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Referencing assignments from past students
When working on an assignment (e.g. essay, report), is it allowable or ethical to reference (as in both "read" and "cite") previous students' submissions for that assignment? For example, the student may have a friend or relative that sat the subject previously and is happy to share their assignments.
From my understanding, unless the teaching institution has an explicit policy, this should be allowable assuming the referencing is done correctly. So saying, it may not be the best educational experience, as the student may not undertake the critical thinking and research the assignment expects.
To be clear, I am not talking about referencing assignments of students currently studying that subject. That is clearly collusion.
I also assume the student attained previous submissions with consent from all the authors. However, I do not assume that all students currently working on the assignment have access to all past submissions.

Are you asking from the student's perspective ("Am I allowed to do this?") or the instructor's ("Should I allow my students to do this?")

@ff524 The instructor's perspective is probably more important (since they can disallow it) but either perspective is fine.

Theoretically, wouldn't they be the same? Not really. If a student asks about doing this, I would say "Ask your instructor, and do it only with his explicit approval." If an instructor asks, I would say "Whether to permit this or not depends on the educational goal of the assignment. If you don't want students to use past assignments, you should explicitly tell them so."

By "reference" do you mean "cite", "read", or "copy"?  Reference really means cite, but I think you mean something else, since assignments don't usually involve citations.

By "reference", I mean "cite" and "read". I'm thinking about essays and similar forms of assignments where citation is common. I'll update the question.

@ff524 A better way of making my point is to say that the instructor can set their own rules with assignments (e.g. no referencing older assignments) so the instructor's needs will trump the students'.

I allow students in my classes to use any resource at their disposal, provided they write in their own words and give proper credit.  As my syllabus says, "If you use an idea from your mom, cite your mom."  So obviously I think the practice is perfectly ethical.  But within any particular course, only the individual instructor can tell you if it's allowable.

It's common on many assignments to require the submission to be the student's original work.  If a student quotes another student's work and properly cites the source, that might not qualify as plagiarism, but the instructor could assign a grade of 0 for lack of originality.

I think it is both ethical and within the rules (or at least it is within the rules at my university) as long as the reference is clearly cited.
Furthermore, it should also be fine with current students as long as the work is cited too.
For example for undergraduate experimental lab course I took during my 3rd year, I worked on an experiment with 2 other students working on the same experiment independently. We each had to write a project report on the results we obtained during the experiment.
Only one of us managed to get a particular dataset for a part of the experiment that was sensitive to conditions and difficult to get results on. In that situation we were able to used that student's data so we could discuss their result in our report (as long as we cited the person who actually obtained the dataset, of course).
In a seperate experiment I let someone use a java code I wrote for the analysis. This was also fine, because the person cited me when they used my code in their report.
I think if the handin were supposed to be completely independently written (e.g. a math problem sheet) it would be collusion to reference older (or current) work but that is generally acceptable to cite anything (past student work or otherwise) in work which you would normally expect to see citation (e.g. essay or report).
If you have assessment regulations, there is probably a clear indication of what your university expect in there. That would not be able to tell you the answer to ethics part of this question but otherwise might be able to tell you the rule at your College or University.

Some people I discussed this with seemed to think it copying from previous assignments was collusion. If cited corrected, I could not think of a problem but wanted to open this up to people more versed in these matters.

@akton I updated my answe in response to your comment.

I agree with Magpie's answer as far as it goes; I don't think it's unethical to reference work done by past students in your own work.
However, my worry would be that, except perhaps in certain specific environments, "work done by past students" is hardly authoritative. Courses for my degree, at least, only accept certain types of sources, mostly published books, certifiably authoritative websites, and of course journal articles.
In other words, I don't see a problem with reading past work, and of course mentioning that you have read it, but I personally wouldn't be comfortable with citing that work as a source.
Of course, this becomes less applicable the further up the education system you go; if you're writing a dissertation, you'll almost certainly be referencing past dissertations.

That said, the important question here, on a practical level, is whether or not your instructor thinks that reading or citing past students' work is ethical, not whether it actually is.
I'd advise caution; an email to whoever assigned the work, or a trip to their office, is more than worth the effort, considering the possible consequences if they eventually do decide that this is collusion.


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Are concerns about studying in Russia reasonable?
I'm sorry if this is not the right place to ask this sort of question, but I really need an answer.
I'm from the middle-east and wants to apply for a master's degree in Russia, but lately people are discouraging me about the idea, for the following reasons:

A Russian degree is not perceived as "very good" in other parts of Europe (western countries) & USA
difficult to get a job while (or even after) studying, since you are a foreigner
even if you get a job, incomes are LOW
there have been several racism-related crimes against Black and Hispanic (etc) people, and all-in-all it's a dangerous country.

Don't get me wrong, I love Russia and Russian culture, but I'm paying a big amount of money, so I'd love to get things in return.
My question is: are my concerns reasonable, or are they just the product of American (Hollywood) propaganda? Would you advise me to study abroad in Russia or drop the idea and find somewhere else?
I mean: is it worth the time/money/effort or not?

What do you want to do after your degree?

Is your Russian fluent?

What do you want to study there? And why in Russia? If you speak Russian, go to Russian websites and read the relevant topics, e.g. if you are planning to work in another country after that, say in Germany, find a site where Russians discuss finding a job in Germany with a degree from a Russian university. Go to some social sites and search for hints about the general attitude towards middle-eastern people (there are many Uzbeks, Tadzhiks, etc. currently living in Russia, especially in Moscow and other big cities)

I try not to think of myself as a person influenced by the US propaganda (I am more acquainted with Soviet and late Russian propaganda, more likely). However, I can not really advise you to go for degrees in Russia.
First of all, the STEM subjects were traditionally strong in the Soviet time due to the nuclear project. Unfortunately, the professorial level degraded significantly in the post-Soviet 90s, and did not fully recover yet.
Second, you are probably aware that most of the universities in Russia teach courses in Russian. Unless your Russian is already fluent (or at least basic), be ready to spend a year or so mastering it before you will really address your subjects. Unless you plan to work in Russia afterwards, the knowledge of Russian (as opposed to English) is not something that increase your career progress dramatically.
Lastly, having summa cum laude BS and MS degrees, as well as a PhD (or Cand Sci as we call it) from strong Moscow Universities myself, I probably can confirm that many HR departments prefer to see something easily recognizable on your CV, e.g. the University of Oxford as a trademark impacts your progress much better than the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology that sounds almost like Inshallah Salam Alaikum University for someone who never heard of it.
On the bright side, studying in Russia you most definitely will experience interesting adventures, befriend the best guys and hang around the most gorgeous young ladies. Also, if you can solve problems you face in Russia, you arguably are ready to solve them in any other place.

To add to your answer, in France, being from a russian university will not open you many doors, I am afraid... :/

You know, you can also befriend ladies and not just admire them.

There are many industries (eg oil, gas) where knowledge of Russian benefits the career.

@Emilie studying in MIPT some 20 years ago, I'm afraid Dmitry didn't have that many to befriend (it'd probably be something like 5 ladies to 70+ dudes ratio) :) But great point nonetheless!

I will extend Dmitry's great answer, to answer the later part of your question: "Any alternative suggestions" - part.
Teaching quality:
It is clearly stated (and pretty obvious from History) that Russia used to do a great job in terms of science, but things have changed after since.
Living Prospects:
I don't know what is the real motivation behind your decision to pursue studies and possible career opportunities in Russia, but to me it Russia does not seem like calm waters. Overall, the country is facing political difficulties which may result in economic difficulties which in turn would affect the job market. Additionally, the country is now well known for its racist behaviour (as you have noted). I don't know how would that reflect to your assessment during studies, and living quality overall.
The propaganda consideration:
The same way you assume that you might be biased by the Hollywood propaganda, you should expect the world to be biased by it as well. If we assume that you get a quality degree in Russia, it might not have the same value outside of Russia. What if you decide to switch from Russia to another country afterwards? That would put you immediately in an unfavourable position, especially if you move towards west.
Alternatives:
I would strongly recommend you to have a look at European universities. It depends what your priorities are. If your priority is high quality teaching that you could start with Switzerland, Austria, Scandinavian countries etc. If you want a more laid back working atmosphere you could have a look at South or Eastern Europe: Spain, Czech Republic, Poland. However, if you want to have a strong scientific background, with considerably less living expenses than the other Western Europe countries have a look at Germany.
Note:
As the other members have asked, it would be nice to add details about the amount of money you are going to invest, and the field of study you are interested in.

