text:
It may not be in my best interest to ask a professor I have done research with for recommendation letters. Can this seem suspicious in my application?
I am not from the US and my field is in the social sciences. A while back, I started collaborating with a foreign professor on a research project which is now under review and another one which is halfway through. however, I did not find these topics very fulfilling and I want to move to another area closer to my original interests (I already have two other published papers relevant to this new area). The complicating issue is that the professor has told me several times he would be very interested in having me as a PhD student. So, I guess, he may not appreciate the fact that I have decided to pursue another area with another supervisor. Therefore, it may not be very fair or wise to ask him for letters of recommendation. What worries me, however, is that if I list these papers in my CV (which I eventually have to when they get published), it may raise questions/suspicions about why I have not asked him to recommend me. I cannot preemptively tell my prospective supervisor or the admissions committee the real reason for my reluctance to ask this professor. So, I am concerned that if such questions arise in their minds, it may lead them to mistakenly assume that I have something to hide, motivating me to exclude this professor as a potential recommender.
Is this a legitimate concern?

This idea that professors are offended if you decline a PhD offer with them occurs often on this site. You can read those answers. They boil down to: don’t be concerned about this, unless that professor is a real jerk.

Has this professor said or done anything that would indicate to you that you have upset them in any way?  What evidence has led you to suspect that this supervisor may hold a negative view of your abilities or your actions?  Is there evidence of this professor acting in a vengeful, domineering, or adversarial way with other students of theirs?

Being in a rather obscure department which may not get enough applications may be enough for a professor to get out of his way to try to recruit new and promising individuals. Usually, it is the student that tries to  convince the professor, not the other way around. I do not want to go into the specifics but it does seem a bit out of the ordinary. Regarding why someone would choose to cooperate with this person in the first place, it could be a combination of lack of experience in making such decisions, deceptive initial appearances and small number of connections due to country of residence.

the professor has told me several times he would be very interested in having me as a PhD student. So, I guess, he may not appreciate the fact that I have decided to pursue another area with another supervisor

Could be, if this person is vindictive and unethical. But if they are a decent human being they would write a gushing letter about how they would love to have you as a student, and other professors would take this as a good sign.
Unless you have a stronger reason to think this person falls into that bad category, I think they are probably one of your best potential letter writers. Someone who wants you as a PhD student is someone who has confidence in your research potential - that's exactly what you want from your letter writers.

Bottom line is that only OP understands the relationship they have with this professor.  We, across the vast gulf of the internet, cannot provide a psychological profile of their professor to decide whether or not their concerns are justified.  They have really provided little information that would shed any light whatsoever on the quality of that relationship.

@J... That's why I suggested they consider evidence they have that suggests this person might be in the vindictive category. However, OP like others asking questions on this Stack seems to have a common misconception that this sort of sabotage is common. It's not. What's the best case for the professor here? They prevent a promising student from going to grad school and then...profit how? Would the student become their student instead as a backup, and now the professor's colleagues see they have taken the student they just trashed in a letter to them?

Instead what is very common is: "It would be great to have you as a student." "Thanks! I've enjoyed working with you but was hoping to pursue (another institution/another topic/move closer to family/explore a different part of the world)" "That sounds like a great plan, let me know if you need a letter or any advice." Because most professors aren't evil overlords, they are mentors with a shared interest in academia.

While I agree that viewing sabotage as a common category may be a misconception, I have noticed increasingly that a good portion of the responses (in the website possibly not just here) are also under another (maybe US-centric) misconception: that professors all over the world act equally ethically and are well-known so they are afraid of their colleagues' censure. If a professor isn't very well-known and doesn't operate strictly within an ethical framework, what would he be afraid of? Who would notice that he has taken on the same student they trashed? They are not well-known so nobody cares.

In the end, I think it boils down to how far this person is willing to go. Maybe not as far as I assume but It doesn't hurt to think about and prepare for the worst-case scenario as well, does it? Especially, given my situation.

@DIanon If you have any reasons to believe the professor may have some reasons to seek a personal vendetta against you, please include them in the question (or just acknowledge their existence). As it stands, your question doesn't explain what would the professor stand to gain by sabotaging you. It's not a matter of being well known or ethical, just: Why bother stopping you from getting a PhD just out of spite? If the professor isn't interested in helping you, why wouldn't they simply refuse to write a letter, instead of writing a negative one? Just to be happy they made you go flip burgers?

@DIanon Also, what exactly do you mean by "Especially, given my situation.". I don't see anything really special in that regard in the question. Would you mind explaining that in a bit more detail?

I have another professor I have done research with, who, I am sure, will write a strong letter. Therefore, If you think I will not run into problems with the committee or the supervisor and that choosing one letter writer over another doesn't imply anything to them, I may rely on the second person. Overall, I need your perspectives to be able to make a better decision. So, whether you respond yes or no, I will have to weigh my options. In other words, your responses, while much appreciated and precious, are not going to decide the issue for me. I just need this input to make a better decision.

I don't understand why you are concerned unless you happen to be in a place where it is common for an admissions committee to reach out for comment to others not mentioned in an application. I think and hope that such a thing is considered improper almost everywhere. And, therefore, rare.
Your application materials contain certain required items, probably including some number of recommendations. Supply those. If someone goes out to others who might speak negatively of you it would be a problem, but one unlikely to occur. If it does, then just speak to the issue.
But people are busy enough without going on fishing expeditions to see what dirt might be found on applicants. And the recipient of such a request would also be acting unethically if they give a bad "review" for such a reason.
I can't guarantee that it can't happen. But it should be rare enough that you can ignore it as an issue.

The problem is not necessarily a person on the committee who may reach out to the professor. This, as mentioned, is probably rare. The problem could be a question or suspicion   that might form in the back of a committee member's mind regarding why the applicant has not asked a rather well-known professor, who knows his research strengths, for recommendation, opting instead for a less-known professor. The question actually is that if this happens, how would such a suspicion be dealt with responsibly? Although, something like this may rarely happen as well.

I doubt it will be an issue. "The other people are more aligned with your current interests" is all you need to say, I think.

I should say, for instance, that the other letter writers are more aligned with my current interests, you mean?


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Lacking motivation
I am a student pursuing a Ph.D. I am just an average student who is hard-working enough to complete the assignments and tasks on time.
I have been feeling incompetent for the last so many months. I am not even focusing on a particular work. There is n support from my supervisor and he is found out to be very much manipulative. The working environment is equally not supportive. I have been feeling stuck for more than a year now but can't leave the program. But, in the back of my mind, there is an urge to leave the program. I am worried about my future as I belong to the reputed institute. It is affecting my mental as well as physical health.
Please help me out.

You should try and talk to a professional about your mental health, but a good first step would be searching "impostor syndrome". Can you change supervisors?

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Is it against the rules to see someone's exam answers after the exam?
We had an exam and got the results 2 weeks later but I got slightly less points than I expected and we could not check the corrections yet. I was a bit impatient and wanted to see where I could have got it wrong, so I asked one of my classmates, who got maximum points, to send me what answers he got so I can compare them. I want to point it out again, it was clearly 2 weeks after the exam, so I did not have any unethical advantage from it. But still, I am a bit afraid that we did something "illegal".
Is this action considered to be academic misconduct, or since it was after the exam, students are allowed to share their answers with each other?

This may depend on the rules of the individual university, and it would be helpful to specify at least the country where you are. However, at least in my experience, sharing the exam papers between students and compare them is quite common. I can hardly imagine a university ruling against it.

