Can we add co author later? Me and my friends did a project during final semester. It got accepted for publication. Later I came to abroad for studies. My friends didn’t add my name as a co author.I have given my input and it’s my project idea to initiate. Can we add my name as a co author later?

In principle, it is possible to make changes up until the point that final proofs have been submitted. However, at a well-run journal any attempt to add an author after acceptance would require approval from the journal's editor, and they would likely require an explanation for why this change is being sought before agreeing.
The reason for this is to guard against various forms of misconduct, especially:

subversion of the review process, e.g. by concealing conflicts of interest;
offers of authorship as a reward/bribe.

If the editor is satisfied with your explanation, they will allow you to add authors. If they are not, the result is likely to be that the paper's acceptance is rescinded, and it is rejected from the journal. Note that many journals require the corresponding author to certify that they have included all relevant individuals as authors as part of the submission process, and admitting that you lied here does not do much for your credibility.

I believe we cannot. This is because the purpose of an article is to be a source of information and entertainment for people who do not have the time to do research on their own, which means that it must be as accurate as possible.
If you were to go back and change things after it was published, then what are the readers supposed to believe?
The co-author would likely have a different perspective than the original author, which means that he would either disagree with it or expand on the topic in ways that could be considered offensive by people who agree with the original article.
It is possible that the co-author would disagree with the topic and remove it entirely, which makes a mockery of the entire article.
It is also possible that the co-author might add information that was not there before, which would change the focus of the article and make it more about him or her than he main topic.
I believe it is best to keep articles like this as they are, where the author has a single point of view that will not change over time.


How can I address a student systematically boosting their grades by filing frivolous complaints? I was recently accused of unfair grading by a student.  The accusation is meritless, and it didn't take long to prove that I didn't do anything wrong.  No damage, but a lot of time wasted.

Later, I learned through the grapevine that I was among a long list of victims.  Indeed, in just one year, the very same student filed formal complaints against at least nine professors.  The nature of the complaints vary from case to case, but they follow the exact same script:

In every case, the student will take some small thing, e.g. a missed quiz or a late homework, and make a big argument with the instructor out of it.  The student will then escalate the issue to higher level and get the dean of college or even the president of the university involved. Of course the dean or the president have better things to do, so the student is usually ignored and the whole thing blows over quickly … or so we thought.  This part turns out to be only the lead jab in a one-two combination.  It's more of a setup.
The real strike comes at the end of the semester. When the grade is not good (which is 100% of the cases), a formal complaint will be filed stating that the student was punished for the earlier argument.  This is a very serious accusation and lead to complicated investigations in several cases.  It caused so much additional work that several professors just gave in and changed the grade to something the student liked.

This trick had a surprisingly high success rate, especially considering several victims are tenured professors.  The student is emboldened, and I have no doubt that the cycle will repeat.  If not stopped, I wouldn't be surprised if this student can earn a degree just by reusing this trick again and again.

My question is: Should we professors (as a group) react to such a behaviour and if yes, how? What could be the consequence, if any?

So far I have read the students' code of conduct carefully.  There appear to be nothing that can be directly applied here.  The closest appears to be the rule about dishonesty, but it wouldn't work by itself.

Updates:

After sharing parts of this story, I received several similar stories from friends and colleagues in other universities.  So the situation I described here is perhaps not as unique as it first appears.  It turns out, in my previous university, the department chair handled two similar cases while I was there.  But because such cases are supposed to be confidential, I was not aware of them.  I suspect this happens more often than we think.
The student does not have to prove his/her claim for this trick to work.    He/she simply has to file a complaint and a grade change appeal at the same time.  Students' have the right to do those.  That will trigger a lot of work for the instructors, the department chair, and the dean's office.  In my case, it took me 20~30 hours to respond to the complaints, provide assignment for review, and do other works.  Not everyone has this kind of time on the last day of the final week.  Given the options of doing these extra work vs. changing a letter and let it go, not everyone will make the right choice.

More update:

This student scored one more win:
The grade appeal committee's new ruling is that I should/have to change my grade (one letter grade higher) even though it was determined that I did not do anything wrong.
I now realized the student's trick work on multiple levels: It just keep on throw in serious accusations. At some point, someone, will feel it would less trouble to just give him/her what he/she was asking for. The instructor does not have give in. It could the departmental committee, or the chair, or the associate dean, or the college committee,... The only way this trick fails is that every single person along this long chain stand their ground.

When it comes to "he-said, she-said" situations, as seems to be the case here, most institutions will tend to take the side of professors by default. For obvious reasons—the 18–22 year old college student is much more likely to lie to obtain a favourable mark, than the professor is to act maliciously to sabotage a student. The only scenario where the professor might be in trouble is if there are accusations from multiple students.

The most significant red flag here is that the student is making essentially the same accusation against nine different professors. It is preposterous that nine professors would collectively decide to sabotage a single student.

  So far I have read the students' code of conduct carefully. There appear to be nothing that can be directly applied here. The closest appears to be the rule about dishonesty, but it wouldn't work by itself.

Making dishonest accusations to obtain more favourable grades is an unequivocal form of academic dishonesty. Any respectable institution would discipline a student engaging in such behaviour. If this behaviour cannot be disciplined at your university, I would suggest seeking employment elsewhere.

You should lodge a formal complaint, possibly in collaboration with the other professors who are being accused. You have a rock-solid case.

juod's first paragraph sums it up: it's about improving the system, not about that student.

Many instructors don't know the policies for academic dishonesty, complaints, reviewing grades ... they never need to. Especially non-tenure-track lecturers don't know if the department head or the university will back them. Just a little outreach can be reassuring and help them stand their ground.

Hearing about how a typical complaint is resolved: "you'll get students who claim X, here's how it's typically handled" -- knowing the process and the offices involved. If Stan has the semi-common policy of "no retakes, but the lowest quiz score is dropped" will that stand-up to a challenge? Has it? Is there another instructor they can ask "does this class typically get lots of complaints?" (many times the answer is: "wow, how did you get so few?"). If a student complains to you about another instructor, what can you tell them to do? Some general bits:

when something is sprung on you during finals week, sometimes it has to wait until the next semester. Grades can be changed after the class ends. There's a form for it. Sometimes administrators will yell at you and require a written reason why, but that's easy.
Incompletes aren't extensions. Students always ask for an incomplete at the last minute. But they generally require a whole process and an agreement prior to missing the work.
use email to create a record. Use only one account, so it's easy to search. This is "as we discussed in class, I looked over your assignment...".
if a school has some crazy assignment software that takes forever to search and can lock you out, keep an organized copy of everything on your home PC (I learned this the hard way).

As for that particular student, they only need to meet one old-school hard-ass who teaches most sections of a required class. Stops them cold. As for the sense of injustice about scammy students -- it helps to remember that you get paid the same either way, your name isn't on the school, and to read Black Lives Matter posts to put the injustice in perspective. Sure, use that indignation to keep it from happening again, but there's no point in making a negative incident personal with a student.


Should I hide the fact that I did a group assignment completely by myself? Three students and I were assigned a small (~14 hours of work) group project. Because there was no effort on their side to meet and work, my e-mails regarding their progress remained unanswered and from previous experience I know that their quality of work is much lower than mine, I decided to do it myself and already spend around 10 hours doing ~2/3 of the work. The reaction of the others was something along the lines of "Wow, thanks man. This looks great. You're the man!"

Later I asked them to help me out with the rest because I had another assignment due and thus my time was limited but the contributed work was much less in quantity than what I asked for and also of very low quality, hinting that they did not bother reading the assignment thoroughly or did not really spend time actually thinking of something substantial to contribute. As it stands now I will have to do the remaining 1/3 by myself as well.

Because I had a question for the lecturer I was writing him an e-mail and one of the sentences was

  I already did most of the work but we need to...

then I thought whether it would be better to write

  We already did most of the work but we need to...

The reason I even mention it, is that it is very close to the submission deadline and I do not want him to think that I/we only started now. My intent was not to slip by this information and blame the others.

Is there any reason to be "diplomatic" and actively hide the fact that I did everything myself?

I am mostly interested in the impression I will leave on the lecturer. On the one hand I do not feel like I owe the others anything, on the other hand I also want to avoid the lecturer seeing my behavior as tactless or arrogant.

Personally I would dodge the issue using

  Most of the work is done, but we need to...

I don't think it will really matter which option you go with, but that way you don't have to worry about it.

Anyone setting a group project knows that it is fairly likely someone will end up doing all the work. If they don't take any action to avoid that (and it sound's like they haven't in this case), then presumably they don't really care.

I understand that you want to get the credit for doing the work. But I agree it might come across as tactless to point out the situation in your email. It might be more productive to separately have a conversation with the lecturer about why they haven't taken steps to avoid the situation occurring.

I have been in this situation a lot, particularly in my last master year, where group projects were literally piling up.

One thing you need to understand is that, in any group work (at school or at work), there will always be people working more than others, and everyone will get the reward. Why? Because in a project, what matters is the completion of the project, not of your part.

