text:
What are the implications of the whole class failing an exam?
I am an MSc student and in my class are 10 people.
The module has been taught exceptionally poorly and as a result none of us can see ourselves passing the module. The exam is in two days time.
By failing the exam we will have to retake it in the summer because we will not met the threshold to pass the module.
The lecturer mentioned that the department was thinking of scrapping this module so this may be the last time it is run. Also throughout the module we got the impression the lecturer was really concerned about us and we got the impression people have done really badly in this module in previous years to cause him concern. Talking to other lecturers in private, have supported the fact that this professor is very bad and has not taught the module well enough to prepare us for the exam.
In the open book homework assignments, the class average has been high, around the 60%-70% region. But these assignments in total only account for 20% of the final module grade.
The final exam accounts for 80% of the final grade.
What are the implications, if any, for the lecturer or the university if everyone in the class fails the final exam?
I am in the UK.

It's not clear to me why you think that everyone in the class might fail the exam?

There is always that one guy who knows everything from the module before the course started, and he probably isn't hanging out with everyone else because you would have known that by now...

Studying math I experienced this: A test had 4 subtests each awarding 25%. A conversion table was used to get the grade from the percentage. > 50% to pass, 75% ~ average grade. Too many failed and the percentages were multiplied by a factor. The clever students were able to get more than 90% and with the multiplication factor they went above 100%. The grade distribution was weird with a big group barely passing and a smaller group getting the rarely awarded max grade. The factor increased each year. It was unsustainable and algebra was eventually assigned to another professor.

@MartinLiversage That is generally less of an issue in the UK because the average grade would be closer to 60%.

Have any of your class brought this to the attention of the department before now? When I was a student there was a class that was very very poorly taught where the department made the exam a bit easier and provided more support. But students approached the department early on which made it a very different situation to a few students worrying they'll fail days before the exam date.

"The module has been taught exceptionally poorly and as a result none of us can see ourselves passing the module" -- Once you (as a group) understand that learning is your responsibility, there'll be some who passes.

Anyway, do you ask what should (very little, probably) happen or what will (everything up to panicked faculty issueing emergency actions and involvement of press have happened) happen?

So what was the end of the story?

@jessicaB I think I passed. Depending on how he freely he makes available the method marks, I should have done ok

@Aljabra Well done.

Your question is about the consequences for the lecturer, but you've asked in comments what you should do.
In the UK, if it's felt that noone has reached the required standard then noone will pass. The basic paradigm is that everyone is measure against a standard, unlike in North America where it's more about measuring students against the others in the class. Still, it would not be a popular move to fail a whole class. What the effect on the lecturer would be will depend on their position, and what the uni is like.
Given it's two days from the exam, and I'm guessing it's in maths or similar, I think you should start memorising. The pass mark is 40% (usually), and with high homework scores you can pass with slightly less than that. You're more likely to convince someone you deserve to pass if you can show you've understood the basic ideas of the topic. Make sure you can reproduce the key definitions and theorems, and have at least an intuitive understanding on the methods of proof appropriate to what you are doing.

I would say the North America part of your answer is incorrect or at least far from universal. I have taught in four USA universities and never seen this policy.

It's not the standard grading policy, but some professors do grade on a curve in some classes in the US.

@Ifyoudonotknow-justGIS What I came across was students and staff telling me that the most important thing was the average. Also, the (high) school system doesn't allow for proper comparison, as I've encountered it. The people I spoke to said they would be ranked within their school, but there's no reference point between different schools. That's a big contrast with the UK, where exams are set and marked nationally.

The thing that most strikes me as unusual is the variation in the exams. If you're trying to argue over marks, I would probably start from there. But I would probably check first with another professor in the subject, as it's just possible that the questions are more similar than they appear to students. I would also look up the examiners' report, if you can. If there's been high fail rates in the past, there should be some comments about how the module should be treated in future. If problems are ongoing then stopping the module is the obvious choice, and you say that's already on the cards.

I think the answer has a point, even if maybe it's not phrased as I would put it. Based on my experience in the NA system (less than @Ifyoudonotknow-justGIS, to be sure), we do use the idea that there is a certain standard students are expected to reach. But if an entire class fails an exam, we typically take that to mean one of two things: (1) the exam was too hard, setting up even those students who did meet the standard to fail, or (2) the standard itself was unreasonable. We typically don't entertain the possibility that every student in the class is simply not good enough.

dramy, I agree. I know some test as well that are needed for certification, credentials, etc. I know some nursing tests etc., are graded in the manner described in the UK (you get it wrong based on an external expected answer). I think the same applies to some other more professional type degrees. One thing UK academics confuse (I list me as this until I taught in the USA for 15-years) is that US higher-education as a blanket item does not exist. States and regions have their own accreditation boards and standards. Education is one of the truly federal components of the system here.

"you should start memorising [...] show you've understood the basic ideas of the topic" -- non sequitur, unfortunately.

@Raphael There's still a difference between being able to reproduce the main ideas and not being able to. I came across a case where someone had got a mark approaching a passing grade, but they'd done so mostly using peripheral ideas, and since they hadn't demonstrated any real knowledge of the topic, they failed. If they had at least produced correct definitions and theorems they might have been allowed a minimal pass. When I was a student the standard for that was something like 'shows some minimal understanding of some part of the course'.

@JessicaB At an orientation for new hires at a major US university, we were given a breakdown of what the average grade distribution was, and were encouraged not to deviate significantly from this.  Significant deviations (which was not clearly defined, though it was clearly stated that you did not have to conform to it perfectly) could be subject to investigations, etc. which could impact the department as a whole in a negative way, even if the department members themselves believe the grades given were appropriate.

@JessicaB Yes: knowing something beats knowing nothing, and knowing the important things (and which are the important things) beats knowning something. But still, arguably, that standard for passing is way too low. A university degree should attest more than memorisation skills. (I can recommend Nilson's "Specifications Grading" for a brutal assessment of such standards -- and a proposal for a solution.)

First, to make sure that we are talking about the same thing, let me make clear that my answer pertains to a scenario in which the entire class failed after making a sincere, good faith effort to study and do as well as possible on the exam. (If you are talking about something else, like students conspiring with each other to all fail the exam as a form of protest of the bad quality of teaching or because they believe it is pointless to even try to study for it, my answer would be very different.)
Now that we got that clarification out of the way: if all the students failed, that would certainly be a very clear warning sign to the professor and department that something has gone seriously wrong with the course. What I would recommend in that case is for the students to document their grievances in a very clear way, including any relevant evidence, and take the matter up with the department chair or head or other appropriate university authority. Assuming that you are in a reputable department at a reputable university, what I expect to happen is that the department will initiate some kind of external review of what took place by people other than your professor. Assuming that your claims are found to be reasonable, I believe the department will be strongly motivated to take steps to address the situation in a way that repairs at least some of the harm that was done to the students. This could be in the form of a change to some or all of the grades, or, if it turns out the grades are essentially meaningless and no useful information can be salvaged from them, some other creative solution.
If the department is unwilling to address your complaints, you can try to enlist the help of your student union, go to other university authorities (e.g., dean, grade appeal committee, ombuds office), and, if else fails, even try to use social media to create a scandal and rally support for your cause. However, if you really have a strong case with good evidence that you have been mistreated, I doubt that will be necessary, since no sensible department will want to risk having its reputation tarnished by mistreating its students in a blatantly unfair way.
Finally, let me add that in my opinion the right thing for you to do right now is to concentrate on studying for the exam and not worry too much about emailing the professor with your concerns or about what will happen in the aftermath. It may turn out that your concerns were unwarranted and a good number of students end up doing just fine, so all this energy that you are spending right now on worrying would have been better spent on studying. Good luck!