It was a family tradition to study in Moscow, so I had strong stimulus (both financial and personal motivators) to continue this.
However, things have dramatically changed in a very short period of time. Ten years ago, the country was open to foreign academics (also potential ones) and they were considered a benefit to the country. This is not the case anymore. You could clearly see discrimination, not among your professors, but among the population.
Without fluent Russian you will have a hard time at university. Even harder outside it. I have been mocked, because my Russian, which is grammatically above the average level, even in academia, has an accent. I had also encountered aggression, both verbal and physical, when people notice that I am a foreigner. Young people are quite nationalistic, so expressing any opinion that is different than the current status-quo can be dangerous, if not among the right audience. Contrary to one of the answers here that states that all Russians are the same, I can say that I have met my best and most reliable friends there, and all of them are Russians.
I have lasted there 2 months. However, I have to admit that in the past education from Russia was quite competitive. My grandfather graduated in Foreign Relations and he was working for numerous Western European ministries, because of his degree and experience. Russia had also brilliant scholars in chemistry, medicine and biology.
Nowadays, when someone hears a Russian degree I can clearly see that the first thing he thinks is corruption and "How much this diploma cost?", which I think is rather unfortunate.
Unfortunately, due to the times we live in, being from the Middle East is quite a negative characteristic in the eyes of most people.

Leading universities (Moscow, St Petersburg and the state universities in the capitals of the former Soviet Republics) used to be very good during the times of the Soviet Union and the first decade afterwards, and it was possible to get a PhD position anywhere in Europe after finishing them (not a post doctoral position after doing PhD there, however). I am unsure about the most recent situation.

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Waiting for an overdue review?
I have submitted my paper on 12-Jan-2019. The journal uses ScholarOne Manuscripts for online submission. The status has been changed to Awaiting Reviewer Scores in the same week I created the submission.
I've recently contacted the editor about the status of the manuscript on 8-Apr-2019 and he replied that he is waiting for an overdue review, the the reviewer wa chased on 5-Apr-2019.
At this point, I know I should wait. But it's interesting to know if I can send another reminder and when should I do that. Especially when the editor actually reported what is going on and didn't simply mention that the paper is "Under Review" and I should leave it like that until a decision is made.

Field? It's relevant for waiting times.

It's Computer Security

You can send another reminder, but I would wait a bit. It is an uncomfortable thing to do, and my own level of discomfort with sending such notes usually gets outweighed by my impatience at around the 2-month mark. So, if you don't hear anything back by early June, you might write again.
But different journals and different fields have different typical timelines, so you will need to come to your own decision about the timing.

Mmm early June? Interesting! For me, when the editor said he is waiting for an overdue review, I got the impression that I may receive a decision pretty soon, because he only needs the reviewer to send the report. But I guess even one reviewer can take a significant time to finish. At worst case, the editor will have to find a new reviewer to review the paper. Am I right ?

You may well get a decision pretty soon. I'm just saying that if you don't, it seems reasonable to me to ping them again in about 2 months. In my field reviews can take 6 months or more, although many journals are trying hard to bring that time down to ~3 months.

Let's hope I get a positive decision pretty soon. Thank you very much!

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Visa preparation for the postdoc will take weeks. Can I start research (with the PI?)
As it's mentioned in the title. I am going to receive a formal letter this week. During my meeting with HR, they told me the visa will take 12 weeks so we can agree on the start-date at the point. My question is this: I really want to be successful in my postdoc and I want to do research as soon as possible, can I email tell the PI about this? (to get information about their current research step, etc.) or I should keep doing research and reading on my own and wait until everything is official?

You certainly could go to a University library and start reading papers related to your postdoc. If your postdoc don't happen, you just have lost some time...

In some cases the university may be required to employ someone who is physically present in the country.

You can act active and send an email with suggestions to start working remotely. What does that mean in terms of the salary? Do you expect to get paid for that work? That point perhaps should be clarified.

Thank you, I don't expect anything to be honest. My main drive is to provide results and build my profile, but I am not sure how the PI will react to that: Even if I do clarify that for the salary, some people don't want to work with people who want to work for free..

Your case is not just "some people who want to work for free". You are going to be a part of the group soon, and that is YOUR research, and you are the one who is the most interested in getting results as soon as you can. So I don't see any objection to emailing the PI

-1. This answer obscures important information about it often being illegal to work with or without pay without a visa, and that's without even touching on the ethical problems of offering to work for free.

@AzorAhai-him- As long as OP is not an employee, he doesn't work for them, but with them--it's a collaboration. Collaborations are usually not compensated (who would pay whom anyways?), not subject to labor laws and also not seen as ethically problematic.

@lighthousekeeper there are many things in the Academia that are not seen as ethically problematic, but they absolutely are...

@EarlGrey And why is the thing in this case one of them? Collaboration is the norm in most creative fields. The main ethical issue in collaboration is that it must lead to fair credit---in the case of academia, authorship, according to the relevant guidelines.

@lighthousekeeper Creative fields, exactly. The main ethical issue is that work for free is work for free. If a collaboration was just selling twice the same product, I would have nothing against. Since usually it is workload that trickles down to PhDs and the likes, I have a lot against. On one hand, research hours (and wages of 99% of the researchers) are closely linked to a specific project/grant. On the other hand one is expected to collaborate... otherwise he/she would not have a succesful career. Are collaboration hours allocated in the project time? of course not!

@lighthousekeeper If it was a collaboration in the true sense of the word, then the OP wouldn't be asking these questions at all. Having dealt with similar visa issues, the authorities are smart enough to know what a "collaboration" is vs. "starting work early for free" is. The host university's legal department will tell the supervisor not to let them do anything. The OP could for-realsies collaborate in their current position (if any). The relevant authorities probably also don't care much if the host sends a reading list.

@AzorAhai-him- I think it's the other way around: If OP had been aware that every act of working together is a collaboration, he wouldn't have asked the question. Without knowing the specifics of your case it's hard to say if it applies here. What I do know for sure is PIs in academia often hire their collaborators - it's quite natural to hire people whose work style you know. It's unclear on what basis an authority would distinguish hiring cases like that from the case at hand.

@lighthousekeeper You cannot work for an employer in your host country without a visa. If you are employed in your home country, you could call it a collaboration. If you are not employed, you cannot and should not work for free. If the OP is not employed in their home country and tries to work for free in their host country, they are endangering their visa. This answer does not mention that.

@AzorAhai-him- I believe that none of this applies here for the reasons I explained earlier.

@lighthousekeeper Well, you'd be wrong.

[Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice]
As Thomas mentioned in his comment, generally, without a visa you cannot be legally employed in the country of the university, this includes remote work from abroad. In addition to that, at least in some countries, it is illegal to do work that is normally paid, even if you are not getting paid for it, unless you have a proper work permit. I guess, the logic is that you enter the labour market by doing work and not by getting paid.
So be careful and precise in your requests. Starting working on the project remotely, before your visa is ready and valid, is probably against the law (and your future boss will share some responsibility for this). However, simply asking for suggested reading before you started working on the project itself is probably okay. I suppose your PI would be happy to give those suggestions even if your visa fell through or you hadn't signed the contract to begin with.

Hi, thank you for your answer. I am aware that it can create some problems regardless of what I want or what the PI wants, but for me I consider this risky if I started receiving the exact same responsibilities that I would receive when I have the visa, which is crazy. What I really want is to be included scientifically (could be reading articles, assisting seminars, etc), since these are "public" activities.. I really see no harm.

@U.User I do not see any problems from the academic research point of view: a reasonable PI is also interested in faster progress of their project. The discussion seems to drift towards the visa and legality issues, because for many these are red flags and caution is warranted. This is why if you email "Can I start doing some work while my visa is being processed?" you can receive a negative answer. You mentioned "assisting seminars" - it sounds like a being responsible for coordination, which is something an employee would normally do. Also not clear how it benefits your research.

I wouldn't be surprised if "assisting" were intended to mean "attending" (because of French "assister").

I believe that the premise of @thomas's comment is wrong. You do not need to have a visa for country X if you work in country Y, even if the employer is in country X. That would be absurd: No company could, in that case, contract with self-employed individuals in other countries for certain services.

@WolfgangBangerth Contractors generally have fewer legal protections than employees. Thus there are laws that prevent classifying employees as contractors (and companies like Uber spend many millions of dollars fighting against such laws). Thus you cannot reclassify employees as contractors to evade immigration law.

@WolfgangBangerth Here we are talking about a standard postdoc contract, which is a contract of employment between a university (the employer) and a postdoc (the employee). I conclude this from OP mentioning HR, who deal or assist them with their visa. I personally would be interested in hearing your (or anyone else's) account of a university hiring a research as an individual contractor or self-employed.

I think that this answer does not apply: As long as OP is not employed, he does not work for the PI, but with them. It's a collaboration situation, which is the default way of working in academia.

@lighthousekeeper "As long as OP is not employed, he does not work for the PI" - I will respond to your truism with one of mine: OP should not be employed before they are allowed to. The important point is that the difference between "OP is not employed" and "OP is employed without proper paperwork (illegally)" is defined not by one's imagination, but by factual circumstances.

