text:
How should an administrative assistant reply to student addressing them as "Professor" or "Doctor"?
As an administrative assistant at a major university, I regularly field questions from prospective applicants and students. Occasionally, in response to my reply the author will address me as "Professor" or "Doctor".
What is a concise yet polite way to reply with regard to this (in my case) misattribution? I am flattered to be sure, but my flattery is exceeded by my concern for honesty in advertising – I'm neither a PhD/ScD/MD, nor a professor. On the one hand, if I just ignore it I feel I'm tacitly accepting the misattributed title, on the other hand if I reply with a correction, I fear that I misrepresent the values of our community as being overly obsessed with titles and protocol. Any suggestions for a tactful and honest way of addressing this kind of misattribution is appreciated!

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In the U.S., I think just don't bother to directly respond.
Your email signature probably accurately indicates your position, and if people don't understand the hierarchy of universities, it doesn't really matter. Their respectful form of address is just recognizing that you can give authoritative opinions on things... whatever your precise title/degree...

Also in the UK this is the right answer. If you are writing a letter or email and don't know the correct title for the person you are writing to, then the polite thing to do is use the "maximum" reasonable title, in a University this is likely to be Professor.

Similarly, in language teaching, we recommend not making a big deal of grammar/vocabulary errors.  Usually, just restate correctly and only explain if the student doesn’t catch on.  (Or if the error is one that is “hazardous.”)

@JamesMitchell If I just cannot find out if a person has a doctorate, I would assume in the negative. If I cant be bothered to find out, well, why am I contacting this guy anyway? ;-)

No need to correct explicitly, but ensure you include title (Mr/Ms/Dr/Prof./&c.) in your signature
To an outsider, it is often unclear:

whether the designated contact is an academic or an administrator; and

whether the designated contact has a doctorate (in the UK, many people working in academic administration do have a doctorate).

The lack of clarity is exacerbated by the fact that many university websites and web profiles do not spell out titles and credentials prominently.
Given that it is a far bigger faux pas to address somebody with a doctorate as Mr/Ms/&c. than it is to address somebody without a doctorate as Dr/Prof., the general advice for an outsider is, "if in doubt, assume the designated contact has a doctorate".
If you are concerned about anybody being misled, the best solution is to ensure your electronic-mail signature includes your title, credentials, and position; for example:

Ms Josephine Bloggs, BA (Ebor.) MA (London)
Secretary for Research and Postgraduate Programmes, Department of Futile Studies
University of St Kilda
+44 1632 960555 [this is a fictitious number, so calling it would not disturb anyone]

But if it really bothers you that much, you could add a brief note just below the salutation in your reply; for example:

Dear Mr Schopenhauer,
[Please note that I do not hold a doctorate, so I am "Ms Bloggs"]
Thanks for your enquiry about our postgraduate programmes. We are certainly willing to consider applicants with a degree in a different subject, and your background in philosophy looks like it would be compatible with the prerequisites for our Master of Futile Studies programme. I should observe, however, that it is very windy on our campus, so your proposed enquiry into whether a falling tree makes a sound may be tricky to ascertain reliably. We should also warn you that, in order to avoid replicating the mistakes of Easter Island and Donal Rusk Currey, we have a rigorous policy to protect the trees on our campus, and you will require a special permit and ethics approval to fell any of our trees for research purposes. You may find it helpful to make a campus visit before committing to your project.

In the U.S., including those degrees would seem rather strange...

For what it's worth, when I was an admin on the us 15 years ago,  having my email signature say "Ms X Y" wouldn't have seemed strange at all.

"Given that it is a far bigger faux pas to address somebody with a doctorate as Mr/Ms/&c" - really? I once collaborated with a senior UK academic who was also a Fellow of the Royal Society (which doesn't quite put him on the same level as Isaac Newton, but not so far off...) Everybody called him "Dave" - and that wasn't even his official first name, which was David.

I send emails to university administrative staff frequently, and I don't recall ever seeing this. The staff without don't write their degree/s and the staff with sometimes do and sometimes don't -- eg "Dr Adam Inastrive" sometimes, other times just "Adam". In fact, the person who was head of my (sub)department used to use email address "james@..." (now it's j.r.[...]@..."), even on papers/etc

@alephzero The faux pas is referring to someone that is a stranger without previous contact with a title below theirs. For many people the use of a title is odd and they don't expect it to be used, but undergraduates are typically cautioned to be careful in case the person they correspond with is one who does care about their title.

Calling someone by first name is not at all the same as calling them by the wrong title.

In some countries, it is usual to either add some titles to people vaguely linked to academia, or to "upgrade" their title.
I was often addressed as "Professor" when everything about me said "Doctor" (business card, letter, signature, ...).
So depending on the country these student write from, it may be a normal thing for them to do and you should not bother (and not feel flattered, and have your signature up to date which it I am sure is). Correcting them will bring more problems / misunderstandings than it is worth.


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What are the social norms associated with stealing free coffee?
Every morning, at the institution where I work, I attend a lecture series with on the order of 100 other students. The lecture hall is very central on campus, and large meetings are often held nearby -- almost right outside -- at the same time. Very frequently, tables equipt with refreshments accompany these meetings. Again very frequently, I will pour myself a cup of coffee as I go by.
I'm reasonably certain that this is unethical (*), but what surprises me is how socially deviant it appears. Of the approximately 100 students with whom I attend lectures, I do not see any of them making use of these resources on a regular basis. I've once or twice been harshly reprimanded by a conference-goer getting coffee at the same time as myself, and I've seen people sit down to work only about 20 meters away with coffee that they've licitly purchased, even if the meeting was clearly over and the refreshments were just waiting to be cleaned up. I once walked by a table just as it was being cleared and asked the staff member clearing it if it was okay for me to take something, and he was totally cool with it. I've never seen signs posted near the tables indicating that the refreshments are intended strictly for the attendees of the meeting, though I would guess that this is assumed to be understood. My only other source for views on this matter is PHD Comics, which has published an assortment of strips centered on the topic of free food.
I know that social norms probably vary geographically, maybe even by discipline, but I was wondering what others' experiences have been as regards stealing free food. As is -- I believe -- apparent, I consider it a relatively minor trespass, but other than the conference-goers who've yelled at me I've never heard the issue brought up explicitly. So, how do you think people judge the stealing of free food, and how have you formed these perceptions?
(*) I'm only "reasonably certain" because, as I understand it, the excesses from these meeting are frequently thrown out. As someone legitimately attending a conference, I've been instructed explicitly by the organizers to take excess food with me to avoid wasting it in this manner. I dislike waste in general, and I particularly abhor the waste of perfectly good food, especially coffee.
Note: I'm not 100% sure that this belongs on Academia Stack Exchange, but this is not a question about the ethics of stealing coffee; I am interested specifically in the attitudes of academics towards stealing free food. For instance, why do so few others seem to do so? People do little unethical things all the time -- arguably, speeding falls in this category -- but I seem almost alone in breaking this particular rule.

While excess food may well be thrown out, it is just as possible that all the people helping with the conference organization get to take whatever they wish before anything is thrown out. I've had the pleasure of getting quite some amounts of leftover cookies like this on past occasions.

Concerning the paragraph marked with an asterisk: As a little thought experiment, replace each occurrence of conference with eat-all-you-can buffet in a restaurant and check whether you are still just "reasonably certain" about the ethics of taking something for free while paying attendees are serving themselves. I think the two basic "misconceptions" in this question are that (1) the food is not free (conference attendees paid for it), and (2) the excess amount is probably not fixed, but proportional to what was ...

... used (i.e. by taking some of it, you are contributing to an increase of the waste during the next meeting). With that said, I feel this question, in its current form, aims a bit too much for a discussion than allowing for a clear answer.

Probably not in this case, but one of the sad truths about food waste is that in many places, there are laws and/or regulations about food that is not served in the intended manner. At least a significant portion of food waste at restaurants is food that has not been held or kept at the required temperatures for the required time, so health codes dictate it may not be served. Taking waste food is not the same as being served it, but if it appears that a food service organization is knowingly allowing waste food to be consumed, they could get in trouble in some cases.

"I've once or twice been harshly reprimanded by a conference-goer getting coffee at the same time as myself" --- The least you could do is wait until the meeting is over before taking anything.

I feel that the general location may be relevant. For instance,  if in the US I would question the premise of "perfectly good [...] coffee."

@ToddWilcox I'm certain that these regulations are not the reason why OP is being lectured about stealing coffee.

@ClementC. I think taking food and coffee from events you are not attending is pretty universally seen as dishonest, regardless of location. Besides I don't see how the phrase you cite would be questionable.

@CapCode That was an attempt at a joke with regard to the pretty universally seen lack of quality of US coffee. Sorry if that wasn't clear -- have you ever had some?

@ClementC. I was also about to make a 'bad coffee' joke about conference coffee quality...

@ClementC. I see, I didn't get the joke. I actually struggle to find coffee I like outside of North America (Dennemark being a notable exception). True though that the one poured for free after talks is typically not of the highest quality.