Solutions are to retake exams or other evaluations, as the extant ones are probably tainted or at least so heavily biased/measuring irrelevant aspects (here some teachers are accused to write exams like a sphinx, only those who solve the riddles know what is being asked) to be useless. Much more damage would be done if the material was not assimilated at all, which would mean retaking the course in any case.

I think it's imperative to voice concerns as early as possible, as opposed to only after the exam. 1) The teacher should get honest feedback and the chance (time-wise) to change things. 2) Complaints after the fact can be interpreted more negatively. Compare "Dear Dean, I think this course has serious problem X. What can we do about that?" with "Dear Dean, we all failed because of X. Please help!".

@Raphael that's a good point, and indeed it would have been better to start complaining a long time ago, but two days before the exam I think it's best to focus on studying. Also, if it proves necessary this page can be used to document the students' concerns.

Based on my experience with professors and officials, a voiced concern now ("I've been studying for X weeks [better make sure that's plural] but Y makes me doubt that it is possible to prepare properly for Z on the exam.") still beats whining after the exam. The email takes you fifteen minutes to write, so it's not a big deal. But you are right: all you can do on your end is study. (Disclaimer: in my experience, such concerns voiced by students are usually based on wrong assumptions/expectations and lack of self-responsibility. Such effect nothing. You need factual, undisputable mistakes.)

Everything will depend on individual university policies.
I can say that at my institution, more than a few eye brows would be raised and the professor would have to have a very good basis for failing more prone than the very unofficial maximum of about 15-20%. If it's because no one turned in their final paper, or everyone were caught cheating, the failing grades would be justified. If the final paper were unreasonable ("write a three hundred page paper, topic to be assigned two weeks before it's due"), then students should go through standard grievance channels.
If this were an undergraduate intro class with departmental exams and several other instructors teaching the same course, then if a pattern of poor exam performance is established, then if the professor were non-tenure track, they'd likely not have their contract renewed.
For graduate level classes, I'll admit, I've never seen or heard of such a thing. If students could document genuine pedagogical incompetency, then perhaps the department could arrange a solution, though what that would be, I'm not sure. If it's incompetent assessment (but not instruction) they could probably just give an alternate assessment and have other faculty grade it. Something similar happened to me when a professor died towards the end of the course although we didn't actually have to rewrite the paper thankfully.
In all cases, though, merely having all failing grades will only pique the interest of your instructor's colleagues/department head. Everything else will depend on department policies, the instructor's status in the department, the reason for the failing grades, etc.

What can you recommend we do? A couple of us emailed the lecturer expressing our worries but he has not replied. When he does reply would it be worth talking to him in private and offering a different idea on how he could examine us ?

You indicate the course has been taught badly before. Is there a picture of the type of exam you are to expect? Failing of of a whole class is extremely rare, is the topic so difficult?

@captainEmacs Yes we have past exams but they dont help in this case.The questions are all very different across all the papers, there is no consistency in the type of questions that come up. The course is very difficult and very lengthy, the module contains three times as many more notes as all other modules. – Al jabra 25 mins ago

From the outset, it looks like an interesting module; what is your evidence that the lecturer did a bad job in the past? Was it worse than last years (you seem to indicate that it was bad before)? Too much material? Too difficult material? Incomplete explanations? Or something else? I have seen (when I still was a student, when this was considered acceptable) failure rates of 80%, but never 100%. Especially as it is not the first time this is run, such a bad rate would be pretty rare.

@captainEmacs I have heard other lecturers say very bad things about his teachings and I have heard other students say that in one his modules (it may be the one I am doing) students received the worst marks out of the whole department. Also people say the pastoral care he offers his tutees was very bad.  He kept saying that this module will be replaced and he seem concerned if we understood the stuff or not. Its a mixture of all the things you mentioned. The module doesnt really fit in anywhere withink the course.

@Aljabra I'm not in the UK, but I'd say document, document, document.  Any extraordinary action taken by the department would almost certainly require extraordinary evidence.  If you're not getting responses to e-mail, consult in person (tactfully).  Sometimes, mentioning things in passing to other professors can have some effect (in small departments especially), but sometimes not.  If there is a student Ombudsman or Dean of Student's office, they may be able to provide more specific advice with respect to your institution.

@Aljabra Well, it looks like you have the bad luck of being in the last round of a unsatisfactory module. If you indeed would have 100% failure rate, I think that would be such an obvious situation that you indeed could take action. It would be very strong evidence that there was no reasonable chance for any of you to pass. Your problem is more likely to be that you will have a lower failure rate for which it will be difficult to demonstrate who's right, you in demanding better teaching or the lecturer in expecting more from you. So, I agree with the documentation aspect, just in case.

@captainEmacs Hopefully they will "massage" the results. I had a case last year in my final undergrad year at a different university where there was a mistake small mistake in the exam in a question and the exam paper was not of the "right" sort. basically it was not weighted properly. I was certain I only got 35% in that but I came out with 75% haha. so you never know

@Aljabra adapting the results may be justifiable for a new course before one can gauge the cohort skill, but should really not happen with an established course. Good luck, perhaps things will work out ok.

It is very difficult to write an exam that everyone fails and still adhere to departmental rules and the office of the dean. In organic chemistry it is quite common actually for the majority of the class to fail just by the difficulty and amount of material. That is the purpose of the curve. I taught at the most prestigious engineering school in the country and it was mandated that a C- (70%) must be the average at the end of the semester. How that was done was not difficult as there is always some type of normal distribution unless there is an exceptionally small class, in which case the few in the course would earn a C-.
However there was a situation recently wherein the professor by deliberate choice failed his entire management class and there was a great deal of fallout. His reasoning was simply this:

None of you, in my opinion, given the behavior in this class, deserve to pass, or graduate to become an Aggie, as you do not in any way embody the honor that the university holds graduates should have within their personal character. It is thus for these reasons why I am officially walking away from this course. I am frankly and completely disgusted. You all lack the honor and maturity to live up to the standards that Texas A&M holds, and the competence and/or desire to do the quality work necessary to pass the course just on a grade level ... I will no longer be teaching the course, and all are being awarded a failing grade.

As predicted, a higher-up in administration didn't elaborate but his pompous outburst was quashed as the university reported that his intentions would not come to fruition.

The administration intervened in that Texas A&M case because students weren't given a chance to take the final exam and pass or fail the class on academic grounds. The administration said: "No student who passes the class academically will be failed." I don't believe it's strictly relevant to this case, where the students expect to fail on academic grounds.