@lighthousekeeper I will expand my comment, in case it is not clear. You are implying that the line between "working for" and "working with" is blurred, therefore OP can engage in research activities with his/her prospective institution arguing that they were merely "collaborating" while the visa was being processed, and started working as an employee only once the visa was done. The problem is that no immigration officer will buy that, and no HR worth his salt will risk it. What you think is "OP not employed" others will regard as "OP employed without paperwork (illegally)".

@paperskilltrees That's more clear. But I wasn't implying that the line between "working for" and "working with" is blurred - quite the opposite, I say that its quite clear: before starting the appointment, they are only working with. Once employed, they are working with and working for. On which basis do you assert that an immigration officer will not understand this difference?

"without a visa you cannot be legally employed in the country of the university, this includes remote work from abroad" What? No. Visas are about traveling and what you can do while traveling. You don't need a visa to work remotely if you never step foot in the country. There might be other labor laws involved depending on which countries, but e.g. in the US it's perfectly fine to hire people to work abroad: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/us-companies-can-legally-hire-foreigners-living-other-rich-mba

@lighthousekeeper  "I say that its quite clear: before starting the appointment, they are only working with. Once employed, they are working with and working for. On which basis do you assert that an immigration officer will not understand this difference?" What exactly is this difference between "not started appointment yet" and "employed without proper documentation (illegally)"? In either case the employee does not have a contract.

@user3067860 First I wanted to thank you for the link, but I changed my mind after spending 30 minutes on checking its content. Under the header "No U.S. Immigration Visa Required", the blogger refers to 3 sources. None of them is a government agency or legislation. The first two, upon inspection, do not say that the visa is not required, as the blogger claims. The 3rd reference is another random blogger making a claim without any support at all! Basically, the guy made up the whole thing and copied and pasted Homeland Security logo into his blogpost to impress gullible and naive readers.

@user3067860 In any case "if you never step foot in the country" is not the OP's case.

@paperskilltrees The OP needs a visa to enter the US. Until that time, "visa" does not apply to them. Visa, n., "an endorsement on a passport indicating that the holder is allowed to enter, leave, or stay for a specified period of time in a country". https://www.google.com/search?q=define%3Avisa

@paperskilltrees Do you have anything saying that someone does need a visa to work remotely for a US company (not while they're physically in the US)?

@paperskilltrees I explained that already. Collaborating with someone (=working with) is not the same as working for someone (= employment).

A visa allows you to live in a country and (for the visa I assume you are getting) to be gainfully employed in that country -- that is, to draw a salary.
You do not need a visa to work on things while you are in your home country (working in your spare time, or in fact in a paid position). In other words, you can work on whatever project you'd like even before you get the visa. You just can't move to the target country yet, and you would have a separate conversion with your PI about getting paid if that's what you'd like.

Generally, getting paid requires a visa. The way to work around this is if your employer has a legal presence in another country and can employ you there. Generally, universities don't have such arrangements.

@Thomas: Neither of these are true. Universities are free to pay whomever they want abroad. They do not need a visa. They can simply be a contractor, and the university also does not have to have a legal presence in that country: the university only has to obey the labor rules in the country of the person being paid, but it doesn't not have to have a presence there. --- Separately, during the current pandemic, most universities have formed relationships with outsourcing companies that ensure adherence to local laws (health insurance, retirement contributions, tax deductions, etc.).

If only employment law were so simple...

@Thomas: Exactly because it's out-of-country typically makes it easier. In determining what's covered under employment law, the law typically takes into account a number of factors. Your typical researcher doesn't work exactly prescribed hours, and since this involves another country, it means the university also doesn't decide where the work is done. Assuming some academic freedom, it also means the university doesn't really decide what will be done. So on the common "where,when,what" tests, the position does not appear to be that of an employee, but more that of an contractor.

@MSalters Employment law is complex and neither of us is qualified to make definitive statements about it. We haven't even specified which country (and state) this is in -- even a professional employment lawyer wouldn't comment in such generality. However, I have never heard of postdocs being classed as contractors, rather than employees. In the US, contractors must pay their own taxes and health insurance (only employees get taxes withheld and and employer-sponsored healthcare) -- I'm sure I would hear complaints from postdocs if this were the case.

@Thomas Do you have any citation for a visa being needed to pay someone in a country that is not the one issuing the visa? As far as I know, a visa is basically equal to printer paper outside of traveling to/in the country that issued the visa.

@user3067860 This discussion is well beyond the scope of comments. Ask a question on https://law.stackexchange.com/

@Thomas: I'm not saying that one can be an employee without a visa. I'm just saying that there are ways to get paid while working from abroad. You can certainly work as a contractor with the university paying for the value of the contract. That's no different than the university paying a foreign company for 100 rolls of toilet paper. Neither the university nor the toilet paper company have to be incorporated in one of the two countries for this kind of exchange.

@WolfgangBangerth I'm not qualified to say how such an arrangement would work, but I can confidently say it would be complicated and the university's HR department may not be willing to do it.

@user3067860 Here's a citation for "it's complicated": https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/global-hr/pages/paying-employees-abroad.aspx

@Thomas I believe it's complicated re: things like payroll tax, but not re: visa. And your comment is being used by other answers to justify saying that the OP will need a visa to work for a company from Y while living in X as a citizen of X (wtf). I already checked yesterday and there are already a couple of duplicates on Law (I will come back and post them later, no time now) but unfortunately no answers on the best duplicate. (Some bad duplicates w/answers, like "I've been overstaying in the US for five years, can I return to my home country and keep working with the same US company?")

This sounds like a case where legally and officially, you cannot be working as a postdoc before you receive the visa. Unofficially, no one is stopping you from working on a specific topic, or with unpaid collaboration, assuming you want to do this. If your aim is to continue research, such as to boost your publication record, most PIs would be willing to offer advice for getting started.
However, any work you do should be purely voluntary on your side (you can always say no to work until you are officially employed).

Please note one point: a visa is required to perform work (paid or not is not that relevant) in a certain location in the world.
Contrary to what the majority seems to think, if you are working remotely, you still need a visa, depending on where you are based and NOT on where your employer / client is located.
In other words, you can work remotely from the US for a Chinese company, as long as you have an US visa.
Similarly, you can work from India for an US company, as long as you have an indian visa ... come on guys (&girls), the whole outsourcing business is based on this cornerstone!

In the outsourcing business, it's a common practice that a company A (for example in the US) will contract a company B (for example, in India) to do the work. In this case, visa considerations are irrelevant, because nobody works remotely for a foreign company.

@lighthousekeeper visa considerations are not irrelevant at all. To work for company B you need to have a valid permit to work from wherever you are in the world. Usually, people has the right to work in the whole of their own country (not always applicable, see the old Soviet Union or current modern China).


text:
Who reviews the postdoc file applications? (UK)
I was informally invited to apply for a postdoc position at a university in the UK. The professor will be the PI of that project and said I can use the resume and the covering letter I had once for a postdoc. The problem is that the advertised position asks for certain skills that I didn't  highlight in the cover letter. So, I'm not sure if I should use trust the PI and use the original documents or I need to customize the files a bit more. Is the PI is the only person who reads the application documents? Or the files get analyzed first by the HR team and then they're sent to the PI?

I don't know how it works in the UK, but in the US context I would be very wary of generalizing any answer from one university to the next or even between different departments at the same university.

@AlexanderWoo Things are more universalised over here, because HR and management have a tighter stranglehold

Actually this potential PI told me to use the same documents I used in a different university. But this documents are already 80% close to the person specification, it's just this postdoc have extra skills (mostly soft skills).

Similarly to the answer of @YemonChoi above, the way recruitment is supposed to work at the place I have experience (n=2, higher than @Yemon, but not massively) is that HR passes the documents, mostly without reading them, to a recruitment pannel chaired by the PI who holds the grant.
The panel independently score the applicants on a predetermined scoring scheme matched the person specification drawn up for the position (and normally advertised with it) and the applicants with the highest scores are invited to interview. For any internal redeployment or disabled candidates that are not invited to interview, there most be an explicit reason why not.
Interviews are conducted using predetermined questions/activities and the panel score the interviewees independently. After the interviews, the panel confer, but ideally, the best performing candidate is offered the job first.
Thats the theory.
In practice, the PI generally decides who they want to interview, and checks that the rest of the panel agrees.
At interview, most panel members don't bother to score on the predetermined criteria. After the interview, they have a conversation, but in the end the PI makes the decision. Scores are then created to justify the decision made.
What this means for the OP is that if the PI wants you, the rest of the panel will not get much say. That said, it probably can't hurt to make some optimizations to your materials, unless that will be very time consuming and you worry about a soft or hard deadline, or creating a poor impression to the PI for being slow.

Thank you for your answer Ian, I took the safe road and customized the application a little bit. For my case, the PI is interested in my application and encouraged me to apply, and warned me that the competition is going to be tough, so I want to avoid creating a poor first impression.