We have here conferences all ther time. While I do never help myself, I would not think much about a cup of coffe as the cost is irrisory. However, I would consider taking food seriously crossing the line. People do not think much about norms here, I have seen higher ups in the hierarquy doing that...

After reading those five paragraphs I still have no clue what is being asked here. Is OP just asking "Is it ethical to drink coffee set up for a conference/meeting that I didn't attend?"

Meta post re on-topic-ness of this question: http://meta.academia.stackexchange.com/questions/3404/attitudes-of-academics-towards-x-on-or-off-topic

I voted for reopening before reading the meta thread; after reading it, I was convinced by the arguments and I changed my mind, but now I cannot retract my vote. So if you are looking at the reopening votes keep in mind that they should be one less.

Although I agree that the topic of this question does not fit this site and should probably be closed, I would like to acknowledge that the question itself was extremely well-structured and well-written, about as good as I could imagine on this topic.

The big difference here is simply whether the meeting is over or not, i.e. whether it would have to be thrown away or not. If those who are supposed to consume it (for which, as others have pointed out, someone paid) clearly have no intent of doing so (because they left), then I think it is fine to consume it.
In fact, in that case, you would even do them a favor because noone has to clean it up. But otherwise, it's stealing. Another indication for this is the group size: With about 100 students, there clearly wouldn't be enough if everyone took some coffee.

I remember back in grad school, whenever the department had some event with food (e.g. for donors etc., not students), the department secretary would let all the students know when it was over. Basically turned into a feeding frenzy, but we didn't take anything before given the go ahead. Very effective method of cleaning up excess food and getting rid of waste.

Even if the meeting is over, I would consider just taking stuff as stealing, since you don't really know that they are going to throw out the food. At one of these things, they let the janitorial team take the food home. I can't really justify taking food from the lowest paid employees of the place...

@pwcnorthrop that's exactly how we do it as well in our department (actually, often, the organizers simply post it in the department's Facebook-groep: Free food there-and-there). But if such a policy is not in place and if it is beyond reasonable doubt clear that it is not needed any more, than I'd just take it, I guess.

@FábioDias in the context of this question, I do strongly doubt they're going to take the coffee home (or give it to orphans as another had suggested). Coffee is cheap, the quickest and most cost-effective means of disposal is down the drain. Others helping themselves to a cup or two after the event just means a lighter dispenser/percolator for the staff to have to haul off and dump out.

@DoktorJ I agree, but that doesn't change the fact that, until you ask someone in charge, it is all speculation, IMHO. I'm actually trying to avoid conclusions that are too specific because this question is already a slippery slope, even if a mostly harmless one.

@pwcnorthrop I've seen mailing lists devoted exactly to the purpose of inviting students to vulture on leftovers.

@FábioDias the janitorial team will probably be cleaning up after events like this almost every day, and the "menu" is likely to be very similar every day. There's a limit to how often anybody would want to eat the same "free stuff", unless that was the only option they had to survive.

A useful way to think about free food/coffee is to try to determine its purpose. Why did someone spend time and money to provide it? Are you subverting that purpose by taking it? The refreshment might be there

to attract people to an event
to encourage socialization or attentiveness at an event
to create a more welcoming general work environment somewhere
etc.

If you are taking something which is destined to be thrown away, that is more ethical than taking refreshments from a seminar that you didn't attend.

This issue is particularly confusing because you are mixing several different scenarios.
"hard" facts:

There is no free lunch,
You do not have legitimate access to the food,
You have no idea what they will do with the "leftovers".

One thing is for you to just get there and serve yourself. That is, literally, stealing, as you said yourself. The fact that is food can ease the rationalization, but doesn't change that. Fact 3, you don't know if they will take the leftovers to an orphanage, for instance. Or to the trash, I don't know either.
Another case is when you ask someone, with the appropriate level of "power", if you can serve yourself. With proper authorization, you change the second fact and it is not stealing.
Personally, best course of action that I can see, talk to the organizers, see if they have anything against you taking a cup everyday, even offer to help pay for it. The organizer will laugh, tell you to go right ahead. Then you can calmly tell the next guy that yells at you that you have proper authorization for the coffee, all clean and ethical :)
The only "academia-related" change would be that students might get a free pass. Since you work at the university, yeah, sorry, no free meal for you

I agree - except for "students might get a free pass", it might just as well be employees who might get a free pass.

@O.R.Mapper I might have missed a word there. Poor students might get a pass, following the idea of underpaid grad students, from phd comics, referenced by the OP (http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive_print.php?comicid=1223)

@fredsbend http://www.usda.gov/oce/foodwaste/resources/donations.htm

@fredsbend. Popular misconception. See http://youtu.be/i8xwLWb0lLY and https://www.epa.gov/recycle/donating-food. Some food require specific care, but if it is unspoiled, you can donate. Between EPA and USDA, I believe they would have mentioned specific state laws that would contradict the information on these links, so I believe you lost that bet, but I won't check all states to be sure.

Three considerations in rationalizing activities (on campus):
(1)  Do not inconvenience the 'registered conference/meeting goers' or the equivalent. One's actions/choices should not delay or hinder them access, or make it unappetizing or difficult for them to partake.
(2)  If one is not honest about small things (stealing some coffee) then when the stakes are higher one becomes more ethical?(really?). That sounds a lot like just being more cautious when the stakes are higher because the consequences if caught are more severe.
(3) On-campus, When it is clear there is plenty of extra coffee/tea/cookies/food - usually most faculty are OK with students getting some benefit as long as it doesn't conflict with (1).  (And this is one rationalization why we tend to be flexible with (2) (But do not use (3) as rationalization to avoid paying for department coffee/tea/cookies when there is an honor system collecting money).
(3prime) If the setting is on-campus but not so clearly academic (say a for-profit conference center or eatery run by the university, most administrators are NOT OK with students getting some benefit of sampling a bit.
(4) If someone partakes of food and it is set out to encourage attendance at a colloq/seminar/meeting, then he must attend the meeting.
Examples of applying (1), (2), and (3).
If everyone going through the area samples the other meeting's coffee/tea/food/cookies, it becomes a problem, but if a few people do it is isn't. Avoid being a chronic sampler, and build up karmic points by occasionally buying it yourself.
When the other meeting is done, the food/coffee/etc is usually considered free game in the academic setting, but do be careful. When no one is around may also mean that the attendees are still in session and will be desperate for coffee/cookie when they get break.
Avoid taking food /coffee/tea before or during the intended times the conferees have access. Maneuvering around an interloper is almost annoying as finding that the preferred coffee/tea type/cookie/food is used up before one has gotten to it.
edit one:
Add more cautions to 'end of meeting' exceptions.
Added (3prime) to cover on-campus venues that are not the usual faculty/committee meetings.
Added (4) (attend the seminar)

I think point 2 can be expanded or even linked to a point 4 in this way: If others see someone not attending the conference taking refreshments, they may either think that the refreshments are for everyone, or at least they may think that it's easy to get away with taking some even though it's not meant for them. The fact that this doesn't seem to have happened (yet?) in the asker's situation doesn't change the fact that it's a selfish thing to do and a selfish message to send and a selfish example to set for those around you.

@Todd_Wilcox, that is an important expansion clarification that I think goes under (1) (since encouraging directly or indirectly a horde to descend inconveniences the participants being able to get their choices, etc). In the OP's example, because of cenralized location  there was a potential for a horde but I was also trying to convey a general academic 'food' situation, which more often would be the small coffee/food tables  for faculty/univ-committee/colloquium/smallworkshop etc./meetings (relatively less often conference with registered attendees ) and typically not so centrally located.

@Todd_Wilcox, I have to admit in the exact details of the OP's example (centralized location with lots of people from different meetings and also unrelated to any meetings pass through, I personally would be using your thought (if one person takes cookie/coffee it likely would just encourage a nuisance of others to ravage the table, which definitely would be considered an issue even in an academic setting where we would be otherwise sympathetic to giving students a bit of a break when it comes to food/coffee set out for a faculty meeting.

Just make sure the conference is over already before taking the coffee intended for the conference.
If the conference is still going on, conference-goers might want coffee, and if you wind up emptying out the coffee container, you'd be responsible for the conference-goer not getting coffee.
But if the conference is over, then anything left from the conference is excess, and will be thrown out anyway - so you are in no way obligated to leave it for anyone.
By waiting until the conference is over, you're avoiding any risk that you might take something from it that someone else wanted - and only someone who is truly uptight would have any problem with you using the leftovers that would otherwise get thrown out.

@fredsbend I have no illusion that there doesn't exist in this world people who are that uptight - fortunately, they don't usually hang around after meetings for that long.  Too much downtime. ;) (More realistically, if someone does get upset at you, it's unlikely you'll get in much trouble, unless they recognize you as someone who's supposed to be held in high respect, in which case, you probably don't need to be taking leftovers from a conference you didn't attend, but all of these are edge-cases).

Theft is theft. If the coffee was paid for by the Institution you work for, you are stealing from your employer.

You can get fired for that (at least in Germany)
It is highly unethical (i also don't take other things from my employer because they are "free" - like paper which is needed to print something on it, the coffee on the table of a conference prevents hundred people running to a long queue and stalling the meeting by not finding change/the way to the machine)
I would hope you understand that PHD comics address a lot of things which the authors probably see very critical.