@ff524: Although this is certainly a different situation, I think it remains relevant to the question at hand.  It provides a boundary case, at least.

Some skepticism as to the claims of this new user, using the title of a classic rock album and the picture of a glamor model with her derriere exposed, having "taught at the most prestigious engineering school in the country", seems warranted.

The difficulty in writing an exam adhering to the rules and where everyone fails depends on the country: the OP is in the UK, where rules seems to be different from the US.

@MassimoOrtolano It definitely does depend on country. I would have no trouble writing an exam adhering to departmental policy in the Czech republic which fails the whole class. And that's true even if the professor did a very decent job of explaining the material. Failing a student is trivial.

@DanielR.Collins it's interesting that you assume it's a glamor model rather than the user whose profile picture this is. Is the person shown in your profile picture also a model?

@DanRomik: A quick Google image search shows that the picture is from Heather Hogrefe, who appears on several modeling sites, including Sports Illustrated online, and tweets about the complications of being a drunk undergraduate as of 2013. I'm flattered you think I might be the same.

I find it odd to speak of "the purpose of the curve" when the course in question has just 10 participants. Hopefully nobody grades on a curve with so few people.

It is actually very easy to write an exam that everyone fails. Most of the top schools exams have to be written that way or everyone would get 95% or higher. It is really a simple matter of writing the questions to require that the student demonstrates they know how to APPLY what they've learned in the class, versus just expecting that the student knows how to do the homework assignments from the book. Questions written with the expectation of knowing how to apply the material would crush the overwhelming majority of students in most colleges.

I have a suspicious mind. One possible cause of all students failing is the students deciding to fail in order to make trouble for the instructor. I am finding it difficult to see how the OP and the OP's peers can know they are going to fail unless that is what may be happening. They got good average grades on the homeworks, so it is not a case of unfairly harsh grading. If, in past years, everyone failed the exam they would know what happens afterwards.
That would be a very bad strategy, as well as dishonest. People experienced in grading exams in the subject are likely to be able to distinguish deliberate failure from students failing due to excessive difficulty of the exam despite doing their best.
I hope I am wrong, and the OP intends best effort on the exam.

The OP indicates they are in an MSc (Masters ?) program. As such, one would expect to have sufficient academic experience and familiarity with both the college's, the faculty's and the professor's expectations by now. In a class full of experienced students someone should have been able to the identify teaching gap and raise the concerns with the lecturer or department faculty earlier. It seems rather too late to deal with now in an impartial manner
I had one such experience in my first year in a 100-level. By the end of the third week the class took their concerns to the department head and within 2 weeks they completed an assessment, validated our concerns, assigned a replacement lecturer and gave due consideration in the final grading that we could not reasonably complete the entire curricula under the circumstances in contrast to the other classes.
It's your education; take charge. If you sit there like a lump on a log, you get as much out of it as the mushroom does.
As for the actual grading question, again you should understand what are the expectations. My brother took a Master's level astrophysics course where the professor indicated at the outset:
This was probably the toughest course in the department and the college. In turn they were some of the brightest students in the school. The point of the course was to stretch the students understanding of the subject. His exams (mid and final) would be 3 questions each, 3 marks each. Expect almost all students to fail. Answering a question correctly would get you one mark; demonstrating an in-depth understanding of the material got you 2. If you got 3, you probably wrote the theory/book and are auditing the course. Most students were expected to get 3 marks (1/1/1) or (2/1/0). The class final average was ~ 2.7; yet all but was given a pass. That grade was not based on a curve, rather the professor's assessment of whether the students truly demonstrated they learned the material. Everyone understood the terms and expectations from outset.


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MBA recommendation letter from the board member of another business school?
I know someone very well who is a board member of a business school at one of the world’s top ranked university. This university has a great business school for undergraduates but the MBA program is not at all held in high regard.
I have my eyes on a highly ranked MBA program at another university.
My question:

Will a recommendation from a board member of a
  business school improve my application or harm it when applying for an MBA program
  at another university?

I can see it harming my application because if I am such a good applicant for an MBA then why would the board member endorse my application for another university? Why wouldn’t he try and make me attend the MBA at his business school?
On the other hand I can see it improving my application. For someone in his position to endorse my application to attend another business school shows I must be a very good fit for where I want to go.

Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone
  else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

I know someone very well who is a board member Does the board member know you very well?

I can see it harming my application because if I am such a good applicant for an MBA then why would the board member endorse my application for another university? Why wouldn’t he try and make me attend the MBA at his business school?

Because, like you said, the other program is much better. If he knows and wishes you well, he won't try to prevent you from benefiting from a better program. Also, he cannot force you to attend his business school and you may have very good non-academic reasons to prefer another place. Perhaps your partner lives there, perhaps the job opportunities are better or the school has better career services, perhaps you just want to change your environment.

Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

First of all, it doesn't hurt to think of a back-up plan in advance, in case the board member declines to write a strong letter.
Generally speaking, a recommendation letter from a board member of a good university should not harm your application. However, whether it will improve it depends on the capacity in which he knows you. Was he your professor in some classes where you performed exceptionally well and can commend on your analytical abilities? Does he have first have experience of working with you in the industry and can talk about your leadership potential, etc? Does he know you from some outstanding community service that you have performed? Look at how business schools describe their ideal candidates (they usually have a section like this). You want your recommendation letters to speak directly to those qualities based on their first-hand experience and giving specific examples as evidence.
In other words, his status of as a board member can amplify an otherwise strong application letter. However, if it is going to be something superficial, then it's better to look for someone else. And, of course, you don't want to be related to that person.

Thanks for the answer. He is my partner with whom I am working with on a non profit business venture.

Then he sounds like a very good source of a recommendation letter. Just make sure that you phrase your request in such a way that he doesn't feel that his decision will affect your future partnership.

Will a recommendation from a board member of a business school improve
  my application or harm it when applying for an MBA program at another
  university?

From personal experience, it makes no difference. The admissions team has to treat all recommendation letters the same, whether its from the President, or from your neighbor. Otherwise, it would offer an unfair advantage to those who have more resources to procure such a recommendation letter from someone more affluent.

Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone
  else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

Certainly ask this board member for a recommendation letter. There are really no pros or cons. It's almost like when you asked high school teachers for recommendation letters for college - doesn't matter if it was your math teacher or your gym teacher.

I disagree. If you want to study math in college, a recommendation letter from your math teacher carries a lot of weight. Gym teacher - little if any.

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text:
Sponsored H1B vs. green card self-petition: What's the quickest?
I am a postdoctoral scholar at a top ranked US University and I am on a J1 visa. I have received an offer for a position in a company, which should be filled by May 2016. The company told me that they may sponsor me for a H1B visa, but the asked me to check whether it may be faster to apply for a green card with a self-petition as an academic of Extraordinary Ability (EBI-1A). Time is what counts most for them now, and they won't be able to hire me if I don't get this done before May- which I think it will be tough.
I would appreciate to receive your advice on this. I moved recently to the US, and I am still misinformed and very naive on this issue.