Caveat: I only have direct experience with one place in the UK (my current employers).
Based on this experience:

The files pass to central HR first who are then meant to pass them onto a panel which will include the PI and selected colleagues. I am not sure if they undergo any screening beyond "were the right documents supplied".

It is the panel's responsibility to make a shortlist, during which they will give applications a score based on certain tick-boxes. For instance, some of the criteria mentioned in the job advertisement might say

"Essential: experience with MATLAB or similar software"

and then the panel might give the application a score such as "3: exceeded" or "2: met" or "1: partially met" or "0: not met".

The panel should have access to all submitted documents, not just the cover letter. However they are NOT meant to make use of external private knowledge, to avoid prejudicing the decision. E.g if the PI knows that you have done X, Y and Z but you don't include this in any of the documents, then strictly speaking they are not meant to use this when making their evaluation and rankings.

My observations are based on recent experience of being on such a panel, but not being the PI.
Depending on the institution and the discipline, the panel might include people from outside the specialist area but with some general experience in related project management; it could potentially include cross-faculty members depending on the nature of the project.
Usually the PI is the chair of the panel and hence informally gets "final say" in edge cases. Nevertheless, my recommendation would be to play safe and customize the documents a bit more -- it just makes it easier for supportive panel members to tick the appropriate boxes.

Thank you for your answer. I was just worried that documents will have an initial screeining by someone else before sending them to the PIs. But I think I'll play it safe!

My experience (of two places, rather than one) is that what is described here is what is supposed to happen, but in reality, the PI asks a couple of their friends to be on the panel, will let them know ahead of time what his preferences are on the candidates. The PI will definately make the decision on who to short list. After interviews the PI will ask for the panels opinion, but in the end will make the decision themselves more or less independently. Any documentation will be written afterwards to fit the decision.

@IanSudbery Sure, but I thought that I would give the author of the original question the "safe" advice rather than saying "hey the PI says you're in, so no need to sweat". I can only say that the description above is what happened for the panel that I was on, but perhaps that was due to a conscientious PI and colleague with whom I am on good terms.

@IanSudbery You're welcome to write an answer setting out your experiences. (I mean this sincerely and without snark, since one point of SE platforms is that contrasting answers can be left!)


text:
I couldn't negotiate my postdoc salary during HR meeting, should I try days later? (I haven't received the formal offer yet)
I had a meeting with HR last week. During the meeting, the recruitment officer talked about a lot of things very quickly in the first 5 meetings: "you will receive a formal offer in the next few days, since you don't have much experience you will salary will be 30k (lowest spine point for postdocs in the UK), and for the visa...."
So, I just focused about the visa because it was most important to me. Next, I received an email reiterating these points and I just said "I'm excited for the position", I couldn't bring the topic to the PI and I don't even know if I should..
But now, days later, I don't know how I feel about the salary. It's my first postdoc after my PhD (computer science), yes I don't have experience in the industry, but I have a lot of experience for a full-time phd student (for my home country) in teaching and supervising students. For my department, I assisted professors in teaching activities in 3 classes/semesters, supersized around 10 students and I was a jury member of many graduation projection presentations. I was even hired as a fixed-term lecturer at a another university for 2 semesters (where I design my course, supervised even more students and everything). I also reviewed papers in conferences and I was a member of the organizing committee of many and many conferences.. On tap of that, noticed that it's below the average salary in Glassdoor (34k)
I really feel that I deserve more, but I am afraid it's too late and the PI might have a bad impression about me.. Should I bring this up to the HR? if so how can I approach the situation?

What is your last drawn salary? Think on those lines.

Research is not funded in my home country, and salaries per semester doesn't say much..

Exactly!....how can you negotiate when the other party is fully aware of this?

Just to point out, 30k is basically bang on the UK median household income, and depending on where you are in the country (basically if you are not in London), would be considered a decent wage. You can compare it to PhD stipends in the UK which are around 15k per year tax free.

@astronat OP’s level of professional training is much higher than the median, why should what you said be of any relevance to them?

In the UK, it is not common for postdocs and entry-level lecturers to negotiate their salaries. This is different from the customs in the USA and some EU countries.
In the UK, the starting salary of a postdoc or a lecturer would normally be set up by HR in consultation with postdoc's PI or lecturer's HoD. As a postdoc, if you want a better offer, you have the following options:

Provide additional evidence of your relevant experience. Note that an experience of course design and "helping professors with teaching" may not be considered relevant for a research-focused postdoc position. And even if you have relevant experience, it may not be considered sufficient by the PI or HR.
Tell them that you can not accept the offer unless they raise it. This is a risky move, which can cost you an offer. Bear in mind that HRs are not really interested in hiring you, their goal is to ensure the hiring process goes smoothly and according to the rules. They may approve your claim, provided there is a budget for a raise and the PI/HoD supports it. Or they can send you a polite email starting from "We are sorry to hear that you declined our offer" and offer the job to the next candidate.

Before you proceed, note that if your postdoc salary comes from a grant, there may be a firm cap on how much the University can offer you from the limited grant budget. You may want to ask your PI if there is even any room for negotiation before discussing it with the HR.

Just to add explicitly: each year of relevant experience translates to 1 spinal point. This is essentially "years working as a postdoc (or equivalent position) after PhD graduation" therefore fresh PhD graduates rarely have (m)any negotiation points.

Oh this is sad, if the salary is proposed after consulting with the PI and other professors, then I don't think there is much I can do here..

@penelope So, this means that spinal point increases by +1 each year, is it possible to be more than 1?

@U.User You will move up 1 spinal point per year until you reach the top of your grade. Exceptions are extremely rare.

@U.User Not within the same institution, unless you explicitly negotiate it (e.g. you're a Lecturer with some grants to your name, and you "threaten" with an offer from another University saying that you'll go and take your money with you -- then they might give you an extra bump). It is, however, possible for it to be less than one -- for example, most UK university employees did not get any spinal point increases in 2020 due to covid.

Interesting, thank you for the information!

@U.User Just to clarify -- not getting a spinal point due to covid last year (uh, out of context this sounds so odd) is extremely exceptional and not even my colleagues that are in academic positions longer than me remember it happening ever before. It does not seem likely it will repeat soon. Final tidbit: there is usually a cut-off point for a spinal point increase. E.g.: increase usually happens with the start of the academic year, in September, and applies to everybody who started their contract in March of the current year or earlier, but not later (an Aug hire won't get a bump in Sep)

@penelope Interesting! With the visa process for my case, it will take a few weeks to officially start working. So, like you mentioned, I have to wait until next year!

The 1 point per year system is why you will be starting on less than the average salary for a postdoc - the average postdoc has been a postdoc for more than 0 years.

Its also worth adding to the discussion of caps imposed by grants: almost all postdocs in universities in the UK are paid for from UK government grants. And when you apply for such a grant, you have to say how much you will pay the postdoc when you apply for the grant. Thats the bad news. The good news is that postdocs are usually not costed at the lowest point - this allows unis some leeway if the unions negotiate a bigger than average pay rise one year, or inflation gets high, for example. .


text:
Research database access friction
Why is access to research databases (ebrary, EBSCO, JSTOR, LexisNexis, Project MUSE, Proquest, Sage, Science Direct, etc) – even when you’re a student or faculty member at an institution with a subscription - such a hassle, especially when off-campus or on a phone/tablet? Is there any way to solve this?
I’m also curious which database is least painful to deal with, and what a solution to this problem could be.  Who would be best positioned to fix this problem?  How should they fix it?

Generally institute subscription is based on IP address range of institute. You can not have that IP if you are not on institute network. However you can ask for VPN access, from that you can access institute network from outside. Now a days, many universities also offer special portal which you can use to browse various journals and databses.

I think this question needs to be thought through and made clearer, because it resembles a rant. If you are not aware that accessing these services requires a paid license, you should focus on that aspect. If you are asking about the technology of verifying that you are a student or faculty member at an institute with a paid subscription, then focus on that. The "hassle" usually comes from the library, not the database.

@user6726 as a librarian, I'd contest that. The hassle is because the database imposes access limits. No library is trying to make resources more complicated to access, and a lot of work goes into trying to reduce that friction...

I'm asking about the verification. In the question, I said "when you're a student or faculty member at an institution with a subscription", taking that as a given.

@jaith my experience is that the library's web interface is the problem. I don't think the hassle is intentional, it's just a consequence of not testing the interface adequately. My library still doesn't correctly detect that I am signed in so I have to sign in twice; the protocol for signing in (separate browser window popup) doesn't work in my tablet. Anyway, I urge you to edit the question and be more specific about the precise hassle.

@Andrew, as a librarian you approve the spending on the database therefore can get together with other librarian and tell the database provider that you will stop the spending if they don't make the access better.

@Ian If threats to drop our subscriptions unless they improve their service worked, we'd have done it for price rises :-). In all seriousness, most of the major providers do work to improve access, they're just enormous entities with a lot of legacy systems, and move glacially slowly.