Highly anecdotal answer ahead.
For about a month or so, I would do the same in my department's building outside of the main auditorium. There were even snacks that I would take. Now I assumed that these were available to all in the building(they were not).
A month later, after taking my share of food, one of the department chairs immediately called me out and told me to put the food back. He was definitely not pleased or forgiving. Afterwards, they had actually hired someone to stop people from taking from the table.
With that said, if I had set out a table like that for my own meeting, I wouldn't reasonably believe that just the people attending my meeting would take some of the refreshments. Now I'm not condoning my actions, or even condemning them, but I believe that's the most realistic.
All I would say is, like some of the other answers, wait until the conference is over and take what you'd like.
And as a side note, I would definitely consider myself as a social deviant in the department I study under.

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Should seemingly arbitrary things like "play piano for Church" or "intramural badminton" go on M.S. or PhD applications in sciences/engineering?
And if they should, I assume that these things should go on a resume under something like "Activities and Community Service". I mean I consider being able to sight read music to play at my Church as a significant feat (how many people can do that?) and might sway one person on an admissions committee if he or she enjoys music and understands how hard one must have worked to accomplish this.
Badminton?.... perhaps not so much

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

No.
These things are by and large irrelevant. Everyone has hobbies, and many of these may be challenging, but the purpose of a graduate school application is to understand your background as a potential scientist.
At best, this will make someone go "Huh, neat, the oboe..."
At worse, it will make someone assume that you're either attempting to pad out a relative lack of accomplishments, or don't really know what you're doing.

So you're saying if an application specifically asks for campus or comm. involvement, you should not list either of these things? I'm talking about on a short answer type question I saw one graduate application have. It was just a short box to list these things. I can't see why it wouldn't be appropriate there

You said resume, not an application with a specific prompt. Though I'd tend to focus on leadership or more relevant campus activity over random hobbies.

In this case you can follow the 2 general rules that almost always apply: follow the instructions given (and ask if they are unclear) and when that leaves you still room to pick and choose: add only things of which you can explain why they are relevant in this specific situation.

It really depends where. In Germany, extracurricular skills (especially cultural and social ones, such as classical music etc.) are considered a plus in many cases.

Moreover, since @masque is giving the example of church, it depends even more on where the person lives. In France, saying that you do some music is fine in extracurricular skills, but saying that you do that music specifically in church is a big no-no.

Naaah. This comment doesn't coincide with research that has been reported to suggest that music programs in schools help to promote intellectual achievement in students.

@Inquisitive If I'm looking at a grad school application, your intellectual achievement should already be obvious. If it's not, playing the organ in church isn't going to save you.

Should seemingly arbitrary things like “play piano for Church” or “intramural badminton” go on M.S. or PhD applications in sciences/engineering?

As long as you are succinct about it, and none of your hobbies take large amounts of time, accomplishments outside your primary field can be a positive addition to a CV or application.  However, these features would be of minor importance, compared to your accomplishments in your primary field of interest.
Example of how to handle your two examples succinctly:

Hobbies: intramural badminton, organist for Name-of-Choir

When I see "badminton," I think: This candidate has figured out a good work-life balance, and has resources at his or her disposal for dealing with academic stress, and staying healthy.
When I see "organist for choir", I think: This candidate can relate to other people (can get along with the choir director); this candidate may turn out to have a talent for community outreach; this candidate is smart, creative, disciplined and appreciative of beauty.
Both hobbies suggest to me that this candidate might have a talent for building community in my department.
You never know when an outside interest in going to play in your favor.
Example 1 (fictitious): You practice judo.  Someone on the committee does too.  S/he is intrigued and reads your application more carefully.
Example 2: A friend thought he would play a bit of chess in the café while waiting his turn to be interviewed for a teaching position (not in the U.S.).  He won every game, including against the best local chess player.  Word spread, and he got a big crowd for his talk.  He got the job.  (Of course, he wouldn't have gotten it if his talk hadn't been solid.)
Example 3: I was given permission to take computer science prerequisites concurrently when I changed fields, by virtue of my degree in music.  I asked the department head why she signed my permission slip so quickly, after everyone else had said "no exceptions," and she said it was the music degree.
Disclaimer: I have never sat on an admissions committee.

Example 4: The reviewer dislikes your hobby for one reason or another (it implies a level of religiosity, they think its frivolous, or have negative associations with it) and this colors their reading of your application.

@Fomite - the religiosity is easy to downplay.  Do you have a couple more examples, I guess I mean counterexamples?  I am not feeling very imaginative today.

In some fields, nerdy or off-beat hobbies might count - tabletop gaming or the like. In others, something that reads as "jockish" - like certain sports. The issue is it will vary wildly by the one thing you can't control - your readers.

@Fomite - I'm not getting it.  For example, what is tabletop gaming, and do you mean by "count"?  Are you imagining that tabletop gaming might turn someone off, or intrigue them?  I really need some concrete examples.  I can't imagine a field where the reaction would be, "Oh, yuck, this person has a regular source of exercise and team interaction.  Let's shun him."

I said "nerdy of off-beat hobbies" by "count" I mean "Tabletop gaming might be included in the set of nerdy or offbeat hobbies". Stack Exchange has a whole site on them: http://rpg.stackexchange.com . And given my example was that a reviewer dislikes something, yes, I'd be imagining that a potential advisor might say "Man, this person spends a lot of time pretending to be an elf. Maybe they're not serious about their work...".

This issue, for me, is that you can't control the responses. In naming something like a hobby, you have invited a panelist to think about your personal life as well as your professional one. A resume isn't the place for that. You selected all positive examples, but I thought it was useful to note that "You never know when an outside interest in going to play in your favor." also means you never know when it won't.

@Fomite I think it depends on OP's attitude of the application. If he really wants to enroll into that specific university/program, then I suggest play safe and try to only show off in academic achievements. On the other hand, if he is applying to many places, then he just needs the benefits aparente mentioned to help once, no matter how many negative responses it generates elsewhere

@jf328 and Fomite, but I still need to hear a couple examples.  I'm having trouble imagining a particular hobby mentioned proudly and briefly in a one-line list in a CV that might make a reasonable committee member think, "Oh, yuck."

To a certain degree, I'd say Yes if your proficiency in a particular activity increases the chances you`ll be a good scientist in the field of study you are applying for.
I.E. if you are applying for a Master in Aerospace Engineering having great skills  in designing and building in RC models definitely shows that you are in possession of skills that can be useful for a scientist in that field. I first-handily know a guy whose proficiency with xflr5 and fem, obtained from a hobby, were a nice added value when applying for his PhD, which he ultimately got.

Mentioning a slightly quirky hobby can give someone with a pile of CVs a hook to remember you by. They might not remember your name but they will remember that you collect tea pots.
Also, often an interview will start with the 'Simple question to put the interviewee at ease'. Mentioning your interest in Bolivian throat singing will give the interviewer something to ask about.

Disclaimer:
I have never been on a hiring committee, so take this post with a pinch of salt. On the other hand, I have some relevant experience so I though it would make a nice comment, but it came out way too long. Best, take it as a "common sense" advice, but shuffle it way down the priority list.
Also, a lot of it feels like obvious things, but I think there is still value in stating them, so that they can be consciously taken into consideration.
1. The hired person must be able to do the work he or she is hired for.
Here I assume the claims below are truthful and well understood (see point 4. for more on the matter).
Claim "can play church organ well", means that you can work hard to obtain your
desired goals, you understand delayed gratification and it is a weak evidence
that you can do the necessary work.
However, "Olympic-level swimmer" suggest there will be some additional obstacles. It means that person will probably want to constantly train to maintain such skill and perhaps go to some competitions which might collide with conferences, workshops, seminars or other scheduled activities. Unless the hiring committee goes for the special perks (like potential publicity gain), it is actually a negative signal.
If you are really serious about leading church choir, it might conflict with your work as well.
2. All else being equal, interesting people make for a better team.
Having an interesting hobby is a weak evidence that you may be an interesting person.
A good team is one that works well together, and having people with good skills is not enough by itself for that. Being a "team-player" is important, but there is another factor that is sometimes overlooked: it is good for the team if its members like each other and like talking to each other. Many of us like working with interesting people. The whole place becomes more enjoyable, and being at work may be a thing to look forward to rather than just a necessary routine. Additional non-work topics provide a social glue that makes team works more smoothly.
3. All else being equal, it is better (in the long run) for the employees to have good work-life balance.
Having hobbies (but not too many) is a weak evidence for having a good work-live balance.
Although be careful, for example it's a feat to sail around the world, but this immense dedication might also mean this person will be gone sailing exactly when its time to write down the thesis (see also point 1. above).
4. Any statement on your resume has also indirect meaning.
You say you can sight-read. So what, so can I (or could). Yet, such a statement does not mean anything. Even if the person reading your resume does know what it means and what it entails, there is no scale to compare yourself against.
One could say in Europe sight-reading is a given if you have any reasonable musical education. But what level of sight-reading?
If you can sight-read like my teacher could or better, then you do have my deepest respect (e.g. Scriabin studies full of accidentals, almost in tempo, and I could spot no mistakes even if I knew the piece recording well; moreover she did not do that by knowing the piece or by ear – she could play my own compositions on the spot too). Yet, how can you convey that information to another person, one that perhaps does not even know what sight-reading is actually about? For example:

Oh, you can sight-read? Great, I can read notes too!
That person claims he/she can sight-read?! But Chopin is so hard, nobody can sight-right Chopin. That person must be delusional.

