student in epidemiology. It's an insane time in our field right now. Of course, I find what's going on fascinating (that's why I am in this field), but extremely stressful as well.

I have 2 advisors. My primary advisor is not working on COVID-19 related stuff. So, although she's really busy trying to re-plan all of her classes to be remote and just reorganize everything, she is not responding directly to the outbreak. My co-advisor, however, is on the response team for the outbreak in my country. Basically, she is working with the government to create models to predict the trajectory of the disease. I had a meeting with her 1.5 weeks ago and she said basically all she has on her mind is COVID-19. That was before the world went into quarantine so I imagine things have become even busier for her.

My primary advisor sent me an email today talking about how to move forward and in the email she mentioned that it does depend on how busy my co-advisor is (but also assured me we would figure this all out).

Unfortunately, the project I am working on now is a modelling project and my primary advisor isn't a modeller, so it's my co-advisor that needs to move the project forward. I still have other things to do for my thesis, but I am almost done those other things and I am just in the editing stages. I have a lot more to do on my modelling project, but my co-advisor is extremely busy right now. I am finished what she asked me to do a couple of weeks ago and want to send it to her.

Sorry for the long post explaining my situation. My question is, should I send her the things the I have finished or would that be a bit tone-deaf? What should I even say in the email? I don't want to come off as not caring about the biggest health crisis in at least a decade while asking her to review something that's not even related to COVID-19. How should I even frame the email or should I hold off from sending her things for a few weeks?

If it makes a difference, although I do have an office, I can do 100% of my work remotely (and do usually work from home at least 3 days a week).

As someone who's been out of academia for a while, I would like to offer a different perspective. Yes, occupying your co-advisor's attention when the roof is on fire is tone-deaf. However: you have acquired skills that are obviously in high demand these days, and are thrown into a (hopefully) once-in-a lifetime situation to apply these skills. Especially since you're not on a strict deadline with your thesis, there are now more important things than finishing the thesis at the scheduled time. See this as an opportunity, not an obstacle.

Check if this is okay with your primary advisor, then send a mail to your co-advisor saying that you would be glad to put your thesis on ice and help her with her COVID work if she has anything you could be of help with. If you are a capable student, she probably will.

Then, when things have calmed down, reevaluate the situation, see what you have learned in the meantime, and continue from there.

Can you adapt your model to deal with the problem that is interesting everyone else? You don't have to come up with a magical solution to modeling the COVID outbreak, just use your knowledge to say something interesting and relevant. Help your co-advisor with the collection and synthesis of data, do your bit of modeling and write it all up. The level of interest in the topic will out-weigh the downsides of having to change tack at this late stage of your studies.

You need to discuss this (or any other option) with your primary advisor first.

Keep the material you have already completed, and try to discuss it with your co-advisor in if and when the COVID outbreak is under control.


Why do German universities rank so low internationally? There are very well known American and British universities, which have a very good reputation in a lot of different fields. Obvious examples being Cambridge, Harvard or Princeton.
But what about the state funded German universities, how is their international reputation? Why are the German schools ranked so poorly in international rankings like the Shanghai ranking?

There are lots of biases in international academic rankings, they tend to favour US and UK universities because they use criteria which are mostly relevant for a market-oriented academic system, such as the US/UK ones.
In many European countries the academic system is not market-oriented, or at least not as much as in the US and the UK: students fees are very low because higher education is mostly funded by public money.  Universities are seen as a public service offering education to society as a whole, rather than a kind of commercial institution which sells knowledge and qualifications to those who can afford it. As a consequence Non-US/UK universities are not as incentivized to attract international students, they don't make big efforts to play the competition game since their income doesn't depend (at least not much) on their international ranking.
Of course this is only a simplified explanation, but this is the main reason why US/UK universities perform better than German universities (among others) in international rankings.

[Edit] Originally this was only a quick answer to explain what (I think) is an important structural and cultural difference with respect to international rankings between UK/US-like academic systems and others. My point was only to emphasize this difference to the attention of prospective students looking at these rankings, knowing that this is a common source of misunderstanding among them. I didn't imagine that the question and my answer would attract so much attention. I gladly admit that this is a rather simplistic answer, and I'm happy to see that other answers have done a much better job than me at analyzing other aspects of the question in detail.

I would like to add one more point:
Top Institute like Max Planck, Helmholtz, Leibniz, Fraunhofer Institutes and many more offers Research (master, PhD, etc) in the German language, where hardly any international students gave more choice. Even these Institution and other Institution offers in the English language, which gives more completion for admission.


Publication - discovered an error in the proof of theorem which the referees have not spotted, what to do? I have finished my Phd in maths shortly. A few days ago, I have heard a revision decision from a very good journal where I submitted my paper. The comments from referees are generally fairly positive, and are not too difficult to address. However, I have found a mistake in a theorem proof,  which the referees have not spotted. This mistake is difficult to fix, or may be unfixable. The theorem is the extension of the main result of the paper. I assume it is not an important result, as there are no comments or revisions from referees on this part. Then how to write to the referees to address this issue? I imagine it would annoy both the referees and the editor. When I am going to submit the revision, is it better to remove the wrong theorem or to keep it there? Many thanks.

You absolutely have to advise the editor and referees of the error, and either correct or remove the erroneous part.  It doesn't matter how much it annoys them, or even if it leads to the rejection of your paper.  Keeping it there would be totally unacceptable and unethical.

Just tell the editor straight out:

"I discovered an error in the proof of Theorem 1.2.3.  It does not seem to be fixable, so this theorem should be removed from the paper.  The rest of the paper is unaffected [assuming that it actually is]."

The editor will probably ask the referees to re-review the paper with this information.  It might change their decision, or it might not.  But even if it gets rejected, that's something you just have to live with: fix the paper and submit it somewhere else.