Is your problem having to log in to each database? That problem can be solved easily on your end, using your browser's form autofill feature. You still have to click "login" but at least you won't have to type everything out. Also, see if the library can/would be willing to create a Webpage that lets you access the databases with a one-time login.

The fundamental reason for friction is that these are commercially licensed resources, and so the licensors have a strong motive to ensure that only people who've paid for it in some way have access to them. Without that requirement, there'd be no reason to throw up the barriers.
The exact ways in which this friction manifests vary a lot - my understanding is that different access methods can be preferred in different places. I'll try and be general here, and explain what's currently used.
There are two basic methods for authorisation.

Site verification.
Individual verification.

The first of these involves identifying that you, the user, are coming from a site which has access. This is pretty trivial if you are on-campus and that campus has a defined IP range - "oh, they're coming from 1.2.3.4, they must be at Wherever University, let them in". In these cases, it can be completely seamless - in fact, so seamless that one real problem is that users can believe the resources are public, and get frustrated when they go home and they're not there! It also allows for 'walk-in' access - many licenses explicitly provide that if you're physically using the library, even as a visitor, you can access these databases. I am guessing from your post that you normally use this approach.
The second, individual verification, relies on each user having a signin to the database. This can be an enormous headache for both institutions and users, especially when you have multiple systems you need to sign in to. IP authentication is thus more popular.
However, IP verification breaks down if your institution shares its IP ranges with someone else (this is more common outside the West). If two institutions have a shared IP range, there's no practical way to provide access to users from one but block them from the other. If most of a country shares an IP range... you can see where this is going.
A similar problem arises if you are at an institution that uses IP authentication and you go somewhere else - perhaps you're at a conference, perhaps you're working from home, but either way you're not on the right network. One approach to get around this is to provide a VPN system, which drives all your traffic back through the "right" IPs. This is a hassle for users (and for the provider), and may not always be available. Another approach is to use a proxy server, but this is again something of a hassle for users. Both can lead to long network delays, and you have the associated problems of actually getting into the VPN/proxy server.
A common approach is to fall back on individual authentication. Most major databases offer optional individual logins, which let you save papers, set your viewing preferences, etc. These can be repurposed as logins which 'remember' that you have access rights, and let you use the service when away from your home network. They'll usually stop providing access after a while (a few weeks or months?) if you haven't signed in to it from your home network at some point, in order to prevent them remaining active forever. However, this still has the too-many-names problem of individual verification - no-one wants to juggle a ScienceDirect account and a JSTOR account and a Lexis account etc etc etc.
The best solution to this is to use an identity management/single sign-on system. The most common of these at the moment (less common in the US, I believe) is Shibboleth. Shibboleth provides a single login screen for all participating services. A user selects their home institution, is taken to a page there, signs in (or is automatically authenticated), and returns to the database service with authorised access. If done effectively, this can even completely replace IP authentication - you can do the necessary authentication for people on a local network automatically.
In theory, a system like Shibboleth should reduce friction dramatically - it can provide a standard sign-on system for all databases, and only require a single username/password which the user already knows (usually because it gets them into their email...). Compare to, eg, the ubiquitous "sign in with Facebook/Twitter/Google" buttons on web services. However, the problem is that each individual provider service has to set it up. The big databases like ScienceDirect or JSTOR are usually happy to do this, but small journals or databases - especially if the majority of their customers are happy with IP authentication - may not be willing to go to the effort of setting it up.
In an ideal world, we'd all be standardising on something like this. Unfortunately, there's a lot of people who all have to pull in the same direction for it to happen, and what is most convenient for publishers is not always what's most convenient for libraries or for users.

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down vote

The fundamental reason for friction is that these are commercially licensed resources, and so the licensors have a strong motive to ensure that only people who've paid for it in some way have access to them OP is asking about people who have access via their institution.

@CapeCode That's addressed by the next sentence - Without that requirement, there'd be no reason to throw up the barriers. The barriers that are "friction" to people who have access via their institution are only there at all to restrict access to authorized users.

If most of a country shares an IP range... you can see where this is going Never mind that: There actually exists a whole country using a single IP address: Qatar.

@IwillnotexistIdonotexist Indeed - I think Thailand had the same situation (for a while, at least). I believe that in some cases, universities end up buying a proxy server elsewhere (eg in the US) and routing all their traffic to external databases through that in order to make sure IP-based authentication works welll

@CapeCode As ff524 says, it's not that there's friction because you don't have access, it's that there's friction involved in showing that you have access and aren't one of the many people who don't...

@ff524 I don't understand. If the barriers are to prevent access to non-subscribers, then they should not be present for subscribers. Unless you consider logging in to your library account "friction".

Why is this a hassle? One of the motivations, and in many cases the primary motivation, of those hosting the databases is to make money via subscription fees. For example LexisNexis is a subdivision of Elsevier, a company which made over US$1,000,000,000 in profits last year and which is the subject of an ongoing boycott. The financial interests of companies like Elsevier dictate that their first priority is to make research inaccessible to those who have not paid.
In the short term, your university library might be able to make this easier by means of a VPN or something similar. You might contact your librarian and ask for instructions (which will be specific to your institution).
In the long term, you can help this problem by publishing your research in open-access, freely available venues. For example in mathematics it is common to publish papers in journals and also (in preprint form) to the free, open-access arXiv. Doing so helps to reduce our dependence on closed-access venues such as the ones you described.

Low demand.
The vast majority of researchers have little knowledge about these and to what purpose they can be used. An increasing number of scholars have a hard time locating the library on campus or mentioning an online service from their library or one to which it subscribed.
Also, these are relatively modest commercial operations, and we are increasingly used to highly efficient data queries and search engines. There is no way they can compete e.g. with a Google service in terms of absence of "friction".

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
Unpublished research similar to mine
I am a PhD student and I wrote a paper in the social sciences. The contribution of my paper is that it's the first non-North American analysis on the subject.
There is a working paper I found online from a doctoral student in another university, whose research is semi-similar to mine, and who looks outside of North America.
I am submitting my paper to an academic Journal. I have not cited the other students paper. It's been two years since they uploaded the working paper, and there is no sign of it published anywhere, and no update on the students (now a post doc) own research website. I tried to contact the author to ask if they intend to publish, I got no response.
I did not reference their paper in my research, because I don't think it's right that I should forfeit my contribution for an incomplete paper that doesn't seem to be heading to a journal and undergo peer review.
I am seeking opinions/guidance as to whether I am right. My supervisor has provided no guidance, and I can't find information on the internet.

Surely you should reference that paper in your literature survey (or equivalent). If a reviewer knows of that paper then you may end up worse off... How can yours be the "first" if that other one exists?

For most fields, whether the other paper was done in North America or elsewhere will have no bearing. For some research on government, or social systems it would be different. But that implies that "place" is an inherent part of the research itself.

I think in your literature review where you point to the gap in studies that look outside of North America, you could add something like, "Little research has applied this theory/concept/idea outside of the North American context (for an exception, see Smith, 2016).
And then cite it in your references as
 Author, A. A. (2016). Title of paper or manuscript. Unpublished manuscript. Date retrieved. URL.

That is perfect and reasonable! Thank you for that suggestion! I will be using it!

You need to cite the paper only if you use it or depend on it in your research in some way. However, if you have a section on "Similar Research" then you should probably mention it there. You don't forfeit anything if your work was independent. For purposes of your degree, your supervisor will decide if you have made a proper contribution. For purposes of publishing, the editors and reviewers will decide on priority. Just because you don't cite it doesn't mean that it isn't known.
Independent research on a topic goes on constantly in the real world.
The worst case for you is that if you don't cite it and someone thinks you have plagiarized. But the real world situation is as it is. You can't change that.

You need to cite the paper only if you use it in your research in some way. — I strongly disagree.  Ethical scholarship requires acknowledging relevant prior work.

I'll add another aspect to the main issue that's covered in Buffy's answer. It seems that the working paper is not at all identical to your work. As you say, it is "semi-similar" and focuses on a different region. First, this means that your paper remains original. Second and more importantly, your work and that of your colleague seem complementary. You said you already contacted your colleague without response, but in general, this is a great opportunity for collaboration, for example on a comparative paper. Maybe you'll get a response if you suggest a collaborative project that builds on both of your contributions.

New answer
Comments below explain the OP posted their work online first and that their underlying question is about priority, in particular, is priority awarded to the first author(s) to make their work public or the first author(s) to formally publish their peer-reviewed work? My original answer to the original question appears below, and my answer to the aforementioned question is as follows:
Priority is rather contentious. Ultimately, no one can deny that a work publicly available before another takes priority, regardless of whether one work is formally published after peer-review and the other was merely part of the public record. Moreover, no one can deny that authors of the second work had an advantage. Nonetheless, some will argue that being first doesn't matter; being formally published does. But, they still cannot deny the previous statements. Thus, they can only make claims such as "this is the first published, peer-reviewed work that ...," which implicitly acknowledges that the work isn't first. I recommend avoiding such claims altogether and mentioning related work, regardless of whether it is formally published.