By choosing to put some information on your resume you make a decision. These decisions may indirectly reveal something you won't like. Even tiniest details, like punctuation (see Lessons from a year’s worth of hiring data), might matter. If you choose to claim that you "can sight-read", then the hiring committee might misunderstand it as (I am exaggerating on purpose) "puts value in unknown, obscure skills", "has problems communicating clearly" or "does not understand what skills are relevant to the position".
While I would encourage you to include information on your other skills, do so only if you can communicate them clearly without putting too much emphasis. Furthermore, remember the hiring committee will be looking at this from their perspective, in particular "leading a musical ensemble in years 2014-2017" might be more relevant that "can sight-read".
I hope this helps ;-)

I didn't mean I would write on my resume or application "I can sight read" but I meant obviously if I play in Church, then I can sight read. Anyone who knows anything about music would know that so no I wouldn't write "I can sight read"

"The hired person must be able to do the work he or she is hired for." is I think the biggest reason why hobbies here are at best "meh". If I interview you, I may ask what you do for fun to get a better sense of who you are (and if this is the right geographic area for you). But if I'm reading your CV, I'm looking for job-specific information. "I do this outside thing" is irrelevant for that, and a poor enough signal for if you're a good fit (I dislike a large number of people who do the same things I do...) that I'm not going to rely on it.

@masque I think you are overestimating how much people know about music, esp. when it comes to things that you learn by participating in performances of various kinds.

I would be careful about what you put under hobbies because people on the admissions committee might react in completely unpredictable ways. This can work for or against you. An anecdote:
One lunchtime I saw some staff in the common room browsing through applications for a mathematics position. One of them, a prominent category theorist, started guffawing. "Look", he said, holding up one of the forms, "he lists herpetology as one of his hobbies." Somebody else explained what herpetology is. "Oh," said the category theorist, "I thought it was the study of herpes."

Well, and what would be funny about studying herpes?  I went to a fascinating talk once about measles outbreaks and chaos theory.

They will definitely remember this application.

Yes. Include them under a title like you suggested. You're correct. The ability to read music in that fashion is an accomplishment and it may actually suggest an innate ability others don't have.
I've been personally convinced for a long time that artistic aptitude and technical aptitude are frequently paired in individuals. For example, I've known several people who had strong artistic aptitude who I also thought had abnormally high intellectual aptitude.

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I can't find a masters thesis advisor. Can I publish independently in a math journal and get my MSc degree that way?
Is it possible publishing original work in math research without having an adviser?
I had some thought of matrix multiplication which I posted in this forum which wasn't welcomed that well, I plan to publish it in the arxiv.org but I also want to publish in a journal.
I tried looking for advier for my MSc thesis in PDE but with no success so I am thinking of publishing an article by myself, will that be sufficient with providing me with my Msc degree?
I heard once that Saul Kripke published during his Bsc studies, I am not sure if he were granted his PhD without an adviser, but I hope it's possible.
P.S
my case is different than the other case as I don't even have an adviser to discuss my paper.

Duplicate? http://academia.stackexchange.com/q/11094/19607

Duplicate, see this and perhaps this

This is going to depend on your university's requirements. At mine, you cannot get the degree without an advisor and a second reader both signing off on your work, whether it's published or not.

Even if you can, should you? Or that would make your future career even harder?

Are you currently enrolled in a master's degree program? If so, you should be able to find an advisor in the department, and then pick a thesis topic that you and the advisor can both work with.

I reopened this post because it was marked as duplicate of one that was mainly about interpersonal issues with an advisor. The answers there really didn't address the situation in this post.

Publishing an article and getting a degree are two different things.  One can do either of them without the other.
At least at the Ph.D. level, the thesis should be of "publishable quality" but in some exceptional cases may not be published.  And of course many get masters degrees without publishing.
You can publish without an advisor.  But it seems unlikely you will get a degree without one.  (Some Ph.D. programs may have a masters degree by coursework and examinations that you receive during the course of your Ph.D. work.)
Generally, the work for your degree is done after you have an advisor, in consultation with that advisor.  It is rare that you have the work done before you have an advisor.

A masters by coursework exists outside of PhD programs, too (it's common in the US)

@ff524 I finished with the coursework (taken quite a lot of courses); now I am just supposed to write my thesis, I thought it should be original work but I have seen some people that haven't even get their work published beyond arxiv.

@Alan You  really, really need an advisor, even if it means picking a different topic for your MSc thesis. An advisor should not only be able to discuss the department's formal requirements, but will know what passes and what fails in practice.

Of course you can. Anyone can submit their work to a journal. The editor will make an assessment to determine if it should be sent to peer review. It if is, you will be subject to the perils of your peer's opinions. If they think it is good enough, your work will be published. Be advised though, that some journals will charge a fee for publication, and without an advisor or being part of some organization with budget to cover such expenses, you will have to pay yourself.
One published article is not sufficient to be granted a degree by a university. You will need to fulfill the criteria for a degree, which at the very least means an assessment of a thesis by a committee or examiner. You could possibly come to some agreement with your university about submitting a thesis for assessment without having an advisor. However, having an advisor, if only for the administrative aspects, is probably the simplest way to proceed.

It is not the case that "most journals charge a fee for publication". Some do, some don't, and it's not just about "open access"...

True, the ones I have experience with do though. I'll update the answer.

Some journals have a fee that is to be paid by the grant that supported the research; but if there is no grant then the fee is waived.  The thinking is: if the government (or a corporate sponsor) is paying hundreds or thousands of dollars for the research, then they should be willing to pay one or two thousand to support publication of the research results.

I hear that virtually all reputable math journals do not charge a fee

Does the MSc thesis have to have original new work or is it just an overview of what is already known?

I guess this depends on your university's criteria. In my experience and opinion, a MSc thesis should demonstrate mastery of recent theory and methodology. A good thesis would be one in which a problem is solved using existing, preferably recent, methods. Developing new theory or methods is not required...


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How to refer to a Research Training Scheme Place for PhD study as an achievement
In Australia, students pursuing higher studies (typically a PhD) can complete it on a Research Training Scheme (RTS) place. The RTS is funded by the federal government (see here) but it is up to each university to select candidates who meet eligibility and other requirements. This is a substantial (financial) award that is based on merit and in my view one way of highlighting one's achievements. To the best of my knowledge, some universities have a competitive application process to select which candidate is awarded an RTS place (as the number of students may exceed the number of places available).
Question: How should this award be referred to in a letter or a CV?

One Sentence Description: Recipient of National Research Training Scheme (RTS) Grant for XX University, a program supported by the Australian Commonwealth, authorized by 'The Higher Education Support Act 2003' designed to improve quality of Ph.D. graduates. Received Award for XX years which allowed completion of XX Degree and Dissertation titled "XX".


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Does a survey require an ethical approval?
We did a student project - which included a questionnaire and anthropometric measurements. Since it was a student project, and the topic was decided in a short time, we did not take an ethical approval from our institute committee. Our institute doesn't have a  provision for fast track approvals for student projects.
But we took a  written informed consent for each participant. Since we got interesting results (unexpexted) we thought of publishing our study. The institute ethical committe denied a post hoc approval.
Do surveys actually require an ethical approval from a journal point of a view?
Since we have the forms of informed consent, aren't they sufficient?
If none work out, is there a repository for unpublished work like ArXiv  in epidemiology?

If you read the Declaration of Helsinki, which some journals expect authors to follow, they clearly state that an ethics committee must approve research before the study begins. I suspect that by not seeking approval before conducting the research you may have limited the number of journals you can submit to.

I disagree with the close vote. I think it is a legitimate question although the OP may have made a mistake by not doing IRB before the project. But, that's exactly why the OP needs to ask if he did it wrong.

Consider yourself very lucky you were not failed outright and chalk it up to experience. Many departments would fail students who carried out experiments without obtaining appropriate ethical approval.

Ya, I understand that an ethical approval is a must. we do these projects as research methodology coursework in a fixed time (ethical approval at least at our place requires submission of the proposal before a month or so and we are supposedto decide the project and finish in a month itself). Since it is a practical issue, we do it just with consent and these are generally not thought of being published.

If you were so fast in collecting meaningful data the first time around, why don’t you re-do the experiment from scratch? This time with prior approval. You should get the same results.

The question of what sort of ethical approval is required is a complicated one, depending on the local laws, funding sources, university policies, and journal policies.  I don't think anyone can give a definitive answer without knowing these details.  For example, see these charts for an indication of the rules imposed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Since we have the forms of informed consent, aren't they sufficient?

