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What to do when a referee asks me to do something impossible/unreasonable?
What are my best options when a reviewer misunderstands my work and asks for an unreasonable improvement? She was very clear that this was a major issue and that she would only accept the paper under this "improvement".

Should I withdraw the submission?
Should I write to the editor and try to convince him that the reviewer is wrong? (Possibly asking for a new reviewer).
Should I make the revision normally trying to convince editor and referee that what they ask is impossible?
Something else?

I'm inclined to go with the 2nd option.
The field is in the intersection of Mathematics and Computer Science, and the journal is not a top one.
Edit: I've made the revision normally, as suggested here. Thanks to everyone that commented as I wouldn't have done so. In the end, I was happy with the revision.

What does it mean "impossible"? Provably impossible? Impossible for you, but perhaps possible for others? Impossible in a realistic timeframe for revision? Perhaps not impossible, but you have no idea how to do it?

Impossible as very unrealistic in any reasonable timeframe. I want to say that it is as she asked me to prove P vs NP, but it is not a well known problem.

Do not compare it to P=NP, this would look not mature. Say that because of reason A,B,C, this would require a completely new proof of which even the outline is not known. It would not be a simple extension of the paper result and is not reasonably achievable. That being said, the paper, as it stands, may not look sufficiently substantial to the editor and might still be rejected, but at least you then made the point that it is not at the stage where "just a little push" is needed to make it publishable, but actually a fully new paper.

As a mathematician, I think you are misusing the word "impossible."  It is also not clear why you think the reviewer misunderstood your work or did something wrong.  I know of several journals that only want to publish things that dramatically improve upon what was previously known.  If you submitted e.g. a paper on algorithmic complexity to the Annals of Mathematics, if they were feeling especially honest they might conceivably respond by saying that you would need to decide P vs NP in order to publish there....

...Of course there is a lot that you didn't say, and it may well be the case that in context the referee seems to be asking for something that she thinks you should be able to do if you wanted to and is mistaken about that.  In which case option 3) looks most reasonable to me, but I would advise you to avoid the off-putting word "impossible."

@CaptainEmacs Thank you for your comments. I made the analogy with P vs NP just for the sake of answering your question. I wouldn't mention it to the referee.

@PeteL.Clark I agree. I may be missusing the word, but that was the word I found to best describe the situation. i agree what you said about a paper submitted to Annals of Mathematics, but it is not the case here. This is a mid ranked journal.

I feel that doing 3) will take a lot of effort, which I may find to be useless as I wouldn't do what they asked for.

Broadly speaking I'd go with 3). It worked for me when I had a similar case, although not quite as extreme

The reviewer has no power to accept or reject the paper. Only the editor has that power. The reviewer can only recommend acceptance or rejection.

Possibly related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/67173/how-to-respond-a-reviewers-reply-when-he-is-asking-about-much-more-to-be-discus

@DavidKetcheson : Hmm, form won't auto-fill name.  Maybe he won't get this message since he didn't post a comment? :( Based on latest edit, entirely removing the word "impossible" makes numerous other texts (comments, and the accepted answer) look to mismatch question.  It would be better to say unreasonable/impossible (so that the other texts don't look mismatched/strange).

I believe the key is that you can include the information in your paper about this direction being "impossible", and improve it significantly by doing so.
Rather than rejecting the suggestion outright, add a discussion to your paper of that future direction and some notes on its difficulty (i.e., although we show in this paper that 10+10=20 through novel use of the podal digits, the corollary of 20-10=10 cannot currently be proven empirically due to limitations of the primary technique of positive incremental dactylonomy, and the lack of willing test subjects for the secondary approach).
Although it might seem obvious to you why that improvement is "impossible", your reviewers may read your paper even more carefully than your broader audience. If something was unclear (or at least, non-obvious) to this reviewer, you should expect that at least some non-negligible proportion of your broader readership will come to the same conclusion. I think you improve your paper substantially if you can explain this concisely.
Even better, if you can suggest some approach that is possible but currently difficult to implement or outside the scope of your current paper, your work could be the priority reference for that approach.

+1 for "podal digits" and "incremental dactylonomy". Perfect lalocracy.

Onomy or ectomy?

@YemonChoi That would decremental dactylectomy.

+1 "If something was unclear (or at least, non-obvious) to this reviewer, you should expect that at least some non-negligible proportion of your broader readership will come to the same conclusion" - So very true. That's the value of review that many writers fail to appreciate, and it can be difficult to explain (both as teller and recipient).

I’m not a researcher, just live with one and work with others, but it seems to me that reviewers do this kind of thing a lot, where they state a need for a major extension or augmentation of the research when all they really want is for the paper to acknowledge its limitations and discuss important future work. Kind of seems an odd way to go about asking for those things, which achieves little more than stressing out new researchers, but it seems to be pretty common.

I am not sure about your field, but when I have made a revision to a manuscript, it is required to have a letter detailing your changes and your response to the reviewers' comments.  In your case, make the changes that you can accomplish and detail your reasons for not doing X in this manuscript. Be detailed and specific.  You could even address the fact that you did not do X in your manuscript as well, if you think it could be useful to a reader.

Agreed.  It is acceptable to push back.  A reviewer may still feel they are correct, and argue against acceptance, but it doesn't mean the editor will side with them.  I don't think a special contact with the editor is necessary except under special circumstances.  The normal cover letter will suffice.

I have met a similar situation now, one of the reviewers criticised the lack of novelty, not enough for publication and proposed some drawbacks of the article. In fact the revisions according to the comments are somehow infeasible, some kind of redoing the work. Yet the editor just ask me to adquately address the concerns of novelty and highlight it in the Introduction of article. Does it mean the editor prefers accepting the article without major revisions according to the reviewer's comments?


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When resubmitting a paper, should I write individual letters for each reviewer or one common letter?
My question is simple. When resubmitting a paper after review was done, should I include different response letters to each reviewer, or should I include my comments addressing each reviewer remark in a single letter?
Edit: I usually send one single letter. However, recently, I was in a situation where the reviewers made only minor comments while the editor had a major issue. I'd think the editor would not necessarily want to share his major comments with the reviewers, so I sent separate letters so the editor might choose which ones to send to the reviewers. This made me think that always sending separate letters is possibly the best practice.
Edit 2: Please note that I'm not asking how to write good response letters in general. I'm sure there are plenty of good advice about that on Academia.SE. I'm particularly interested in pros and cons of using single vs multiple letters.

I write it in a single letter. I think that since your correspondence is with the editor, this is the best practice. After all, you correspond with the associate editor (AE), and it's hers/his role to delegate your responses to the reviewers, if he/she sees a need. It's an important point in my opinion - it emphasizes the AE is not just pushing papers.
The AE has an active role in this. If the AE sees you respond well to the reviews, e.g. when the reviewer just asked some questions / needed clarifications, then the AE might not wait for a response from the reviewer. Further, the AE might see that the reviewers requests had some conflicted comments and that you tried to answer the best you can, etc.
So when you separate your letters, you kind of say "hey AE, this is between me and the reviewers", which is not the case.

Usually, you sent back one single letter in which you answer the reviewers questions one by one. I always start with a short note to the editor, listing the major revisions done as bullet points. I also thank the reviewers for their time spent on the review and that their comments advanced my manuscript (of course I write this only if the review really improved my work). Then I start with "Reviewer 1" and list each of his questions or remarks and mark my comments either in bold or in a different color.

Agreed.  You are talking to the editor, not the reviewers.  The editor may or may not share parts of the letter with one or more of the reviewers. Probably not, unless he wants a response from that reviewer.

I think that @Jens already provided the right answer, that usually you answer all the reviewers in a single response. In my experience, all the ACM and IEEE journals I've been involved with as author/reviewer/editor share the response letter with the reviewers, who then see each other's comments and the authors' response to them.
You describe a somewhat unusual situation here, in which the editor has more major comments than the individual reviewers.  Even then, I think I would send a single response, and assume the reviewers are going to see the response to the previous submission, including the editor's concerns.  If you have reason to think otherwise, asking the editor the question you have posed here seems appropriate.
By the way, in my experience usually the letter from the journal says specifically that the authors are to respond to the comments and explain how they have addressed each concern.

I agree with the prior responses. Typically, the editor does not share the letter with authors' responses with the reviewers. Therefore, there is no need to worry that the reviewers' will see the suggested responses from the editor. Good luck!

That's the opposite of what I said.  My experience is that the response is shared with the reviewers, for IEEE and ACM publications at least. Other fields may vary, but I wouldn't make a blanket statement.