I suspect my own professors tried to teach us this lesson, because I know other students who reported the kind of issue you report, and noone did anything, in fact the projects that were unfinished were still blamed: if a project fails, no matter why, it's the whole group's fault, you included even if you did your part of the work.

Indeed: why assign a group project when you can have individual assignments? This might serve to enforce training in group work. And group work's goal is to not only do your part of the job, but working together to complete the whole work. Managing dissensions and colleagues not working enough is unfortunately part of any group work, so you have to know how to handle it.

Concretely, I think two ways to approach this, depending on your objectives:

Report it to those in charge: this might (but not necessarily) get you sole credit for the project and punish your colleagues. Ideally, this is only fair to do that. Downside is that if the professors wanted to get you to train in group work, you will clearly show you failed, and also probably you won't get a good mark if the group work is unfinished (even if you completed your part: what matters is the project, not what you did).
Let it slide and do all the work yourself: if you are interested in having good marks, this is the best way to go. Downside is that you might have a LOT of work to do, but the bright side is that you can ensure the work is done well, and you can shine during project presentation (if you have one scheduled), knowing your project better than anyone else. So even if you let it slide, you can show you did most of the work without telling it directly, which is way more appreciated by everyone (both your colleagues, professors and superiors in a professional setting). Another advantage is that you will get a lot of skills in a short period of time (at the expense of sleep...).

Also, there is a 3rd way: balancing the work. Often, students have different skills and they do not necessarily excel for all kinds of projects. If you have several projects, what you can do is that you can arrange with your colleagues to form the same team in different projects, and share the work depending on each member's skills and affinities: you might end up doing most of the work for project A, but one of your colleague will do most of project B since he is more skilled with working on B field, etc.

The only requirement for this 3rd way is that you choose colleagues that are able, and that you upfront discuss and concur on this solution (if you discuss later on in the project, it might not end well as you experienced...). If you have lots of projects, this might actually help you speed up the completion, by assigning adequately to the most pertinent member the work to be done. And bonus, this is what a good manager should do, so that's also a good training if you want to lead projects later on :-)


Using "et al." in maths papers In general, mathematics papers have no first author; instead, authors are listed alphabetically. Therefore, citing “Smith et al.” is at best misleading (it implies that Smith did all the work) and at worst insulting (Zelmanov never does any work!). Basically, all the authors are considered equal but citing “Smith et al.” messes this balance up.

The “et al.” style is made slightly more complex because it means that the “big shot” may come further down the list. For example, Zelmanov is the big name but the paper is Smith, Smythe and Zelmanov, cited as Smith et al. So you don’t realise that it’s a Zelmanov paper.

My question is:

  What should be done if a journal changes your citation of Smith, Smythe and Zelmanov [10] to Smith et al. [10], especially when Zelmanov is the big name?

Is the answer simply to ask them to change it back to Smith, Smythe and Zelmanov? I think that changing the citation to “Zelmanov et al.” undermines the equality ethos even more — it is a slap in the face to Smith and Smythe, and anyway how do I not know that Smith won’t win a Fields medal himself one day?

I should say that before today I have never seen this in a maths paper.

Added 2018: This was resolved nicely. I send the copyediting team an email asking if every instance of "et al." could be changed back "especially on line 244 because "et al." here is just a single person!", and if not can I edit the certain bits to remove the names. So they removed each et al. and it appeared online a week later. No hassle (but lots of worry!).

While mathematics is not my area of specialization, I think that in your question you are making a general and IMHO wrong assumption about the importance of the name, appearing in the "et al." construction. Essentially, this construction is used only for the purposes of convenience (brevity for readability) and not for implying the amount or importance of work, performed by any of authors.

When people see the "et al." citation, I am pretty sure that decent scientists immediately refer to the full citation in a reference list in order to obtain full information on all authors of a paper in question. Therefore, I believe that the "problem" that you have described in your question is really an artificial one, which exists only in your imagination (due to the incorrect assumption, mentioned above).

One purpose of the way to shorten author lists is to allow finding the cited work when it is listed in a library catalog, which happens (primarily/only) by first author. Hence knowing the first author is essential in order to find the text - no matter how important whose contribution to the work in question is (a subjective question anyway). Granted, this kind of restriction comes from the time of cardboard catalogs, but the implied citing tradition still stands ...


Professor sleeps in class and makes cheating easy I’m a senior in my final year of a B.S. degree in Engineering in the United States. One of my professors is in a geriatric state (he is not tenured). His class is largely themed around student presentations which form the core curriculum and all material tested on exams.

Unfortunately, the professor often falls asleep during these presentations which he should be grading as they are delivered. He does very little to facilitate discussion in class. When he generates the exam, he often just reviews the slides and picks out extraneous details for questions. To make matters worse, there is a small group of students who have taken advantage of the said professor’s poor proctoring skills and have used their phones to view the slides hence giving them a magnificent advantage over even the best students in the class.

I have already notified our department head, who is peripherally aware of the situation, and his superior, the college division head. However, they seemed concerned but have  not taken means to solve or even observe any of the issue for themselves.

What else can I do to address such an issue?

The first thing I want to say is that you should be careful with the information you provide on the internet.  In ten minutes of routine searching I was able to determine the identity of your instructor and other information about him: e.g. he is 84 years old, that his highest degree is a master's degree, and that he is (as mentioned) not tenure-track at your institution.  Thus you have publicly enough claimed that someone is senile.  That opinion is yours to express...but it is not very nice.  If you have not already had at least one conversation about the instructor himself about what you find unsatisfactory about his teaching, then complaining about him to everyone is not an honorable thing to do.  I think it would be better to remove identifying details from your profile.

Now moving on to your question: I think you have at least two issues here.  The first is that you claim that rampant cheating will put you at a disadvantage in your classes with this instructor.  The second is that you think the instructor is unfit to teach at your institution.  These are pretty different: one of them is localized to a particular situation and is primarily about you.  The other is a general problem and is primarily the concern of the institution.  I would recommend decoupling these concerns at least in your own mind and thinking about how to pursue them separately.

As for the first concern: is the cheating you're describing taking place in a class you are now taking? Your question suggests that but doesn't quite say it, and in my internet research I couldn't find any courses that the instructor in question is teaching this semester.  If yes, this is a pressing issue, and of course you should bring it up first with the instructor himself.  Does he know that students are cheating by looking at their phones in class?  What is his response to that?  If he hasn't been informed of the cheating, it is not very reasonable of you to blame him for it.  If his response is "I don't hold truck with those devilish pocket phones" then that's inadequate and merits escalation.  It sounds however that you're trying to bring forth action on a more generalized "everyone knows this is happening" cheating situation that may not even be taking place this semester.  That's going to be hard to do.  You lament that many students complain about this but are unwilling to do anything formal about it.  You're right to lament, because that probably will kill the matter right there.  I am a university professor and I've had the experience of students who complained to me about cheating but were unwilling to take it any further.  That was very unpleasant for me, because there was nothing I could do about it....other than make sure that the circumstances that allowed the cheating did not present themselves in the future.

In terms of your second concern: whether this man is fit to be an instructor at your regional campus of a state institution is primarily the concern of that institution.  I am not trying to say that this is none of your business.  What I'm saying is that it's more their problem than yours, and you should take the attitude that you are helping them out by informing them about it.  Do you see what I'm saying?  If you come to an administrator saying that a certain instructor is not fit to teach...and you are not asking for any personal reparations for that in your own coursework, then it puts a different spin on things that may make the administrator take it more seriously.  (That's why I would consider separating out discussion of this with the cheating issue: if you discuss them at the same time, then it can look like you have a conflict of interest, because something good could happen to your course grade if the instructor's incompetence is recognized.)

In terms of informing administrators that the instructor is unfit to teach: you have to realize that this is a long game.  It is extremely unlikely that someone is going to get pulled from teaching in the middle of a semester for reasons of "senility".  Firing a faculty member -- even a temporary or untenured one, and especially someone who has been working there for many years -- is not something to be done lightly.  You can't really know that the administration is not looking into this or will not look into this in the future.  Maybe they are.  However, in the absence of any positive evidence, yes, maybe they're not.  In that regard Dan Romik's advice is on point: bring this up repeatedly.  If other students feel the same way, get them involved.  (If really no one other than you wants to get involved...what's up with that?  It's worth thinking about.)

Another thing that students don't necessarily appreciate is that universities have limited resources, and the in current economic climate many academic programs are being held together with string and chewing gum.  Every once in a while I get an evaluation from a calculus student saying something like "Dr. Clark knows his math, but I'm not sure if he's ready to teach UGA students." Which makes me smile a little bit: I was a tenure-track (now tenured) faculty member.  Do the students think that teaching freshman calculus is a privilege only earned by the very best, and that some time in the penalty box would make me rethink the error of my ways?  That's just not the way things work.  At my university faculty members get tenured for excellent research and unproblematic teaching.  Freshman calculus students are going to be stuck with my teaching -- which, according to student feedback, is below the departmental average -- for the foreseeable future.