What would be, in your opinion, the purpose of such a rule? I'd find it a pretty strange rule and I would hope that if somebody would invent such a strange rule dor their exam, they'd tell the students (and provide a reasoning). So I'd guess that if you have not been made aware of that rule, it does not exist..

Assuming the instructor has not released the exam back to students yet, then I can imagine that it might be against the rules for students to maintain a copy of the test questions and related materials. That's halfway common for in-person exams, and therefore fairly likely that syllabus language is maintained that effectively holds distance exams to the same standard.

Related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/81133/is-it-unethical-to-take-a-photograph-of-my-question-sheets-from-a-sit-down-exam

The interesting question is: what will you do if you find that your friend with perfect marks has answered two questions in the wrong way, i.e. the marker made a mistake to your friend's advantage? The question is not hypothetical.

This is entirely dependent upon your university's and/or professor's policy, but it seems highly unlikely that there would be any policy against discussing exams you have already taken with other students who have also already taken them. It was very common at my university for students to discuss exam questions immediately upon leaving the exam room and compare answers to see how likely it was that they got the correct answer. There was no policy against it, though I did hear stories of certain professors who were very strict about exams solely because they recycled questions verbatim.

Was one of the questions "When to use 'fewer' and 'less'?"

Certainly it wasn't illegal in the technical sense and it is very unlikely, though not impossible, that some local rule would prohibit it. In fact, it ought to be entirely permissible for one student to aid the learning of another in this manner.
Even working together on "possible" exam questions before the exam should be permitted, even encouraged, IMO.
The point of it all is learning, not grading. There shouldn't be secret information.
On the other hand, there are some things that are best learned through struggle and not by reading answers. On a math test, for example, seeing the answer is very different from generating it. As a learner, you want to strive, as much as possible for insight, especially in those subjects that you are most interested in. That insight comes from hard work.

There's absolutely no reason this would be "illegal". The whole point is to learn isn't it? The test was over. You are supposed to learn how to solve the problem properly afterwards to learn from your mistakes. How can you learn if you can't see what your mistakes were?

For rules, only your university can answer that question. But if you are asking about ethics, it is surely ethically permissible to discuss anything with someone if doing so can no longer possibly affect any grading under normal circumstances, and you both commit to abiding by this principle. That is, there should not be any further component to the exam in question (e.g. oral defense), and you both commit to not discuss the exam question or anything at all to do with that course with anyone else unless they commit to the same principle stated above.
Why do I say this? Suppose you have two friends A,B. A has taken the exam and got full marks. B has not taken the exam yet, for whatever reason. You have taken the exam, but got one question wrong and do not know why. However, you have studied together with B, and so it is possible that you may be able to guess whether B would answer the question correctly or not, after your discussion with A. For example, perhaps after discussing with A you realize that you used some theorem wrongly because you had the theorem written down wrongly in your notes that you copied from B. You would now be in a sticky situation. Do you tell B that the theorem there is an error in that theorem you copied? Do you want to be in such a situation? That is why the second part of the above-stated principle is important.
Ultimately though, since you only asked about rules, you have to ask your course instructor for that.

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How to upload LaTeX files in editorialmanager when there are folders and hirearchy for the latex files?
I have submitted a paper in a journal, and in the minor revision email that I received, I am asked to "Please make sure to submit your editable source files (i. e. Word, TeX)."
The thing is, there are a lot of files related to my paper for the latex paper to compile (.tex, .bib, .png, etc) and some of them are inside another folder in the root folder of the paper (for example in the content folder)
But in the uploading section of the editorialmanager, you can only upload files it seems. I tried to zip them altogether and upload that instead, but this website then tries to unzip it!
So what is the proper way for me to upload all of my latex files (all the files that are required for my latex based paper to compile) in editorialmanager? Because I need to upload all the required files for them to be able to compile it properly without a hassle it seems.

What's the problem with reorganizing the files and putting them in a single folder?

@AdamPřenosil But is this actually the normal way of uploading it? because there are like 25 .tex files, do I really have to manually upload every single one? not to mention I think there was a limit on number of uploaded files..

Not a direct answer, but I always like to run a “sanitizing” script on any LaTeX source I upload, removing comments and regularizing figure names, etc. This kind of export script could easily extend to flattening the document into a single file, letting you keep your structure for internal use.

You can use an export script to flatten your document to a single file plus images. Several options for doing this were provided as answers to this question on the TeX Stack Exchange:
https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/21838/replace-inputfilex-by-the-content-of-filex-automatically
(As compared to editing your source directly, using a script like this lets you maintain your structure internally, then give the publisher the view they need for their purposes.)

Since you want your paper to be published in this outlet, you need to follow their production process. This means concretely that you have to edit your latex files so that you have a completely flat file hierarchy, where you only embed files that exists in the same directory. It is usually not that complicated. I would also create a bibtex file with only the references that they need.


text:
Easiest way to get a bibtex citation of a paper that scholar is still not showing its proper published paper?
For some reason, even papers published in very places like ICLR, still don't get updated on scholar, for example "HOW POWERFUL ARE GRAPH NEURAL NETWORKS?" paper still shows as arxiv in scholar.
so what is the easiest way for me to get the bibtex citation of these type of papers that scholar still don't update their published place, other than writing it myself? (I know, I'm lazy)

Most publishers that provide bibtex records (including Google Scholar) provide terrible bibtex records, with inconsistent titles/abbreviations/capitalization, syntax errors (especially near names with accents or mathematics in titles), redundant/extraneous data, hyphens instead of dashes between page numbers, and so on.  Moreover, bibtex records from different sources use different standards---some abbreviating titles and others not, for instance.  Even if you get the record from the publisher (or Google), you will have to correct it.  It's honestly easier just to type it yourself.

Maybe not so useful to the OP, but for the benefit of others who come across this question in the future: in (pure) mathematics, MathSciNet and zbMATH are the go-to sources for bibliographic information on papers that have been published, and they actually provide pretty good bibtex records.

One technique for me (currently writing my PhD thesis, so did this a lot of times recently, works more than 95% of the time) is to google and go to the conference/journal/openreview page and get the citation there. I look for a button called "cite" or "export citation" or sometimes it is hidden under another button, e.g. "tools". Usually I first skim the page for a couple of seconds, then hit ctrl+f and search for the phrase "cite", if it does not find anything then I look for different buttons such as "tools"...
For your example: If you google (here) the name of the paper the first hit after the arxiv one is the openreview webpage: https://openreview.net/forum?id=ryGs6iA5Km. On this page there is a small button "Show Bibtex" right under the title. When you click on it it opens a small window with the bibtex entry as written below. This takes me about 10-15 seconds, definitely faster than writing it yourself!
"
@inproceedings{
xu2018how,
title={How Powerful are Graph Neural Networks?},
author={Keyulu Xu and Weihua Hu and Jure Leskovec and Stefanie Jegelka},
booktitle={International Conference on Learning Representations},
year={2019},
url={https://openreview.net/forum?id=ryGs6iA5Km},
}
"


text:
Sabbatical in mathematics in the US
I am wondering how a mathematician can find a sabbatical in the US. More specifically is it necessary to have people interested in a collaboration with them in the department they wants to visit? Is it possible to find a department for sabbatical in order to start working in a new field?

You may have some misconceptions. Are you looking for a paid position of some sort? I'm not quite clear on what your needs are here.

And where are you? Are you a faculty member at a US institution?