No.  If ethical review consisted of nothing but saying "be sure to obtain informed consent", then it would be replaced by a simple rule requiring informed consent.  Even that is tricky (what exactly are the risks you need to inform participants of?), and there are other issues for a survey.  For example, are you following best practices to ensure anonymity of survey respondents?

If none work out, is there a repository for unpublished work like ArXiv in epidemiology?

I don't know, but I can't really imagine the community would look kindly on using such a repository to avoid ethical review.

The institute ethical committee denied a post hoc approval.

It makes sense for ethics committees to be reluctant to approve research after the fact.  One reason is that it puts a lot of pressure on them to approve research that's not perfect but can no longer be fixed; another reason is that if post hoc approval is an option, it creates an incentive for researchers to skip the initial approval in the hope of forcing it through the process later.

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Can research experience in one subject area be relevant to applying to a master's in a different subject area?
I'm a computer science undergraduate student at a Canadian university, going into my second year this September. I am interested in going to graduate school in the future.
I don't know specific topic of computer science that I want to study in graduate school yet, but so far I have been looking into human computer interaction. I've been trying to speak to faculty in my department about research opportunities but none of their areas are in human computer interaction, rather their research is in computer science education. (I'm not exaggerating when I say that all of the computer science faculty is on education because the university I go to is new and the department isn't huge, but nonetheless it's a chance to know your professors more).
Anyway, I was thinking, if I do have a lot of research in computer science education and I apply for a graduate program that isn't computer science education (eg human computer interaction) how sufficient is my experience?

You may be able to bridge the gap by researching HCI aspects of some computer science education tools.

As a mentor I like most people who can do stuff independently, somewhat irrespective of the topic of interest. So if you can prove you can achieve with limited supervision, then even if you are applying for something off topic with your prior experience, you're still a potentially appealing candidate.

@GiuseppeBiondi-Zoccai: I would upvote what you wrote if it were an answer.

@WillieWong Will boost it ASAP

Of course the best scenario would be that you can prove you are capable of independent or supervised research activity in the field of interest of those organizing the master.
However, in my perspective field competence is not the only important element, as methodological competence and evidence of successful research endeavors is also crucial.
Personally, as a mentor of dozen of trainees at different levels in medicine, cardiology, and biostatistics, I like most those people who can do stuff independently or with limited supervision, somewhat irrespective of the topic of interest.
So, if you can prove you can achieve in research (or any other similarly challenging field) with limited supervision, then even if you are applying for something off topic with your prior experience, you're still a potentially appealing candidate.


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Advisor asking me to do review work after my PhD is finished
In the question Is it common to review papers assigned to your supervisor?, it is answered that it is not uncommon for the advisor to ask a student to review a paper.
I was ok with it during my PhD program. But now my PhD is finished, and even though I keep working with my advisor on some research papers related to my thesis, he sent me a new request to review a paper on his behalf.
I really would not like to review this paper, as it was not assigned directly to me and I'm not a PhD student anymore. On the other hand, I don't want to sound rude and, in the future, I plan to work as a teacher on the same university, so I wouldn't like to burn any bridges.
How should I answer to this?

What do you mean by "on his behalf"? Why does it matter to you whether it was assigned directly to you or not? The work is the same, and so is the credit you get for it. If you think it'll help your career to review it, then of course you should. It's just a review. Why "I'm not a Ph.D. student anymore"? Reviewing is not a grad student thing. Professors review way more papers than grad students do.

Although I completely disapprove of advisors delegating review requests, if anything, you are now more suited to do it after obtaining your PhD. After graduating you have received recognition to be able to do independent research, so hence now you are effectively deemed competent to assess others' work.

@Sverre the credit you get is not the same. Journals and conferences publish lists of reviewers, which you are not on if you just get papers delegated to you. Whether or not this is important is another matter, but it is not entirely irrelevant.

@MarcClaesen That depends on what the OP means by "on his behalf". I've had professors give papers to me to review, but then the journals transferred the assignment from them to me.

@Sverre I see your point. Maybe I jumped the gun thinking "on his behalf" immediately implies "without anyone knowing it wasn't the prof" (though I think this is what the OP meant). OP: can you clarify?

Guys, I think the OP is really not interested in a discussion of the practice in general. Can we please answer the actual question whether one should still do reviews for the professor after graduation?

I think this dilemma can be best understood by separating it into two sub-questions:

To what extent should you be doing reviews after graduation?
Assuming you are doing reviews, does it matter whether they are sub-review requests coming from your former advisor?

For the first question, there are already good answers on this site about number of reviews and about whether reviewing is mandatory.  Both essentially say that reviewing is good community service but never required, and it's better to not review than to give a poor quality or resentful review. Considering this, if this paper came as a direct review request to you from a journal / conference rather than a sub-review request from your former advisor, would you be willing to review it?  If the answer is no (which I think it might be given what you wrote in your question), then the fact that it came from your former advisor is beside the point; you can politely decline just like you would if you had been asked directly.
Now, if you would be willing to review if asked directly, but not when asked as a sub-reviewer by your former advisor, you need to ask yourself why this is, and frame your response accordingly.  For example:

If you are concerned about getting credit for your service and the review request is from a journal, then you can tell your former advisor you're wanting to build relationships with journals and ask them to have the journal transfer the review request (conferences may be unwilling to transfer, depending on how they manage their program committee).
If you're feeling resentful because you want to "leave the nest" and the way that you were asked makes you feel your advisor is still treating you like a student, then you might respond by saying you are very busy in your current position (no doubt true) and suggesting that your former advisor send this to one of their current students instead of you.

Other reasons may have other responses, but these are the main ones that I could think of, and I think may cover the most likely possibilities.

Yes, this is the answer I need. It's a mix of the two reasons you wrote, and I'm going to base my response according to this. Thanks.

I assume you mean to review a paper for a journal. When a paper is assigned for review, it is supposed to be reviewed by the assignee, and not given to a student. So you should politely but firmly decline.

That answer misses the point entirely.


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Precedent of country (or large institution) that did teaching reform: reducing number of tutors while increasing salaries for the rest
I am looking for a Precedent of a country that would have done a teaching reform: From many tutors with minimal (or low) salaries to a fewer teachers with bigger salaries and how did it work out...
I was a bit reluctant inquiring here, so have asked this on meta and it seems this question does not break any rules as long as we are talking about universities.

This has been tested at the level of individual schools.  I do not know about entire countries.  It is a big difference because if you change one school, you can use higher salaries to get new teachers from other schools.  If you change a whole country, it is not trivial to get new teachers from another country.

@AnonymousPhysicist this would be just fine, as underlying economic forces should work same way at a country or single large enough institution level.

For large or isolated countries, I disagree.

@AnonymousPhysicist If immigration would be limited then certainly it would be an issue, as supply would be cut off... Why do you think size of the country would matter? Is it because due to large amount of teachers required supply would be limited to the neighboring countries? I think it would partially be solved by internal supply of tutors as large enough country should have 'enough' of 'good' teachers, ofc ratio of reducing teachers would play a  big role here (2 to 1 reduction on big county)

If Monaco wanted to replace all its teachers with better ones, they could do it.  If the USA wanted to replace all its teachers with better ones, they could not find 1.5 million experts who were willing to move, no matter how much money they offered.

@AnonymousPhysicist 100% with you.

The question didn't say anything about replacing them with better teachers, just increasing salaries.  Taken literally, one could achieve this by firing half the faculty at random and doubling salaries for those who were left.  No immigration required.

@NateEldredge Hi Nate. Indeed.., I would have hoped that they didn't do experiment the way you described, lol...

Please do not cross-post questions across sites

@EnergyNumbers Hi, It wasn't clear at all where this question belongs, so it was suggested to try multiple communities, and it was discussed in community metas too. I would like to remind that rule of not cross-posting is not a 'law' and questions that can be 'designed' to fit on-topic for multiple communities are perfectly fine. Anyway, I have deleted other questions.

Your scenario is to a large extent ongoing in Russia now. In May 2012 "newly re-elected" president Putin signed a number of bills for the Government to implement in 2012-2021. In particular, Bill 597 says that ...

by 2012 average salaries of teachers should reach the average level in corresponding regions
by 2018 average salaries of teachers should reach 200% of the average level in corresponding regions

The implementation and the effect of this bill is rather controvertial. It seems that the required government funding for the educational sector was not increased appropriately.  To comply with the request, many schools and HE institutions had to reduce the number of posts significantly to report the required increase in average salaries. In practice, many tutors were pushed on 0.5FTE contracts (or less) with increased FTE salary levels, ending up with the same take-home salaries and sometimes higher teaching load. The overall effect on the sector is hard to see at the moment, since it is obscured by other ongoing reforms and political changes.