You are unlikely to qualify for that type of Greencard. When I graduated from my US PhD, I asked my adviser if I did, and he set me up to talk to a friend who is an immigration lawyer. If the rules haven't eased up (and I doubt that very much), merely having a PhD, and having done some research, doesn't help. You'd need to be an international scientific celebrity; this is for truly exceptional candidates (concert pianists, famous actors, Nobel laureats, and such).  The H1B is fast though.

Thanks for your prompt reply. So I think I misunderstood the visa category I would be eligible for. A friend of mine of my same nationality an equivalent achievements told me that she got her green card in 5 months. I guess it was probably under an EB2-NIW.
Do you know how long it may take to get a sponsored H1B? And will it be more difficult to get a green-card afterwards once I leave academia?

You should confirm with your friend - if she got her greencard under the exceptional clause, by all means give it a try; 5 months turn-around sounds about right for the sponsored greencard though (used to be much longer). When I needed an H1B, it was immediate - my company sent me to Toronto, where I was able to get it right away (don't ask how and why; all I know is that it was perfectly legal); but things have changed, and I'm unsure. Your company should know this though.

This isn't the type of question that you should ask of people here.  Rather, you should retain an immigration lawyer to get an answer that you can depend on.  The exact circumstances of your case are going to be very important here and you really haven't provided the level of detail that would make it possible for a lawyer who specializes immigration law to answer your question...

@gnometorule: I think you should turn these comments into an answer.

@Wrzlprmft: I think the actual content  - educated guesses - are better as comments. :)

US immigration processes are a chancy and fast-moving target, as well as being subject to arbitrary interference from the political system.  I have been peripherally involved with an "extraordinary ability" application before, and my understanding from that process is that it's awesome if you can get it, but highly unpredictable.  I would thus strongly recommend against counting on EBI-1A.
On the other hand, H-1B also has its downsides: the number of available H-1B visas is capped through a highly complex formula.  You also can end up "hostage" to a poor employment situation because you go immediately out of status if you quit or are fired.  You also count as a non-US person, subject to export controls and potential limitations on the types of work that you can do---with some companies this is no constraint, with others it severely limits your career.
Instead, the first thing I would recommend is to get a trustworthy immigration lawyer involved to help you through the process.  See if it's possible to do a "belt and suspenders" approach where you simultaneously aim for the extraordinary ability green-card (since getting a green-card gives you more personal and professional flexibility) and the H-1B route with the company for backup.  Even with the company taking charge of an H-1B, it's good to have a US lawyer advocating for you also, because if a random low-level clerical mistake at the company may be "Oops, too bad!" for them but a wrenching restructuring of your life plans for you.

For J1, it will very very tricky to get GC though NIW, unlike F1 holders. For J1, you can get I-140 approved, but to change your status from J1 to GC holder (form I-485), you can get it approved until you satisfy the 2 years rule (if you have it) or waive it (you need a court visit/order). So basically, you can get your I-140 approved in 4-6 months (you need to check processing time posted by USCIS). If you do not need to satisfy the rule, then things might be easier. My advise it to get an immigration attorney to look over your case, most consultations for immigration purposes are free.

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Are there specific organizational processes or tools (not necessarily software) that can help in developing and structuring research ideas?
I am doing research in computer Science as a PhD student. I have some research ideas and for months I've been continuously thinking about them, developing them and make them more specific. I mean, these ideas continually change until one day they are finalized. Over time they are more specific and complex.
I use Evernote to write down my ideas, and sometimes maybe also brainstorm mapping tools like Mindmeister. But I found these tools are not good enough, e.g. not easy to structurize my ideas, or modify, elaborate them, in a word, manage my ideas.
Do you have any good methods or tools for the organization/management of your developing research ideas? How do professors and professional scholars and researchers deal with this issue?

I am voting to close. See http://meta.academia.stackexchange.com/questions/174/are-questions-on-software-on-topic

@DanielE.Shub would the question be more acceptable as a slightly more general variant, like: “Are there specific organizational processes or tools (not necessarily software) that can help in developing and structuring research ideas?”

I'd say lets spin a bit.

@Daniel - It seems like the community voted against closing such questions in the meta discussion you linked to.

One piece of advice: don't allow the search for the right tool to delay actually working. Nothing wrong with scraps of paper, as long as you can keep track of them :)

http://www.moleskineus.com/moleskine-cahier-notebooks.html

Strong +1 JeffE’s mention of Moleskine! Using them made me take note-taking more seriously that I did before.

Moleskine is like Apple for notebooks, if I understand correctly?

Also tried Evernote, but it's lack of structure was not enough. Currently, I'm still looking for a good tool, but I has some good experiences with: http://tiddlywiki.com/ and more recently - http://gitit.net/ (BTW: see also thread http://mathoverflow.net/questions/1785/how-do-you-keep-your-research-notes-organized-closed).

A good tool is PDF-XChange. It allows you to annotate pdfs in an application agnostic way. However, it is not freeware. Perhaps someone knows an open source solution to this.

For PDF annotation, I use Foxit reader. It's free and very fully functional.

I am using MS word for this idea organization purpose now. :) Word is not that bad.

Aibase has the option to put formulas, mind-maps, bullet points lists, diagrams, sketches, to-do list in ONE document, basically a hybrid software (Evernote + MindMapping) for creative project managment. Best software I ever bought for knowledge and project management

I explained the software here more in detail

I'd have really appreciated the answer if you'd have come up with an open source or free software solution.

@Md.GolamRashed ??? Sorry, but very good software sometimes costs money, 50$ for a software I now use for several years isn't that much. Even the popular Evernote costs at some points money. The best opensource software similar to aibase is probably freemind, but it lacks a lot of its functions

I was feeling quite tempted by this until I realised it was Windows only :(

@Nathaniel The simplest solution to OS-specific software is to simply dual or triple-boot your computers. Install Windows first, then OSX/Linux if you want. It's actually a really simple process (if you know a bit about computers and/or can follow tutorials). I have Windows, OSX and Linux Ubuntu on my laptop on separate partitions, so I never have problems in usnig software. All my data/documents are stored on the 4th partition and easily accessible by all of the operating systems :)

comic sans...

May I recommend Org mode? It's free software, and it was created by Carsten Dominik, an academic himself. Its focus is to help you maintain hierarchical notes and to-do lists, but it has a lot of other features that are useful for juggling large amounts of information, such as tags, links, many kinds of summary reports, and capture (a way to quickly add a note in the right place before you forget it), as well as many features useful for scientists in particular, like tables, spreadsheets, mathematical notation, export (as papers, slideshows, or websites), and support for source code and reproducible research. Perhaps best of all, Org documents are text files, so you can munge them with standard Unix tools at whim. I've moved more and more of my workflow to Org since I started using it in 2010, and I regret nothing.
Org has a steep learning curve, which gets steeper if you aren't already a disciple of the Church of Emacs. But as I see it, getting used to Emacs is worth it even without Org mode, especially if you do a lot of programming. I was an Emacs zealot for years before I took up Org.