A lot of such positions use the word "visiting" in the advertisement. The type I'm most familiar with involves primarily teaching (so you need clear evidence of good teaching, especially lower level courses such as precalculus, first year calculus, elementary linear algebra, business calculus, etc.) with no significant research expectations, but having interests in common with some faculty and an indication (recent publications and/or research statement) that your presence could also be research-beneficial to the department will work strongly in your favor when other things are equal.

I think this is a request for a general understanding of how sabbaticals work in the US for mathematics professors.

@Buffy: This is a general question how sabbaticals work in the US particularly for tenured faculty members.

Are you asking about sabbatical leaves for faculty who work at US institutions to visit other institutions or persons from outside the US who want to come to the US for a visit?   Are you interested only in sabbatical visits to university departments, or are you also interested in visits to research institutes that are separate from academic departments?

The main thing to keep in mind is that from the host department’s point of view they aren’t inviting you to come “do a sabbatical” - that’s not an official status at any US department I know. They are inviting you to come and do a certain kind of work (usually with a title such as Visiting Professor/Researcher/Scholar, which is usually but not always unpaid), whether it’s teaching or research or some combination of the two. The fact that you’re on sabbatical from your home institution (as opposed to some other status like being on leave) is immaterial.

is it necessary to have people interested in a collaboration with them in the department they wants to visit?

I think it’s fair to say that it’s necessary to give the department a reason to invite you. They need to have some concrete expectation that your presence will be beneficial to them. The most common such reason (in my very anecdotal experience) is that you will collaborate with some of the department’s faculty, but if you’re offering to teach, run a seminar, mentor graduate students etc, those could all be useful things that might make the department receptive to inviting you. And a collaboration might not necessarily be very concrete - it may be that you are simply an expert in some field that’s of interest to someone and they feel that having you around would be nice for them and their grad students, postdocs etc, regardless of whether there is an official intent to collaborate.
It could also be that you are a famous researcher at the top of your field. In that case I doubt you will need to offer anything concrete. Just say “I was wondering if it would interest your department to have me visit next year”... Your reputation will do the convincing for you.

Is it possible to find a department for sabbatical in order to start working in a new field?

I don’t know, but I don’t see why not. Again, the key is that you have to give people a reason to want to have you around. If you want to expand from field X to field Y and the department has people who are experts on Y but are interested in learning more about X (or about techniques from X that might help them attack the problems of Y) and think you could help them, I think that could be a win-win for everyone and a perfectly good reason to invite you for a visit.

One common option for sabbatical leaves in mathematics in the US is to spend a semester or year at one of the NSF funded mathematical sciences institutes.  There are currently 9 such institutes, see
https://mathinstitutes.org/institutes/
For semester-long visits, these institutes will typically provide housing and some funding for travel expenses.
I've done semester-long sabbatical leaves at IPAM and ICERM.  I've also visited for shorter periods at IMA.

Let me complement the answer of Dan Romik with some information from the other side, for those who may not have it: the home institution. And, this may apply only in the US.
A Sabbatical originated in Jewish Agricultural Law. The land should lay fallow for one year in seven and the farmer should take the year off. Wikipedia will give some background on the origin, but not much on the current practice.
Academic sabbaticals aren't universal, but they are pretty common. When available at an institution they may be a contractural right or not. They may be for a full year or a shorter period, say one Semester. They may be fully paid or not. There may be expectations or not. A lot of variation is possible. Some institutions won't offer them at all, though an occasional year without pay, funded elsewhere, is usually a possibility, though that isn't really a sabbatical.
The ideal is that you are more or less entitled to one every seven years, but need not take it. Fully paid with all benefits paid. Few if any expectations about what you do for the year. Earning additional income permitted.
A year in the south of France is possible under the ideal, tasting fine wine, even if (especially if?) you are a mathematician. Starting up a company based on your research is fine. Moving to a new place and working with new people is fine and is hoped for by the home institution.
You may, however, need to arrange it so that continuing work gets carried on in your absence. The lab may not be able to be shut down. Doctoral students still need to be served.
But that ideal isn't open to everyone. To a large extent it depends on the financial position generally of the home institution and how solid their planning is. Having 1/7 of the faculty not "producing" anything is pretty expensive to maintain.
So, more realistically, you may have to negotiate a bit and you may not get a sabbatical every seven years. You may have to make an application. You may have to explain how you will be productive during that period. You may be required to file a report at the end detailing your productivity. There may be some restrictions about teaching at another institution. There may be an expectation that your research will continue. Changing sub-fields is unlikely to be restricted, but changing fields entirely might be an issue.
And you probably have to agree to return to the home institution for at least one year after a sabbatical, even for the ideal model. The institution hopes to get something back from you in productivity or renewed vigor.

I think standard is that you get a year at half pay (but full benefits).

@AlexanderWoo, typical, yes. Ideal? Close, but no cigar.

It's often one semester at full-pay or two semesters at half pay.  People on half pay often teach a course or two at the institution they're visiting to make up for some of the lost salary.


text:
Good idea to warn students they were suspected of cheating?
I am a math professor. Several of our midterm questions were posted to Chegg. We found some students who clearly used them and gave them zeroes for the exam. We also had two students where I kept going back and forth. Most of their work was fine but, in each case, there was one answer which was surprisingly close to Chegg but not so close that I thought it couldn't be a coincidence. I kept sitting on the edge and finally decided to let it go.
I've been thinking, after all grades are in, of writing these students and saying "If you were cheating, you came very close to getting caught. You should be scared about how close you came and make sure you don't do this again; you clearly know enough to pass without it. If you weren't, than I am very sorry to have suspected you." Good idea or terrible idea?

It seems redundant in any case. If you gave several students a zero for the same reason you are considering to tell others they might have gotten one, what does it add? A general reference to using online sources leading to failing the exam should suffice.

@gnometorule Please use the answer box to answer questions.

As long as the students know that you know, they should get the message.

To me (non US) it sounds very strange that you can deduct points at all for correct answers, just because they were memorized from published solutions online? (They were not using a mobile phone during the exam to copy anything, right?) My feeling is that it is up to the examiner to give suitable questions, and if their questions are identical to ones that have already benn circulated then it is not the student's fault? Or do I misunderstand the question entirely?

Echoing @Jakob's remark/query: would/does the "cheating" consist of memorizing information that was on the internet prior to the exam, or is it somehow getting access to that info during the exam?

@Jakob: In this forum, there is a question about whether it is cheating to drink coffee during an exam (and many answers taking this question seriously). While the clear answer is of course no, I find it (from my culture perspective) very worrisome in what exam culture someone must grow up to ask such a question (or treat and answer it seriously). I guess there are many "extreme" exam cultures we are not used to..

@Jakob I wouldn't jump to that conclusion given that the sensible interpretation is that the questions were posted and answered during the exam. Which means that copying the solution is clear cheating. No memorizing involved...

@Jakob: In the U.S. most of us are currently in a distance-learning environment, and there's no way to prevent students from using desktop, laptop, phone, anything from accessing online answers during a test. E.g., This semester I had a totally unique question, never before posted anywhere, in a discrete math test that was posted to Chegg (incl. my hint for formatting a table in our LMS), received an answer with terms and techniques never covered in class or book, and copy-pasted verbatim to 5 student submissions, all within the 90 minute span of the test.

Related: This question on SE Math Educators about how to give online tests in the current environment, with several experiences around cheating by Chegg during the tests: https://matheducators.stackexchange.com/questions/18477/what-are-the-best-practices-for-giving-online-tests

Was this a test done at home or online? Or were they accessing the internet from class?