In order to reduce the number of teachers, while still teaching the same number of students, means either increasing the "teaching load" or the efficiency of the teaching needs to be increase.
Increases in teaching load require decreases in other job responsibilities. This is essentially the difference between teaching only colleges and research universities in the US and new and old universities in the UK. While teaching only colleges do not generally pay their faculty more, there is evidence/claims that having professors with active research benefits students.
One way to increase teaching efficiency is with larger classes. From my understanding moving from small seminars (10 students) to large seminars (40 students) is bad for student outcomes (again no change in how much faculty get paid). I am not sure if going from a 200 person lecture to a 400 person lecture has the same hit in learning outcomes, but logistically, most universities are lacking large (400+) lecture halls. Additionally, logistically, large classes often means less variety to students.
Another way to increase efficiency is for less contact hours (and to an extent less assignments requiring grading). The US and UK teaching models basically hit the extremes in terms of contact hours and grading. The US has lots of student contact and lots of small assessments compared to the UK. I do not know if there is any evidence that one system is better than another, but having US students switch at the university level would be difficult.


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If a journal not indexed in SCI nor in EI, is it worth publishing in?
After looking up the journal name (Journal for Internet Technology and Secured Transaction (JITST)), I discovered this journal was not listed in either the SCI or EI indexes.  Is this journal worth publishing in? More generally, how do I judge journals that are not indexed?

Do you mean the IJITST or the JITST?

JITST , onlline  :http://infonomics-society.org/jitst/

@rjzii My bad, I Googled the journal name listed in the original post, and only the "International" version seemed to show up.  However, there are indeed two, so my correction of the post was probably in error.  My apologies.

@Buzz No worries.

Not an answer to the general question, but. The journal you mention, in particular, is junk and a waste of your time and effort. See What are "fake", "shady", and/or "predatory" journals?

Knowing almost nothing about the journal's field, I was curious as to whether I would recognize its worth. I randomly picked an article (first article in Volume 2, Issue 1/2, March/June 2013) and saw this gem of a sentence near the beginning: "Comparison to the vast universe and the tiny atom still in the initial stages of the study of the human brain cognitive."

There are good journals that are not listed in the SCI, so this alone does not mean that the journal is bad. However, an overly long list of topics including non-descript terms like "web-service" and "Future technologies" looks bad. Also the sentence "Our journals’ impact factors have been compiled by Indexing Citation Board (ICB)."  is pretty suspicious, when you find out that ICB is actually "Infonomics Society’s Indexing Citation Board (ICB).". A review process of 4 to 6 weeks is also not hinting at serious checking. So even if this is a serious journal, someone tried really hard to make it look like trash, and I would definitely not consider publishing there.

It's a scam for sure.  (See below.)  They have imitated the name of another (apparently real) journal.  It got me confused while I was editing the post.

It really depends on your field to determine if it is worth publishing in or not. Some reputable, but niche, journals don't get indexed very broadly but are well respected and read by members of that discipline. As such, your best bet is to see if you recognize any of the names of peers in that journal and then publish accordingly. You might also want to reach out to some of them directly to see what their experience was as well. It should be noted that that generally journals will work to get themselves added to major indices so an old (i.e. more than twenty years) that isn't indexed may be a red flag.
On the subject of red flags, you may have noted the copyediting that went on with your post. Another thing to be careful of is similarly named journals as is the case of the International Journal of Internet Technology and Secured Transactions (IJITST) and the Journal of Internet Technology and Secured Transaction (JITST). There is a subtle difference there if you are just looking at the acronym and personally it raises a red flag for something worthy of close inspection. If you look the journals and publishers up on Beall’s List of Predatory Publishers, you will find that the publisher for JITST, Infonomics Society, is there. Inderscience Publishes, which publishes the IJITST, does not appear to be listed.

They fact that there are two so similarly named journals suggests that something odd is going on.  One of them may be trying to cash in on the name of the other.  After the edit, I see that the other one, IJITST, looks like the legitimate journal.  It certainly has a better Google presence.

@Buzz Yup. JITST's publisher is on Beall's list.


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Is it worthy to publish an extended abstract in a conference?
I have an accepted Extended abstract in an international conference. As a master student, it is heavy to pay for an extended abstract (400 Euros ).  But at the same time is it good for my future to publish an extended abstract ( 2 pages paper ) in a conference?

I don't think this is something we can judge; we don't know you, your future career plans, the quality of the abstract, or the quality of the conference. You should speak to faculty in your department, who may be better positioned to advise you on this.

Conference name : ICITST . I have a plan to study Phd .

I wasn't suggesting that if you tell us those details, we'd be able to answer this. I think this question is simply not answerable by strangers on the Internet. Speak to faculty in your department. (If you plan to do a PhD, you anyways need to form relationships with faculty in your department, who will hopefully then be able to write recommendation letters for you.)

The aspect of what an extended abstract is differs from one field to another. Refer this page to get a better idea on what does it mean in your field:
What is an extended abstract?
For example, in CVPR,
extended abstracts are handed out to the attendees before the start of the conference. They are much more handy than a huge proceedings book as each article is much smaller than its full version and includes all relevant details at a glance. It serves as a means to attract attendees attention especially when there are multiple venues occurring in the same time.
However, whether the amount you pay for it worth it or not depends on various factors, such as the field, the tier of the conference and so on. Sometimes in top tier conferences, there may be funding agencies who might be attending the conference. In such cases extended abstract would be a pretty valuable. But in any case, this decision would be better sought out by consulting it with your advisor or faculty members of your department as @ff524 suggested.


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How to answer a supervisor's email that includes and presents another professor to you?
What do you do when professor A wants to present professor B to you and does that by including professor B in the same email with the formula "I have copied him/her into this email so you can make contact with him/her directly"?
I'm a little uncertain if I should answer separately to thank professor A and to present myself to professor B, or if I should answer with the same email to both. If the latter, what is the best approach to use?

You are over thinking it. You can do either.

#ProfessorsArePeopleToo. The fact that these people are professors doesn't require you to do anything unusual. Just be polite.

It depends on what that new contact is for.
If it is for something completely unrelated to anything that you are working with professor A, then I'd suggest replying to both with a thank you message and then separately contacting Prof B.
If, instead, the work is, even sidely related to whatever you are doing with Prof A, add everyone in your emails. Transparent communication is key in any healthy relationship. If you are worried about spamming Prof A with relatively non-related content you can always contact Prof A separately and directly ask him if he/she wants to keep being CC'd in the email chain, there is no problem with that.
These Profs, they are just people, treat them like people!. Don't overthink it, as StrongBad says.

It is definitely the first situation: I'll do as you suggest. Thank you for that, really useful.


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If a reviewer makes significant contributions to improving a paper, may he/she suggest becoming a coauthor?
I was asked by the editor of a mathematical journal to review a submission by an author (unknown to me) which heavily relies upon some of my earlier work. I do not have much experience with writing peer reviews, but I have a good grasp of the topic of the submission.
The new results in the submission build heavily on earlier results in my published work; they are interesting and, in my opinion, worth publishing. However, while reading the mathematical proofs, I couldn't shake the feeling that they were overly complicated. Indeed, after thinking about it some more, I found that the proofs can be dramatically shortened by using insights that the author may not have had. For instance, one proof would go from roughly three pages to around half a page. For another proof, it seems that it can be reduced to a more standard situation, again drastically shortening it.
My work-in-progress report on the paper now 1) sketches the shortened proof for the first situation, 2) describes the needed insight to reduce the proof in the second situation to the more standard situation. At this point, the suggested changes seem to amount to a significant contribution to the paper since they touch not just minor parts of the paper, but the bulk of it.
At this point, I wonder what the best way to proceed is. Should I just submit the report with these suggestions? Or may it be appropriate in this situation to suggest to the editor that, if the original author is interested, he may contact me so that we can co-author a revised paper together? Or would that be considered unethical?
I do not want to overstep my bounds as a reviewer, but on the other hand I don't know how common it is for reviewers to contribute significant improvements to a paper anonymously.

Are you reviewing the paper anonymously?

@Mindwin Yes, I do.

An anecdote: one anonymous reviewer once rewrote a whole paper and said: is that the paper you intended to write? They didn't ask for coauthorship.

@cfh then there might be ethical implications of breaking anonimity; conflict of interest. Once you are an author, you cannot be a reviewer by the eat/have cake lemma.

At this point, I wonder what the best way to proceed is. Should I just submit the report with these suggestions?

This is indeed the high road to take here. As a reviewer, you explain your ideas on how the paper can be improved. The authors will or will not take all or some of them into account.
Asking for co-authorship in return for your service would likely be perceived as very cocky and unprofessional. I doubt that either the editor or the authors would be pleased about this or seriously consider taking you up for your offer.

If the review is significant enough to warrant co-authorship (very rare - probably more substantial contribution required than what the OP describes) the editor will often intervene and contact the authors and explain the situation to the authors. It is extremely unheard of and inappropriate to ask to be a co-author yourself.

+1 Offer of co-authorship is for the authors or possibly the editor to make, if at all. It is unwise for OP to ask, I am afraid. It is a bit of a shame that there is not a clear established code of conduct for very substantial improvements of a paper/proof which goes far beyond a regular review (and would, if done on the submitter's side, warrant co-authorship rather than acknowledgement) demanding that the reviewer be elevated to co-author, but that's the current state of things. Some journals/conferences publish prizes/commendations for reviewers.