Anytime I get a chance, I try to use the productivity applications. These may be associated with time management or structuring ideas etc. I found out that there is no best way to do this. Every application has some heuristics behind, and these are mostly decided by the developers. Sometimes an app may seem to solve your problem, but later you may realize that it is not what you want or need. In my opinion, you need to come up with your own way to do it. However, let me list some ways/advices I encounter:

Open a google document. Write down your ideas as a list. If you need
to structure them, nest the list items. Go over the document
periodically.
Take a look at wunderlist. They have done a good
job task/note management. wunderlist 2 has just released with new features.
Trello is another example. It may seem
to be an project management tool, but you can use for managing your
ideas on a whiteboard-style.
Springpad is another way to    save/organize things online.
Your example Evernote, and others    like do.com,
todoist can be listed also. If you really need    to find the
right application you need to search hard. Take a look at here as well.
Mindmup is a online mind mapping tool.
Hiro is another newly released tool. Try it here.

For me, the best way is to keep a small notebook and write down what I have done in terms of research day by day. I also note the ideas for my thesis. After some point, when you go back and check your progress, you would be amazed how much things changed and become more mature. But the most important thing is that I realized what is best for me is to grep a pen and write down it on a paper rather than some website.

Why evernote and not onenote?

I just listed the ones I know for that time. Of course, you can add onenote to the list above and others you happen to know. For example, wunderlist 2 has just released with new design and lots of new features.

+1 for Trello.  Great especially for working with others.

Whiteboards & (electronic) notebooks.
My notes start in one of two places:

On a whiteboard
Being jotted down to my to-do list to be thought of more in depth later, usually because I'm away from work. These will then later be thought through on the whiteboard.

The primary benefit of the whiteboard is the freeform mapping. There are many mind-mapping software packages out there; I don't think any are as good as an actual whiteboard. On a physical board, you can write easily, sketch ideas, connect concepts, erase stupid stuff, and leave it there while you type easily. You can do this with a program, but you need to use a mouse and keyboard, which I find overly constrictive.
I typically sketch the idea out there, and then just write it down either to paper or to an electronic notes program. I use Simplenotes, but there are many very similar programs... Evernote is very popular. Unless you're very savvy with the command line, I recommend against just using text files, as there's a huge benefit to having the features that come with these programs: quick searching, tagging, and attachments.

Why not Microsoft OneNote? Is there a benefit to Simplenotes or Evernote over OneNote?

@Jase - The benefits for me were: (1) price; Evernote and Simplenotes are free, (2) famliarity; Simplenotes is brain-dead simple to use. That being said, if you own and are already familiar with OneNote, this workflow should fit perfectly well with it (or with the dozens of other notetaking options) as well.

I like to use DevonThink for managing developing research projects. It's a Mac-based software which offers a data and knowledge management system. The relevant steps in my workflow for refining research ideas to concepts and then projects are as follows:

Collect literature on a relevant topic and put it into a dedicated DevonThink group.
When I see important points for the project in a particular paper, I create an annotation text document in the same group to write down these points.
I import email related to the project (for example discussions with colleagues) into the database, so that I can link to them when making use of ideas obtained from there.
When starting to synthesize ideas, I do it in a text document where I can insert links to or even image snapshots from the source documents in the DevonThink database.
When working on a project, I create journal files in the DevonThink database, writing down what I did, what results I got, and maybe pasting screenshots or relevant result diagrams into the journal file.

I also find Devonthink to be helpful at all of the various stages of research. Using their browser extensions is also recommended.

In my opinion these tools do restrict you too much. I prefer plain sheets of paper (A0 or bigger) pinned on the wall. Post-Its are wounderful for organising and structuring ideas. Probably parts of the books (there are many more) "Presentation Zen" and "Businessmodel, you" helped me with developing my own way of doing it.
Essentially, I do write every idea on a Post-It and put them unordered onto a white paper (e.g 2 m long 1 m high). Afterwards I start to order them. This is an iterative process and I do it at least three times. These Post-Its serve as heading for my thoughts. I do write them underneath with edding.
These posters  stay at my wall as long as I need them and slowly, over time I add or reorder something. Highly recommended. Furthermore it helps, to walk around, move your arms, go back and forth etc.

Microsoft OneNote was a great research helper for me for a long time, as it can save snippets of the pages with the link to the original site. But, after capturing several hundred notes, I could no longer find the needed one in a reasonable time.
Some people start structuring their bookmarks into a deep tree of categories, but I was too lazy for that, so I found this Flamory tool. It does not offer any categorization at all, but instead it groups the snippets into topics automatically.
I usually find recent bookmarks by looking through small screenshots that it shows, and for older one's I use the search. It can find words in the whole page or PDF that I bookmarked, not just the title.


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Why does the Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine think they will need quadrillions of DOIs?
The Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine uses the following format for Digital Object Identifiers:

DOI: 10.1097/JSM.0000000000000xxx

Where xxx is a simple incrementing count, currently in the 200s, based on order of article publication. The latest issue has 26 articles, and they publish bimonthly, for a total of under 200 articles per year. Theoretically, if they increased publication to daily, they could reach 10000 articles per year. Hence, their 16 digit format will be sufficient for at least a trillion years.
Simple question: why? The usability is terrible; it's very difficult to transcribe by hand. They could chop the number of digits in half without any realistic risk of running out.

How about "10.1002/1521-3773(20020715)41:14<2596::AID-ANIE2596>3.0.CO;2-4"? :)

Perhaps they are considering micro publications, each data point can have its own DOI.

This question does not seem to be on topic for Academia as defined within our help center; see especially what not to ask.  Your question seems slightly rant-y ("This is really lame, am I right or am I right?") and not answerable (the only people who know for sure why they set things up this way are folks who work for that journal; why are you asking here?).  Those kinds of questions typically don't work well for our site format.

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it's a rant and the underlying question is only answerable by the staff of the journal concerned, not by the general academic community.

@DavidRicherby, D.W. it's not necessarily a rant (ever heard of curiosity?), and some members of the general academic community may know the reasons for the particular case or other similar cases.

This "answer" is really speculation - if you truly want to know their motivations, you have to ask them.
But I think the simplest and most likely explanation is that they don't consciously believe they will need that many DOIs; they just had to pick some format, and arbitrarily chose a number of digits that seemed more than adequate (as well as perhaps allowing for DOIs to be assigned in some other way than just serially; e.g. someday the DOI could identify volume, year, page number, etc).
They probably didn't even think about people needing to transcribe them by hand - and to be fair, in this age of electronic distribution and copy/paste, it's a pretty rare use case.

This. The only thing DOI has to be is: unique and admissible. How to achieve this is completely irrelevant. Someone may use UNIX time in nanoseconds when the DOI was processed by their server. Why not a very long fixed-width integer.

I suppose it's probably a coincidence, that they've chosen just enough decimal digits to represent the same contiguous range of positive integers represented by an IEEE double.

... or by Javascript.

@yo' Why not a very long fixed-width integer: usability, not having to set any limit, etc.