As an aside, since this has not been mentioned elsewhere; if you have designed the kind of test that can easily be cheated on via a simple visit to Chegg, then you should use that as feedback that you need to improve your exam. Know that in the presence of perverse incentives (e.g. easy to cheat exam, others will do it, 1st class student will have their grade dropped due to grade normalisation if they don't also cheat, etc) cheating behaviour may not even register as morally wrong e.g. (look up literature on moral disengagement and cheating). So to some extent you are co-responsible for this.

In one course the professor had to give a final term paper instead of an exam, he said something along the lines that if all the papers come back the same, he's going to assume it's a statistical anomaly. Not so that we have a pass for cheating, but that we feel encouraged to work together if we get stuck. If the answers are close, but not enough, give them the benefit of the doubt.

The fact that you want to put an apology in your message to them (not to mention being "very" sorry) should already be a signal to yourself that it's probably not a good idea to send such a message in the first place.

@TasosPapastylianou I don't think your assessment is justified. What we're discussing is the following cheating mode: the exam starts, the student posts an exam question online during the exam, someone else (unrelated to the course) answers the exact question and posts their answer online (for a small payment), the original student copies that answer. We are not talking about questions whose answers can simply be found online independent of the exam. Such type of questions would indeed be a bad choice for open book exams (which practically all exams are right now).

@user2705196 possibly, but to the extent it may even be partly true then it's worth considering. It's not a statement intended to justify cheating by the students. I only play "devil's advocate" here because I think this particular point can be relevant, but often completely disregarded when considering "what action to take".

Notifying the students of your suspicion is a bad idea for the reasons already mentioned in the top answer by Buffy. It also reduces your chances of catching the students; instead of no longer cheating (if they were cheating), they may simply try to cover it up better next time.

Be sure to read and understand your school's academic honesty policy.  I would not be allowed to issue penalty for dishonesty without using official mechanisms to do so.

What kind of questions were these?  There's only so many correct ways to solve any given mathematical problem, so it's quite likely that some people in a large enough class would stumble upon ones that closely match each other.  If it's a word description of something, that's more suspect.  But if it's just working out equations, cheating is a little harder to detect...

@TasosPapastylianou posting on Chegg is equivalent to showing a knowledgeable person your exam and asking them for the answer.

If you want to be sneaky, put a nonsensical question on the test, then put a "solution" to it on Chegg.

No, you should not single them out. If you have evidence of cheating, then charge it. If you have suspicions then you should swallow and ignore them so as not to prejudice the students in the future.
If you want to announce to the entire class that there were a few other cases that were suspect, not naming names and not singling out any individual, that would be fine and the message would be delivered.
Some people would take such a singling out very badly. Psychologically. Especially if they didn't cheat.

What do you mean with "not to prejudice the students in the future"?

@FedericoPoloni if a professor told me that I was suspected of cheating, and I did not, I would be incredibly outraged and pissed. I know for a fact I would be distracted in the course, and constantly worried whatever I did next would be under a microscope (which would be true if I was suspected, but I would be unaware of it). And it would be impossible to look at that professor with hope for any sort of academic relationship. Perhaps in years worth of time, but certainly not in a college span. Others may be more forgiving, but sometimes your reputation is all you have and that stain is deep.

Strongly seconding @J.Hirsch's comment... Things/suspicions that are voiced cannot be unsaid.

And math, being what it is, is hard to say whether the correct answer is due to cheating. However, if they got an answer wrong the same way, then that is more likely (still not proof, but extremely suspicious).

It should also be emphasized that many undergraduate students are under a lot of pressure, especially in their first year, as many of them are experiencing independent life for the first time. Many of them have literally never struggled in school before and have no idea what "studying" is or why you would want to do it. The last thing they need is a thinly-veiled "I think you cheated but I can't prove it" email from the professor (assuming innocence, of course). Obviously, those same students will also have no answer if you demand to see their studying process.

I think announcement to the whole class is also profitable towards the people who might have actually cheated without even being suspected. If I was to cheat, and to learn people have been caught cheating, and that others have been suspected and I'm none of them, I probably would feel even more confident. While knowing I might be among the ones being suspected, I might be hesitating next time...

@DanielHatton, yes, I agree. But that is really just a proper lesson on good academic practice. But that is also a lesson for the entire class, I think.

I can say I was falsely accused of cheating because I and another student made the same wrong guess about something that hadn't been taught yet (basically, the difference between a harmonic and an overtone), and I still hold a grudge against that TA 25 years later.

I was accused of cheating in high school when I hadn't. I didn't like it, still remember it. But, I also realized that he thought I was cheating. He was just wrong, that's all. He was one of the best teachers I've ever had, and I still have tremendous respect for him 40 years later. Nevertheless, I like this answer for the middle paragraph.

If you suspect cheating, one option is to ask the students directly to explain how they got answers that were so similar to the online source.  In my experience, this often results in an immediate confession on the part of the students.  If they come up with a story that's hard to believe, but you don't have enough evidence to get through the disciplinary process, then you can drop the matter.

I completely agree with both Buffy's answer and this answer.  Don't accuse students without strong evidence, but depending on how much you care and how sketchy their exam looks, you can require some students to chat with you to "discuss concerns about their exams" before you assign them a final grade.  If your university has something like an Academic Integrity Office, you might chat with them first about what to do.

Brian, my experience this semester has been the opposite. The email conversation usually goes like this: student asks why they got a zero. I say because they copied the answer to q2 from an online source. They reply that no, that they studied very hard and that all their work is theirs. I send them a screenshot of the online answer they copied. They reply that they were "self-studying", and that it was "the only time", that their life is hard, and that they are  in a small village in country X. I send them a screenshot of another answer and report them to the Dean.

I've also had students who deny cheating despite evidence showing verbatim copying of large chunks of text.  Since the copied text itself is sufficient evidence of plagiarism, I just send the charges on to the dean.

@MartinArgerami I think student reactions over email and in person/Zoom can be quite different.  If you schedule a conversation with them and ask them to explain how they got their solution and why they wrote such-and-such, some people who copied will confess readily, though it's true that others deny deny deny.

@Kimball: makes sense. Though in person I've also heard the most outrageous excuses.

It feels a bit weird to punish only those students honest/stupid enough to admit, as this answer suggests.

If you ask Chegg, they would supply student data they hold. This includes not only those who asked the questions but also those who viewed the answers. If you have the right clauses in the honor code preventing students from seeking unauthorized help, then you can take students to the disciplinary tribunal with the evidence you obtained from Chegg.

Let's say I'm the student suspected of cheating and look at this from my perspective:
Case 1: I cheated, and receive this email warning me I came close to being caught. This should be a good result. It would act as deterrence - after all, next time I might not be so lucky. Only thing to pay attention to here is to not reveal the evidence against me, since otherwise I might be tempted to cheat again except this time also to cover any tracks.
Case 2: I didn't cheat. In this case the warning is irrelevant to me. Like, the conditional is false, so whatever follows it is irrelevant. After all, the statement "if you cheated then pigs fly" is true! The allegation would only become a nuisance if I had to invest time and effort to fend it off (which I presumably don't in this case), or if it became public (which it doesn't have to, if you send private email).
If you are very worried about case 2 (which is reasonable), you could try looking around to see the effect of false allegations in online forums such as StackExchange. We do for example have rules against multiple accounts. One can never actually be sure that two accounts are actually the same person, which will invariably lead to false accusations and possibly investigations. I don't actually have the statistics on how people react, but perhaps a mod will be able to say. My experience elsewhere is that people get annoyed if they have to mount a defense, but if it's just being told they've been suspected, they might even react with laughter.
Edit: Based on the comments, different people come to different conclusions on this because they interpret things differently. I for example would consider the proposed email closer to being exonerated than being accused, but many others don't. Clearly the dividing line between the two very different reactions is extremely fine. If you do send the letter, you will have to word it very carefully. At that point, it might be better to just sidestep the potential quagmire entirely and not bother.