Note that I didn't consider "asking" for co-authorship, but merely "offering" to the author to contact me, which I feel does make a difference. Anyway, it seems your view has the majority behind it and seems to be the way to go. It irks me not to get credit for a contribution, but perhaps this is something one has to get used to when reviewing.

@cfh Would becoming a co-author be a conflict of interest with the assumed neutrality of the reviewer?

@WetLabStudent Actually, the contribution described in the question seems easily significant enough that co-authorship would be a no-brainer in any situation except the contribution being made by a referee.

@DavidRicherby It's not so much a no-brainer. The referee is in a position of power, so Mindwin's question about conflict of interest is quite relevant here. In fact, the reason why the whole thing is so problematic is that a referee could phrase some mediocre improvements, or propose significant additional simulations/experiments and then ask to become a co-author, lest they will effectively have the power to reject the paper. Putting such temptation out of reach is the concrete reason why it is inappropriate for the reviewer to suggest coauthorship, even if it were otherwise deserved.

@CaptainEmacs That's why I explicitly said "in any situation except the contribution being made by a referee."

@DavidRicherby Overlooked that, you are right, of course.

I want to thank everyone for the comments and will accept this answer based on the majority vote. For the record, I ended up taking the free karma and submitted the report as it was, without any comments to the editor.

I have been on the receiving end of such an extremely helpful review, and I am grateful for that. Since (s)he is anonymous all I could do was thank the anonymous reviewer at the usual "thank you footnote". That won't help her or him much, but if he or she reads it he or she will know that the help was appreciated.
However, the editor does know that you have written an exceptionally helpful review. Leaving good impressions like that does tend to come back at some point: maybe (s)he is in a hiring committee for a position you are applying for, maybe the journal is looking for new (associate) editors, ...

I would like to add that the author, for an exceptional review, as described by the OP, should probably say something more flattering than the standard line in the acknowledgments, something along the lines "We thank X anonymous reviewers for their comments, one of whom's significant insights greatly simplified the proofs of theorems X Y and Z". You don't often see such specific acknowledgments like that because most often the reviews aren't that significant. However, it is more common than you might think.

Sure, what I did was add such a footnote at the point where (s)he made that contribution

+1 for mentioning that accruing good karma will pay off one way or another.

I once submitted a review and had the authors contact the editor to ask if I'd like to be a co-author of the revised version. The editor asked me, without revealing my identity to the authors until after I agreed.
I also once completed a review (in my institution's internal review system) in which I suggested various improvements, one of which would require quite a lot of work which I was better placed to do than the author. Rather than doing the work myself, I said, "if you want a co-author to help with this, contact me." He did. I don't think I'd do this with a journal review, though.

In line with the other answers, I agree that you should not suggest becoming a coauthor.
However, an alternate route could be to relinquish your anonymity by signing your review. This would allow the authors, should they choose, to acknowledge you by name or contact you directly.
There is the possibility that your choice to do so could be regarded as self-serving in this case, but there is clear precedent for signing peer reviews.

According to your second link, 0.96% of peer reviews in mathematics are signed.  Calling that a "clear precedent" seems to be a stretch.

If the paper is otherwise sound and of acceptable quality, you could submit your review saying as much, and then also include your improved proofs as a follow-on submission to be published, ideally in the same journal issue. The original authors come out ahead, because not only does their paper get published, but also cited right away.

I think the results aren't big enough to warrant re-proving in a second publication.


text:
Should I cite author names as they appear in the journal or as I know them to be complete?
Since I've been using Mendeley to manage and extract metadata from my PDFs, I've come to notice that authors are sometimes denoted with all their initials and sometimes with just one. I assume this has to do with different journal's rules on denoting author's names. However, this makes a mess in my author list in Mendeley, as the same person may be known under two or even more names (e.g.: "Last, F."; "Last, First"; "Last, First M,"; "Last, First Middle").
If, for completeness' and tidyness' sake, I edit the author fields to always have the most complete name of the author available to me regardless the journal the author published in, I inevitably will change the way I cite them. For example, an article from a certain journal only uses the first initial:

Last, F. Article Title, Journal name, x:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx

After I have "updated" my authors, it is possible my citation includes also the second initial, i.e.:

Last, F.M., Article Title, Journal name, x:y (YYYY), pp. xxx-xxx

So my question is: am I incorrectly citing the article when I include more complete information about the author's name than is given by the journal article itself?

I can see your problem but I am afraid you will have to live with the mess. The reason is that a publication must be referenced exactly the way it is published. The exception is that it is permissible to abbreviate first names to initials to adhere to the standard of the publication in which you intend to publish. It is, however, not allowed to remove middle names (initials) if they are part of the original publication, nor to add initials if they were not part of the original. I know many authors who have published under one and two initials randomly, but there is not much one can do about it.
Now, if you do it in your reference program, there is nothing wrong with that, but you need to make sure your changes do not migrate into published work that you write.
Just an example, Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals:
Manuscript Preparation and Submission: Preparing a Manuscript for Submission to a Biomedical Journal states:

Some but not all journals check the accuracy of all reference
  citations; thus, citation errors sometimes appear in the published
  version of articles. To minimize such errors, references should be
  verified using either an electronic bibliographic source, such as
  PubMed or print copies from original sources. [The text then goes on to discuss retracted articles.]

"a publication must be referenced exactly the way it is published": why?

@JukkaSuomela I primarily think of the requirement that information/sources should be traceable. It is possible small deviations may not matter but the problem is that one cannot be sure. One way to put it is that it is not the readers job to figure out what sources an author uses, it is the job of an author to make that clear to the reader.

But the exact source is typically clear even if you did not have any author's names at all in the bibliography. For example, journal name + journal volume + page numbers are typically sufficient to identify the article that you are citing. With the exact title of the article and the correct last names of the authors, there is very little room for any kind of confusion or ambiguity left. I cannot really see how it would confuse anyone if you used the full first name instead of some kind of abbreviated version of the first name, no matter what was written in the original article.

@JukkaSuomela Taken to the extreme, I guess one could only state the doi but then much would be lost from being able to browse through a reference list and get an accurate and informative sense of the source material.

But citations serve multiple purposes. Not only are you telling the exact source for a piece of information that you are using; you are also using citations to give credit to those who made the discovery. And I think the use of, e.g., full first names is a much more effective way of giving credit to the right people.

@JukkaSuomela You have completely lost me now. Perhaps you can develop your thoughts into a separate answer. The short comment format tends to fragment thoughts a bit.

let us continue this discussion in chat

It is, however, not allowed...
That sounds like there is one authority who's (de facto) putting down these rules.  Is there something like that?  Otherwise I would guess these rules are a bit more squishy and up to pragmatism or even personal style.

You can run into problems this way. There are two common transliterations of the Russian name Делоне, Delone and Delaunay. Suppose you want to cite two translated articles, which used different transliterations, and one untranslated article. What do you do?

I'm very sympathetic to Peter Jannson's reasoning, as well as @AnonymousMathematician's.  A problem that has not yet been mentioned is that if the same author is named differently in different publications--perhaps because of different journal conventions--then if one cites both publications, it may appear to readers that the works are by different authors.  In addition to potentially confusing readers, it will certain confuse bibliography-management software.

I disagree with the statement of "a publication must be referenced exactly the way it is published."
From Knuth's Mathematical Writing

In his bibliography Knuth has tried to keep his citations true to the original sources. The bibliography contains mathematical formulas, full name spellings (even alternative spellings when common), and completely spelled-out source journal names. (This last may be unusual enough that some members of a field may be surprised to see the full journal name written out, but it’s a big help to novices who want to find it in the library.)

This means that you can change reference, give full name of authors, give full name of journals. It may be unusual but it can be done and it is DONE. It is done by one of the most respected authors in the academy.
To answer your question:

So my question is: am I incorrectly citing the article when I include more complete information about the author's name than is given by the journal article itself?

When you include more complete information, you are not doing anything wrong. Actually according to Knuth, you are doing very good job.
Therefore if your target journal does not have any rule about same reference rule, you should be perfectly alright.

+1. I am actually quite religious about hunting down authors' full names and using them in my bibliographies, even when they publish using only their initials. (Of course, this requires care; some people's given names are initials.)

In recent years, I've tried to give authors' full names, or at least the first and last names (middle names can be too hard to find). As far as I can remember, one journal copy-edited the first names down to initials; no other journal made any changes or asked me to make changes.

@AndreasBlass, but your personal bibliography database retains full data.

Your quote doesn't seem to me to match the rest of your answer. It sounds like Knuth is saying "use the full version from the original source rather than an abbreviated version". After all, it is prefixed by being true to the original source. If the original was in "Journal of Awesome Results" by "Donald E. Knuth", don't cite it as "J. Awes. Res." by "D. E. Knuth". But also don't cite it by "Donald Ervin Knuth" unless that appears on the paper. I had a look at some bibliographies in Knuth's solo papers, and they are consistent with my understanding.