At your institution I noticed that there are a lot of non-tenure track faculty, often without PhDs, teaching courses for majors.  Your administration would certainly prefer if such courses were taught by people with PhDs: it would add considerably to its academic prestige.  The fact that they have courses taught by non-PhD faculty probably means that they have limited resources and/or haven't had the chance to do enough hiring to correct the problem.  To put it more starkly: if your octogenarian instructor gets released, who will replace him?  If they don't have such a person, then they are probably working towards getting one and thinking that in the meantime he is a lot better than nothing.

I will end by saying: you are right to be concerned about this, and if what you say is true than in my opinion you are helping out your university by doing so.  Good on you, and I hope you follow through with it.  Definitely do not do anything like publicly shaming your university by uploading incriminating videos: that is not a step towards a solution of the problem.

Added: Based on information provided by the OP, I have changed my mind about who the faculty member is.  I now believe he is 79 years old.  Anyway, the point is that when you reveal your institution and department any complaint about faculty members is certainly not anonymous.  Any slightly interested party can make a guess.  Maybe they will guess wrong...which is not so great either.

There is nothing that you can do.
There are more students than there are qualified instructors.
A University cannot fire an instructor unless they can find a better replacement.
As of the year 2015, roughly 1 in 3 Americans get baccalaureate degrees. Not so many Americans used go to college. Not only do 1 in 3 Americans get bachelor degrees, but the percentage keeps going up.

Suppose that there were only 50 high quality martial arts teachers on planet earth.
For purposes of this hypothetical scenario, also assume than each martial arts master takes exactly one student per year.
Unrealistic though it may be, students and teacher in thought experiment have a one-on-one relationship for one year. After one year, the student turns into Jet Lee and leaves. It is not necessary to train for 10, 20, 30 years.
If there are only 25 students per year, that's great.
If there are only 40 students per year, that works too.
What if there are 10,000 students?
There are only 50 good teachers.
If there are a sufficiently large number of students, then some students will find themselves a charlatan.

As another analogy, when I was in high school school cafeteria sometimes offered a popular food item: the Chicken Parmesan. On most days, the cafeteria food was terrible. However, the percentage of students who liked Chicken Parmesan more than the usual fare was more than 50%. The cafeteria manager was not the sharpest tool in the shed. The cafeteria manager assumed that students ate the same number of meals each day no matter what awful slop was served. Well, if there are fewer plates of Chicken Parmesan available than there are hungry students, some of the students might end up eating something else; or in some cases, not eating anything at all.

There are more students than there are high quality teachers. In the long run, you can create, or train, more University professors. However, in the short run, you end up hiring people who aren't that great.
If you need 50 horses, but only 20 horses with good teeth are available, then you will probably end up buying some horses with rotten teeth.


Is it appropriate to call a professor for a recommendation on the weekend? I emailed my professor about two weeks ago, but there was no response to my first email. I sent a follow up, and got a reply saying they'd be happy to write one for me on the following weekend. I waited, the weekend passed, and nothing happened. I followed up  again, and again no response to my email.

Now I am thinking to call as a reminder. My professor has written many recommendations on my behalf, and my guess is that it didn't get done  due to  laziness or  forgetfulness. Now we have a long holiday coming for the next ten days and I want a recommendation as soon as possible. Is it appropriate to call  on the weekend given the fact that it was said that it could be written one a previous weekend?

No -- it's totally inappropriate.

Seriously. Think about it. Unless you're at a school where profs phone grad students at their home on weekends to inquire about a late paper, it's totally inappropriate.

Note: Many grant agencies / admissions committees know that we (the faculty) are thorough flakes and couldn't be trusted to tie our own shoelaces in the morning. They usually give a few days of extra time for faculty references to come in after the deadline.  Others, however, are very strict on deadlines and thus faculty need to be properly shepherded into getting their materials in time.

When in doubt: no. But it depends on the teacher. And often fortune favors the bold and the brave. If you can get away with it, and it helps you get the recommendation, why not?

"Professionalism" is still secondary to results. Besides, if you have his cell number it is already a kind of permission. I mean it, you should only have gotten it to use it. Go for it, apologize for calling on the weekend to keep connected, proceed to give nothing but a gentle reminder (of your deadline/how nervous you are about getting all the documents together), that's it. Won't hurt either of you.


How to avoid being falsely accused of harassment by a student? I am a junior faculty member and as part of my work I have to supervise students. I am required by the University to have one-on-one meetings with them every week to check their progress and give feedback. I usually have these meetings in my office like all the other staff.

One piece of advice I have received from senior colleagues and online fora is to always keep my door open during the meetings to minimise the risk of being falsely accused of misconduct (in particular harassment). This could happen for instance with a student trying to hurt me or the university for failing a course.

I understand that the probability of this happening (being falsely accused by a student) is very small. Yet, the advice of keeping the door open during meetings is standard in academia, which means a probability must exist (albeit very small) - or, the universities think so.

Question: Is there any other advice, common practice, or university policies for precautions to be taken - along the lines mentioned above (open door) - to minimise the risk of being falsely accused of misconduct by a student (with the focus on false harassment accusations) during private meetings?

I reject in advance any answers that might discriminate or bias against any group of students based on their gender, origin, or background history. Also, I would prefer to avoid solutions that include audio-visual recording, as this is not usual in my university.

For context, I am a male professor having meetings with students of all sexes. My main concern though are meetings with female students (due to past experience of a friend being falsely accused by one of his female students, with severe effects to his professional and personal life).

Note: My original question was misinterpreted leading to debates concerning what I actually asked. You can retrieve the original question in the edit history for context on some of the answers.

I am not sure if my experiences are common, but as a faculty member in a psychology department I have had a number of unique and uncomfortable experiences with female students. I have described the two most egregious cases here and here. As for an answer, I want to start with an excerpt from this answer since I think it is so good

  1) Never sexually harass your students. Don't even come close -- have a clear-eyed view of what the boundary of acceptable behavior would be and make sure that you stay two stops on the side of that boundary. Especially, maintain a very strong sense of what is acceptable physical contact with a student. (Handshaking: okay. Tapping someone on their clothed arm or shoulder to get their attention: probably okay, but monitor while you do it to make sure that it is being received that way. Almost anything else: as a rule, don't do it.)

In addition, it is important to think about your behavior. I advise always keeping your door open, and remaining on opposite sides of the desk/table when appropriate. You need to be mindful of physical contact with students (cf. What physical contact, if any, is acceptable between a supervisor and a student?) and what you say to them.

Apart from actually not harassing your students, I advise you to document any awkward interactions you have with students. If you accidently (remember rule 1) inappropriately interact with a student (e.g., physical contact or an odd turn of phrase), regardless of if was you or the student that did/said it, you need to tell someone. Similarly, if a student gets unusually upset about a grade, or anything else, you want to document it. I suggest email so there is a written record. I always told my department chair, but the director of teaching or a faculty mentor could also work. I would advise always telling the same person, so they have some context.

In cases where you know the situation could be difficult or where students have been difficult in the past, you my want to have another faculty member join your meeting. You obviously cannot do this for all meetings (e.g., having a faculty member sit in on all your office hours would not work), it would be fine scheduled meetings with problematic students and difficult situations (e.g., failing a student or academic misconduct).

It is also worth noting that sometimes students want privacy (maybe you are discussing grades or a medical condition). If a student wants to shut my door for privacy, I am fine with it, barring a past history or an obvious difficult situation. If anything uncomfortable happens after the door was shut, or if you are feeling the slightest bit concerned/paranoid, you should document what happened.

  Dear Department Chair,

  I met today with Jane Doe to discuss her medical condition. She requested and shut my door while meeting. At one point she briefly came around my desk and showed me the rash on her arm. It was a little odd and in the future I will make sure students know to respect our personal space. I don't foresee any issues, but wanted to keep you in the loop.

If there is an actual chance that you would fail a student, then seek out resources to help the student academically.  That's the right thing to do, and it's the right think to focus on, rather than fantasies of how the student might want to take revenge.
Your concern seems irrational.  Statistically, which is more common?

A. A student is sexually harassed and reports it, yet the university does nothing to address the problem.
B. A student falsely accuses an instructor of sexual harassment.

If you're not sure, then I recommend you do some reading on recent activism around Title IX.
If you spend a significant amount of time worrying about this, then you may want to check whether you have any additional  intrusive thoughts beyond this one.  If so, you might benefit from a treatment called Exposure and Response Prevention.  Ideally you would be able to stand back and notice yourself having an irrational, perhaps outrageous thought, and just watch it go by, as you might watch an interesting cloud float by overhead.

Here are some specific observations to back up my conjecture that you might be spending "a significant amount of time worrying about this":

You wrote, "Am I being paranoid (probably)?"

Several participants quoted and addressed this question in their answers, and you did not remove this line from the original question, and you did not jump in below their answers to try to convince them they had misunderstood you.

A participant wrote, "You are afraid, perhaps phobic, but not paranoid."  This suggests that I'm not the only one who wondered as I did.

You wrote, "I will try to lighten up; I am a stressful person by nature."

Your title and focus were "How to avoid being accused of harassment by a student," not "How to avoid giving the appearance of harassment," or "How to avoid making a sensitive student uncomfortable."