I'm sorry I missed that in your response, Fred. Yes, I am in a different discipline and I have never received the "Response to the reviewers" letters for articles that have been resubmitted. This is good to know.

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Is there a financial motivation for organizing a summer school?
Do professors and scientific staff of an institute make money from summer schools?
Or is it a well-intentioned unpaid activity done by organizers?
For example, a summer school about a topic in mathematics.

What I see at large universities in the U.S.: summer school programs, e.g. for high school students, bring in revenue.  Many of the university's costs are fairly fixed.  Many dorms would otherwise by empty in the summer.

Whithin the universities that I've been affiliated outside the US, there is no financial gain in a math department organizing a summer school, as there is no tuition.
Usually, they should submit a proposal for a funding agency that will cover the costs of the project.
The reason for doing summer schools is for advertising the department and their graduate program outside their regional area. The department may also be interested in boasting a particular research project/area.
One can also squeeze a few activities in the project with a collaborator far away, so the project would also serve for other research activicies not publicly advertised, by paying for his/her visit.

So, that is, all organizers work unpaid? I mean, an organizer could change his position to another institute and the advertising the department does not make sense for him.

Maybe in the US it is different, as they don't get a regular salary during the summer, so I believe one can get paid by the school for organizing a summer school. But in other places these would be already part of their regular job. An outsider would get paid by the funding project, depending on the type of work he would be doing in the summer school (say, teaching).

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How to negotiate salary at a school with a two-stage negotiation process?
I have a tenure track job offer from school S. This school appears to have a two-stage strategy to negotiate a low salary with candidates. Early in the process, HR discusses the salary range, [MIN, MAX].  At a later stage, when the first candidate is chosen, in the first step HR will negotiate with candidate, to a mutually-agreed compensation; that's proposal A. After A is reached, HR will say, this is now my proposal; department still has to approve my proposal! Then comes the department head, which reduces the compensation further, to proposal B, likely to be the MIN value! The department head states that this is the final offer and cannot be negotiated.
I am in an excellent position to get several offers from other institutions. But results will appear in March or afterwards (some applications are now just being reviewed). On the other hand, if I accept the offer from S, it's not ethical to withdraw and join other schools later on.
The strategy of S sent me a negative signal about the school administration. However, I much like the faculty there and the school and the program are great fits. I am giving it a second thought whether I wish to join S. I now have to decide:
D1. Insist on proposal A (despite the fact that the department claimed that offer B is not negotiable)
D2. Reject the offer, do not live with a low salary, and pursue other applications for good (including an rearlier delayed offer)
D3. Accept the offer B, and don't argue over a few k USD a year.
Using this experience as an illustrative example, I would like to ask some general questions. The questions might be of interest to all applicants seeking faculty positions, when they negotiate salary:
Q1. Is two-stage negotiation a well-known business strategy to lower compensation package?
Q2. Is it ethical for HR to agree to a proposal, and later claim that it was countered by higher authority?
Q3. To what extent HRs have autonomy in negotiations?
Q4. Statistically, how often "final offers" are bluff/final? Your answer could depend on who says "this is our final offer and non-negotiable," HR or upper-level authority.
You may consider several cases for HR:
HR1. HR declares his autonomy level "before hand." For instance, he or she may say "Before starting, I would like to brief you on our procedure ... ", or "I am in full charge."
HR2. HR does not make any statement regarding his/her decision making independence. It may do so after a first agreement.
HR3. Employer sets bounds (MINs and MAXs). By definition, HR should be able to make independent decisions withing those bounds. Otherwise, the HR, the candidate, and the negotiation process, are being dismissed and disrespected by institution (and what's the point of negotiation with HR).

What is your question? If you are intending on polling about what we would do in your shoes, then this isn't a fit for StackExchange sites. If you have a specific question, then perhaps you should rephrase it because it's not clear as it is (at least not to me).

While I wish you the best on the job market, given the competitiveness of the academic job market in almost every field, your statement "I am in an excellent position to get several offers from other institutions" is laughably unrealistic.

@posdef I agree the question is not clear. I think the interesting question is something like is the behavior of school A typical and is there any negotiating room (I also think we have answered that question before).

@StrongBad. It is not always unrealistic. I already  delayed a position in past months for this one (which seemed to me a better fit). I am not sure what happened to it, but A appeared promising, so I lost contact with the other one. I could resume my contact now, but it's kind of embarrassing. Also, my applications are making it to short list at two other schools now. They know me well. But as I said, timelines are different.

I find it very odd that HR would negotiate an acceptable salary, and then have the department low ball. That should be going on behind the scenes, with the institution making one 'offer' to the candidate.

@Jon Custer. Totally agree. HR initially says I am in full charge. But later the school unilaterally dismisses the agreed proposal between the candidate and HR, and offers something lower, which cannot be negotiated. It seems that it's coordinated: the first stage is an attempt to discover your threshold, and the second attempt, to offer something 5-10k lower than your threshold.

I think you should ask the department to explain why they have made a lower offer.  Typically a department is motivated to successfully recruit because the administration may not give them a second chance to hire.  You should also ask yourself if these are the kind of people you want to work with.

One thing I might say is that if this institution is going to defraud you in the salary negotiation, then the ethical obligation to avoid taking the sure position and not backing out later for a better one becomes a lot less clear.

Just walk away. (Or at least theeaten to walk away unless they negotiate in good faith.)

@StrongBad It's definitely not unrealistic. Many of the best candidates in my field have a number of strong offers.

What @djechlin said. I'm also voting to reopen.

While I do appreciate the concern related to the competitiveness of the academic market, I'm especially concerned at the idea of taking an offer to work at a place where unethical business practices are accepted as the norm and you are just supposed to take it or leave it. While I think you can be the only person to choose what's right for you and your family, if you are in the personal position to be able to say "no thanks", even if you might not get another offer - then I'd strongly suggest you not be manipulated into a sort of "just be happy you have a job" situation using strong-arm tactics. You can push back or walk away - or pretend to, as JeffE says - but I would not suggest you just roll over and take it if you don't have to.
Why is this a problem?
This Is Called Low-Balling

First make what you want the other person to agree to easy to accept
  by making it quick, cheap, easy, etc.
Maximize their buy-in, in particular by getting both verbal and public
  commitment to this.
Make it clear that they are agreeing to this of their own free will.
Then change the agreement to what you really want. The other person
  may complain, but, if the low-ball is done correctly they should agree
  to the change.
The trick of a successful low-ball is in the balance of making the
  initial request attractive enough to gain agreement, whilst not making
  the second request so outrageous that the other person refuses. It
  nevertheless is surprising how great a difference there can be between
  these two requests.

The fact that HR specifically told you that you are in "full charge"? Yeah, that's part of the low-ball technique. They are all playing the same game, together. HR is the good cop, the helpful salesman who really wants to get a great deal.

Guuguen and Pascual (2000) found it to be important that the person
  believes that they have made a free and non-coerced agreement to the
  first request. In particular adding 'but you are free to accept or to
  refuse' to the first request increased compliance.

First, they put out a feeler - asking for a range. That's ethical, honest. Then they get you to show interest, negotiate, spend some time - make a commitment. OK so far. Then you come to an agreed upon decision...that's where honest negotiations end.
The "gee, I'd really like to do that, but my [boss/sales manager/department head/dean/provost]"...that's normal for a used car dealership in Fargo. How about they offer you a clear coat upgrade to go with being tenure track - just 10% off your salary. It's a real steal, we don't normally do this, but you seem like a real smart guy. Please.
Let's Talk Payments
If they want to negotiate, by all means if you are willing and able to negotiate, have fun. Yes, you do need to be able to say no, and perhaps you need to get past embarrassment and contact that previous offer or stall so you can have the comfort to mentally know you can turn this offer down no matter what.
"Gee mister, I sure do like your school, but since I originally talked with HR  I've had to consider some very compelling other options [like telling you to shove it]. I feel bad about this - truly - but I think my original agreement with HR for X was lower than I should of been willing to accept. It seems like X+10% is really what I should have agreed to.
This is within the range we had originally discussed, and I feel bad about bringing this up now, but I wasn't aware of these other options at the time."
Maybe, you feel awful bad about this - but you suppose, if it would just be too terribly untoward to want more than HR originally OKed, the department being so great and the department head being clearly such a great guy, you'd be willing to accept something more like you originally agreed to with HR.
Or you can be angry and make it clear that you can't negotiate with such a thing on the table - the walk-away. But you have to be actually willing to walk away.
They seems to want to play games, and turn-about is fair play. But you have to be willing to turn down the offer and do something else, period, or it won't work out so well.
Still, I'd warn you that they are telling you now - far in advance of joining - that they are willing to negotiate all the way to playing unethical games with their offers and candidates, including wasting their time and reneging on phantom offers. If your facts are correct, this is not a accident - it's a design.
Personally, of all the jobs I've had I've only had one employer of any kind - academia, small business, or large enterprise - try to low-ball me like you describe here. And I didn't even try to negotiate that one - I just silently thanked them for letting me know they think it'd be OK to play games with my livelihood before I joined, and I got out of there with all haste, so I can't say how "winning" might work out.