"@anonymous, I suspect you are actually Buffy who's posted this question to upvote your own answer so you can get more rep on your main account. If you are actually Buffy, you've come very close to being caught. If you are not actually Buffy, I am very sorry to have suspected you." I actually feel pretty ridiculous typing that out, and I very much think that you are more likely to laugh than to feel outraged. If you do feel outraged, then perhaps it's a reason not to send the warning.

I disagree with case 2. You seem to assume that students think like machines. In reality, I'd assume that most students would intrepret a sentence starting with "If you did cheat" as "I suspect you of cheating" (if the sentence was not given in a complete abstract way or is complete nonsense like your comment). Are you familiar with Schulz von Thun's communication theory?

If I was wrongly accused in cheating I would probably put a formal complaint again the professor. I would most certainly not "see the warning as irrelevant".

@Allure That's not a good analogy because you don't hold any authority over Buffy, and the accusation is pretty silly. Imagine instead that a police man came at your door and told you that have been investigated for some crime at a place that you frequently visit (i.e., you could plausibly be suspected of this crime), but they didn't gather quite enough evidence to charge you. You certainly wouldn't just shrug this off.

@Inkblot To be fair, if the professor acted in good faith and followed regulations, this complaint would go nowhere.

@Inkblot this is not an accusation. An accusation would force you to mount a defense. What the OP is suggesting is a warning that you were suspected, which is a lot less severe.

@xLeitix I can't say for certain since it's not happened to me, but I suspect I would indeed shrug it off. Why wouldn't I? I haven't even been accused of wrongdoing. Here's another comparison: suppose MH380 were found today and all the passengers are still alive. I'm one of the passengers. Would I be offended that I was investigated as a possible terrorist? I honestly have a hard time seeing it. In fact, I'd probably be more troubled if the authorities didn't investigate me.

@user111388 it is possible I assume students think like machines and they don't. I can't prove it. All I can say is that I have seen sockpuppet investigations and people's reaction to being discovered that they were investigated. It is usually not outrage. I don't know how much of it is due to online disinhibition, however; getting suspected in real life is presumably more troubling.

Wasn't there an American guy who said about Guantanamo "It's better to torture an innocent person than to let a terrorist go"? I'd be much scared about being suspected a terrorist. It's similar with a prof: of course, a prof doesn't torture students - yet every examination has some sort of biases. I'd also wouldn't like to hear that a prof is biased against me because he suspects I cheated/didn't like my outfit/gender/whatever.

@user111388 It's not like the OP can forget they suspected the student. If this suspicion will eventually lead to the OP being biased against the student, would the student prefer not to know what the OP is suggesting they reveal? That sounds suspiciously like "ignorance is bliss".

This answer greatly, greatly underestimates the devastating effects a wrong accusation of cheating can have on a student.

@Stef except, to emphasize again, what the OP is proposing is not an accusation.

I considered adding "just because you say in a comment that it is not an accusation, doesn't make it any less of an accusation" in my last comment. Apparently I should have. You are obviously very detached emotionally from this and believe that it's not a big deal. But it is. For the students it is. A false accusation like that, no matter how you call it, can have devastating effects on the student and might very well cause a lot of otherwise hard-working students to completely stop working for your class, and lose faith in university in general.

@Stef Except, again, it is not an accusation (and equally, just because you say it is an accusation doesn't make it an accusation). It becomes an accusation if the OP actually tells the student to present their defense. Compare: a SE mod could investigate right now if you are actually Buffy's alt account, and if they don't tell you, you would never know you've been investigated. Are you saying you don't want to know you've been investigated? Again, that sounds very much like "ignorance is bliss".

@Allure Clearly you have never been wrongly accused of cheating. It doesn't matter that the accusation is not official, nor does it matter that the teacher adds "if you did not cheat, I am very sorry that I suspected you". Once the words are said, the damage is done.

No, I have no account other than Buffy (and never have had). You are really mistaken, and insulting. I don't need to game the system here. I just answer a lot of questions.

Both of your "cases" are flawed. In the first case, not revealing your "evidence" is improper. In the second, it is anything but irrelevant to a person to be unjustly accused and have a cloud remaining over them in the future. I won't downvote because you don't recommend improper actions here, but you should rethink your assumptions.

Ah, maybe your accusation in the comment was just a joke. You "suspect" me of cheating, but have no evidence. If I'm a student in this situation, my opinion of you just went down a few notches.

@xLeitix: As other remarked, being falsely accused in cheating is a big deal. And if I had received an email "I think you were cheating, but if you weren't then no biggie", I'd have taken it as an accusation of cheating. I don't expect a complaint over this to get anywhere, I expect it to be put on record, and I expect it to cause a minor headache to the department chair and the professor, who should at the very least be more selective of their claims in the future.

@Inkblot the proposed email doesn't say "I think you were cheating". In fact, it pretty clearly says "I think you weren't cheating", since if the OP thought it was cheating, they would've pressed a real accusation.

@Buffy I certainly don't think you were gaming the system. It was just a conveniently available, almost certainly false example to illustrate what it'd feel like for the OP. I'm sorry to have used you as an example though, it was in retrospect pretty bad. I can't edit the comment anymore though. Any suggestions? I could delete it.

I am actually curious now how the reaction would be if the letter is of the form "you were suspected of cheating, but the case was dropped due to lack of evidence. If you were cheating, you came very close to getting caught ...". I am also curious if that reaction would change if it were a TA sending it instead, worded as "the professor suspected you of cheating, but there wasn't enough evidence. Just FYI, and if you were cheating, you came very close to getting caught ...".

Actually, I think it would be a mistake to delete the comment. It serves as a warning all its own. Your comment, my reaction.

@Buffy even then I don't consider the comment & your reaction as a warning for what might happen if the OP goes ahead though - the comment was directed at anonymous and there is no third person in the OP's scenario. It was a bad comment in the way that it's usually not a good idea to make a joke at someone else's expense (again, apologies for doing that).

The suggested email is NOT saying "I think you weren't cheating." It's saying "I think you were cheating, but I don't have quite enough evidence to prove it." That's entirely different from "we investigated you and cleared you of any wrong doing." There's no way that can do any good if the students weren't actually cheating, since it's not like they can make their work less suspicious.

Case 1 might not be deterrence at all. I can imagine it gives the student this feeling: "Aha, so that kind of cheating is enough to raise suspicion, but not enough to charge accusation. Next time I cheat, I'll be doing it better." Without any deterrence/scare

Actually, I wonder why this is a problem at all.
Especially math is about understanding and solving a problem. And not about how well you can find external information.
If exam questions are testing understanding and solving, it won't help your students when they are looking up the answers somewhere else. Therefore it doesn't matter if they look up answers. So I think you are fixing the wrong thing here.
Edit:
For me it was not clear the questions were posted during the exam. That makes a bit of a difference. When remembering my math exams: besides the answer I had to give an explanation why the answer was correct. Without explanation you got only a fraction of the points. Depending on the teacher, even with a correct answer.
When cheating was suspected you had to clarify your explanation. Which you are not able to if you cheated.