I wondered if you were making yourself just a bit miserable about this.  All over this page, you basically say, "Well, yes, ... hmm, no...."  Look, IF there is an element of phobia here, the only person suffering from it is you.  You get to decide whether this is limiting your enjoyment of life or not, and if so, whether you want to do anything about it.  If I were in the set of people close to you, and I confronted you with my conjecture, that could make things uncomfortable for you.  But the beauty of the internet is that you are free to consider my conjecture, or not; you are free to consider it, and reject it; you are free to accept it, and then put your head in the sand and leave things the way they are.
There are two aspects to my answer.  One is motivated by a sincere interest in sharing information about what you could do about it if you conclude that your worry has wandered outside of the realm of healthy fear.
The other is indeed about gender issues.
There are students who have been traumatized by previous experiences, and there are professors who spend a reasonable amount of energy avoiding causing discomfort to such students.  I wonder, would such considerations make you less reluctant to hold some of your office hours in a public place, such as the library, as you were considering doing?


Will it affect my Reputation to leave my MSc without finishing the Thesis? I am currently doing my MSc thesis (in an area of science).  I have completed the exams but I am having real difficulties with the research project.  Both my supervisors are based remotely and when I ask them for help with the coding I am doing one of them says she is too busy going to conferences to Skype me and tells me to go back to previous 'training' we did: this training consisted of  two Skype calls which were made 6 months ago and I did not really follow due to having problems understanding her English at times (made worse by poor sound quality and microphones).  The second supervisor just keeps describing the task which I need to do, but is not explaining how to do it or how it works, even though I have said that I need some more guidance as I have limited programming experience.  If I ask for guidance, he just describes what I need to do again: 'you need to do this and get some results' without explaining how to do it.  I have tried for months but they are just not helping me, and the stuff is too specialized to get much help from anyone else.

I know, suck it up and stop whining, that is what I am trying to do, but theoretically, would it come back to bite me if I terminate and leave with a PGDip (or whatever you get for completing the exam component), as I feel like I could use the summer to get back in touch with my previous supervisor to continue with the project we were working on together.  The offer I have for a PhD is unconditional and based on undergraduate results so I could theoretically leave the MSc now and then start the PhD regardless.  The PhD is in a completely different area, not related to the MSc, and it is the only PhD offer I have received so I feel like this is all a pointless exercise and feel like my motivation to do this thesis is draining away from me every day, as it is mostly 'training' for a particular area which I know I am not going into now as I have not received offers in this area.

I would advise you to go on with your MSc degree, maybe right now the thesis doesn't seem relevant but the topic it covers may turn out to be essential in future (getting a job for example). Moreover by completing it you will learn how to code (to some degree at least) which is exceptionally valuable these days in every field.

having said that, what i would advise you to do is either asking somebody for help (or paying them to help you) by help i mean sitting with you by the same desk (or using TeamViewer) and writing code with you. learning on your own by referring to books materials etc is the most effort and time consuming way if you are a beginner (later on it is the best way to learn coding). Another thing i would advise you to do is online courses, programming on beginner level is probably the best covered skill you can learn in the internet. The courses are cheap and truly amazing for beginners.

you can try Coursera, but remember that courses where you don't have to submit your code to autofrader are not very good in teaching real coding skills.

Udemy courses are mostly video based and assignments are presented and then solved through video. there are interactive code assignments in more recent courses only.

you can try datacamp if the topics they cover are relevant to you. I find datacamp to be too easy - everything is interactive (you type code in your browser) and most of the code is provided, the user many times is asked only to fill it with some methods. datacamp removes all the stretches of programming and presents you with methods of doing stuff, but without going through the typos etc you will nkt learn too much IMHO.

there is also edx and LinkedIn learning and probably dozens more but i didn't try them out.

i would advise you to try udemy first and pay somebody to teach abd most importantly learn coding (by finishing your thesis), its the most important skill on a job market and in academia in 21st century. (sorry for formatting of text)


Is it considered unethical to pay participants differently based on some quality? Let's say you are recruiting two groups of people, English monolinguals and bilinguals. If you're having a hard time recruiting enough bilinguals, the natural, free-market thing to do would be to offer to increase how much they are compensated to attract more.

Assuming that both groups complete similar activities in the same time frame, is it unethical to pay one group more than another?

Would the answer be the same if the quality wasn't the part of the design? For example, if your monolingual group is older on average, is it unethical to post an advertisement for an increased rate for young monolinguals to bring your group averages back to comparable?

I have never seen a research group do this, presumably because of how time-consuming it would be to do, but I haven't found anything to suggest that it is wrong to do.

I'm asking here because I briefly discussed this idea with someone, and she seemed to think the IRB would take an issue with it but we didn't got much further.

I don’t see on what grounds anyone could regard this as unethical, but one might legitimately wonder whether paying the two groups of participants unequally might inadvertently create a bias that would compromise the integrity of your conclusions. After all, your research is presumably premised on the assumption that the participants from the two groups are both fairly typical representatives of those groups. But if you pay participants from one group $10 and those from the other (for argument’s sake) $5000, the participants you’re likely to get in both groups might differ in some ways that you didn’t expect - for example, the lower-paid participants might be people who are more motivated by an altruistic desire to help scientific research than the higher-paid participants

Whether this is a genuine concern or not depends on the difference in the pay and on the precise nature of your study, but it’s something to think about.

This is a general social/economic/polticial question.

I would say this question is way out of scope. I mean, fair enough, you come up against it in an academic setting, but really:

Is it ethical to pay people more, or less, because of pre-existing conditions which are not under their control?
Is it ethichal to pay people more, or less, because of conditions which are due to a mistake they have made, which in hindsight they would not have?
Is it ethical to pay people according to their performance on the job, rather than according to their needs? One person does twice the work than his/her colleague, but is single and healty; the other supports a spouse and children, and has some ongoing medical condition.
Is it ethical to pay young people less because they are less experienced and knowledgeable, and are in junior positions, even though young adults typically have less or no savings to rely on and their expenses are typically much higher than those of people at age 40 or 50?

These are all deep, serious issues to contend with - regardless of whether you're in academia. I could write a book about it (if I had the time and perseverance); and I'm sure prominent social thinkers and philosophers have.


Is it common and acceptable for a postdoc to leave before contract ends? Is it common and acceptable for a postdoc to leave before his/her contract ends, for whatever reason? How early should a prior notice be submitted in this case?

Usually, a postdoc is a normal contract between an employer and an employee, and as such, terminating it earlier than its date depends on the contract and/or the country. It should be normally specified on the contract, otherwise the laws of the country should apply. For instance, in the UK, I have had a notice of 1 month, in Italy, it was 3 months.

It is normally acceptable for a postdoc to leave before the end of the contract, although it depends on the situation. If the employer does not provide any guarantee for further employment, and if the postdoc has found another offer, starting earlier than the end of the current contract, then that's the rule of the game. If the postdoc has found a much better offer (for instance, a permanent position), then that's also the rule of the game. If personal reasons are involved (going with a partner, going back to home country, etc), that's quite fair.

By acceptable, I mean that the employer should normally not make any problem (assuming the legal obligations are fulfilled), and might even be supportive in the end of the contract. A case that might not be acceptable is to leave in the middle of a contract, breaking some work commitment (e.g., an experiment to run) for a reason that might not appear very strong. But in the end, it depends a lot on the relationship between the postdoc and the employer. The point to remember is that Academia is a small world, and that in general, it is worth keeping good relationship with former employers. In doubt, talk with your current employer, or with a mentor at the place you're working at to know what the rule normally is.

If either or both parties are miserable, then this is not indentured service and therefore the contract should be terminated. However, the termination shouldn't be to the detriment of the lab i.e. if the PI needs time to hire a replacement, then the postdoc terminating the contract should stay on until the new hire is made and trained.

Sometimes it's better to let a toxic person leave rather than remain for their technical skills. I hired a very unpleasant postdoc in 2012 and luckily she resigned while I was still trying to figure out how to work with her. Now she is probably making her new boss miserable. She never asked for a recommendation from me so perhaps her 5 month stint in my lab was overlooked when she was recruited.

Postdocs out there take note:

Your boss is not your mum or dad, so if you hate either or both of your parents, punishing your boss is just psycho behavior
Your boss is not your mum or dad, so if either or both dote on you and spoil you, consider that your boss is not obligated to treat you that way. A postdoc is a trainee position but it's also a JOB. There are expectations and you are being evaluated by your boss/mentor and colleagues in your field. You are not a student anymore, so time is precious and is not to be wasted with drama and procrastination.
If you regularly got 'A' grades as an undergrad and graduate student, beware that these top grades may have been due to grade inflation. You will now need to get used to the idea that there is grade deflation for academic professionals and faculty. Peer review (journals, grant applications) is harsh and often brutal and you have to deal with it. Your postdoc mentor is not your enemy and can help guide you through that process.


Why do major international universities still have courses in languages other than English? As an example ETH Zurich, which is arguably one of the best universities in Europe, still educates Bachelor's students in German:

  Please note: the Bachelor’s degree programmes begin in German. In the second and third years of the programmes, some of the courses may take place in English.