Original answer
You open by explaining

...The contribution of my paper is that it's the first non-North American analysis on the subject.

Yet,

There is a working paper...from a doctoral student in another university...who looks outside of North America.

So, your claimed contribution is seemingly a lie: It's [not] the first non-North American analysis on the subject.
(I don't understand how a paper can contribute simply by conducting analysis in a new geographical region; to contribute, you surely need to bring new science. I'll proceed regardless.)

I did not reference their paper in my research, because I don't think it's right that I should forfeit my contribution for an incomplete paper that doesn't seem to be heading to a journal and undergo peer review.

I consider that to be morally and ethically wrong. You should rightly forfeit your claim of first non-North American analysis, because by your own admission, you aren't first.

Keep your comments non-accusatory, the tone is inappropriate. I am first, in that I wrote it first, and it will be published first. Somebody has to be first, otherwise no seminal contributions would ever exist. In my field, analysis in a different region is a major contribution. The other person, never referenced my paper, and did not respond to my email. So if I did something bad, they did something even worse.

@Kelly You aren't first by your own admission: In academia, first is measured on the basis of public record, i.e., results that have been made public, you weren't first to make your results public. (Regarding your contribution, I didn't question it, I merely said I didn't understand it. Thanks for the clarification.) I don't understand how you expect the existing paper to cite your paper, since it pre-dates your paper. I also don't understand how "they did something even worse" (nor your opening sentence).

I accepted the answer a few comments up. However, as you are tying to counter productively twist my words, I have to correct your statements so others find value in the context of this page. I am first, I wrote it worst, and posted it online first. The underlying point of my question is, is it who posts their paper online first, or publishes it in a journal first that makes the contribution. Someone can post an unpublished working paper but the statistical method is invalid and thus results unfounded, and thus there is no contribution. I'm confused about it.

@Kelly your question makes no mention that you "posted it online first," I would have given an entirely different answer had that of been mentioned, nor was the "underlying point of [your] question" apparent to me. Priority goes to whomever publishes in the public record first. Some will contend that priority goes to whomever published peer-reviewed work first, but that isn't the first work, that's the first peer-reviewed work. I avoid the use of the term first in my own work; my work is novel, so it is first implicitly. I prefer that to haggling over what precise aspects I was first to do.

I think there is still merit to make that claim because its sounds like it would be the first peer reviewed published work. I think he can cite the exception in brackets and reference the unpublished paper.

@Jay, There's merit, but the quantification gets a bit awkward. We start with "the first analysis," we move to "the first non-North American analysis," and end-up with "the first peer-reviewed non-North American analysis."


text:
Experience transfer and promotion
If a non tenure assistant professor moves to a different University inside the United States, would his two years of experience count or would it be as if he just started in terms of promotion to associate

I can only speak to common practice in the US. Other places may differ.
That is something to be negotiated as part of the process of accepting the new position. I doubt that many universities have fixed rules, other than being open to considering it.
For some people it is an advantage to get "credit", shortening the probationary period. This would be someone with a strong record; research and/or teaching as appropriate to the position.
For some people it would be a disadvantage. It might be useful to have a longer probationary period if your record is relatively weak and you need the time to build up that record of accomplishment.
I was once able to get a 2 year probationary period as I was moving into a senior position. Yes, even a Full Professor might need a probationary period and a tenure decision. Obtaining tenure-at-hire can happen, but I doubt that it is the norm.

I've seen situations in which incoming assistant professors negotiated a shorter tenure clock and then were denied tenure because they hadn't accomplished enough during their shortened probationary period.  That's a substantial downside to negotiating this kind of arrangement.

@BrianBorchers, yes, thanks. I see now that I left a phrase out of my answer. Corrected, I hope.


text:
Effective way to organize a course so that it can be followed from abroad
I'm reaching out because I'd like to take a Master's Degree in Spain (which starts in October), but my current job will end in December, and I'm trying to find an effective way to organize classes with the course's professors to study from home for the first few months, if possible.
The course is a programming one, and a big part of it is interaction between students and with teachers. What I thought would be an acceptable solution is a mix between Realtime Board and Skype, but it would require someone to watch over my assigned "station", and would in my opinion disrupt the flow of the class. Are there any alternatives?
In short, I need two things:

A tool like RB, but specifically for code (although RB itself could be used if no alternative is found); basically an online, self-refreshing collaborative space.
A communication tool. Skype is sometimes unreliable with my current connection, but maybe there are other ways other than recording each lesson to do this?

If anyone needs more information to answer properly feel free to ask, and if the question is not appropriate for Academia, do suggest a better site, I'm all ears!

Did your professor say he would let you take the course remotely?

Attendance is not strictly enforced, so if we find a solution that doesn't impede him teaching and me learning he said he'd do all he could to make it happen

Do YOU need the constant interaction or does the TEACHER require this? What is the purpose of such close attention to every move you make? Authenticity? Something else?

First, I suggest you consider what are the absolute requirements of this lecture. You say the attendance is not that important. Are there mandatory weekly homework assignments, or a final project which has to be handed out in the end?
It is good that the professor seems to be in goodwill to help you in the process.
I assume this course requires a lot of interaction because it is related to programming, but honestly I have not learned much from the lectures when I have ever had programming classes. Exercises, and actually sitting down and writing the code has helped the most. Of course, the presence of an expert in the field can make things easier for understanding. But, I don't think it is absolutely necessary.
I also believe that the gain that you will have by following the lecture via skype or via Realtime Board, won't be as big as you doing the exercises alone. You might be loosing more time than gaining knowledge from attending the lecture.
The time from October to December does not seem like a long one. Even if it is (assuming that the course might be fast-paced) you still will be able to catch up for the two months when you will be back. Because the introductory parts are easier and you can grasp them faster. If we add other factors to the equation, for example, if you have previous programming experience, this will be even easier.
I don't know what programming language you will be learning there, but if it is one of the programming languages which is covered in one of the online programming teaching platforms (Codecademy), then you don't need to worry at all.
One thing you can do, is to reach out to the professor or any other fellow student and ask them to record the lectures for you; You can listen to the lectures while studying from the textbook. But the main point will be doing the exercises. My experience so far has told that programming is something which you learn by doing, rather than learn by being taught, although some help is welcomed.
Hope this helps!
Note: It would be useful if you could provide the programming language, and your previous experience with programming in the question.


text:
Should university administrators share official matters with students?
Should the department share the departmental problems (financial, officials, political, etc) with the students? or it is official matter and none of their business?
For a more specific example. Imagine that students are complaining about the lack of teachers in specific topics. The department head tries to secure fund for faculty recruitment, but Dean refuses. Should the department head consider this as an internal matter between officials or should inform the students why he is not hiring teacher?
Of course, I do not mean organizational secrets. Most of these news spread among students through rumors and gossip. My question is: should a department head directly inform the students about problems? Or according to the common business models, an organization should not reveal its failures and problems to customers unless it is a must?
What is the appropriate scheme for treating students? (1) customers who get service from the university employees in return to tuition fee, or (2) part of the organization? Obviously, these are not solid categories, and I just want to express the issue.

Can you give a concrete example?  I don't know what sort of departmental problems you mean.  (I also agree with ff524 that your introduction is based on a false premise.)

As for informing students about problems: there's no universal rule as to when/whether to do it. I've heard about some problems at my school via an official email from the university president, some problems informally from faculty members, and some problems from reading about them in the newspaper the next day (i.e. even faculty were not officially informed right away in that case).

@ff524 I didn't want to introduce model; I just wanted to categorize possibilities for my example.

I think a department should share information with students that can affect them. A non-hire of faculty doesn't affect students directly unless the students were recruited to the department with the promise of expanding in a certain area, and then this fell through.
But I don't know of a single department that would make such a promise to incoming students (and certainly not undergraduates).
On the other hand, if the department experiences a shortfall in funding that means that they have to change how they fund students, then these students must be informed as soon as possible since this materially affects them.
Apart from these cases, one can certainly make the argument that sharing relevant information with students helps foster an atmosphere of collegiality and gives the students a sense of belonging. Within reason...

recent example of changes affecting students http://www.laweekly.com/arts/an-entire-class-of-usc-art-students-leaves-school-after-dean-pisses-them-off-5581808

The answer is "it depends."
It depends on:

What the specific problem is,
The department/university/student/faculty culture,
What can be gained by telling students about the specific problem,
What reasons there are not to tell students about the specific problem.