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I didn't acknowledge someone who helped with my thesis, is there anything I can or should do now?
I received help with some aspects of my PhD thesis from a tutor (proofreading and graphics). Of the help I received, some mathematical notation they provided made it into my thesis.
However, I did not acknowledge the tutor in the PhD thesis for this help (since received).
Is there anything I could (or should) do to rectify this?

Flowers? Chocolates? Offers of a return favour?

Do you see this as a politeness issue or as an issue of scientific ethics? I.e., are you concerned about making the other one angry for not mentioning them or about being accused of having infringed against good practices by not citing/mentioning the contribution of this person?

@Benedikt Bauer: This question is about academic ethics. The help was not intended to be with the research itself, but mathematical notation and plotting routines in code can be interpreted as such.

If ever the thesis is published elsewhere, say as a paper in a journal or a conference, or perhaps as a technical report, include the name of the person there.

If allowed for his thesis, would it then be a good idea to upload it with a revised acknowledgement on arxiv?

@Lilienthal, I understand that the arXiv clearly handles revisions (linking to earlier versions and dating all of them) so I think doing what you suggest would not be a problem.

So it would also work if he had already uploaded it before? Good to know.

I'm not that familiar with arXiv, but I understand that it would work.  If the OP uploaded it another way, then perhaps the revisions won't be handled correctly.

@Lilienthal, by the way, your comment also seems to be relevant to Dave Rose's answer.

It's probably not a huge deal.  Not many people read theses and probably even fewer scan the acknowledgements.  In the worst case you might figuratively have stepped on the persons toes.  I would send them an e-mail or perhaps a postcard with apologies for forgetting to mention them.  That probably suffices — their career is not going to depend on you mentioning them in the acknowledgements.

You might be able to edit the acknowledgement section of the electronic version of you thesis. Contact the university library yourself or through the postgraduate student service.

good workaround. It can appear in the errata section


text:
Asking for help in refereeing a paper?
I was asked to referee a paper. The topic is within my field but not in my exact area of research. The paper seems all good and fine, but I struggle to judge the originality or whether they miss relevant work. I have a friend/colleague in my department who works in the same area. Would there be any problem with asking for their input on refereeing the paper?

Ask the editor. And read whether there journal has any specific guidelines on this. Many do.

Not exactly an answer to your question: You could also be honest in your referee report about what parts of the manuscript you can assess and what you cannot judge. Not a terribly common practice, but I wish it would be.

There is no problem as long as your colleague agrees.  Usually, the assumption, if I was that colleague, would be that I will not receive any acknowledgement for my effort.  If your colleague agrees with that, I don't see any problems.

@Prof.SantaClaus not that reviewing in practice gives much of acknowledgement but I agree that it is correct to ask for advice.

Some journals are geared towards a general audience, and they may be looking for papers that can be read by non-specialists.  If that is the case of the journal in question, you might offer suggestions to make the paper more accessible.

I would assume that it is a fairly common practice as long as no conflicts of interest arise. But, to be sure, this is really a question to address to the editor. You might have to say a few words about the colleague.
Some situations, of course, require confidentiality. Most do not as long as the normal rules and expectations apply.

I know more than one journal which (at the stage of review submission) explicitly asks reviewers whether they prepared the review alone or discussed the manuscript with other researchers (and if yes, ask for their name too). So this is totally fine (except obvious situations when you ask help from one of the co-authors of the manuscript, of course), just don't forget to mention it to the editor.

If you need to ask for help (and know who to ask) when refereeing a paper, don't review it. Instead, decline the invitation and suggest the editor ask the other person.

Because even when a paper is technically in your field, you might not necessarily be an expert in the specific topic, there is always the possibility to reject an invitation to review a paper. If you did not accept the invitation yet, I would honestly rather suggest you politely decline the request, stating your abovementioned reasons. If you have already accepted, than I would inform the editor(s) that your colleague (without any conflict of interest) is joining in the review.

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text:
If my research is applying methods from field X to field Y, should I do my PhD in field X or field Y?
Let's say I'm a PhD student in a field, let's call it X, and my research is all based on taking the methods developed in field X and applying them to some other fields, let's call them Y, Z, and W. Let's further suppose that I do not make any contributions to the theory of X, I only apply it to Y, Z, and W. Is X the proper fit for me, or should I really pick my favorite of Y, Z, and W?

A PhD is meant to extend the knowledge within a field. It's obvious that you can contribute knowledge to Y, Z, and W, at least if you apply the X methods to solve some research questions in these fields. It's less clear what you contribute to X.
You state that you don't contribute to the theory of X, but maybe you extend or generalize the X methods alongside applying them? If you do that, you could get a PhD in X. Otherwise, Y, Z, or W would seem to make more sense.

If you are making most of your contributions to W, Y, or Z, then it probably makes most sense to get a PhD in those compared to a PhD in X. This is for the reasons given by silvado.
However, if you're already a PhD student in X (your first assumption), you have to consider whether it is worth switching to W, Y, or Z. From what you've written, your department or advisor seems fairly flexible in terms of allowing you to work in different areas. Would switching to W,Y, or Z mean switching advisors or departments? Would it mean that your funding might change (e.g., if your funding is tied to a particular field)? It seems like if your research on W,Y, and Z is viewed positively by your department/advisor, there would have to be a substantial reason to switch away from that department/advisor, since the switch might result in less flexibility.

If you are applying X to Y, you can easily be in either a department of Y (where you are making a difference) or in a department of X (where you will no doubt be contributing through the adaptation of the techniques to problems in Y).  The biggest factor, I think, would be where you can find the best match between yourself and an advisor and departmental culture.


text:
Do editors allow authors to respond to reviewers when a paper has been essentailly rejected?
I recently submitted a manuscript to a journal that focuses on short papers about software packages. One reviewer gave a very detailed (and helpful) critique of my software/paper with one major objection: another package already exists that has similar functionality. S/he mandated that I clarify what my package offers that the other package does not.
Unfortunately, I was not aware of the other software package when I started my project (which I'm pretty embarrassed about). On further inspection, I realize that this other package is far superior to my own in terms of functionality and performance. I've come to the conclusion that my project is not salvageable. This is disappointing but not soul crushing as it was a side project that is only tangential to my dissertation work. Frankly, I don't have time to improve my software to point of being a significant contribution, and I'd only do so for the sake of "getting a publication," which does not seem fruitful. Improvements wouldn't be immediately useful to me. and thus I don't have the motivation to submit a revision.
That said, I'd really like to submit a genuine word of thanks to the anonymous reviewer for their detailed critique of my paper/software. Through their comments and working through a revision I learned a lot (how to use Docker, sharing and recording terminal sessions through
asciinema/asciicast, general improvements to my writing, etc.) Do editors allow authors to respond to reviewers even if their manuscript is essentially rejected? It seems as though editors would generally disallow this since authors responding to a rejection may often want to say something nasty. Would it be best to email the editor directly with my request or respond through the submission system?

The most likely scenario is that the authors can respond to the editor, and the editor will decide (at their discretion) whether or not to pass back the message to the referees.
After all, there are valid reasons to message the referees afterwards (for example if the main argument for rejection is based on a misunderstanding). For a simple thank you, it will depend on the editor's preference, but it definitely doesn't hurt to try.