This doesn't make sense to me as it's obvious that the vast majority of technical literature and textbooks are published in English. And pretty much every major scientific journal only accepts works in the English language. This also decreases the amount of competition between the applicants as German speakers hold an advantage over others (not to say native English speakers don't hold the same advantage back at home, but English is by far more common).

So why didn't every single major university switch to English already?

EDIT: I am mainly referring to programs in the STEM field, such as engineering

ETH and all other universities in Switzerland are funded by the government and offer college education for minimal tuition. While foreign students are welcome to attend, the primary purpose (at least at the undergraduate level) is to provide education to the locals. Nonetheless, that doesn't seem to be a limiting factor, especially at the graduate/research level since ETH has been recently ranked one of the most international institutions by Times Higher Education.

There is a wealth of excellent textbooks in German, and many fields still have original research published in German.
Also, the majority of students don't pursue academic or research careers and thus might very well spend their entire career speaking almost only German.

Plus there are practical considerations too: asking non-natively English speakers to teach in English is most certainly going to decrease the average teaching quality. Now if it's to give lectures to a class that is almost entirely German speaking, it borderlines the absurd.

The question seems to be more: why would some universities switch their teaching language to English?

Building on some previous answers, e.g. AndrejaKo:

When you learn something in your dominant language, it is more likely you will own it, i.e. make it your own.


Is it OK to thank the examiners in the acknowledgements of the final draft of a PhD thesis? The examiners of a friend's PhD thesis required revisions which they needed to approve before they would accept the thesis. The requirements were fairly demanding but overall reasonable and helpfully explained, and my friend wishes to acknowledge the examiners' contribution in the final submission, in anticipation of their approval.

However, it seems to me that examiners are not supposed to be friends; and any implication that they are seems to suggest that the examination process was too cosy, or that the examiners were perhaps rather a push-over or even somewhat corrupt. Are such concerns well founded, or am I worrying unduly?

Peer-reviewers of academic research papers are not supposed to be authors' friends, and on many occasions are direct opposite. However, it is not uncommon to thank them in the final version of the paper, because their contribution often helps to improve the paper considerably.

In the same way, I think that it is OK to thank the examiners for their suggestions, which helped you to improve the presentation of your thesis.

The acknowledgement is for the people that helps you to provide such a work like this.

I think the examiner is only the person give you some feedback,  but he was not during your Ph.D process.


What's the point of maintaining a CV after tenure? Once you have tenure, presumably you're never going to have to search for a job again. However almost all professors have a CV on their website, and fairly recent ones. Why? They already made it.

Upon joining the club of those who've "made it," you find that there are further gradations.  A tenured professor can safely breathe a sigh of relief for at least a year or two, but eventually she will notice (i) that her salary is lower than most of her tenured colleagues and (ii) that she is still being asked to document and defend her productivity across several axes: research, teaching and service.  (Also, in many cases, (iii) She is increasingly pressured to apply for and get major grants.  In many cases, her future salary and promotions depend on this to a large degree.)

The main tool to exhibit your recent accomplishments in research, teaching and service is...your CV, usually.  In fact, "whether they want a good raise or not," most faculty are required to submit annual "activity reports" in which a CV is often a required component.  (When it isn't, it usually means that we manually copy information from our CV into some form or type it into some internal webpage.  So having an updated CV is more or less necessary for
many faculty members.)  Certainly having a carefully groomed CV is necessary when you go up for "promotion to full", apply for an endowed chair or distinguished research position, and so forth.

The bottom line: academia has bureaucratic, competitive and hierarchical aspects all the way through.  Most people who have made it tenure in recent years have learned how to keep reasonably up-to-date CVs without too much trouble or heroic effort -- the CVs do not need to be rewritten from scratch to showcase their skills for some new job, usually, so it is mostly a matter of regular updating -- so honestly, this is not the worst part of the bureaucratic minutiae.

This question reminds me of the parolee who resumes his life of crime as soon as he steps out the prison door. Tenure should be seen not as the end of something but the beginning of something. Everything before tenure was an effort to demonstrate how one would be once tenure is achieved, and to quit just because one has finally been admitted irreversibly to the team, betrays the team: your colleagues, the school that hired you in good faith, and more vaguely but more importantly, the field that you've committed yourself to studying. OK, I realize you're tired, you've made a superhuman effort, but that's why you've been granted such an extraordinary position. Take a sabbatical, get over it, and get to work.


Should I send a "cease-and-desist" letter to ResearchGate? ResearchGate is pretty well placed on Google. But it does not have a lot of contents or active users, despite their constant invitation spam.
So they spidered a lot of publications, and provide some metadata on publications and authors on their web page, even when you do not join.

Given the amount of spam I receive from them, I'm considering to file a cease-and-desist letter, disallowing them to use my name or work for advertising their service and for encouraging users to join their site, and instead display a clear statement that I am not a member and disable search indexing for these pages.

Currently, ResearchGate has a pretty bad reputation, see e.g.
ResearchGate: an asset or a waste of time?
as well as the Wikipedia article.

I'm really annoyed by them:

They have a fake profile page with my name, affiliation, co-authors, publications, and a big "sign up" button; that does not state that I am not a member, as if they could contact me this way.
They publish incomplete numbers of citations and impact, which one may consider to give me a bad reputation on their site. (I don't care, but this may be a legal point to make?)
They have information pages of many of my articles, with a big "request full-text" button, which will not work, as I am not a member and do not get contact information.
They use a proxy redirector to have their website show up first in Google search results, even when the actual contents are only available on a different website,

Do you think that it is detrimental for my career to have such contents removed (by sending a C&D letter to them), or do you think they will ultimately manage to become a useful platform, and then it would be better to not have my data removed? Even with a C&D, I could probably retract it at some point and join. After all, the real contents are available on my homepage and Google Scholar; and these are the locations I want to show up first (fortunately, most of the time, they do).

I am a law professor, and I am equally pissed with research gate.

It would be unwise and inappropriate to give you specific advice about your own situation: this would likely constitute the unauthorized practice of law; for actual legal advice about the claims and defenses and legal strategies that apply to your situation, consult a competent lawyer admitted to the bar in your jurisdiction.  I will recount my own experiences below by way of generally informing the world what one person's approach is to one specific situation (i.e., mine).

That being said, here's how I've dealt with Research Gate.  They committed four serious affronts against me:

Fraudulently inducing me to sign up for the site by sending invitations claiming to be from my coauthors,
Forging my name on e-mails to other people claiming that I invited them to sign up to the site
Posting a draft of a paper of mine without permission, and
Maintaining a profile of me on the site without permission. (This one, as others have noted, may not be illegal---I am not sure---though it is certainly offensive in context, and to the extent it involved misleading attributions of endorsement may be illegal.)

In response, after learning about 1, 2, and 4, I sent their customer service people a nastygram over e-mail demanding the forged emails stop and be unsubscribed. They sent me some useless response claiming I could unsubscribe.  I thought nothing more of it, but continued to hear of forged emails.

I then discovered 3 via a google scholar alert and really blew my stack.  So I contacted their general counsel, also listed as their contact for DMCA takedown notices and send them a DMCA takedown combined with an incredibly nasty cease and desist letter.

Their general counsel promptly replied and informed me that he'd taken down the paper referenced in #3 above.  I haven't verified that this is true, or checked on any of the other ongoing acts of wrongdoing (the serial email forgery etc).  I have some hopes that this will work, however, I am prepared to file suit against them on my own behalf should it not.

What can others learn from my experience?  It's not clear yet.  I am of the opinion that this company operates by massive fraud and needs to be put down, but if my attempt to menace them into acting a little more law-abiding at least with respect to me succeeds, it may only be because I'm a law professor and they know that it would not be hard for me to drag them to account.

Of the various wrongs they inflict on the world, the posting of unauthorized copies of papers is the easiest to stop---the DMCA is a blunt instrument, and, moreover, the publishers also have an incentive to put a stop to this.  The next time I see a paper of mine on their site, I may not even going to bother with doing my own DMCA, instead just turning it over to the publisher.

The rest?  As I said, for myself personally, if the forged emails don't stop I may go looking for a class action plaintiff's lawyer, or just file seeking an injunction myself.

But otherwise, the best choice may be prevention.  Don't sign up for their site.  Tell your friends not to sign up for their site.  Let people know if emails inviting them to do things on that site show up under their name.  Publicize their practices so that others stay away from them.  Starve the beast.

Yes, unless you have a clear and quantifiable rational for explaining a future PI or research associate why you were driven to use legal means rather than negotiate.

In your professional life you have to push your personal research agenda through myriads of (small) political hurdles, in the long run your reputation is a two-sided coin. It does you no good to be a stellar researcher if you cannot work smoothly with others (teamwork is the Hallmark of 21st century research) and just working with others without inventing new paradigms will not make you a stellar reputation.

ResearchGate is free and they by and large try to help people, so I think your question is a red-hearing. I would say go back to work and make a name for yourself.