There are several reasons to tell students about problems:

It can often be beneficial to share information with students so that they feel more invested in their department (as Suresh suggests).
Another reason to tell students about a problem is if there is some action students can take to help the problem.  (For example: "We have been having trouble attracting the top students this year, and we really need to recruit some great new PhD students to keep this department going strong. Please make some extra effort at the event for admitted students to show them what great research we are doing here and encourage them to accept their offer!")
A third (more cynical) reason: if it's a major problem that students will find out about anyways, it's often better for them to hear about it directly from the department/university, so that administrators can add their "spin" to the news. (For example: "Our recent accreditation review didn't go well, as you may read about in the newspaper tomorrow, but here our concrete plan to fix this issue.")

On the other hand, there are good reasons not to tell students about some problems. Here are a few:

It can be beneficial to shield students (to some degree) from department politics and financial issues that don't directly affect them, and that they can't do anything about. (For example: I don't need to know which faculty member is mad this week because they feel slighted over not having been asked to come to lunch with a certain job candidate.)
Having partial information can be worse than having no information at all, i.e., students can misinterpret the information they are given because they lack certain context (which can't be shared with them for whatever reason).
Department/university guidelines may require information to be withheld in some cases. For example, there may be a policy that things said in certain meetings are to be held confidential among the participants unless explicitly approved for outside release. This may allow certain things to be said that wouldn't be said otherwise, but limits the sharing of information with students.

Students need to be informed! Students pay tuition to go to college, and, in my opinion, the college or university leadership that chooses not to inform students of information about the school they are attending, is making poor decisions. I am an older student working on my undergraduate degree and I think students need to be informed. If students aren't included in the information loop, it's not going to help the schools reputation, and if the students read about it in the local newspaper before they're informed about it, in my opinion' they're going to lose a lot of respect for the leadership.


text:
Is it ethical to reach out to other postdocs about the research project before the postdoc interview?
I have a postdoc interview at the end of the month. I found a researcher's profile that's been working on the same research project I applied for. I am thinking of sending her an email or a LinkedIn message (I've already connected with her). But I don't know if that's ethical to do that or not, I am afraid that it will look like I am asking for more information as an advantage on other candidates.
I want to basically ask her a particular question about the project. The job's description mentions that they're using a method X on a tool Z. But this confuses me because I know it could mean a lot of things. I actually emailed the PI (*) way before I applied asking for a clarification and the potential similarity with an approach I have already used. I needed that information to decide if I'll apply or not, but she didn't reply to me email and I applied either way.
Now that I am invited for interview, I still need to know more details about the method X and the relationship with tool Z. Is it unethical to send such detailed question to a researcher working on the same project before the interview?
(*) Her email wasn't listed in the job description, so I used the one in the department

How could that not be ethical?
Whether it might be fruitful, or worthwhile, is wholly different…

For every job I've contemplated I have gone out and done what I consider to be the necessary due diligence. If you have connections, use them. If it involves cold-calling a person or two to ask questions, do it.
Fun story - I was considering moving from technical staff to management and an interesting position opened up. My due diligence consisted of answering two questions for myself. (1) Did I really want to be a manager, and (2) was this position the right position to step into management. In the course of a week I talked to about 10 different people, some staff, some managers, some trusted confidants. I decided the answers to (1) and (2) were affirmative, so I applied.
The day for the interview arrived, and I walked into a room with 6 people, the interview committee. I had talked to every single one during my process. Not surprisingly, the interview went very well.
So, yes, go and ask. There are no ethical issues at all.

Thank you for your answer. I will email the researcher hoping she will clarify the question.

There are no ethical concerns here. You don't need to go into an interview blind about the project.
It is possible, of course, that people have been asked not to correspond with people in the pipeline other than officially, but that is up to them.
You can ask. But the tone of your mail will determine whether people think you are looking for information or for an advantage.
You can also ask after the interview, of course, but before you need to make a decision.

First I think there's an important point to mention, even if it doesn't answer the question: in theory the interview is a two way street, i.e. not only the PI wants to know if you're the right person for the job, you also want to know if the job (and the PI) are right for you. There would be nothing wrong with asking some details about the job during the interview, and the decision to take the job (should it be offered) doesn't have to be made immediately.
I have seen academic job ads where canvassing is explicitly prohibited, for example see these "instructions for candidates" from University College Cork:

Candidates should note that canvassing will disqualify and will result
in their exlusion from the competition.

However I don't know if this kind of question would be construed as canvassing or not, and normally if this was the case at the institution where OP applies it should be mentioned clearly in the job ad.

Note that many universities follow strict procedures for selecting candidates. Especially, if they are state-funded, they have to adhere to objective and transparent procedures.
Contacting your potential peers or future bosses outside formal channels may be perceived as gaining an unfair advantage over other candidates. This is a big no-no and may backfire.
To stay on the safe side, I would ask your primary contact for the interview to clarify your questions.

In most English-speaking universities, communication outside formal channels is something academics are allowed to do.


text:
What am I doing to scare away prospective PhD students?
During PhD admissions, our department assigns each admitted PhD student both a faculty and grad student contact, and we make every effort to express our excitement and enthusiasm about the student joining our program; often the faculty contact is a prospective advisor.  Usually there are some nice conversations, which provide a nice prelude to the on-campus visit.
In one or two cases, I've had a student simply stop responding to email.  In this instance, a student I admitted who was initially glad to talk to me quickly cut off contact with both me and the grad student contact (even before the visit).  I am trying to understand if this is a bad sign, or if I'm just reading too much into it.  It's been a long time since I was a PhD student, and I suppose there are a lot of reasons for this behavior.  Still, during my own PhD visits I was sure to be very polite and timely with everyone who contacted me.
Question for current prospective PhD students: Why would you give a faculty member the cold shoulder, rather than just replying politely and briefly to their email?
I can come up with lots of hypotheses (busy with classes, overwhelmed with contacts from faculty, or simply not interested in the program), but all I can do is guess.  I want to hear from the latest generation of students: what makes these interactions with prospective advisors tough?

I wrote a more extended response below, but I wanted to add that it is not necessarily true that you are scaring them away. It is a behavior that occurs in multiple departments, multiple fields, to multiple faculty (some of them really nice human beings).

You can probably use the same reasoning for 'speed dating'.  :)  A student is more likely to pick you if they have taken a class from you, and you're a great teacher.  Also, word of mouth is very important.  If a student is not interested, then he/she may recommend friends who may be interested in joining your group.

I am not a prospective PhD student but a current one, and I am not in the mind of every PhD applicant, but my best guess is that some are not really interested in your department, some don't know how to say "I actually accepted an offer at a different school" with good manners, some are not fully sure if the e-mails come from a human or from an automated system (especially those who come from countries with a strong culture of professors ignoring or being mean to students, especially undergraduate - I wouldn't have imagined I'd receive personalized e-mails either!), and some are just rude. Or maybe it's just generational: in the same way it's starting to be considered more polite to never reply a text again than to politely decline a second date, and that many prospective employers say "we'll call you" after a job interview and they never ever call, there might be some perception among some people that it's better to be silent than to reply negatively? I don't know. Do they get interviewed before receiving an admission offer? Are they aware of how many offers you make out of a larger applicant pool? Emphasizing that might entice some of them to continue the conversation, or at least it might dissipate the question on whether they were not aware of things or, instead, they were plainly impolite.

Continuing in a similar vein, it appears that there is not a widespread culture of "acknowledge emails", regardless of the sender. Although I seem to have successfully convinced my own research students (who of course were sensible all along) that I do like confirmation of my email-proposed schedule changes and such, it does not appear that grad students (in math, in the U.S.) think that confirmation emails or acknowledgement emails are absolutely necessary.

If I am understand the situation correctly, your department has made an offer and the student has not accepted it yet. Here are my guesses from my own experience (current phd student):

The student does not want to make it seems like he is committed to the program. If he showed too much excitement it would be awkward for him to turn down the offer later on.
The student is not sure if he or she should reply to the email, especially if the email does not end with questions. Sometimes when people send me emails about some information, I am not sure if it is a good idea to send an email saying that I am grateful and I have received the email.

At least in some/many situations, a return email acknowledging that you've received and read the email is a good thing. Even though it is not so easy for email to truly be lost, there is no guarantee that it is read...

Why would you give a faculty member the cold shoulder, rather than just replying politely and briefly to their email?
Emailing faculty is a touchy subject for students. A student who doesn't email you back and ends up cutting off all contact most likely was thinking of the "best" way to tell you why it just wasn't "working out" but couldn't quite figure out how to do that.
Looking for a citation with that?
Have a look at this question, the questions that are related or are linked to it, and the questions with the "email" tag, for starters.
Your titular question is not something that we can possibly know, but I would guess that it's probably not you, specifically, that is the root cause of the problem. Some people click and some don't.

Or, alternatively, they were trying to think of a way to phrase a response, started over-thinking it and turned the whole thing into a series of ineluctable doom scenarios, decided to put it aside a little bit, went back to it, over thought it again, repeat until now they're trying to figure out how to also apologize and explain how their mind just does this shit to them sometimes (aka: all the time), started overthinking that, and repeat until eventually it's best to just slink through the hallways and hope you never make eye contact again. Not that I speak from personal experience...