I don't follow the logic here. If a question (which is testing understanding and solving) has been posted in advance online and you memorise and then transcribe the answer in the exam, in what way does it "not help the students"? It helps them to pass the exam without the need to demonstrate any understanding or solving.

This question is not about memorizing answers. The exam in question had been posted and solved online during the exam to be shared with the students taking the exam! This is the type of cheating we're talking about.


text:
How to ask a postdoc professor for experimental work when my PhD experience is computational?
My PhD was in computational modeling 3D printing process using Abaqus finite element analysis. It took me 5.5 years to get the PhD and I published 4 first author papers from it. The issue is, I had put forward my desire to do experimental work during my PhD. But that did not materialize. Looking back, I do regret not choosing an experential topic. The true fact is I was not getting any good PhD positions. I liked this topic and started it. I do have an experimental background in my masters and undergrad research. But that's like 6 years ago.
After 3 years of starting, I had realized that I might get into issues securing job after PhD. But I did not want to leave my PhD halfway.
Now, I am trying to get a experimental+simulations postdoc position but I am unable to get one (thanks to both my CV and covid). I know that I have screwed up chances for an experimental+simulations position.
But, do you have any suggestions on how I can approach a professor for a postdoc position with such a proposition in mind?
Another negative point on my resume. I am 31 years old.

What field? ....

@user151413 field is computational materials science

Can you clarify what experimental work in computational material science would be? To me, this sounds like, well, computation.

@user151413 well my current field is computational materials science. But experimental work like characterization with electron microscopy, mechanical testing would help to validate the simulation results. Academic and industrial positions for computational work is limited and I am trying to get an experimental position to expand my skillset.

What I'm after is how big the distance between your past computational work and your potential future experimental work is.  To me, it seems rather big.  Have you talked much to experimentalists in the past, been to their lab, understand what they are doing, how, and why?

Yes, my PhD was in close collaboration with experimentalists. I also designed some experiments for validating my models. I was not hands on with the experiments and characterization though. So yes, I know what they are doing, how and why. I only don't have the hands-on experience.

If you had or have close contact to experimentalists, those are the natural people to approach if you want to work in the lab.  You can also offer to start with a short half-year "internship" (even if formally on a postdoc contract), so they don't have to give you a 2-year contract just to realize after three months that in the end it turns out you are not suited for labwork.

Is really 31 considered to be too old for a first PostDoc position?

Your age isn't material. You have skills. Tell a potential advisor that you are looking to expand your skill set into experimental work. Perhaps your computational work can complement the experimental, looking at problems from two aspects.
Even if you are still doing mostly computational stuff in a new post-doc you will get connected with the experimentalist's outlook and start to absorb those skills. Joint papers would be a good way to get recognized.
But just ask for what you want and say why. It is perfectly reasonable. A post-doc should be a learning experience, not just a repetition of you doctoral studies.

related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/153694/how-may-a-young-scholar-without-tenure-change-their-field-of-research/153696#153696

@Buffy Well, my PhD work was extensively in collaboration with experimentalists. I have good understanding of the experiments and how to design better experiments for validation of the computational results. But that's not enough to secure a position with computational+experimental requirements. They require hands-on experience. That's what I want to acquire in my postdoc.


text:
A senior faculty hates me -- should I prepare to leave?
I am a pre-tenured faculty.  A senior faculty in my department hates me.  She has been  very strange to me.  For example, she sent out a dinner invitation for all people in my department.  I accepted it -- she personally approached me and said like you should not come.  Recently I learned that she has been talking about me very negatively like making stories I've never said or did.  Also it is not just her now - a small group of senior faculties do together.  I am in a female-dominant colleage - however, I am very dumb a kind of in female-relationships; all of my best friends and collaborators are male; so I simply do not know what to do.  Anyway now I am ignoring all and focusing on my works.  However, I am very worrying about my evaluation -- is it possible that I can fail in my evaluation/re-appointment for this situation.  Should I just apply for different schools now to leave?

Is there anyone whom you know and trust, who also knows this senior faculty member, that you could ask for advice?

"I am very dumb a kind of in female-relationships" maybe consider that if you treat women as though they are a separate species they are going to notice that.

It should not matter whether that person is female or not. Can you identify a point in time at which their behaviour changed towards you? Do you let them sense a discomfort or skepticism with a "female-dominant" college as apparent in your question?

I think it is critical for you to get more information about what's going on.
I do not know what it is like at your university, but usually starting junior faculty is assigned to one or two senior mentors, usually part of the group who supported the original hire. Otherwise, find the person you trust most among the colleagues that help recruit you for this position. You should bring up this topic gently with one of them and see if this is a common issue for others with the senior faculty member and if there is anything you can do about it.
That said, I would not even consider moving to a new place before you find out more. It is not clear that a) the senior faculty member would greatly impact your career at this university and b) there is no guarantee that things wouldn't be worse somewhere else. I would only make such drastic decisions if you have more information. Taking into account how hard it is to find faculty positions these days, I would only consider this step as my last resort.


text:
Switching faculties within a University in Canada
If an Assistant Professor switches faculties within the same University, can this change entail a change in salary? Or since the move is within the same (unionized) University, the salary remains the same?

This depends on your contract, so I think the question should be closed.

I doubt these nuances are discussed in the contract.

You should probably reach out to the admin team and ask, we probably wouldn’t know. It could be highly dependent on the university too.

No competent union would agree to a contract that did not specify a lower limit on every member's pay.  If you cannot figure it out, you should ask your union.  For the contracts I have examined, the answer would be that yes, your salary can change, but only within complicated limitations, and the faculty would not be relevant.


text:
How can I find studies with statistical mistakes?
I would like to create a list of known problematic studies that misused statistics.
I tried searching google and read a few papers on the topic, but none of them contained specific examples of bad studies.
Is there a list of such papers? is anyone aggregating them?
Note: if there is a reason not to reference them I would also like to know why.

I would think "mistakes" are different than "misuse." which one are you looking for?

@AzorAhai-him- At this point both (I couldn't find any), I want studies that have some kind of problematic statistical misuse or mistake in them that renders them false.

I assume that no one has an incentive to keep such a list. Finding studies with such problems will likely be quite difficult. The only way to identify them that I can think of is by finding other studies pointing out statistical errors (here is an example), but finding those will probably also be hard.

@cheersmate how did you find that study? cataloging them can help others see where mistakes were made and to be wary of references to those studies no?

Often people write broad reviews of poor statistical practices with a systematic literature search, but they usually avoid naming the offenders. There are too many possible errors in analyses to list them all. Instead, you have to check carefully all of the individual papers you plan to cite.

@BryanKrause do you think one of the reasons is to not make those problematic papers more cited?

@funerr I think it's because they want the emphasis to be on improving statistical practice in the future, not condemning past papers.

you could browse the archives of Andrew Gelman's blog (this will not be very efficient, although it could be informative).

The closest I would know of are Retraction Watch and PubPeer.
Retraction Watch
First, Retraction Watch has a database comprising retractions of scientific papers. Click on the arrow next to the search field "Reason(s) for Retraction", and you will see possible candidates for statistical mistakes.