If your situation is anything like what I'm familiar with, then this happened:

The reviewer wrote the critical review, and the editor decided on 'revise'.
The revise letter said something similar to "your revision is due in 60 days".
Since your project is not salvageable, you are not intending to revise your paper. Accordingly, you should notify the editor that you are withdrawing your paper. You don't have to, but it's a courtesy, since if you don't you also clog up their editorial management system. You might e.g. trigger automated reminders to the editor/publisher/yourself that your revision is late.

Since you have to write to the editor anyway, that's the time to tell him what you wrote in the question. If you write something positive, the editor is likely to pass it on. Harsh criticisms of the referees - that might get censored by the editor.
As for whether to use normal email or the editorial management system, both will reach the editor but the latter is preferable. Emails sent by the editorial management system will usually include a line with "click on this link to access the submission" and, as you might expect, that is very convenient.

If you were to write to the editor with your words of thanks to the reviewer, I would be surprised if the editor did not pass it on.  A message of thanks to a reviewer is a nice thing to receive, especially one with details of the skills you learned from their review.  Reviewers work gratis for journals, so a good editor is unlikely to pass up the opportunity to pass on a nice happy message to the reviewer from a satisfied customer.

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text:
Can you reject a postdoc offer after the PI has paid a large sum for flights/accommodation for your visit?
I am being considered for a very nice industry scientist position but this involves many interviews and assessments and can take some time.
However I have also accepted an invitation to the US (I'm in Australia) to give a presentation in relation to high likelihood of employment as a postdoc in a research institute.
The postdoc supervisor has arranged for sightseeing and lab visits and hotels. I feel bad if somehow I wish to pursue the industry position.
Has anyone had a similar experience and have you turned down something like that before?

What would you do if you would interview at two places and both PIs pay for your expenses?

"Has anyone had a similar experience" is somewhat vague question, and makes it opinion-based. perhaps, you should remove it from the Q, leaving just "can you reject..."

I really hope this is acceptable, because I did exactly this a couple of years ago (being paid for flying from the US to Europe, and later offered a position that I eventually rejected). No one seemed to be annoyed with me at the time. :)

The PI arranges for sightseeing and lab visits and hotels either because they think that's the polite and normal thing to do when offering a job, which puts you under no obligation, or to increase the likelihood of you accepting, i.e. by betting on exactly that sense of obligation, which at least I personally would consider a bit of manipulation. Nothing to be offended about, perhaps, but certainly enough to void any sense of obligation I would have. The result is the same in both cases.

Thanks for all the responses but I was thinking of long term repercussions...would this affect my reputation and chances for collabs in the future?? Since academia tends to attract a certain kind of crazy.

The answer to questions of the type "Can one do X?" tends to be a straightforward yes. What you (and many other posters) are asking is "What are the consequences of doing X?" I wish that was said more clearly in the title of these questions to stick to the actual issue.

All is fair in love, war and jobhunting until you have a contract in hand.

Don't forget that the interview process is two-way. The institution wants to see if you are a good fit for them. You need to find out if the institution is right for you. I've been involved in faculty hires. Sometimes the person you want turns you down. We held no ill feelings toward these folks and moved on. The institutions you are interacting with will do the same, I would imagine.

It sounds like you are in the interview phase with no stated commitment in the form of having accepted an offer. Having your travel expenses reimbursed for an interview is not in any way a commitment to accept a position should it be offered. This is a completely normal expense that's part of finding good candidates. It is not expected that everyone they offer a job to will accept.
As long as you approach the interview in good faith, meaning that you haven't already accepted a job elsewhere, and that there is some reasonable non-zero probability that you'd take the job if offered, you shouldn't feel bad about having your interview expenses covered because of the possibility you might not wind up there.

+1. I'll note also, that the funds aren't coming from the PI personally, but from some funding s/he has. That is their responsibility to manage, not yours. But congratulations that they are showing strong interest in you.

+1 This is the right answer. However, given the large expense to fly you in, please be sure that there's a reasonable chance (not just nonzero) that you might take this job. And yes, congratulations.

It's great luck to have both a good and even-better job on your plate.  What if you saw the just-good position first?  You might not know until you did all the visits and interviews.  Maybe even now you'll still be surprised and this second one of yours is even better once you have that in-person experience.

I feel like this answer misunderstands the question. The way I read it, the OP has accepted an invitation to go to the US and give a presentation. Things have been booked and money spent (by the postdoc supervisor). The OP has now been offered a job, and in order to pursue the job must back out of giving the presentation in the US, which means the postdoc supervisor will have spent all that money (on flights, accommodation, sightseeing, etc.) for nothing. Am I wrong that this answer doesn't actually answer the question?

Having your travel expenses reimbursed for an interview is not in any way a commitment to accept a position should it be offered. That is not universally true. When I applied for a post-doc in England, I was told that expenses are not refunded in a case where an appointment is offered and then refused. For this reason, I opted for a Skype interview instead.

@Clonkex The OP may have been offered a job, but it's clear they haven't formally committed to anyone. There is no shame in interviewing for a job if you have another offer, so long as you haven't committed yet. The postdoc supervisor hasn't spent money for nothing, they have spent it for the opportunity to woo the OP into accepting their offer. If the OP had already accepted the industry job, then yes, the supervisor would indeed be paying for a candidate they have no hope of hiring, but that's not the case here. The OP may still wind up as a postdoc.

@gerrit That's an interesting and extremely unusual situation that I, nor anyone else who answered that question, have ever seen before. It seems like the the rational strategy is to decide partway through the interview if you'd accept a job if offered, and if there's a reasonable chance you wouldn't, to tank the rest of the interview to ensure you don't get offered the job.

@NuclearWang The way I read it, the postdoc isn't hiring anyone. They asked the OP if the OP wanted to give a presentation (not get a job), the OP said yes, THEN the postdoc supervisor spent the money ONLY BECAUSE the OP said yes. Now if the OP backs out the postdoc supervisor will have wasted that money and may not be able to get it back. I see no other way to interpret the question so it baffles me that so many people are upvoting your answer.

@NuclearWang alternatively I as the employer acting in bad faith having decided that you are not a good fit have decided to make you an offer of minimum wage and nothing beyond what is required by law.  I hope you will reject so that I do not have to pay your travel expenses.  But if you are smart you will accept and then no show so that I must fire you.

@NuclearWang My situation was that I was applying with two different places, and the one who had this unusual policy was my second choice (because the other place I applied for was a permanent position). I did end up at the second choice place and later learned that the PI was not even aware that HR (which sent the formal job interview letter) had this policy.

@Clonkex The OP is clearly expecting an offer of a postdoc position (it's literally in the question title). If the postdoc supervisor isn't hiring, why would they care at all if the OP took the industry job, and why would the OP need to back out of the presentation if they did? The question in no way suggests that the OP would book the trip and not go - they are worried about rejecting a postdoc job offer, not about canceling their already-paid visit. Seems like most others agree with this interpretation.