I like this answer a lot, esp. "They seems to want to play games, and turn-about is fair play.", i.e., the fraudulent procurement of apparent agreement. This is why I feel like the ethical obligation to not take another position gets uncorked at that moment.

@Collins. I tend to agree with you regarding ethics. An employer can offer whatever salary it wants. But it has to be transparent and non-tactical. Setting a range and applying techniques in several stages in order to hire people as cheap as possible (below average compensation for that job), wasting applicant's time, is disregarding employees well-being. And that brings up the question: Should employees care about the well-being of the employer?

Should employees care about the well-being of the employer? — That's irrelevant. Until you sign the contract, you are not an employee.

turn-about is fair play — Maybe so, but why would you want to play this game?  Do you really want to work at a place you have so little respect for that you're willing to negotiate unethically?

@djechlin Oh, yes.  As I've already commented, I'm in complete agreement: Just walk away.

How insane is it for HR to be the good cop and the dept the bad cop?  The other way around is much more logical.  This makes me doubt that it's as planned out as all that.

After A is reached, HR will say, this is now my proposal; department still has to approve my proposal! Then comes the department head, which reduces the compensation further, to proposal B, likely to be the MIN value! The department head states that this is the final offer and cannot be negotiated.

I would treat this offer from HR as what it is, a non-commital, non-binding declaration, but nothing more. To me, this has the same character as an applicant stating that "he is certainly interested but needs to clarify with [whomever]". Just like the department would be asking for a stronger commitment, you are in the right to ask for an actual offer before accepting anything. It is not stalling to say that you will not be making a final decision until you have a final offer - it is just good sense to do so. I would not consider it unethical to renege from the negotiation in the second stage, if HR presents the first offer as fixed and the department head later on does not come through.

The department head states that this is the final offer and cannot be negotiated.

People like to state this a lot. It is usually not true. Also, if you actually have other offers (like you assume you do), every offer gives you at least 2 choices - take it, or go for another school. It is not like you have to accept whatever "final" offer they give you.

Since you don't have other offers in hand, it appears your options are (A) reject the offer with the possibility of having no job or (B) accept the position because you value that more than the salary difference that you are negotiating for.
But don't put your hopes on some future job offer from another school!
Although it is bad to reject an offer that you have already accepted, I have heard of it being done and I think any reasonable person would do it too if they got a much better offer later on.
As far as is this type of negotiating normal? I have always been told to not even negotiate salary for faculty positions since it is competitive enough, most people aren't going to reject the offer over 5-10k unless they have other offers, and some places have standardized salaries.

Thanks Austin. Shouldn't it be based on department interest on candidate? The school appears to be attempting to hire super cheap. It seems to me that that's likely the minimum level they could legally go (based on experience).

@eli In the US, there is a lot of people involved with hiring, many of which are outside the department. For example, the provost/dean of a college might have to approve the salaries which forces the department to have to fight to get their new hires a higher salary which can take a long time, possibly not taking affect until the next hiring season.

Why are people so adamant that nobody gets multiple offers? I my experience, bad to average people get 0 offers, while good to great people often get multiple offers. Why would there even be a negotiation if it were so absurd that a candidate just does not take a job?


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I screwed up while changing my research projects
I was working on topic 1 which wasn't the most interesting topic, but my prof was great. Then prof 2 suggested that I work with him on topic 2 on the condition that I stop topic 1 as he wants full dedication. I didn't wanna disappoint and ruin my reln with prof 1 and leave my old project incompleete, so I told him that my project will have the old and new topic but I'd be finishing the old part soon to work with prof 2. He heard it and is probably angry, and won't respond to my emails.
How do I deal with this?

Perhaps you could discuss the situation each of the professors, directly and honestly, as if they were actually human beings.

I don't think you screwed up, at least from what you said I can't see anything you did wrong. Wanting to first finish your current project before starting the next one, and not leaving your current professor in the lurch, is a honorable impulse.
Just because the second professor is not answering emails does not necessarily mean he is angry - is he busy? at a conference? talking to another student to check if they might be able to start earlier before coming back to you? there are many possibilities. So you should first wait a little and then check what his actual response is - maybe if you run across him in a hallway or something.
If, in fact, he is indeed angry and now giving you the cold shoulder because you wouldn't drop everything at a moment's notice for him, then you have actually dodged a bullet. Do not work with someone who behaves like this.

I've seen this happen a lot at my dept and many students don't realize how close-knit faculty members are.  If you mean you were trying to switch advisors and dropping a project for another one, you have almost no credibility at this point.  It's important to finish what you start with someone, before moving on.  You don't give details about whether you are an undergrad ms PhD so I'm not sure people can help you much more.


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How much a statement of purpose can help with PhD admission?
If I can write a convincing Statement of purpose which conveys why I choose the PhD program and show that I am well-prepared for the field, will it save other parts of my application? I read somewhere said that SOP is not as important as GPA and test scores.

It depends on how serious your admissions evaluator is.  The not-serious ones will see your scores as most significant.

There's no magic formula for PhD admission.


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Should I inform my referee about my applying result even I get rejected?
My referees tell me to inform them the result once I know. Should I still inform them if I get rejected? I don't want to disappoint them.

Yes, why not? Give them the courtesy of informing them if they asked. What's worse, facing a bit of embarrassment/disappointment or giving the people who have done you a favour and given you a reference total radio silence?

Yes. They deserve to know, given the effort they put in for you. They will probably respond by offering you some encouragement.

Getting rejected is probably one of the most common things academics do.

You should tell them the result of your application. If the result happens to be negative, briefly tell them about your next step (e.g. will you apply to the same thing again in the future? what do you plan on doing until then?). They may even suggest a next step.
If you don't inform them of a negative result right away, they will find out if you eventually ask them for a second reference letter. Furthermore, since they explicitly asked you to tell them the result, it would be impolite to not.


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The correlation between GPA in grad school and research ability
In the US graduate universities, Ph.D. students have to take courses. Can a student with low GPA do good research? I think doing research is solving problems. If someone cannot solve a homework or an exam, how the person can even solve more complicated problems to publish?

Stuart, given the title, I think the question is about research and GPA after being admitted to graduate school, not about admissions.

At least at the universities I've attended and worked at, the best graduate  researchers usually also have pretty good GPAs. We always hear of these stories of highly intelligent researchers that did not do well in school. Outside of a few aberrations (e.g. Einstein), quality researchers usually have at least a decent GPA in my experience.

Can a student with a low GPA do good research? Yes! should a student with a low GPA expect to do good research? No!

I don't think that this question can be considered duplicate of the other one, they ask two totally different questions. I voted to reopen.

GPA is a poor predictor of Grad school performance. Scientists have showed that your Quant GRE score is the best predictor among test scores and GPA. However Grad schools adcom seems give the more weight to GPA than GRE score.

In the US graduate universities, Ph.D. students have to take courses. Can a student with low GPA do good research?

In short, yes. GPA is a measure of your ability to follow instructions, do homework on time, and perform on exams. If the grading scheme has enough of a curve it barely does that. In any case, it's not a meaningful measure of research ability.
In the US graduate program I'm familiar with (in physics), several of the classes you take are actually not that closely related to your own research. Spending too much time on those classes can actively hurt your research output, while being somewhat beneficial to your GPA. Often there are also teaching duties to handle, so time management can be crucial. Sometimes you hear the advice to get good enough grades*, and spend the rest of your time on research. It also seems that potential employers are not too interested in the graduate GPA - the degree itself and your research tend to be more important factors.
*The grades should be enough to remain in good academic standing, and count towards your degree.

I think doing research is solving problems. If someone cannot solve a homework or an exam, how the person can even solve more complicated problems to publish?

To some extent this is true, particularly for the courses relevant to one's research area. Understanding that subject matter and being able to solve problems is clearly worthwhile. Usually that translates to good grades in those classes, but I don't think it's guaranteed. One can have personal issues that semester, suffer from time pressure on a final exam, etc.
On the other hand, research problems are not always just more complicated versions of the problems studied in class. They may require new, creative methods that you wouldn't see in a course. They may require learning specific procedures that just aren't covered in standard courses. Not to mention that being able to pick a good open problems to work on is an art in itself. Certainly, getting good scores in a course does not guarantee one becoming a successful, independent researcher.
In conclusion, there might be some correlation between graduate GPA and research ability for large enough population sizes, but I don't think it holds any predictive power on the individual level.