PubPeer
Secondly, PubPeer allows anyone to write a 'post-publication review' responding to any scientific paper. Search for "statistical mistake" and you will find many cases in which readers raised concerns about published findings - some of them having led to formal errata, corrigenda or retractions. Here is one example, where the reader starts an extensive response with "I have no comments to make about the data, but I do have concerns about some of the statistical analyses", and goes on to list issues about the methodical approach of that paper.


text:
Where do the references / sources for Definitions go in a thesis?
I have been asked to historicise my terms, so i have a brief explanations for each definition in the front matter section. Where do the references for these go? With the references  with the main text? Or should I list the references in the front matter with the definitions? (It's a cultural history research study).  Thank you.

Ask your advisor. There may be conventions for your field.
One possibility: If they are references, tootnote them the way you do any other references in the body of the thesis. If they are brief explanations, consider an appendix.


text:
Why would a professor not reply?
A professor has offered me a summer research project at his lab. The last we had talked was on a Zoom call during which I was offered the position. He had then asked me to send my academic records after which he would give the other documents like Offer Letter, Visa Forms, etc. I have mailed him my records and have asked to discuss the project dates. He is not responding to my emails. It's been almost 20 days. I have also sent follow-ups, the last one being sent this Monday. He still hasn't responded.
Has he cancelled my project? If so, why hasn't he informed? What should I do next? Should I send another follow up this Monday?

Many universities are still on break.

Given that the 20 or so days covers holiday periods there might be a simple answer. The professor might be traveling. Might even be sick, given the pandemic. You can follow up if you like, but keep it polite. If you have access to the department email address, you could ask them if there is a reason that they might not be replying.
Don't jump to conclusions, but follow up with other options that you have.

(+1) Normally 20 days (to me) is getting past a reasonable waiting period (but still within some people's response times . . .), but the two things you've pointed out -- holidays and pandemic -- make things quite a bit less unreasonable. Moreover, the existence of these two possibilities affecting things also provides a good excuse-opening for an email request to the department itself.


text:
How severe does an error have to be to warrant retraction?
I have noticed an issue in one of my previously published works, which is approximately 6 months old. The issue has resulted in some minor data extraction errors and the inclusion of three studies (of approx. 20 total included) with duplicate data. These studies were part of a secondary analysis and while the error sounds substantial, there is no significant effect on the results of that analysis and certainly no significant effect on our overall findings or primary analysis.
Despite this, I feel the record should be corrected and intend to submit a corrigendum providing details and updated analysis. Is this sufficient, or should we be suggesting a retraction?

It depends on how likely someone else is to find out.

You should definitely prepare a rigorous corrigendum, outlining what exactly should be disregarded and adjusted.
Whether or not your error warrants a retraction is impossible to say for an outsider. If you genuinely believe that the core of your paper is still valid (as you seem to), I’d file the corrigendum and a cover letter with the editor and let them decide. The most urgent retraction reasons include manifestly false results or those based on fraudulent (or false) data. In your case it sounds more like a question of loss of statistical significance (17 instead of 20 studies). How impactful that is, hard to say.
An informal way to think about this would be to ask yourself: after all necessary adjustments have been made, am I still proud of my paper? If yes, go for the corrigendum.


text:
No rec letters from subject area of master's application
I have a minor in the subject I want to get a master's in (CS). Core courses, all excellent grades. I have a major in math. If I get all 3 of my recommendation letters from math people (or possibly 2 solid math letters and 1 stellar letter in a totally unrelated subject), will that look bad to the CS admissions committee? As core courses, the CS classes were all massive lecture halls and I didn't develop personal relationships with the profs.

Oh, it doesn't really matter.
If it is course-based CS master, not researched-based CS master, then a recommendation letter only takes a very very small portion of it, so whether it is from a math professor or a CS professor doesn't differ too much.
GPA is the most important.
One of my friends who worked in the admission process before told me that the first admission step is to filter out students whose GPA is lower than 3.5 no matter which university they were in.


text:
Where to donate foreign-language academic books?
After the death of a professor relative, my family on the East Coast has a collection of several hundred Russian-language technical books in physics, math, and hydrology. These were carefully selected works, so the family would like to donate them somewhere where they might be used. How could we find an institution or individual who might be interested in this collection?

Send them to https://1dollarscan.com/ to be digitized, and make them freely available. Although they're unlikely to be of much use to anyone.

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/123244/what-can-i-do-with-like-new-recent-edition-textbooks-that-im-not-allowed-to-se Closely related, the accepted answer there might be applicable to your case too.

@DimitriVulis By all means go ahead and scan them for your own enjoyment; but making them freely available (i.e., putting the scans online for anyone to download) would very likely violate copyright laws. Publishers are forever fighting a losing battle against their books being made freely available online.

I suppose you don't mean the East Coast of Russia.  (I know the question is tagged [tag:united-states], but for clarity, it wouldn't hurt if the question body would be clear on its own.)

@JanusBahsJacquet That rather depends on when and where the books were published, however. As I understand it, the copyright protection durations were noticeably shorter in the Soviet Union than in the West, which I think is used by the group scanning and uploading titles published by Mir books.

@Anyon Very true. Regardless of copyright law, it also makes a big difference to most publishers whether it’s a book they’re still actively selling, or one that’s been out of print for decades with no chance of ever being reprinted.

In the city where I live in similar situation relatives started asking on social media (and found me to donate me books, that's why I know). May be you can try the same thing: find somebody interested in your area using social media.

a collection of several hundred Russian-language technical books in physics, math, and hydrology

Given these specific fields, I would encourage reaching out to the Niels Bohr Library & Archives at the American Institute of Physics, which is  physically located in College Park, Maryland. Historical physics books are squarely in their wheelhouse, and hydrology topics relevant to geophysics should be relevant too. I'm not sure about mathematics. A fact of relevance here is that they do have a considerable collection of books in Russian. The library is particularly interested in older materials, books with annotations by prominent scientists, and less commonly stored materials such as catalogs and manuals. Their guidelines for donating books can be found here, and guidelines for donating other materials can be found here.

If you are close to the university in which they taught and there are students there from Russia (or who speak Russian), one fairly common solution is to ask another professor to help by leaving some subset (not several hundred at once) in the hallway with a "free" sign on the box. They will disappear.
I'll note that there was a time, during the Cold War, where quite a lot of math was done in, for example, St. Petersburg, and it was somewhat difficult in the West to get access to the ideas. Perhaps you have a few gems in the collection.
You might contact a head librarian at a university library to see if there is any interest.
If there is another Russian scholar there (or at a more nearby place) they might be able to help, especially if they have kept contact with others. I don't know the current state (retired) but I taught a lot of Russian immigrants in the US.
A more general solution, not focused on Russian language books, but very useful even for English or French books is to have a set of scholars finance a shipment of books to some place in, say, Africa, where books are expensive and hard to come by and where students tend to know the language. A local professor where I live did this on his own, collecting books from colleagues and sending them to Kenya, where he was originally from. This, I think, is expensive, as he tried to fill a shipping container.


text:
References of version 2 of an arXiv paper not added in Google Scholar
I first uploaded a paper to arXiv and it was correctly added to my Google Scholar profile. After a few months, I made some modifications to the article, uploading a second version to arXiv (this revised version included some new references too).
However Google Scholar, despite correctly pointing to the (revised) second version of the arXiv paper, did not recognize the new references.
How can I solve this issue?