You should not add an initial that was not present in the original publication or expand initials into full names if the author used initials.  One reason is the one Peter Jansson gives, namely that the bibliography should reflect what was actually published.  However, there's another reason I find even more compelling: respect for the author's choice of name.
Editing another person's name is presumptuous.  Like many people, I have deliberately chosen the version of my name I use in papers, and I care about this aspect of my professional identity.  What my passport says or what I'm called in person are irrelevant, and I would not be happy to have citations edited to use what someone else thinks is a better (or more formal, or more complete) version of my name than the one I chose to publish under.  If my paper says Alice P. Liddell, then nobody has any business deciding I should be called Alice Pleasance Liddell instead.
In particular, your desire for completeness or consistency should not outweigh the author's autonomy to choose their own professional name, and you should not overrule a deliberate choice.  Of course, some people aren't picky about what they're called, and they may publish using several random variants of their name.  It can be tempting to standardize the name for the sake of consistency, but you should avoid doing so unless you know the author wouldn't mind.  If you don't know the author personally, it's hard to distinguish between an author who doesn't care and one whose preferences have changed over time, and it's not reasonable to rely on your own guess as to how to handle this.  (For example, if someone adds an initial due to marriage, they might be displeased to see it retroactively applied as if it had always been their name.)
There can also be political aspects of naming.  For example, some women publish under initials to avoid drawing attention to their gender.  I'm not convinced this makes a difference, but who am I to unilaterally undo it by replacing the initials with identifiably female names?
To summarize, names can be a sensitive subject.  Every paper comes with the names chosen by the authors at the time of publication.  If you're going to modify these names, you'd better have a good reason.

respect for the author's choice of name — This is a fair point.  However, in many cases, the choice to use initials instead of full names is not made by the author, but by the journal.  I've had to fight with copy editors to use my full first name in my own papers.

This holds water as far as introducing new spellings goes, but one of the drives of the OP is standardising spellings within a database, which amounts to choosing among variants which the author has publicly sanctioned. (On the other hand, there are those times where you just have to budge on spellings or whatever, and having others unknowingly seize on the variant you'd rather not use isn't fantastic.)

This can cause problems, or at least oddities, with multiple citations from a single author if two or three variants show up. To me, if I see nested entries for a single author, I don't necessarily presume the author published with the exact same name in each. But if I see two or three similarly, but not identically, spelled names with unique single author entries, I presume that they are indeed three unique people, and that's not a good thing.

I would be very careful altering the form of the author names given in a publication. As others have stated, it is easier to trace citations if they match those given by the journal. It is also concern for consistency, especially for common names, it would be laborious to authenticate that these are indeed the same authors and not those with the same initials working in related fields across your entire reference library or bibliography.
It is also difficult to deduce "journal rules" from looking at a few articles as many cultures also do not have the custom of middles names. Although I have heard of Japanese authors also taking advantage of this to use their nickname as a middle initial to distinguish themselves from an existing author with a similar name (such as Watal "Metal" Iwasaki). Similarly, some people have geniune cultural reasons for changing their legal or pen name.
Another consideration is that authors may be very deliberate reasons for including their name or initials they way they have in a publication. Some people (including myself) are known by their middle name but publish under their full legal name (e.g., S. Thomas Kelly). These do occur in prominent papers, such as J. Craig Venter who sequenced one of the first genomes. Removing the middle initial may be problematic when attributing such people as it is important for their identity and to show that their work has been cited later.
If it is really relevant to your argument to link publications, I'd recommend mentioning that the articles are from the same author or research group when citing in text. It's far easier to remain consistent with citations exported from a reference manager and will demonstrate your critical engagement with the literature if you compare articles in this way.

"it would be laborious to authenticate that these are indeed the same authors  and not those with the same initials working in related fields" - it can get worse: I know of at least two such author pairs who even work in the same department, researching the same topics. In one case, they only differ by a middle initial - one goes by "First Last", the other by "First M. Last". That makes it very difficult for someone not familiar with them to realize they are not the same person.

Conversely, there are also cases where one person publishes inconsistently under several different names. I didn't say it would be easy.

The problem is that authors may have legitimate reasons for wanting to use only initials. Maybe because of a clerical error, the same author is John Smith according to his birth certificate and Jon Smith, without the H, on his naturalization certificate. Maybe his name was misprinted as Jonas Smith on a widely-cited previous paper. Or maybe he intends to eventually be Jane Smith.


text:
How to get a mentor or supervisor for PhD studies in Computer Science?
If I have already completed a master's degree, but  no longer belong or have contact to the institution in which I followed my master's degree; how to approach one professor to see if he or she wants to supervise me? Actually I see lots of different areas that I would like, but I feel afraid of not having the enough background (I can only contact the potential professors by email because well I am actually in the North America area, and I would like to aim for an European university)
I know that some times there are some published open positions, but in those cases mostly the competition is really fierce.
Any advice, mostly based on experience, will be very useful.
Thanks

Apply to PhD programs in your area of interest.
Visit the schools that accept you into their programs.
During your visits, talk to professors about (a) whether they're taking students and (b) whether you share mutual interests.

You can also try emailing professors before you apply, to get a sense of whether their school/department/research group is a good fit.  But be warned that many will ignore your email unless you've already been admitted to their program.  (Expert tip: pay close attention to the warnings and admonitions posted on their personal home page!)
A much better way to make first contact is to attend conferences or workshops in your area of interest (and make a paper/poster presentation, if possible).  These events let you meet many potential advisors all in one place.  Plus, you get to hear about their work, and get a sense of their personality, hygiene, etc.

I feel afraid of not having enough background.

You and me both, pal.  It's called impostor syndrome, and everyone* in academia has it.
Good luck!
*…except for the real jerk-Os.

thanks, but I have a question, you said that first I should get admitted and then contact the professors. In a lot of PhD programs is established that one should first get a supervisor, so that is also a drawback, because usually they get doctoral students from people they already know e.g. master degree students in their former groups. So how to overpass that situation? I have seen more than once that some students are picked just because they are there, and not because their research skills.

Right—it would be helpful to know where in the world you are, Carmen Sandiego.  But in any case, conferences/workshops are still one good tool in your arsenal.  (And, oh yeah, you should be going to these anyway if you're serious about doing research!)

While @Dnuorg Spu's answer is correct for the US (and Asia, afaik), it is not all that applicable for Europe. Around here, US-style PhD programmes are still more the exception than the rule. In many european universities, one applies directly with the professor before getting admitted into any sort of formal programme.
Essentially, what most professors do when they have openings for PhD students is the following:

Talk to their own (good) master students (sidenote: a master is a minimum requirement for PhD admission in most places here)
Failing that, contact friends and ask them for good master students interested in doing a PhD
Failing that, write a job announcement to DBWorld or a similar mailing list

Step 3 usually brings in plenty of candidates. However, weeding out the bad from the good is time-consuming and error-prone, hence, most professors are not happy at all if they have to fall back to step 3.
Blind applications are usually ignored, simply because the chance that a given professor that you have applied to blindly currently has open funding and is looking specifically for somebody with your skill set is not very large.

I know that some times there are some published open positions, but in those cases mostly the competition is really fierce. Any advice, mostly based on experience, will be very useful.

My advice: give applying for some posted positions a try. Competition is fierce in numbers, but not necessarily in quality. We have had cases where we received 50+ applications, and decided to not hire anybody. Your chance is certainly better than villy-nilly mailing (or even worse, calling) professors out of the blue.

In Europe, usually you have to apply directly in a PhD program.
EPFL (in Lausanne) has a special PhD admission procedure that can be good in your case. They can take you for 1+3 years:

In the 1st year, your goal is to find a PhD advisor and a lab. You have to do two 6-month research projects, take some courses, and you're expected to find a lab for the PhD that way;
At the end of the 1st year, you pass a candidacy exam where your topic and advisor get accepted, and you have 3 years to complete your research program.

Note that you get paid during the 4 years of the program.


text:
Is it acceptable to modify the format when republishing an article?
My faculty has asked for permission to republish one of my articles. This is planned to appear in an upcoming magazine within the school I am currently working in. I have already asked the permission for republishing. It is an IEEE article, but I have some issues about the new printing.
The person in charge of the magazine has told me that they need the change the format of the article, so that it is according the magazine standard. Anyway they plan to change the following things:
- size of the font
- convert from two columns to one column
- referencing of the tables and graphs in APA style (I think IEEE uses another format)

But the content would be left unchanged. I have seen that in the Certification of Clearance sent to me by IEEE states the following:

All uses not specifically authorized in this license and specified in
  the options for reusing IEEE Licensed Material available through the
  RightsLink service are prohibited, including (i) altering or modifying
  the Licensed Material in any manner

and in other part it says:

If the Licensed Material is altered or modified in any manner, it must
  be within the scope of the license granted and it must not alter the
  meaning of the Licensed Material or in any way reflect negatively on
  the IEEE or any writer of the Licensed Material

So according to this, can they change the format?
Thanks

There are many types of rights related to intellectual property, and it is important to understand them correctly. The one you're dealing with here is copyright, which covers the text, graphics illustrations, and other possible graphic media (video, if your paper include any).
However, the copyright which you transferred to them does only cover these elements. Once they give you permission to reproduce the text and graphics, you can reproduce them in any way you want, following the license. But the presentation (fonts, page layout, etc.) is not part of the copyrighted material.