Sure, it's entirely possible to have a poor GPA and still do great in research!
Maintaining a high GPA and doing great research are two different skill sets.  Sure, they have overlapping components - like, as you said, problem solving helps with both - but it's still entirely possible to be weak in one while strong in the other.
Some of the components are even anti-correlated.  Examples:

A student who does things exactly the way the teacher wants them to be done is likely to get a good GPA for it, but the student who figures out their own strategies'll tend to do better in the research world.
A student who seeks social validation might work hard on their GPA, but the student who's more interested in the field itself is more likely to excel in research.
A student who thinks in contrived logic should tend to do better on exams, but a student who thinks more generally should do better in research.

Many academics can pull off both a great GPA and great research, but many others will be good at one but not the other.


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Change grad school and get accepted. Worry that no prof in the new university wants to work with me
My supervisor and I are not a good match and there is no one in my department has the same interest. Therefore, I applied to a new university in my second year of Ph.D. and got accepted even though I did not have any LORs from my current university. Now the problem which I am worrying is that I will be looked down by the faculty in the new university. They might not be interested in working with a student who changed grad school. Even I get accepted, but if no one wants to work with me, So how I am going to get PhD?

Did you hide in your more recent applications that you are currently a PhD student at another institution? Or did your application make that fact clear?

I make it clear that I am currently a PhD student

That's good. Then I strongly support the answer by @aeismail.

Your admission to the new school was decided upon by members of the faculty of the department to which you applied. So it's unlikely that you'd have been admitted without there being at least one or two people in the new department who think you'd fit in and would therefore be interested in working with you.
If you still have doubts, there is an easy way to answer the question. Just ask the professors you're interested in working with if they are likely to have positions available when you arrive, and if they'd be willing to consider you for them.


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The route for a 2nd year physics PhD student to have a career as a data scientist
I am a 2nd year PhD student in physics. Tenure-track positions are highly competitive and I do not love research enough to pursue it as a life career. Since I like programming and playing with data, I want to have a job as a data scientist after finishing my degree. I read some success stories of people who got degrees in Physics but works as data scientists but the people are from top universities like UC Berkely, Stanford, etc...
So my question is how doable it is for someone who only gets Physics degree from the low-rank university to find a job as a data scientist. What is the plan for the next years when I am still in my PhD program? What should I learn? How should I have real projects and internships to work on? Will working unpaid in a research lab about data analysis in my current university help?

Look at job listings for data scientists. Figure out what they say the requirements are. Then learn those skills.

Yes, you absolutely can go from a Physics PhD to a data science career.
The three major routes I've seen have been:

Apply to a program like the Insight Data Science Fellows (there are many like this), where they take students with strong quantitative backgrounds and build up some of their more industry-relevant skills, then place them in jobs. These can be quite competitive, and my impression is that students who get placed in these fellowships have already done significant work on "side projects" in data science - i.e. you create your own research topic, and find out something interesting. [Also, since they are competitive, I suspect students from high-profile universities have an advantage.]
Find an internship at a local company; use this to bootstrap your way into industry (or just go work there if you like it!). Again, usually before you get an internship, you usually need to show some interest, working on a more closely data-science-relevant side project, or providing a solution in a Kaggle competition.
Personal connections. Keep an eye on graduating students now, and see what they do! Many companies need coders with strong quantitative skills, and might offer referral bonuses - someone who graduated a few years before I did reached out to me at one point because of this.

Since you are just starting out, you also have the important option to make your PhD project more closely aligned with interesting data science ideas. It is possible to do both physics and data science - for instance, if I look at the list of sessions at the 2017 APS March Meeting, I see three or four with "machine learning" in the title alone. Of course, this depends on an advisor who is willing to do this and able to teach you relevant things!
However, it is still important to remember that a Physics PhD is a long time commitment, and you have to choose an advisor and a project you will be happy with in the mean time - not just what is going to be popular in industry. (After all, in 3-4 years, the market for data scientists may not be nearly so good.)

If you compete in Kaggle competitions, or the physionet challenge (and win), that will do a lot to prove you are a credible data scientist, no matter what your degree is.

I did exactly this (Physics PhD to data science). I didn't do any 'specific projects' but did some self teaching.
If you want to do help yourself you could learn:

Brush up on Linear algebra.
Good knowledge of one high-level programming language (Python, R, etc)
Awareness of Machine Learning algorithms.

I was already competent in Python and did some basic Machine learning (i.e., regression and basic image classification). I also read the first half of the book:
'Hands-On Machine Learning with Scikit-Learn and TensorFlow' by A. Geron. (I have no affliation to this book or author).
The most important thing is to concentrate on getting your PhD! A good PhD will get you a job in this field rather than the basic understanding you could gain yourself in your free time. I did all my learning while working at a different job for a few months after my PhD.
Following this,  I then approached some Data Science jobs and was honest: I have a strong numerate background, but have  very little knowledge about data science but want to learn. Several companies were very happy for me to 'train up' because of the potential someone with a PhD has! Particularly, as a physics PhD teaches you great research and problem solving skills.

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Travel Budget for Faculty Members in USA
How much budget do faculty members in US  have to travel to conferences every year?
I am looking for the average travel support in CS or Engineetring  departments (not out of my own contracts) across US top 100 schools, for tenured professors with accepted papers at conferences. Consider places like University of Washington.
The background of the this question is, I like to find out, once my tenure track funding package is finished, would there be a minimum research support from the department, or I am on my own. It makes sense that if my paper is accepted, the university pays for it (I present my work under the university banner). Before asking my department, I like to equip myself with prior information.

This is going to be way too broad / too specific... it will vary by institution, college at the institution, and potentially even department.

Made specific for clarity.

Why do people downvote? how else are you going to ask a question in academia?

You have not stated the discipline you are interested in. It might be different for CS where conferences are the main publishing venue than Math for example.

Made more precise.

If you are considering a job offer, you should ask the department chair.  The department chair will want to help you negotiate with administration since that brings money into the department.

Although I am a mathematician and not a CS or engineering professor, I would overwhelmingly expect that at a place like the University of Washington tenure track faculty members would be expected to secure external grant funding (for example from the NSF) and use this to cover their travel expenses.
Universities often provide startup funds which you can use for this purpose during the first couple of years -- but these don't get renewed when you run out.
In the long run, if you don't succeed in obtaining external funding, it is unlikely that your department would rush in to fill the gap. My department (less prestigious than Washington) provides a little bit of money to faculty members without grant support, but it is only enough to attend to one or maybe two conferences a year.

As mentioned in the comments, the question is too broad to be answered in a useful way.  There might be a discretionary budget or a development budget which could be used for travel, but it could also be used for other things.  There might be a travel fund, but it might not be guaranteed to any particular faculty member.  But I will try to give a useful answer:  Most faculty are employed in teaching positions where funding is limited and research is not a priority.  In these cases travel budget is often zero.

Thanks for the comments. I modified the question. So I guess there is typically little or no support. And if I don't get grants, no travel.


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How do admissions committees perceive poor grades in "core" classes in the major, for students with better grades in "harder" classes?
I prefer to avoid the "do I have what it takes to get in?" question, and would rather focus on how a particular graduate committee contemplates a few poor grades on a transcript, particularly in core introductory courses related to the major. Let's say person A gets 1 or 2 C's in his core classes (maybe discrete math and intro to programming), but then has A's and B's across the board in harder subjects such as Machine Learning or Combinatorics. How does the admissions committee view this? Do they care about the C's at all in that case? That is to say, taking other factors such as the GRE or Recommendations into account, what really matters?

I think people are more forgiving for your early missteps if you demonstrate strong performance later in your undergrad career.

In my studies there was one term, where we had a lot of core classes that all took a lot of work and it was impossible (by time constraints) to be perfect in all of them. With the other subjects it was much easier to choose when and what you do and build a suitable schedule. Unless of course your studies are "catching chickens" and you failed "How to prepare for catching a chicken" twice while passing "How to cook a chicken".

Possible duplicate of How does the admissions process work for Ph.D. programs in the US, particularly for weak or borderline students?


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Citation problems, in supporting general information, what kind of paper should I cite?

A country implements the most stringent environmental regulations in a
  region.

For a general statement/common knowledge like this, I cited a peer-reviewed journal paper, which has a similar claim in their introduction. However, the problem is neither this claim is the main findings of the journal paper, nor the paper provides any secondary citation. So it is a general claim made by the authors.
Can I cite the paper? or must I cite all the related environmental standards of all the countries from the region? I really think it is unnecessary, however, there is no such review in this region and in this subject.