Is it normal for collaborator to rerun experiments himself? So I'm a few months into my PhD. It's built on top of previous work that has not been published. My supervisors, collaborators, and myself are working on to get this published. Now here's where things get a bit weird for me.

I found some problem with the previous work. Discussed the problem with my supervisors and have fixed them. For the publication, I'll need to redo the experiment.

So far I'm not getting a satisfactory result as it's tricky to get right. Not gonna go into why, it's just tricky.
My collaborator has been impatient with the result I'm getting. So now he has decided to rerun the experiment himself and double checking that he's getting the result I'm getting. Turns out it's quite similar. So now he's trying his own idea he has only briefly disclosed to me and one of my supervisor. When asked indirectly why he's doing this, he said he's just trying to understand the experiment better.

I found this disturbing. Why are you repeating my experiment yourself only to come and tell me you found exactly the same problem and result?

What's everyone take on this? I would like others opinions first before I discuss the issue with my supervisors.

I don't find that behavior strange at all. If I want to understand problems with algorithms (I don't do experiments with anything other than algorithms) I need to run them by myself and sometimes even implement the method from scratch. It's not that I do not trust other people's code, but if I want to understand all the mechanisms well, it's much easier to get a grip on it when I've done it myself.

The other way round, I do not have any objections if a coauthor of mine re-implements a method I already provided just to see how it works. On the contrary: Usually I benefit from this in one way or another, e.g. by learning new tricks or getting rid of bad programming style…

I would consider it unusual in many circumstances, you generally should trust your collaborators enough that you don't need to redo their experiments. It can be very useful to perform independent experiments to get higher confidence in the results, but that would be something that you discuss prior to doing the experiments.

In your case there is an important aspect that changes this. Your experiments aren't working correctly yet. Curiosity about this particular problem with the experiments is a plausible explanation for trying to reproduce your results. And from what I read, they're trying to find a way to fix this issue, and reproducing your results would be the logical first step for that.

You should consider this as useful information, as an independent reproduction also excludes a lot of sources for errors as your equipment, material and people are likely different. So this could help you to find the issue with your experiment quicker.

There is a communication issue here, and as already said in another answer, you should involve your supervisor to resolve that.


As an editor, what measures can I implement to prevent image/photo manipulation? There's been a case of alleged data manipulation in a recent Nano Letters paper (initial report here; now-retracted paper):

You can surely make your own opinion on whether the images have been digitally modified, given the above snapshots (look for gray rectangles around the rods); I was careful to write “alleged” because the paper’s PI threatened legal action against the blogger who reported the issue.

Now, this case lead to a large number of comments here and there about whose responsibility it was to catch this issue (reviewers or editor). I tend to agree that the reviewer should probably have caught it, but this lead me to wonder:

As editor of a scholarly journal, what measures can I implement to prevent image/photo manipulation? And what about data manipulation? Organic Letters has made the news two months ago when they hired a in-house data analyst. Is that the way to go? Are there other measures one could take to reduce the threat of image and data manipulation?

I think a search term for this type of manipulation detection is image forensics.  Matthias Kirchner: Notes on Digital Image Forensics and
Counter-Forensics may be a starting point.

What can you do?

I think a first step is to communicate clearly what image manipulations* are acceptable and which are not:

is it acceptable to adjust brightness and contrast?
correct unequal illumination?
whitelight correction based not on a whitelight measurement but on parts of the image?
digital sharpening or other enhancement filters?
where's the border between an inset picture and a fraudulent manipulation?

and so on.

Who should detect this?

I agree that the reviewer should have commented and asked about the pictures above, however my experience as reviewer is that I often get pictures in ridiculously low resolution (I comment on that). I'm not sure, but I think that the publishers may ask for high resolution pictures when they spot such problems in the production process. However, that would mean that the reviewers may not have seen the actual picture that is used for printing.

* manipulation in the data analysis sense: calculations that change the information content (e.g. enhance contrast), and cannot be easily undone (as opposed to a transformation where the back transformation is easily possible, e.g. rotation), not in the sense of fraud.

"Kill the chicken, and make the monkey watch"

Institute an editorial policy by which all convicted offenders are banned for life from the publication in question. Convince other publications to share such info, and act in the same way after definitive proof is presented. No second chances.

Publicize these events far and wide.

That will probably take care of 60-70% of the problem, at least the blatant cases such as the one above.

Unfortunately few publishers have the conviction to do that.

EDIT:
To answer your question: "Who do you ban among N coauthors?" To first approximation, all of them as co-authorship implies shared responsibility. However, that can be more accurately determined on a per-case basis as the result of detailed investigation.

Detecting instances fraud is trivial if crowdsourced. Blatant image manipulation as the one shown above would eventually have been noticed by a reader of that paper. Same applies to other similar kinds of fraud. Relying on a single overburdened editor and a couple of bored referees for that task makes it much more difficult. Hiring staff to essentially redo part of the research reported in manuscripts submitted to the journal is just laughable.

The point is to demand ethical standards as a publisher, and raise the stakes so high that the penalty of getting caught, guaranteed loss of professional reputation and possibly employment, offsets any gain from publishing a single or a series of papers.

Relying on automatic detection schemes is inherently unreliable. Smart people will always find creative ways to cheat more effectively. To illustrate my point, consider the unending arms race between virus writers and antivirus software companies.

To conclude, and since you seem to be quite green, I suggest you give this a thorough reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schon_scandal

It won't take many Schönen to drive the point home...


Is it a good idea to take a break from studying a mathematics PhD and revisit academia at a later stage? In September I started a mathematics PhD at a UK university straight after my undergraduate MMath degree at a different university. On the whole, I am enjoying the experience. However, I've been having recurring thoughts that perhaps I am not cut out for doctorate level work and it might be a good idea to revisit mathematical studies at a later stage.

Basically, since coming here I've been feeling consistently like my heart isn't in it (and this has had a negative effect on my work ethic). This is not necessarily because I’m not capable of doing it, but rather because I never had a proper break from academia and I feel like I've been running out of steam. I know PhD students very frequently go through spells of feeling dispirited, but I feel that if my heart is really in mathematics that this shouldn't be happening. I would rather go into doctoral studies with a running start knowing that I am adequately trained in the area I am in, rather than adjusting to a learning curve (and an inexperienced supervisor).

Here are some options I have considered:

Having a complete break from academia (6 months to a year), followed by a period where I slowly ease myself back in at my own pace by reading.
Taking CDT (Centre for Doctoral Training) courses. I had previously applied to this and been rejected, but now I think I would be more competitive. I think this rigorous training would be helpful for me.
Doing something altogether different -- learning another programming language and doing a programming job, or working in simulation/modeling at the Met Office, or another company that relies heavily on fluid dynamics. Or maybe even the EPSRC (which is where a lot of the funding for PhD mathematics students comes from)
Getting a normal job to demonstrate people skills, and saving up money to do another Masters programme, which will put me in a very good position for my PhD.

After doing the above, I could return to a PhD programme much
   later, when I am a much more mature person with a
   better mindset towards my work.

Thankfully, my parents are willing to support me emotionally and financially while I pursue any of these.

My question is whether this is a good plan. In particular:

Is it a good idea to take a break from studies if wanting to
continue them at a later date, especially for mathematics? Would it
hurt any opportunities later on down the line to take up a PhD a
year or so from now?
Would my department or supervisor think badly of me for wanting to
terminate my studies - and (generally speaking) would I not have to
pay back the studentship instalments that I've been paid so far?
(I've been funded solely by the University, not by a funding body
such as the EPSRC).
What would be some worthwhile things to consider doing during a
break from academia?

Update: it sounds like this would not be a great idea, and I should only make the move if I am really, really convinced about it. Nonetheless, I'm leaning further and further towards it because I think it's better to take a break from my studies now rather than 3 years down the line. I don't seem to have the motivation required to be a good doctoral student at the moment. This is something I might speak to my advisor about.

Is it a good idea to take a break from studies if wanting to continue them at a later date, especially for mathematics?

That's a tricky question.  There are probably some people for whom this is a good idea, but I wouldn't say it's generally one.  If it's possible in your current situation to essentially hit the "pause button" on your studies and be guaranteed the ability to come back (I think this is possible at many US universities), it might not be so bad, but otherwise you're taking a pretty big risk.  Also, in even as short a time as 6 months or a year, you risk forgetting a lot.  Certainly this is something a lot of other people I know who've taken breaks (say between undergraduate and graduate degrees) have mentioned.

I would think about trying to arrange a shorter vacation (maybe 1 month) first, and see how that feels.  Taking a whole year is a genie that will be hard to get back in the bottle, and you don't know how you will feel, say, two months in.

  Would it hurt any opportunities later on down the line to take up a PhD a year or so from now?

It certainly might.

  Would my department or supervisor think badly of me for wanting to terminate my studies - and (generally speaking) would I not have to pay back the studentship instalments that I've been paid so far? (I've been funded solely by the University, not by a funding body such as the EPSRC).

I can't speak to them (or speak about the financial aspects), but probably it will not look great.  You should be prepared for everyone in the department to assume this means you are dropping out, no matter what you say about coming back.