As Mad Jack pointed out, for students, Emailing faculty is not all that easy.
I'm a (relatively) new grad student and have been through the process more than once. At least for three of the PhD programs I got offers from, I responded very late and very minimally, even though a few faculty did reach out to me. I wish I was more responsive and honestly, I was quite displeased with myself for how I was handling those emails, but I was just going through a hard time (as many grad school applicants do when they're in decision making process) and responding to their emails was not easy. Two of those programs were those I knew I'm not going to choose, but one was actually one of my top choices. So, I can tell you, although probably "the cold shoulder" means the applicant is more likely to decline your offer than to accept it, it may very well be the case that you're their top choice. That being said, if they're seriously considering your program, I'd expect that they'll eventually send you a somewhat positive email, but perhaps with a delay.
Even out of application context, emailing faculty could take a substantial amount of energy from a student. Especially if they're emailing someone they don't know very well. I often feel quite anxious when writing an email to a professor. Sometimes the email rests for days in my Drafts folder and eventually when I'm fully convinced that further proof reading and editing does not lead to any meaningful changes, I'll send it. Just the burden of the unanswered emails in my inbox itself feels quite heavy on my shoulders and some significant amount of energy is required to get started with answering them. This is terrible, and I'm sure there are a lot of students out there who are a lot better at handling this, but I also know there are some who are struggling even more.
Some tips for making it easier for the students to respond, especially when dealing with new admits:

Make sure you have a very friendly tone and avoid sounding so sophisticated. Make them feel like you may very well make a typo in your email, and would be totally cool with them having one.
Sign with your first name ONLY! And even better, let them know in a very cool and friendly way how they should address you. For grad school recruiting, the best experience I've had was when a professor told me something along the line of them being my near future colleagues and asked me to go by their first name. The worst thing is if you receive an email with a full name signature! I wouldn't know for the life of me whether I should start my email with "Hi Grigori" or "Hi Professor Rasputin"!
Write a short email and suggest to have a chat over a Skype call with them. Although this works very well for me, for some, it may even put more pressure on them, so it may be better if you write something like "I'd be happy to have a short Skype chat and discuss whatever you'd wish to discuss. We can also always discuss any questions/concerns via email". Make sure they would feel like it's totally fine to go with the email option.
If there's any time constraints or some sort of "expiry date" for responding to your email, make sure to clarify that. Also, if there's none, try to communicate to them that you're ok with a delayed reply. Often a student may think it's already too late to respond to your email, and that makes them delay it even further once it's past when they perceive to be the "deadline" for a reply. I'd say it's important not to sound imperative or as if you're demanding a reply, but that you're helping them manage the timing of your email communication. You should always sound like you're on their side, not like someone who's assessing their performance.

Needless to say, these are my views and influenced by my personal experience and that of people around me that I know of. Obviously, there are differences between different people and a different remedy may work better for some students.


text:
Is a policy of asking questions covering material not covered by lectures common in universities?
I have come to know a prominent EU university in which it is an official policy that examination questions will be external to the lectures.
For example, say, they are teaching Probability & statistics. Say, they didn't lecture on Poisson distribution. They will put a question on Poisson distribution. If there are 5 questions to answer, they will somehow keep the questions within the syllabus but external to the lecture slides and/or handouts.
I felt that very strange.
Is this policy very common among universities?

Maybe the purpose is having challenging exercises for the students? Something they can solve, but that they haven't seen before in lectures?

Need to edit your question to make it more specific.  At my university, the syllabus (or subject outline) is a contract between students and the lecturer.  If it says the subject will teach X, then X must appear.  Otherwise, students have grounds to complain to upper management, especially when they didn't do well in the subject.

How about a more descriptive title?

@Prof.SantaClaus Are you at a prominent EU university?

@FedericoPoloni, or to make them cover the entire syllabus through self study where needed. It is an interesting idea, actually, if you want to produce scholars.

@user151413 why does it matter?  I went in to buy an iPhone, and you gave me a Samsung.

If there is assigned reading, then you are supposed to know it, even if the professor did not re-read it to you in a lecture.

The question, literally, is about "how common" this is, but I see no discussion of that in comments or the answer. So far, discussion has been about whether this is "appropriate" or not. Personally, I'll guess (but don't know) that it is uncommon except for trivial things, but appropriate provided students are warned explicitly in advance. Perhaps you can edit this a bit to clarify whether it is just frequency you care about (though I think that isn't really answerable).

@Prof.SantaClaus Because this "contractual nature" is very likely very country/region specific.  So my real question was whether you are in the US, Europe (where), or somewhere else; the prominent part was just ironic as it was written like that in the question.  I don't think the syllabus is seen as a contract in many places in Europe.  (I am also a bit critical towards it, since you want to have some flexibility, depending on the pace in which a specific class is going, the interests of the students, etc., so you might want to ne able to adapt to this.)

@Prof.SantaClaus Note that in many countries in Europe, you don't pay for the education. So it is really: "I went in to get a free iPhone, and I got a free Samsung."

@user151413, is that actually true that "you don't pay..." many places? I'd assumed that had disappeared in the last decade and that there were substantial fees pretty much everywhere. Citation?

Tutions fees in major EU countries... France (170 Euro), Germany (free), Italy (income based means test), Belgium (375-850 euro), Austria (free), Czech(free in czech lanuage, free in English), Denmark (free), Finland (free), Greece (free), Hungary (free), Iceland (free), Ireland (free for first attempt),

@Buffy See Ian Sudbery's comment.

@IanSudbery That's per semester, I assume, with typically 2 semesters per year?

The real purpose of (most) "how common is X?" question here is to find out "how acceptable X is" is and "can I complain about X?". Or it's a thinly veiled rant and not an actual question...

@user151413 some are per year, some per semester. See here: https://www.studyineurope.eu/tuition-fees

@user151413 I'm sure Europe would have law against 'misleading claims'.  Giving a Samsung phone instead of the advertised iPhone surely is against the law.  No?

@Prof.SantaClaus Phones are not syllabi.  Syllabi might say "possible topics include". Syllabi might not even exist, and the lecture is defined by its title.  And there are places beyond the US, and they might work differently, even though it is hard to believe. And laws which apply to phones might not apply to university courses.

If its on the syllabus, then you will be expected to know it. But its not necessary that all material on the syllabus will be taught by lecture.
It might be that the material is part of the prerequisites for the module. It might be part of the recommended reading for the module.
It might be that the question can be solved via application of knowledge taught in the lectures, but this is application of the knowledge to a different situation. For example: I might teach the concepts behind a hypothesis test, and give examples using t-tests. I  might then set questions using the Poisson distribution. As long as I have the appropriate formulas or probability tables, I'd except students to be able to transfer the concept of a hypothesis test from the t distribution to the Poisson distribution.
I would also be aware that this was a difficult question, and would be to separate the top students from the good students, but it would demonstrate that someone had understood the concepts rather than just learning to plug numbers into formulae.

+1, "the question can be solved via application of knowledge taught in the lectures, but this is application of the knowledge to a different situation" this is the definition of higher levels of questions (problem solving and above) in Bloom's hierarchy. Questions that can be answered by directly repeating lecture material are not problem-solving questions, no matter how difficult. I have seen formal education policies that refer to these levels, so it's most likely that is what the OP's case refers to.

On the other hand, there are definitely universities where this sort of thing is outright forbidden - if it's on the exam, it has to have been taught in either the lectures or the tutorials.

@nick012000 so if writing (or reading, or adding) is not taught in lectures or tutorials students can’t write their exams?  That would be very convenient.

An extreme example is the Cambridge English Tripos, where, at least 15 years ago, students only had one lecture a week.

More like 20 years ago now actaully.... I don't know, I didn't do English, I just had friends that did.

That would have been during my time then, but I was just a boring scientist.

I personally stay away in exams from material not covered in assignments or tutorials, simply out of fairness rather than by a policy requirement.  Once can always argue that, if it’s in the course description or the syllabus, it’s also fair game even if not covered in class but to me at least that’s over the line.
There has to be some flexibility to allow instructors to go beyond what was strictly in the lectures: in an absurd example one could argue that, if the instructor showed in class how to multiply 3x5 but not 4x7, then the first example would be legitimate a legitimate exam question but not the second.
A reasonable boundary is to expect that topics covered in class - rather than specific material covered in class - are fair topics.  In the example of my previous paragraph, both are examples of multiplication so both would be fair questions in my mind.
Thus, it is possible to have an exam question on the Poisson distribution if the question deals with properties common to distributions rather than a unique property of the Poisson distribution, provided that distributions were a topic covered in class or tutorials.
I do not know examples where allowing exams questions not covered in class is a policy.  I know of plenty of instructors (including myself) who make it a habit of not asking in exams the same examples covered in class, although the exam questions are on topics covered in class.