@EthanBolker Given that it will all depend on the offers, one can not predict the odds of accepting/rejecting anything.  The US one might offer 10x the salary of the other, or it might offer a 10th.  So I would say there's no such thing as a 0 chance of taking an offer; and it's worth going to both so that you can get the best offers you can.

In addition to the other good answers given here, I think it's also important to understand that what feels like a large sum to a graduate student is often not a large sum for the interviewing organization.
Australia's a bit on the farther side, but a quick bit of searching shows that a ticket is still likely to only be on the order of $1000 US; hotel accommodations and meals will likely bring the total only up to around $2000 US.
In contrast, if you're there for a two-year postdoc, the total cost will likely be on the order of $200,000, when you count in all of the benefits and overhead.
Spending a couple percent on investment to make sure you have a good match is entirely reasonable, as long as everybody involved is being honest about intentions and not wasting anybody's time.

If your date pays for dinner are you obliged to go home with them? Of course not! Same in this instance - you are under no obligation to accept, but as the prevoius poster says it's only good manners to go only if you are seriously considering the role, were you to be offered it.
Good luck with the whole process and hope you find a position you're really excited about one way or another!

This analogy is not appropriate for the workplace, which includes this site.

@Reid: I don't see how it's not appropriate. It's comparing power dynamics and how spending money on interest in someone doesn't place some obligation on them, and is a pretty good analogy.

@Reid This is a perfectly reasonable analogy, why do you think it's inappropriate?

It's about sex, which is not an appropriate workplace topic. Don't be lazy; there are plenty of power dynamics analogies that do not involve sex.

Independently of whether this answer is appropriate, it seems unrelated. Why should I believe that dating mechanics and job search mechanics are the same at all? When I am being considered for a job, shall I offer my interviewer a job just because going dutch is all the rage on dates these days?

I don't think the sex part is inherently inappropriate, but having someone pay significant money for you to have interview if you're certain you're not going to take the job is not okay. Going on a date with no intention whatsoever of having sex after is perfectly fine, even if your date pays for dinner. It's just not a good analogy.

I feel bad if somehow I wish to pursue the industry position

Yes, I have experienced such feelings. Don't worry too much about it. Job application and interviewing is just that: process. You spent your time flying, making presentation, they spent some amount of money because they are interested. There is no obligation or expectation that you'll say yes just because they organized your visit.
Also, they probably have institution account that pays for flying candidates, or grant funds potion that is dedicated for travel. Don't feel like you are cheating anyone if you are just exploring your options.

After Skype interviews we brought the top two candidates over from another continent for face-to-face interviews, tours etc. It's part of the recruitment process to get people on site and spend some time with them, though of course sometimes the money just isn't available.

When I had something similar, my rejected host took it rather unkindly. However, it works both ways, what if the only compensation for a rejection from them would be the "tour" they paid for? In most cases I would not consider it enough compensation, what kind of jobseeker can go on tours when "the house is burning", meaning those few days you take off other interviews, applications etc may be a hefty price to pay. Sure, only occasionally, but your host would also suffer from the hosting expenses only occasionally.


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What to do if a journal article is too hard to review
I am reviewing a paper for a top-ranked journal in robotics. The main results of the paper are about control and not specifically robotics. I am aware that robotics is a multidisciplinary subject which has also a ton of control in it but the problem here is the following. The paper is, mathematically, really hard to follow. The mathematical details would require maybe more than 2 weeks for me to review and to go through the equations.
What would you do in this case? I was thinking to suggest to submit to another journal, more control-oriented.
What do you think?
Thanks for your opinions.

Is it you who has a hard time to understand, or is it generally people in robotics who would have a hard time to understand the paper? In case of the former, you might want to inform the editor that you might not be the right expert to review the paper (and ask whether you should continue anyway), in case of the latter your suggestion to submit at another journal might be good, but you should still try to review the paper as good as possible.

I can't answer your question because the paper has been sent to me and I think in robotics for sure there has to be someone who is able to understand the paper better than me. Though, I think that this is a small portion of roboticists. I am asking this question because I wouldn't like to reject a journal paper just because I don't fully understand it.

The editor can make those decisions if you just present the situation to her/him. If one or more of the other reviewers are able to understand the mathematical details, your opinion on the other aspects of the paper may be enough for the editor. Otherwise, he may decide to find an extra reviewer that specializes in these areas.

i definitely wouldn’t reject the paper for this reason. (if you think the paper’s central argument/results — not just the math — are obscure, then rejection might make sense.) it sounds to me like you have some understanding of the math, but it would take you a while to fully verify it. if i were you, i’d take a few days to check for gross errors in the math, and then review the paper— even knowing i hadn’t fully verified it. then i might send, along with my review, a short letter to the editor of the journal saying i did the best i could and that a reviewer with diff expertise might be ideal.

I am amazed of how many good suggestions I am getting here. Thanks a lot for your time in writing a comment/answer.

Decision based on maths. If an overhaul of the mathematics would significantly reduce the time required for an expert to understand them, then you should state that in your review and that might well be a reason to require major revisions. On the other hand, if such an overhaul would only help non-experts, then that might well merit a mention in your review, but I don't think such an overhaul is necessary for acceptance.
Reviewing. Two weeks is ~4% of the year. Committing that amount of time to a single review (as would be required for you to study the details of the mathematics) seems unreasonable to me. Perhaps you can raise this with the editor. They might well suggest that you disregard the details and focus on other aspects of the manuscript, they can always ask another reviewer to check the details.
Scope. To determine whether the manuscript is in scope, you could compare the volume of material on control with articles published by the journal. If you think it is out of scope, then perhaps raise this with the editor.

it’s hard for me to believe that removing mathematical detail would ever help a reader of the paper trying to replicate the results. i doubt an overhaul of the math is justified. i think the thing that needs to be said is this: at least in my field, reviewers are not expected to fully verify every single variable in every equation in a manuscript. this would take too much time. that said, reviewers are expected to scan for gross errors. can the OP handle scanning in this way?

I should say that, in mathematics, committing 2 weeks to reviewing a paper is unusually long but not unreasonable.  At the most extreme, it is said that the papers of Wiles and Taylor-Wiles finishing the proof of Fermat's Last Theorem took more than a person-year's worth of time (distributed over a number of experts in different parts of the paper) to review.

@dbliss I'm not recommending removing mathematical detail; is there an ambiguity in my post? I can't comment on whether an overhaul is justified, but I do believe it is plausible, given that a well-structured proof is far more accessible than a poorly structured proof.

If you feel qualified to comment on some aspects of the paper, but not all, you can do just that. You should simply be very clear on what you comment on, what you did not checked, and so on. The editor will decide whether to ask another complementary opinion (which means, in case you do not plan to deliver your review soon, that you should inform her or him early that e.g. you will not assert the mathematical correctness).
Mentioning that the paper is mathematically heavy is certainly something you should include in your review, of course, to help the editor judge if the paper is suitable in this journal.
In my book, referees do not accept or refuse papers. Editors do, and referees inform editors decision as much and, more importantly, as precisely as reasonably possible. This includes a wide variety of opinions and comments.