  What would be some worthwhile things to consider doing during a break from academia?
  Has anyone else on here had experiences of a PhD (particularly maths) not going too well and feeling like they have had to stop or recharge their batteries?

I do know of one situation where this worked out a very well.  A friend of mine in grad school took a year off (after 3 years in the program) to teach in an inner city school.  I think at the time he started he was not so sure he wanted to finish, but the experience motivated him very effectively to go back and complete his degree, since he realized teaching middle school was definitely not for him.

So yeah,  that does sound like you're depressed. (I will admit, I did not read the WHOLE post).
The angst is definitely weighing you down, and affecting you day by day.

Sometimes it's better to slow down, in order to speed up...

Speak to more and more people about your concerns.  One : to hear what they have to say, Two : to hear your own thoughts reflected through their minds.

But one thing is for sure,  you can always rely on your own mathematical ability.  Your innate skill to think, reason and absorb mathematics.

Maybe let your mind travel around a bit.

To give your mind a break, there are plenty of YouTube channels that will entertain and motivate you ...
since it has to be 'maths' related,  why not  Numberphile,  ViHart, StandUpMaths,  SingingBanana, MathoLoger.   Hell,  even step outside your intellectual zone and dive into other disciplines ...  MinutePhysics, SixtySymbols,  Periodic Videos,  Vsauce,  The School of Life,  The Film Theory,  The 8-bit Guy   etc...

Maybe a few books to guide your decision:

The Professor is In - The Essential Guide to Turning Your PHd into a Job - Karen Kelsky (auth.) - 2015 - 0553419420
A PhD Is Not Enough - A Guide to Survival in Science - Peter J. Feibelman (auth.) - 2011 - Basic Books - 0465025336

oh,  and one for the LULz:

Surviving your Stupid, Stupid Decision to Go to Grad School - Adam Ruben (auth.) - 2010 - 0307589447

the first recommended book, started out as a blog, in case you wanna take a browse --- Blog :: The Professor is In

The second book shows you how to plan ahead in a cautious manner,  while the third one will have you crackling in one sitting.
But I personally prefer the first one.


When bidding for papers on softconf.com as a reviewer, does it make any difference between answering no or not bidding for a paper? When bidding for papers on softconf.com as a reviewer, does it make any difference between answering no or not answering for a paper?

I.e., is there difference between:

and

?

Answering some comments:

http://softconf.com a.k.a. START:

  START V2 is an integrated web-based solution for managing peer-reviewed conferences and workshops. START helps streamline all steps of the editorial process, including paper/abstract submission, committee formation, paper reviews, on-line technical committee meetings, report compilations, author notification, preliminary conference program creation - and a lot more.

Also, what is “paper bidding”?.

I have crossposted the question at:

Quora

I can't answer specifically for this service, but in general it can make a small difference if some papers fail to get bids. For some CS conferences, if you answer no for a paper you are unlikely to be asked again if a second round of bids is needed. If you don't answer at all, then not answering will be likely treated as more like "maybe" than "no".
But, while not especially rare, it only happens at the margins.
But it is even possible that a desperate program chair will come back and beg even "no" voters for reviews in a future "ask". Even less likely though.


Applying for assistant professor position, teaching statement required but I have no teaching experience I'm going to apply for an assistant professor position in a European university's campus in China. The problem is that I do not have any formal, class-based teaching experience while the job specification says that I need to teach four courses. The university also asks for a teaching statement. What shall I put in that statement?

Please advise and thanks in advance.

I do not have any formal, class-based teaching experience

The way you wrote this suggests that perhaps you have some informal teaching or tutoring experience.  If so, you can write about that.

You have years of experience observing teachers at work.  Think about what made the good ones effective, and what the bad ones did wrong.  You can use this analysis to create your draft teaching philosophy.

If you do not get this particular job, and you decide to continue applying for teaching jobs, then I suggest you get some teaching and tutoring experience under your belt as soon as possible.  It's okay to volunteer -- as long as you treat your volunteer teaching as seriously as you would treat a paid teaching or tutoring job.

Most universities require a "teaching statement containing your teaching philosophy". Just because you have not taught does not mean that you do not have a teaching philosophy.

That being said, I see two serious problems with your question.

They will most likely ask for a teaching reference letter, and you do not have that since you have never taught. You can try to get a letter by offering to teach one of your colleagues' classes (with your colleague in attendance). He/she will observe your teaching, and they can write a letter based on this.
I find it shocking that the only reason you seem to want to apply to this position is because "it is good in terms of remuneration" (a statement that has since been deleted from your question). As a researcher myself I do not teach a whole lot, but if you are already of the mindset that you are teaching because of the money, I think that this attitude will come through at some place or another, and I am not so sure that this job is right for you (or that you are right for this job).


pdf or word of the article for the first submission I'm submitting an article to an Elsevier journal, but I'm hesitant about the file format I should choose as the first submission. According to this journal:

  Your Paper Your Way

  We now differentiate between the requirements for new and revised
  submissions. You may choose to submit your manuscript as a single Word
  or PDF file to be used in the refereeing process. Only when your paper
  is at the revision stage, will you be requested to put your paper in
  to a 'correct format' for acceptance and provide the items required
  for the publication of your article.

My field is computer networking.
The reason why I'm hesitant is that sometimes word files look different in other people's computer and the reason why I'm hesitant about submitting a pdf is that the quality of the images in pdf file is a bit lower than the word file.

I wanted to know which one is better for the first submission? pdf file or word file? or both of them in a zip?

I recommend you submit PDF, for two reasons:

Only PDF gives you full control over the formatting of the document as received by peer reviewers;
Those who are accustomed to typesetting in LaTeX (of which I suspect there are a fair few in your field) may be biased against authors using Word. Admittedly a Word document with default formatting settings could not be mistaken for a regular LaTeX document, if only because of the characteristic typeface used by the latter, but a well designed document might almost be mistaken for a XeLaTeX-generated PDF. At any rate no one will be triggered from the production-neutral process of opening a PDF file, but some may resent having to deal with .docx.

The PDF image quality is a concern. Have you set image compression in the PDF export dialog to prioritize quality?

td, lr: Use the .pdf set up «printer ready».

Check the .pdf generated to contain all text, all tables (if applicable), all illustrations (if applicable, in color [if applicable]) and all literature references to be present, in the order of consecution as the journal wants, and all completely readable.  Then print it on paper (because the screen output may fool you in terms of resolution (72 dpi vs. at least 300 dpi on printer) - don't hesitate to read it aloud.

Note: Some pdf writers allow you to save file space by lowering the resolution of the images, allowing an easy transmission as attachment in an e-mail -- double-check that this does not happen (i.e., you must retain at least 300 dpi resolution).  If this .pdf file is ok, submit the .pdf.

Why submitting a .pdf? Publishers may offer to convert the Word file for you into a .pdf which then is sent (with added line numbers) to the reviewers.  But, how many versions of Word are out in the field (plus, did you use Word for Windows, or Word for Mac?)  You have no control how Elsevier's engines are set up to identify this, nor are you able to change their settings; a .pdf however is intended to keep the content and layout regardless if read on Unix, Linux, Mac, Windows (it is standardized).

If the interface asks you to submit the compuscript (here: your .pdf) once, and later asks for the image files at high resolution / as vector files:  upload both the pdf compuscript (with images embedded) for the reviewer's work plus the individual image files which will be used to set up the galleys by Elsevier later.  You typically get this line-numbered .pdf and a tracking number (sometimes already the doi) you need for further communication with the publishers.

Good luck for the reviewer's suggestions.  Meanwhile, keep and backup the word and both .pdf files at least until you see your paper in the journal with final page numbers.


Placement of period in sentence that ends with "et al." followed by reference number? I have a citation that is at the end of a sentence with dual punctuation. What I mean is that I have a sentence of the following form:

  Blah blah blah is mentioned by Author et al.

What is the proper way to include the citation in this case?

  Blah blah blah is mentioned by Author et al[##].

  Blah blah blah is mentioned by Author et al.[##]

  Blah blah blah is mentioned by Author et al.[##].

Other

Since "et al." is an abbreviation of the latin et alii meaning "and others" the period in "et al." should be treated as periods in any other abbreviation such as "cf.", "Op. Cit.", "conf.", "c.". In most cases of which I am aware periods are shown after abbreviations but I am not a stranger to styles where the period after abbreviations are ignored. So my bet is that "et al. [##]." or "et al. [##]", depending on where the preferred location of the numbered references are, in a majority of cases. If you are uncertain you need to consult the journal style sheet (if any exists) or simply check other recent papers published by the journal in order to see how they prefer to have things set.

Another other:

  Blah blah blah is mentioned in Ref. [##].

At least this is what is used by all journals using a numeric citation style that I am aware of.


Walk up and talk to random people at academic conferences - is that appropriate? As a graduate student, I am relatively new to my community. From my point of view, the best approach to get to know new people is randomly walking around and start conversations (with anyone, no matter what age or known/unknown). But is that appropriate at academic conferences? How do established researchers think about that?