You seem to be assuming that the referees noticed the error but decided not to say anything about it in their review.  I doubt that.  It's far more likely that they didn't notice it at all.  Referees are humans and not omniscient gods, and just because they overlook an error does not mean it is okay to publish it.

Referees are there to check quality of paper, contents of the paper, procedures, theorems and lot of stuff so they often miss here and there being humans.

Letting the error go to be published can have two outcomes.

1st in academia there is trust on authors, other refering your paper assume the theorem to be fine and that can lead other papers to have errors.

2nd some one can spot the error later on and can cite your paper im his work showing the error which can be a matter of shame for you.

So better inform editor that it is the case and removing this portion will have no effect or these these effects. Let them decide then.


Vocational vs. Academic Emphasis in CS Curriculum I have been recently thinking about the role of a university curriculum in CS. Computer science degrees immediately offer their graduates a lucrative position in industry; this is obviously making them highly attractive to prospective students who want to get in on the action, and as a result they often care less about their foundational education (say, computational complexity, Turing machines, logic, calculus, proper algorithmic analysis), and more about getting hands-on experience.

I am leaning very strongly against this trend - I believe that at its foundation, our purpose as a faculty is to train computer scientists, not programmers. If they end up being proficient software engineers as a result, this is a bonus, not the main goal. This line of thinking has some very real implications on how courses are taught, what courses are taught and what opportunities we offer our students.

For example, we are at current flooded with requests from other faculties to offer 'low-level' courses to non-CS majors so that their students get the basic training they need in order to code in ML/AI environments. These requests can't merely be ignored.

My question is this: are other CS departments under similar pressure to produce programmers rather than computer scientists? What will be some of the long-term effects of this trend?

I can only speak for the US, and I'll limit my remarks to undergraduate education there. I've been a student or faculty member at a wide range of colleges and universities from tiny (few hundred students) to massive (tens of thousands). Also a wide range of college focus, including liberal arts colleges, specialized focus colleges, and comprehensive universities. Not everything I can say is current, of course, since the participation started in the early 1960s.

Undergraduate education in the US, is normally very broad, encompassing much of the knowledge of "Western" (now broader) thought. The goal is to "produce" an "educated person generally" and one who is well placed for a lifetime of productive activity. There isn't a focus on "training for the job market", but many of the skills are useful there - thinking, writing, analyzing, debating, etc. In addition to the general education requirements, students normally have a major (possibly two) in which they focus more deeply. Computer Science has been a potential major for only about fifty years and the education has changed as the field has changed. Of course, it is still changing at a rate faster than many other fields.

The "hot job market" for CS graduates is an incredibly transient thing. The market runs both cold and hot. Students are a bit fickle about what majors they want to study based on news reports and such. Sometimes it is CS and other times it is Finance, depending on general economic conditions. Other fields don't seem to have these extreme cycles. I can't remember a "hot" market for mathematics since the early Sputnik days. I have also lived through periods in which you couldn't find CS students anywhere.

But, I don't know of very many places in which the faculty that design curricula think of their job as vocational. While most of our students do wind up working in the field, the faculty really wants to position their students for a wider range of option, primarily advanced education. If we don't make it possible for our students to enter an advanced program, we have failed. That, at least, is the perception that I notice.

Vocational education does occur in "Junior Colleges" of course, some of which have that mission (though not all do).

Also, I wonder about a perception that companies simply want colleges to teach students the latest tools and languages. I actually doubt that is true. I think they want intelligent people who can fairly quickly be productive, but who have the depth to grow with the future needs of the company. They don't really want "just programmers", though when you pin down the people who do the hiring that is what they say - since that is their job. What the company really wants is someone who can think, write, analyze, .... More important, that is what they need.

An anecdote. I once had a class of technical wonders who did essentially everything you asked of them. Mixed in was a student with somewhat modest technical skills. My prediction for her was that she would eventually wind up being the boss/manager of the whiz kids since she was the one in the class that always asked "why are we doing this? why is it important?". I still think that perspective is what leads to success. Not just "how does this work?"

You appear to have framed this as a spectrum between vocational and "academic" emphasis in undergraduate studies.  I think it is an interesting exposition that can shake loose the failings of each extreme but I have to reject this premise of your question.

First, taking it as true, I have to argue that a vocational focus should be preferred.  We live in a market-driven economy which is just as forceful with human skills as it is for competition between Apple and Samsung.  Students choose to SPEND 4 years of their lives pursuing various branches of knowledge -- the choice of which should not be made absent an understanding of this fact.  There may be a benefit to society in having academics pursue purely theoretical works (not the least of which is the potential that that research might get swept up into something with practical benefits) but this cannot be the focus of every, or even most, students.

Now rejecting this premise, I have to say that the two go hand in hand with one another.  Taking Turing machines as an example; there is a wealth of practical knowledge that share a common framework with Turing machines (e.g. regular expressions).  You can teach Turing machines until the cows come home -- so long as you are also teaching regular expressions and compiler theory, you can serve both objectives.  What I found in my undergraduate studies, was that the intuitive basis of Turing machines (regular expressions) was omitted to give the course the air of intense academic theory; the approach was dishonest.

This was consistent with what I found in a lot of courses after first year undergrad; professors stop teaching from first principles and expect students to absorb the subject matter from a conglomeration of theoretical rhetoric.  For instance, neural networks was taught as a complex modelling of the brain when in reality its simplest exposition is in optimization of simple functions.

If one were to "leanvery strongly" against the vocational trend, I fear that the result would be this "Emperor's New Clothes" scenario I've described above.  It takes its seat in the same ego-driven nonsense that allows for Star Wars fictions being published in scientific journals.