General practice shows that a citation is needed for recent, or technical, or disputable statements; whilst common knowledge statements come off as mere context drawing. However it is often tricky to acknowledge what is in fact common knowledge or not, especially when one is a seasoned specialist.

If you don't have evidence that your claim is true, be it from the literature or from your own work, you shouldn't make that claim. "Common knowledge" is often unreliable.

If you want to use a fact, either prove it yourself or cite a reliable source. If that paper does not provide a source for that fact then it’s not good enough in my opinion, but standards across fields vary.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Ph.D. mathematics application: Disclosing course textbooks
More than one math Ph.D. program I am applying to has a section where I am to list relevant coursework. An example is as follows:
"Enter under each category list the two most advanced courses or course sequences you have had or will definitely take before you come to (School)."
Under each class title there is a blank line where I am to list a text or textbooks. (No other instruction)
My question is this: In a few of my courses, the professor has listed a textbook for the course, but whose lectures have not adhered to the structure or level of rigor of the book. The homework also did not come from the course book. If I chose to use another textbook to study out of should I list this one or the one listed in the course syllabus? My reasons for wanting to list the book I used are:

The book on the syllabus is not a good indication of the level of rigor at which the course was taught.
I haven't read a page of the textbook on the syllabus while the book I used is one I own and is the primary reference for the subject on my shelf.

Which book should I write in my application?

People still use textbooks?

I am the Graduate Coordinator for a math department in which we ask graduate applicants to list their course textbooks.
I encourage you to follow the directions and list the textbooks that were used.  By and large, this is a good way for us to figure out the approximate level and content of courses like "algebra," "analysis" and "topology" with standard names but widely varying content.  A complex analysis course taught out of

A First Course in Complex Analysis by Matthias Beck, Gerald Marchesi, Dennis Pixton, and Lucas Sabalka

is likely to be quite different from one taught out of

Complex Analysis, Lars Ahlfors

If you feel that the chosen textbook was below the level of the course and you supplemented with a more advanced/rigorous textbook, you may as well list that textbook too, saying something like "I myself used..."
If the instructor has online lecture notes, definitely include a link to them: that gives a really good idea of what was covered.
Note to international readers: having standard textbooks for advanced undergraduate math classes is much more, um, standard in the United States than in many other parts of the world.  We certainly know that international students may come from less of a "textbook culture."  (This need not be a bad thing in itself, but it is one of several ways in which it can be harder to evaluate the profile of an international applicant than a domestic one.)

To complement the international part: in some countries (e.g. Italy, France, Germany) there are many (good) undergraduate textbooks, but they are usually written in the local language and are quite probably unknown to most of the US audience. Another issue is the possibly different approach to undergraduate courses.

E.g. I didn't have calculus during the first year but a proof-based analysis course.

@Massimo: Right, but the increased specialization of e.g. the average European university student over the average American university student usually works in favor of the European student from the perspective of a grad school admissions committee.  (And for what it's worth: in my first year in an American university I took...a proof-based analysis course.)

Thank you very much for your thorough and informed answer. I will take your advice. I think I panicked that admissions committee will read the name of a book and write off my background in an area as insufficient.

How about leaving it blank or crossing it out and mentioning in the cover letter that your professors did not follow a textbook but rather designed their own lecture? I also studied math and in the whole 5 years until the end of the master, I only had one lecture that was slightly based upon a book; all others used lecture notes written by the professor. Thus, I'd say your case is not that uncommon and should be understood.
If you know of lecture notes being available to the public you might mention these of course; just in case someone wants to take a look.


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How common is it for women to drop out of graduate school because they have children?
I am a 29 year old female. I want to go back to school.  I have been told that I have a very good chance at getting into a very good graduate computer science program (machine learning, AI, robotics, theoretical cs, so many algorithms... it's the real deal here, you guys).  Due to cost, the fact I need to work full-time and giving myself the best chances for success, I will be doing this at a very slow, part-time pace.
As an undergraduate, I saw woman drop out for family, so my question is:
How common is it for women to drop out of graduate school because they have children?
I'm preferentially looking for answers that draw on personal experience or statistics.

Some additional background you might find relevant:
My boyfriend/fiance/partner of 10+ years died about a year ago.  I don't know what I'm doing about all that yet.
I have been out of school for a while.  You don't really need a degree in IT and I hadn't really considered going back because it didn't seem manageable or practical with the rest of my life.  But... now that life is gone, it's cool because it has to be, and I would have never even dared to dreamed about being able to enroll in this graduate program before.
I don't necessarily care if I have a family and/or kids but I'm fairly positive it will not happen on accident.  To me, being with someone or married does not automatically mean having kids, either.  For the sake of the question, when I am ready, I feel it will be very logistically easy for me to date again.
Articles like these motivate my question:

In the Ivory Tower, Men Only
Work and Family on the Rise among College Graduate Women
When Girls Don't Graduate
For Female Scientists there's no good time to have children

Helpful Articles:

Council of Graduate Schools' Master's Completion Project (Perhaps combine that with statistics on the rate of pregnancy / childbirth among United States graduate students? There's data for unmarried Chinese graduate students...)

While I am sympathetic to the OP and the question, I think it's a hard one to answer in this kind of forum, and I am a bit worried that it could engender negative/counterproductive discussions on, um, gender issues.  "From your experience... assuming I perform well with both work and school... what are the chances that I actually finish my masters?" In my experience, assuming that you do well in school the chance that you will succeed in school is good!

"What have you seen happen to woman normally in this situation?" As a feminist this question makes me a bit umcomfortable.  Does it really matter that you're a woman rather than a man?  Does it matter what's "normal" rather than what you want to do?  "Do they finish or do they stop for family (or maybe both somehow)?" Both are possible.  "Do I have any chance at a doctorate, too...?" Yes, of course.  It is relatively common for doctoral students (male and female) to have children.  Also doctoral students in e.g. CS are often/usually fully supported by their programs so don't need outside work.

Not will I succeed... will I finish.  I stated the question so that success could be assumed.  I basically want to know if it common for woman in higher education (if it is a male dominated field may or may not be relevant) to stop and have kids/family for any/whatever reason.  I assume advisers and long-term professors would have the most insight to this.

@gloomy.penguin: For me, succeeding in a master's program implies finishing the degree.  I wonder what nuance I am missing here.  Yes, in my experience a large percentage of women in higher education have children and families.  I am an advisor and a tenured professor in the mathematics department at a state university in the US.

Of course it matters that I'm a woman with this question.   Even just from looking at it in physical/biological terms of being pregnant and the aftermath.  I saw so many woman as an undergrad stop because they got married or something (which is fine).  I have never looked into the graduate world before.  So... I'm asking... "what is typical?"  Do graduate students stop for family at the same rate I saw undergraduate students stopping for family?

Assuming you understand about the birds and the bees, typically you will get pregnant if you want to, otherwise not.  I'm with EnergyNumbers; please make your question clearer.

@gloomy.penguin: I'm not saying that the experiences of women in academia are identical to men.  I'm saying that you're phrasing the question in a way which makes me uncomfortable, as asking what is "typical" it seems to be tantamount to seeking reinforcement of traditional gender roles and stereotypes.  Many -- not all -- women want families and children and need to worry about when and how to do that.  The same goes for men.

Being a woman should be part of your reckoning, but you are making the entire issue depend on what women "typically" do.  Substitute "African-American" for "woman" to see why this is making me cringe a bit.  Bottom line: academia is hard for everyone, and I agree, it can be harder for women in certain ways and contexts.  But as a woman, can you succeed in academia and in life?  Of course.  The question is a little heart-breaking. I think you need to find a female mentor who has done all the things you are interested in.  They are not so terribly rare...

I strongly disagree with the close votes.  I believe OP is asking a pertinent in-scope question which has a factual answer: How common is it for women to drop out of graduate school because they have children?  (Or perhaps "when" instead of "because".)

@JeffE: The question has been edited several times to get to that formulation, which I agree is quite reasonable.

For what it's worth, just yesterday I attended the PhD defence of a female colleague who had one child soon before starting, and another during the PhD.

I have suggested some edits and voted to reopen. You can rollback to your version if you disagree with my edits.

This is a gender-specific issue because women have a "biological clock," and a lot of them start to get antsy around their late 20's-early 30's, when they only have a few more years to safely have kids.  Men can delay childrearing until they have tenure if they want to; women usually don't have that luxury.