I am asking because in my previous conference visits, I often felt that people are annoyed or not interested when I just walked up and started a conversation. What would be better approaches for getting to know the community?

Absolutely. It helps, though, to be a little context sensitive.

If you've just come from an amazing presentation and want to talk about it to someone else, then "did you just hear that great talk by/about X?" is a good way to start the conversation, better than just "Hello" or "Great conference, eh?"

If you know who the person is (they're speaking, you recognize them, etc), then greeting them ("Hi Kate," or "good morning, Dr. Gregory," according to your industry norms) and introducing yourself with context ("I'm Susan, I really enjoyed your book") is a fine first sentence but please, have a second sentence ready. After the person says "thankyou, that's very kind," what will happen next? A question is good here - perhaps there's something you've always wanted to ask - or you could go back to your opener for a complete stranger, "did you just hear that great talk by/about X?"

Never open with something negative - "were you in that stinker of a session? Wasn't it the most boring thing ever?" - is right up there with the friend of mine who asked someone at a wedding "who is that obnoxious fat woman in the flowered dress and why is she even here?" only to be told "that's my mother."

My biggest problem with conference conversations is when someone wants to have a conversation with me but doesn't actually have anything to say. That puts all the conversational effort on me and it's hard work. Should you find yourself in this situation, have a selection of questions you can ask:

is this your first time at [this conference]? (don't ask an industry luminary, or a speaker, this question)
are you enjoying the conference so far?
what is your favourite talk so far? (not good the morning of Day 1)
is there a particular session you're really looking forward to?

It's a little trickier to ask questions outside the scope of the conference, like "where are you from" or "where do you work?" because they often contain assumptions - you might assume someone is a student who has graduated, or is a prof when they aren't yet, or is in a lab when they are not, and it's possible to offend someone. So don't lead off with these. Often, stating your own circumstances is a way to prompt the other person to respond in kind: "I flew here from just outside Toronto. You?" or "I'm doing/finishing a Ph.D/postdoc/intership at ABC. You?" though again be careful if the person thinks you should know this thing about them, or if it's on their badge. You usually want to get a paragraph or two into conversation before discussing "real life" rather than the conference.

Well chosen questions not only move the conversation along, they can meet your other goals. Maybe you'll decide to attend a session you hadn't planned to. Maybe you'll learn about a great book or other resource related to something you enjoyed. Maybe you'll be invited to something, or exchange business cards, or al those other benefits of networking at conferences. None of those things can happen if you just say "hi" and leave it at that, the other person says "hi" and then the two of you stand there awkwardly, wondering why you're not having a conversation.

I read and enjoyed a book called How to Work a Room that emphasizes knowing what you want from encounters like this. Are you trying to find a job? Hire someone? Learn more about something? Tell people what you've discovered? For every want you bring to that conference, someone else brings the matching one and if you two find each other you will both be happy - but only if you tell them what you're looking for and what you have to offer. This is a skill you can learn, and marching up to strangers and saying "hi" is only the first step.

The prior answers are fine as far as they go, but maybe address substance as well as form? You are putting yourself out there for a reason and it is not for the small talk or facial recognition. You are there to network and protect your future or you would just soak up the academic content of the presentations and go back to planning your first IPO. This is a total package we are discussing.

Before approaching anyone, know what are you asking for and what you have to offer in return? When starting a career you are beginning a long-haul cold-calling sales job and the product is you. Times are tough and new grad working cash register to make ends meet (or even abandoning a career) has become a sick cliche now that technical jobs can be instantly exported to the lowest bidder overseas regardless of which continent you happen to be standing on.

Your opening salvo is a crowbar to get your foot in the door. Your crowbar will be seen as such so keep it friendly and subtle. Be prepared with a business card and a thirty-second speech, or a C.V. (and maybe a thesis) on a USB stick for a good prospect, or a short discussion of your interests and the potential business venture you are considering, or the current football score if all else fails. You want them to have a good impression of your professionalism and you want them to relate their own experiences to yours.

Professional conferences can be fun but not like the more casual atmosphere college students experience on campus, not even at an academic conference on campus. Professional decorum is mandatory (even in Silicon Valley).

As you work the room, track your performance mentally in real time, or better yet, also in a notebook offline, and hone your networking tactics and strategy based on your results. If you are not paying attention you could repeat the same mistakes forever. For best results you want people to like, respect, and maybe fear you as a potential competitor a little in order to capture their attention, and what you want them to remember about you is how they can benefit from knowing you.

In this modern era of the revolving door through government and rampant legal corruption of politics with corporate money, the 'little guy' is a splat waiting to happen (even in academia). Be aware that powerful hidden forces are moving through the room. The higher up the ladder those you reach out to, the more powerful those forces, and they might not have your welfare at heart. Think Hollywood drama on steroids without the fiction.

The way people respond is highly dependent upon your personal appearance. This affects everyone regardless of sex or attractiveness. If your appearance has built-in clash due to poor sense of image, you will not be taken seriously no matter how good your pitch is or how much your clothes cost. Think frumpy little old lady in bright red lipstick and flowered hat with a bow versus sleek professional model. Tart yourself up appropriately and people will respond better to you. Your investment will pay off as you avoid wasting money on apparel that hang in your closet forever unused.

You can buy your way into a professional look with an image consultant, but you can also learn it for free from books. In this discipline people are classified by 'season' (spring, summer, fall, winter) according to bone structure, geometry, coloring, and personality etc. It is purely an abstract concept that has nothing to do with the weather but rather how people as products of nature tend to reflect the traits found in nature. Everyone has a unique set of colors, textures, shapes, patterns, and style that 'harmonize' with their body and personality. For example, a 'spring' has small symmetrical geometrical patters such as circles squares and triangles with small bone structure versus a 'fall' that has large irregular shapes and a strong bone structure and both tend toward greens and yellows as opposed to reds and blues. Image consultants are trained to recognize such characteristics and advise you on how to take advantage of your personal attributes.

If you develop a personal interest in someone, well, be careful. It could be the best time of your life or it could ruin you. Be sure you know the risks you are taking, and why, before committing yourself. Times change. Tomorrow your suspended sentence for drunk driving her home might force you out of your profession and your nude pictures on the Internet could ruin your life forever.

I know of no one who got anywhere without some rough patches. Dare to be bold and maybe it will pay off. Happy hunting.


Supervisor takes my results to type a manuscript. Is this normal? I am a PHD student, finishing my candidature in a year's time. The environment of my lab is slightly different. My prof (owner of the lab) does not supervise me at all and I received supervision mostly from a post-doc in the lab. Her role in the lab is more of a PI's role, giving instructions to the other lab members, but not really doing any experiments and data collection.  When I first joined the lab, I took over the one project everyone in my lab is working on (a very small lab), planning, doing and getting data from all of the experiments for the project (except for those that were done before I joined the lab, which is only like about 5% of the entire data obtained). While she initially guided me for the project's direction in my first year, for the past 2 years, I did not receive much guidance from her.

Now, she is writing a paper with the results I generated over the past few years, not giving me a chance at typing my own manuscript. Is this normal in the academic setting? She listed herself as the first author and me as co-first, and  I feel like I have been reduced to the likes of a research assistant, who generates data for her to use. I am worried this will affect my employment chances in the future when I graduate. This will probably be my only paper at the end of my PHD. Does the number of papers/ or amount of contribution listed in the papers matter to PIs who are employing potential post docs?

Supervisor takes my results to type a manuscript. Is this normal?

I don’t know about normal, but certainly not helpful in making you an independent researcher. Perhaps they want to make sure you see how it’s done right, perhaps they really need a paper fast, but I can see why you’re frustrated. I suggest you politely suggest that you help write things that you contributed with: like the data analysis, or the experimental setup. Ask her if she’d like a draft by a certain time.

  She listed herself as the first author and me as co-first

This is tentatively good though author order importance greatly varies by field. Contribution is a tricky thing to establish. You say you generated 95% of the data; even if this is true, maybe your PI and the rest of the lab managed most of the grunt work allowing you to generate so much. What do other lab members think of you getting first co-authorship?

  Does the number of papers/ or amount of contribution listed in the papers matter to PIs who are employing potential post docs?

Very much! When I hire postdocs I want to be sure that they’re “fully baked” and able to conduct research independently, so they can help drive the lab forward, and perhaps advise students (as you were advised).

The solution in my opinion is to speak out. You can approach your actual supervisor, explain the situation to him, ask for a meeting with the post-doc. The may consider the authorship as you have done all the work. Or at the very least, indicate a mark in the authors list saying that you both had equal contributions. With equal contributions, employers can consider you as a first author too.

In these cases, the earlier you speak, the better. If you have learned she started writing a manuscript, you could have spoken earlier and reached a resolution that allows you to write the manuscript or a decent part of it. However, from your question, this stage seems gone now.

You still have a chance to write your own thesis. So do not worry too much about practicing writing. But I am certainly against silence towards some selfish self-centered people who hijack other people's work and ideas. I know how sad that feels quite well from a personal experience. If everyone will stay silent against such people, they will increase.