One of the most important factors is to have a supportive supervisor. You need to find a supervisor that is invested in your success but also thinks that "family comes first" (I know many such successful scientists, of both genders). Good luck!

My wife and I both started graduate school, in STEM fields, in Ph.D. programs, a bit later than most.
Due to this, we decided to have children during graduate school.  Note that I am in the USA at the one of the top programs in my field at an RU/VH university.
A few negative points are

As a graduate student, you are expected to work full time, but you are not paid enough to afford daycare costs for young children.
For the first year of the child's life your research output will be severely limited.  Some PIs may not like this.
After children, you have to be very focused and disciplined to continue, time scarcity increases a great deal, and time is already scarce even if you are a single graduate student with no life.
My wife had severe morning sickness, which decreased her research output. Pregnancy complications can affect your work.
After you have children, being poor really starts to become a burden.  After all, we want to give our children a good life.
Your time in graduate school will be extended.

A few positive points are

Due do the nature of research and graduate school, hours are very flexible compared with a typical job.  This allows for juggling of schedules when needed, etc. which is very helpful to us.
The Ph.D. is less crucial than a post-doc or a tenure track position, so I would posit that there is less risk to have children during graduate school as opposed to other crucial academic career milestones.  However, the caveat is that graduate students receive the least money.
Many PIs don't care what you do, as long as you make research progress. This makes it easy to work around a young child's needs.

The way that we have dealt with this situation is by

Having understanding PIs who also have children, and are flexible.
Acquiring some debt (that we wouldn't otherwise incur) and I've done some lucrative consulting on the side.  The consulting has however, increased the time to graduate in my program.
Being very disciplined in our schedules and having our children in daycare/preschool so that we can work.  This is very expensive.
Not having a social life (but graduate students aren't supposed have those anyway right?).

To answer your question, for us it is working.  However, I do know a few other couples who are doing this, one other couple is like us with both parents in graduate school, but nearly all of the others have only one parent in graduate school.
From my perspective, it appears that women leaving academia due to children is becoming less of a problem, but is still large, and unsolved.
Note : our university does not provide daycare to graduate students.  They do provide a $1000 annual subsidy, but our daycare costs are $10,500 per year.  These costs decrease for preschool, but are very expensive for the first three years.
Second Note : My graduation time will likely be right around the 6.5-7 year mark, I had my mother die during my time in graduate school, and we have had two children, so the actual time increase wasn't obscene, but I already had an MS in Mathematics coming in and was expecting to finish in 3-4 years.  My wife entered her program straight from BS and will probably finish in 5.5-6 years.
I would also like to say that the needs of the child and the lack of sleep disproportionately affect women in this situation, and this is a biological necessity in the first 2 years of the child's life.  For this reason, equality for women in academia does not mean equal treatment, it means providing for the ability for women to have children if they so please, without it impacting their career! This necessitates providing more support for women and families to have careers and children.

On questions of family, the road is a lot harder for women in academia than men.  Some of that is biological, but most of it is cultural: there's still a lot of sexism both within academia and in the larger culture, and numerous studies have shown that women are judged more harshly than men for making the same choices.
This all shows up in a phenomenon known as the "leaky pipeline," which is quantified nicely here.  That particular data doesn't quantify graduate school, but it follows similar trends: at any given stage, women are somewhat (but not hugely) less likely than men to progress to the next stage, and this difference is amplified (again, significantly but not hugely) by having a family.  Overall, this means that women are badly underrepresented in academia, particularly at the higher ranks.  For your own goals of education, however, there is no reason to think that you are unlikely to be able to succeed: most who start, finish.
However, I would question your assumption that the cost of education will mean that you need to work full-time and must go slowly.  If you get into a good computer science Ph.D. program, they should be paying you as a full-time job and covering tuition.  Some Masters' programs, particularly the really good ones, are the same way.  If won't be great wages---typically, you are paid just a stipend that covers the cost of living in your areas---but a good program will generally enable you to dedicate yourself fully to it, which also greatly increases your probability of success.

The caveat is that, if you do have a child while in graduate school then the pay is no longer enough to stay in the program.  Daycare is not affordable unless you take on debt, and if you choose no daycare you will never finish...

@daaxix Not necessarily... there are also other possibilities, including having a well-paid partner, family who are able to help out, or child-care pools.

What does this even have to do with sexism? Women willfully choosing family/children over careers isn't sexism or discrimination.

mod note for transparency's sake: I have edited the comment above to remove a sentence that was not constructive.

@keith Women choosing to have children/family over careers is not sexism (I object to the word 'willful' here); however, women who choose to have children/family are often assumed to be doing so over their careers - as in fact you have done in your comment. When a woman chooses to have children/family, it is often assumed that she is more interested in said children/family compared to her career, the same assumption does not occur for men to the same extent - this is sexism. These assumptions can have far-reaching effects, think funding from department, time and investment of the advisor, ...

@AruRay It's not assumed that's why/when women chose family over careers. It's a fact. You're assuming that's not the case. Unless you have evidence that every woman or man that chooses family over careers is held at gunpoint and "forced" to do so, then it's by choice (and technically, that would still be a choice, but I digress). When a man quits his career or stops progressing for family, he is also choosing family over career. There is no sexism here, besides the sexism you're falsely inserting.

@AruRay Please don't feed the trolls.

First of all, let me start out by saying that I am sorry for your loss. I cannot imagine what you must have gone through. With regards to your specific question, I cannot provide an answer from the "as a woman" perspective, but I can answer as a father, and as a graduate student. I've successfully completed my Master's Degree and I'm ABD status this week in my PhD.
Graduate school is hard work. Lots of people drop out for a wide variety of reasons. Some people can't hack it mentally or emotionally. Some people get discouraged and give up. Some people have too much going on with their work. And some people do drop out for family reasons. I've been working full time and going to school full time since I started my Bachelor's program. It's tough, but not impossible. The biggest key to success that I've found is maintaining balance and effective time-management. If you become pregnant during your coursework almost every school should have a clause that allows you to take a temporary leave of absence from your program which will give you some time off right after childbirth. My own kids are young, but not babies. I facilitate my family time by working on my homework at night after they go to bed, or on the weekends when they are out playing. Having a set schedule certainly helps you succeed too.
So, the short answer to your question is yes, people (men and women) do drop out of graduate school for family reasons.

I am not a woman, but I had a PhD student who was, and who was in her mid+ 30s in grad school, and had two kids while in grad school, and finished an excellent thesis in 6 years. Sadly, her (now ex-) husband was not helpful, in fact the opposite, etc., but she wanted both the kids and the mathematics. A very energetic, intelligent, and strong-willed person, yes, not to mention a bit more grown-up and focused than many grad students. She at first thought there was almost a "rule" that she'd have to drop out, but I assured her that there was no such rule, although there was the obvious practical need to figure out how to work things. (Amazingly, there is an almost-reasonable university-subsidized daycare... of course, the waiting list is longer than most people would imagine...)

This comment from the OP struck me and I think it's something to keep in mind when answering the question:

I saw so many woman as an undergrad stop because they got married or something (which is fine). I have never looked into the graduate world before. So... I'm asking... "what is typical?" Do graduate students stop for family at the same rate I saw undergraduate students stopping for family?

I don't know the details of your experience but it is certainly quite different from my own (woman in science at elite university). I saw zero undergraduates quit school because they got married or became a parent. There was one man who took a few months off because he knocked up his girl friend but he came back. There was one woman who dropped out for other reasons then later became pregnant. Even so, I believe she'll be returning next year. A few people at my university became engaged as undergrads but (with the exception of the guy that knocked up his girlfriend) none of them got married as undergrads. Even if they had, I can't imagine any of them dropping out because of it. My mom got knocked up with me and still finished her undergrad degree. Perhaps others could weigh in on their experience but from my perspective, I very much doubt graduate students drop out for family reasons at the rate you saw undergrads drop out.
I recently got my undergrad degree and am waiting to hear back from PhD programs so I don't know as many graduate students as others on here might. I have only known one pregnant graduate student - she had her baby and is back to working on her Ph.D. Late-stage pregnancy and getting a tiny human out of your body might make it take a few months longer to get your degree but the length of time for finishing grad school is so varied anyways that I don't think it matters much in the grand scheme of things. I will say it's probably easier if only one parent is a graduate student (and the other has a stable job or works remotely). I also imagine it would be very, very difficult if the other parent is lazy or if one is a single parent but even then, it can still be done. I agree with the the other poster who says don't make choices based on hypothetical children. Also, if you're doing comp sci you will probably be able to make a decent salary later on so if you don't want to give birth at 45 or whatever you will be able to afford adoption or maybe even a surrogate. There are many options for having children.

Due to cost, the fact I need to work full-time and giving myself the best chances for success, I will be doing this at a very slow, part-time pace.

Do look into fellowships and scholarships for women in comp sci because there are many. In biology, it is typical to go bachelors -> PhD and it is typical to receive a stipend (~$30,000/year) during PhD studies. Can anyone comment on what is typical for comp sci at masters and PhD levels? There are also companies that reimburse tuition for higher level degrees.
As an aside, I've looked at data of women in STEM and the rates of grad school graduation for women and men are pretty equal (at least since Title IX laws came into play) - it looks like the leaky pipeline issues happen earlier or later. The raw number of men and women is different but the rates are similar That's just me messing with data though.

The part-time thing struck me. In my experience part-time PhDs have a very low success rate. If you're concerned about not finishing your PhD, do not under any circumstance keep working! Any decent CS position, especially in the "hot topics" like ML, is funded. Children are far below that as a reason for concern.

I would suggest reading Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. While the book doesn't directly address academia, it talks about this topic more broadly.
Just because you plan to have children in the future, does not mean that you need to make choices based on hypothetical children today. Yes, being pregnant or a mother to young children is hard but it shouldn't deter you from achieving professional goals.
I personally had multiple new mothers in my class when I was in graduate school. While all of them had a very hard time, none of them found motherhood as an obstacle to graduation and they all obtained a PhD. None of the people who dropped out of the program did so because they recently had a child.

I love this answer for two reasons. First, it seems like you will have the opportunity to choose a partner with your (broad) goals in mind, and Lean In addresses that. Second, the advice about making choices based on hypothetical children is great. Finally, I will say that several of the women in my program (which is not CS) had children while in graduate school. All had non-academic partners, which helped a lot. Furthermore, I have a partner that makes a decent salary, so we could avoid good day care and "throw money" at other problems which arise because of my demanding schedule.

I am not a woman, but I am in a field where women are the majority of graduate students, so I have a non-zero amount of personal experience watching my friends go through this.
It's a harder road than you'd otherwise have - there's no escaping that, and while that's extremely unfortunate, it's also the current culture of academia. However, a large proportion of the women I knew while in graduate school had children, and to the best of my knowledge, this was the cause of exactly none of them dropping out. Several had more than one child.
It is certainly difficult - a baby does not understand "Please go to sleep, this paper is due tomorrow", and several faculty members made not entirely supportive comments when it seemed like a substantial fraction of the department was suddenly pregnant, but I don't know of anyone who dropped out because of it. Of course personal circumstances will vary - but if it's something you want to do, it's certainly doable. One piece of advice I would have is to make sure to find a supportive supervisor - your time to graduation might be slightly longer, and having someone who doesn't view that as a failure is helpful.
As an aside, I'm very sorry for your loss.


text:
Does getting a request to review from a professor count me as a reviewer?
I got a request to help comment on a paper in a journal from a professor. It's an informal request -- the professor is the one who officially reviews the paper. Can I put "reviewer" in my CV or not?

Perhaps your related question would get an answer if you posted it separately.

I think not. Ask yourself what the editor of the journal would think if your CV crossed their desk, and they saw you listing yourself as a reviewer and they'd never heard your name before. Having a review delegated to you does not make you a reviewer for that journal. The journal chose your professor, not you, so you should not muddy the waters about what you've been asked to do. If someone asks you about your reviewing experience, feel free to tell them that you did some subreviewing for your professor.

This is precisely why an assigned reviewer (in this case, the professor) really should not show the paper to anyone else (in this case, the student) without asking the editor first.

For the purpose you describe, the answer is no.
However, I would say that in reference to the headline question; yes, you are 'a reviewer'. You are simply not a reviewer in the traditional (but narrow) sense of somebody invited by an editor to carry out pre-publication peer review.
Anybody can be a reviewer. Carry out some post-publication peer-review and upload it to an appropriate website (for example, Publons). Then you will have a verifiable record as a peer reviewer. You should not upload the pre-publication review you mention as I expect it was shared with you in strict confidence.

authors: موريشيوس أوربينا


text:
Working with `co-guest editor' who has subjected me to harassment as postdoc mentor
Very long post alert!
Background: I have a complicated situation and need advice about how to deal with it. I had joined as a postdoc with a faculty member (a senior professor) in an esteemed research institution in India. However, my postdoc mentor (let's call him Prof. X) abused, bullied, threatened and harassed me. He does it regularly with all his students or postdocs but with me, unfortunately it was much severe and had a different angle. I think I can call it sexual harassment as he invited me to his home alone for dinner repeatedly that I denied and even said he had possessive feelings towards me. Finally, he stopped my fellowship at a day's notice after December. Naturally, he denied having said such things when I had publicly said this out at the height of frustration in front of another student. His behaviour had affected me very badly and deeply and is affecting me even now after many months. My mental peace, academic confidence, career everything has been damaged. I had approached the sexual harassment cell of the institute  but there was no real help. I have managed to get a temporary alternate position at the same institute.
This incident and the behaviour of senior members of the department or institute has traumatised me deeply, more that I had anticipated. I try to be positive and get things back on course, but it is difficult. Repeated insensitive behaviour from other members of the department who grudge my temporary position at the institute only worsens things.
Particular problem: This being the background, there is an issue on which I need your advice. Just after joining, last November, I had agreed to act as a guest editor for a special issue of a journal. The journal had invited Prof. X to host a special issue and he chose a topic which was new to him but in which I had worked since my PhD. Out of his interest in this new subject, he had probably hired me. I did the necessary preparatory work and invitations were sent out by Prof. X, last November with both his and my name, as is the custom. For some reason, the assistant editor from the journal, say Ms. Y, used to communicate with me separately about whom to invite etc. and I communicated with her. She was sending out these invitations so there as no issue. However, recently, the question of inviting some other senior researchers has surfaced and she has requested me to invite them. I'll list below the issues I am facing and the related questions:

I was not sure whether I could send emails inviting contributions without a formal `approval' from my co-editor Prof. X. So, I had to write to Ms. Y that owing to certain serious issues, collaboration or communication with Prof. Y was not possible and as I probably couldn't send invitations by myself, it would be good if she could request him to send them. I also requested her not to send common mails to Prof. X and me, as she was anyway not doing.
Ms. Y said she would ask Prof. X to send those two invitations but asked me how would we go with the review process. This is a question I have also.
Ms. Y has sent me another list of people to invite. Also, of the two people that Ms. Y had asked Prof. X to invite, he has written back to her suggesting I should invite one of them as that person was my PhD advisor.
Any kind of communication with Prof. X disturbs me immensely. With this exchange going on in the past few days, I have again become very disturbed, can't sleep etc. So, on the one hand I want to carry out my responsibilities as a guest editor, but on the other I cannot take any communication with Prof. X. So, what can I do?
Is it ok if, on being asked by the journal assistant editor (Ms. Y), I send invitations where I do not cc to Prof. X and only sign off the mail with my name. In the body of the mail, I can mention the names of both guest editors. Can I say something like, " I am inviting you, on behalf of the editorial team, to contribute to the special issue on ... Prof. X and I are serving as the GEs for the same"?
Or, should I sign off the emails with both names though I would not be CC-ing Prof. X?
Ms. Y has asked me if there is any problem between me and Prof. X and that there has been a circular from the jounal managers that they should write to all GEs together. I am not at all, comfortable with this. Can you suggest what I may tell them?
I can offer to resign as a GE but I do not want that as that would entail not keeping my promise. Since, Prof. X is not an expert in this field, I think that would ruin the project.

Look forward to suggestions from you about what can be done in such a situation.

I’m voting to close this question because it is a complaint rather than a question.

If I were you, I would take the approach that the default outcome here is that you cannot continue with your role as guest editor. From this position you can then start to think about what changes would be necessary for you to be able to continue in the role.
If you feel able to, I would discuss with Ms. Y. One approach would be to tell her that you are no longer able to work with Prof X, and that you don't want to abandon the project without the subject specific knowledge and not meet your promise, but you are struggling to find an alternative. If there are courses of action that you are uncomfortable with them taking, you should say so (e.g. emailing around all the other GEs). Obviously it is easier for me to sit here and say this than it is for you to do, and I understand that this would take a lot of bravery. Perhaps at this time you are not up to doing this.
I understand that you have probably put a lot of work into this, and you don't want to abandon it after that, but the benefit you will gain is small compared to the pain it might give you. I also understand that you don't want to let people down, or leave them in the lurch, but you have to put yourself first. Once not continuing is the default, hopefully you will feel less trapped by the situation, and other solutions might even present themselves.

Yes, you are right. I would be relieved if I could discontinue working for this special issue. Any overlap with Prof. X is difficult for me. Can you give me an idea how ok is it to refuse such a commitment (being a GE) midway?


text:
How to choose a good research problem?
I am working to get a PhD, maybe next year this time around. Currently, this is my second year. I have published 3 papers. All of them are not about one problem but consider different problems. My strategy to find a research idea/problem is given below.
1 - Read papers whose titles are either interesting or I have some apriori understanding of those titles.
2 - Understand those papers as best as I can. That is, I try to understand each detail presented in the paper except the simulation results (this is because I think simulation results are hard to reproduce).
3 - I analyze the paper and try to find a very small problem which can be addressed (i.e. I can solve it) by the methodology of the paper.
4 - If I am successful at step 3 I start working on that problem otherwise I repeat the process from step 1.
By applying this strategy I have been able to write 3 papers and I have submitted a fourth (I am not satisfied with those papers because at very best they can be considered average papers). But my concern is that the problems addressed in those papers do not belong to one area. As far as I have seen, for the profiles of some of the renowned researchers in my field their PhD work is focused on one area. One main thing I console myself with is that almost all of those researchers had good supervisors. My supervisor does not even read the draft/reviews of my papers and the suggestions that he provides during the meetings are so broad that the problem becomes intractable. Under these circumstances what are your opinions: Is there any better strategy to do research?
I will be very thankful to you for providing me suggestions or commenting on my dilemma.

This is a really important question, and it's one that isn't asked enough.
From reading your question, though, it sounds like you are rushing a bit. Renowned physicist and biologist Uri Alon (34k+ citations) has written an excellent paper on 'How To Choose a Good Scientific Problem' and one of his main points is that one, however cliché it sounds, should take ones time to conceive a good project.
I strongly suggest you read his paper. It's not exhaustingly long, and reads like a good talk. He also has a TED talk that challenges the 'A to B' dogma in science, which has helped me a lot.

what would you comment on my strategy? Do you find it common or is it not a good strategy at all?

What field are you in? How much time do you have left of your PhD? How many papers are you required to publish? I'm not in a position to give an ultimate statement of what is a good strategy or not as a strategy should always suit its environment, but if my opinion has any value, I observe that the best research does not come from scavenging existing literature for holes and trying to cover them. Try instead to reflect on deep questions that arise from some of the best papers you read and weigh their research feasibility with the possible knowledge gain from pursuing them (see Uri's paper).

Thanks for your comment. BTW my field is wireless communications and almost one year is remaining in my PhD. The requirement for PhD is 2 SCIE paper which I have already published but as I mentioned in my OP that those papers are not really good papers even in my own eyes.

In your position, you have already done "the things you have to do". If your superviser is as disinterested as you explain, I suggest you take advantage of that and pursue something that you find interesting albeit riskful. The worst that can happen is that you can't publish your final efforts because it led to a dead end, but you still get your PhD. At best, however, you discover something new and interesting at your own merits.

Regarding you comment of scavenging existing literature for holes and trying to cover them. In fact one of my paper is a comment paper which shows that their were some mistakes in a published paper and my paper provided the corrections to those mistakes (It was not so easy to get it published as it may seem because it was one of the better journal in reputation). I was thinking that it is good work because comment papers are very rare in the literature but after reading your comment now I am thinking that it is also not so good work.

In my field I see many papers use methodology of the other already published papers to solve problems which are different from the papers from which methodology is taken and I have seen these papers being published in very high reputation journals. Very few are those for which I can not get reference from where they adapted their problem solving technique and hence I guess their work is completely novel. My third step is trying to understand the methodology and seeing to which problems it can be applied. I just wanted to clarify my point in case my OP was unable to do so.Thanks for you comment

Thanks for the pointer to Uri Alon's article. It's a very friendly read as you said, and is very helpful!

Generally finding good problems you can solve is not easy, and in my view it's one of the most important abilities of good researchers.  Personally, I spend a lot of time thinking about what is interesting to me and what I want to be working on.  Then I end up only having time to think about a small portion of that.
I don't know about your field, but in mine, it's hard for young (and even some not so young) people to figure out both (1) what are interesting problems, and (2) what are doable problems.  Your approach could result in good problems, but it also sounds a bit haphazard and might not.  It's good to get input from other experts.  Here are a couple concrete suggestions:

Go to as many conferences/workshops/summer schools/seminars/etc you can.  This way you can meet people, see what they're doing and see what they think about what you're doing.  This way you get a better sense of the field and current research, and if your lucky someone might be able to suggest a good problem to you.
Look for another advisor.  It sounds like your advisor is not giving you the support you want (note: some advisors are hands-on and some are hands-off; hands-off is not necessarily bad).  Maybe it's too late to find another primary supervisor, but maybe you can either get a co-advisor or get an unofficial advisor for a new project.  Of course you should make sure your current advisor won't have serious issues with this and frame it in the right way (e.g, "I was talking with Prof Y about ABC.  What do you think about me working on that?").

I have seen the suggestion that one should go to conferences for learning about what people are doing. If conference papers are available online even then is it important to go to conferences? Actually, I have never attended a conference hence i am wondering if papers is the only thing that are presented in them then we can access those papers online. Why do we need to attend them?

@FrankMoses One of the most important aspects of conferences is meeting and talking to people.  In my area I would take it as a sign you are not really interested in research if you don't go to conferences.  It's also harder to get an academic research job if no one in the field knows you.

I feel that if you want to survive in academia and climb up the ladder, you need credibility in the community, which gets somewhat hurt by your step no 3 ( I am assuming you are not being modest like some super-genius people I know, by calling your papers average). Because, as you said you are using their "methodology", so people will eventually know that. Ideally you should start with a big question, then narrow it down to some level and then pick the papers accordingly to know the state of the art. The "question" is really important and it is very hard to formulate a good one. Therefore, I would suggest to focus on this part.


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How to cite in text a citation translated by me
Thats the question. I'm writing a paper in Spanish and I need to cite (APA) several citations in Spanish of books written in English that doesn't have translated versions. My reviewer is telling me that I need to be explicit about it but I don't now how to do it. Should I write "Name (2001, translated by me)"?
I have it clear for the reference, put it on brackets with my translation, but I don't know how to do it in text.
Any help is greatly appreciated.

Can't you just mention the language in which the book is written? Then, it will be obvious that you translated it. I don't think that you are putting quotations in your text. Is it right?

@St. Inkbug, first question, no, I'm translating the text because I needed but the reviewer is asking me to clarify if the translation is made by me in each of the citations. Second, no, I'm reading in English and translating what I need. Thx.

To answer @Younes (for some reason won't let me comment), I'm putting quotations in the text translated.

Your suggestion "Name (2001, translated by me)" seems good to me.  Or else "Name (2001)" and then include translation information in the reference.
However, in a formal paper you would not say "translated by me".  Maybe "translated by the author" or "translated by AB" your initials, or even "translated by Alexis Brown" your name.
If there are several of your translations in the paper, maybe say once at the beginning: "Translations are by AB, unless otherwise attributed".

My first thought was "author's translation", but I think that and "translated by the author" are a bit ambiguous as to which author it's referring to - was it translated by the author of the original, or the author of the current paper? For that reason, using your name might be the best option, well, at least if you don't share names with the author of the original work...

I've seen "own translation". E.g., "According to Fopm'd'bbog The Lesser B'ee'g'doomp (1992, own translation), 'The reticulation of splines is closed with respect to the transverse manifold'. ".

You could also just paraphrase. E.g. "Ivanov (1953), writing in the Advanced Soviet Journal of Best Practices in Advanced Underwater Basket Weaving and Nuclear Physics, found that transverse manifolds were effective in restoring the polarity matrix."

Here's what blog.apastyle says (https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2014/11/lost-in-translation-citing-your-own-translations-in-apa-style.html), and it sounds reasonable:

Luckily, the solution is quite simple: If you translated a passage
from one language into another it is considered a paraphrase, not a
direct quotation. Thus, to cite your translated material, all you need
to do is include the author and date of the material in the in-text
citation. We recommend (but do not require) that you also include the
page number in the citation, because this will help any readers who do
speak French to find the translated passage in the original. You
should not use quotation marks around the material you translated, and
you do not need to use the words “my translation” or anything like
that.

I find that advice unsettling. Though certainly there is some art and interpretation in translation, I would definitely want an author to distinguish between where they are merely referencing an idea that they have otherwise phrased in their own writing, versus a quote where they have taken specific language by another and translated it. Though academic referencing and copyright are not at all the same, I think it is still worth considering that a translation of a copyrighted work is typically seen as violating that copyright if it is not authorized.