A good point @astronat, I was a bit off. Comment duly deleted.


text:
Getting married abroad on August 21st, job begins on August 23rd. What do I do?
I just completed my Ph.D. and have recently been offered a lecturer position in a university. The first day of classes is on August 23rd, and I am getting married abroad in Europe on August 21st. The university is not aware of this, and I am not exactly sure about what to do.
I am considering catching a flight the day after my wedding (Aug 22nd) and then going to work on the 23rd, although this is risky and very stressful. Perhaps I will be expected to be present the week before I begin working, which is out of the question for me.
Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to handle this situation?

Have you asked your supervisor, boss, or the department administrators about this ? If yes, what did they say ? It is best to make them aware of this and ask for their opinion. They may find a suitable solution for you such as letting a TA temporarily teach your class for the first few days if this is a normal undergraduate class.

Several years ago I hired a post-doc who wanted to delay starting a month or so to go get married, go on a honeymoon, and then start. I convinced him instead to start earlier, take unpaid leave for the wedding etc., and then 'start' work. I felt better knowing he had insurance coverage and whatnot.

@Job_September_2020 I have not made the department administrators aware of my situation yet. I am trying to determine how to handle this. This university does not have TAs. Any other suggestions?

@JonCuster Since this is a teaching position, I would only delay starting the job by at most 2 days.

@Sarah You are playing a tight game. Flights get delayed, weather, volcanoes or other imponderables can weigh in. and you will have a very stressful time at your wedding to the moment you reach the grounds of your institution. Seriously, not a good idea. Talk to your institution, if they have a solution for you, you'll have them on your side, and if not, you know that you need to make a decision. Reasonable institutions will have an understanding for your situation and might offer the option for some remedy, such as doubling up your first week's duties at some other time.

@Sarah And if they tell you that you cannot delay anything, you know that you are playing a dangerous game, and can take an informed decision then rather than gambling with an unknown risk. You also may want to consider getting an early flight (or a late night flight at the wedding day) and perhaps a fly a more expensive class, so you would get priority treatment in case of a bottleneck (but you'd have to check with the airline).

Teach on Zoom the first day? We'll all be used to it

I would not count on being able to travel on such a tight schedule in August. While we all hope this crazy pandemic situation will be under control by then, it just seems foolhardy to ignore it now. For all we know there might be mandatory quarantines, or even a full ban on flights. Remember that most of Europe is still currently under lockdown, and even if the situation seems to be improving you can never be sure it will be completely resolved by August...

done phd + lecturer offer + getting hitched --> congratulations to you on all of these! ; 2 downvotes = 2 jealous/envious anonymous people?

@BCLC It's fair to say why one downvotes. I just did because I find this a pointless question (not useful to any present or future visitors, which is what the tooltip on the downvote button says): why is the OP talking to strangers on the internet instead of their department?

@Szabolcs well at least you're not anonymous, so ok i guess

I would suggest being less afraid of talking to people. This is something both you and the university would benefit from figuring out, generally in a mutually-beneficial way, so there isn't much of a reason to avoid discussing this with the university to find possible solutions.

@Szabolcs If the OP is getting a job offer, it's probably because they applied for the job. The best advice for the OP is "If you're applying for a job, and also planning another event such as wedding, check when the job would start, and plan your event accordingly". If OP doesn't have a time machine, they can't implement that advice, but if someone in a similar situation, but earlier in that situation, sees this question, it might prompt them to reconsider their plans.

I take it the potential job is in the US? It's somewhat relevant (if you're getting married in Spain, and your teaching job is in Morocco, that's not as much of an issue), and this SE has a lot of non-US people, so you shouldn't treat that as given.

Is August 23 the actual start of classes, or the start of an orientation period?  It is very likely that the actual date when the "job begins", in terms of your contract and expected presence, would be when your orientation / onboarding is to start, which is typically at least a week before the start of classes.

If you have to be there in person on August, 23rd, you must be sure there are no quarantine rules in place, when you arrive.

I would have waited for the wedding. Make the situation clear in advance and not after any contract / agreement.

The best way to handle a situation like this is to get in touch with your Head of Department / Director of Teaching in advance (perhaps, after you receive a formal offer) and discuss your situation. Make them aware of your wedding date (congratulations, btw!) and explain that you can arrive to your post right in time for your first class, but you would be grateful if your first lecture can be rescheduled to give you a bit more time. In many Universities it is customary for colleagues to step in for each other in case of sick leave or important family events (like wedding). It is much better to arrange a replacement / rescheduling in advance, rather than risk not showing (or showing not prepared) for your first class.

I have done this previously when having prior commitments when starting a new job. Upon acceptance, I let them know that I need to take leave on these dates for prior commitments. It has always turned out well.

Congratulations on finishing your PhD, getting married, and getting hired as a lecturer, all at once!
Can you record the first lecture online?  We've all been pretty used to online lately, so maybe you could start the class off this way.  Apologize to the students, explain you're out of the country but everything will be normal for week two.  You would probably need to clear this with your department first, but this seems like the best option if they'll allow it.
Barring that, has your school opened up the fall classes for student enrollment yet?  If not, maybe you can shift the weekly schedule to get another day or two.  I see August 23rd is a Monday - does that mean you teach M-W?  If so, maybe you can switch the class to T-Th, for example.
Or if neither of those, are you teaching one section of a larger course, with other professors also teaching the same sections with standard curriculum?  This often happens for early required classes that many students take every year.  If that were the case, maybe you could ask one of your fellow instructors to cover your first class, because they will have prepared the exact same material already anyway.  It's a little awkward since you're asking favors of people who don't know you, but it seems reasonable.
If none of those alternatives work, unfortunately, I think being back on the 22nd is your only option.  A teaching schedule isn't flexible - students sign up well in advance in order to coordinate their schedules, and the semester itself starts on a university-wide schedule that everyone knows well in advance.  You want to make a good, professional, first impression with the department and your students, and not taking responsibility for being there on the first day of class would be quite the opposite.

The first lecture is probably still going to be online even if the OP is back.  With possibly vaccine-escaping variants going around, OP would be endangering the students by holding a physical lecture within days of an intercontinental flight, and hopefully won't be allowed to do so.

At a lot of (US) universities, fall registration is already open, so switching the class around would probably be a hard no.

been offered a lecturer position

how to handle this situation?

Do not sign the contract until you have an agreement that is satisfactory to your future spouse, yourself, and the person who supervises your teaching.  Get the agreement in writing.
Signing the contract and then asking for changes would be extremely rude if this is the sort of situation where you have been hired to meet teaching needs.
Keep in mind that travel during a pandemic that is not essential is irresponsible, and will hurt your reputation.

Cancel your wedding and hold it locally instead.
In this time of global pandemic, international travel for trivial reasons should be avoided wherever possible, and weddings would be included in that. Travelling internationally to hold a wedding is simply selfish and irresponsible. As such, I would recommend that you simply cancel your European wedding and instead hold your wedding locally. If you have relatives in Europe who would be unable to come to a local wedding, stream it to them over the internet.
From an academic standpoint, this also means that you won't be stuck in quarantine for the first two weeks of term, and you'll actually be able to perform the full breadth of your duties during those two weeks.

This assumes: oj isn't vaccinated, the vaccinations campaigns will be late, the wedding guests aren't from Europe or won't fly to the wedding, the spouse is in the US, etc etc etc. And names none of those assumptions while being pretty presumptuous. -1

@DonQuiKong Even if those assumptions are wrong, travel for a wedding is inappropriate right now.

@DonQuiKong Even if all the guests are from Europe, they should still cancel the European wedding and livestream a locally-held wedding for them over the Internet. Even if they're vaccinated, the vaccines still aren't 100%, and there are dangerous strains like the UK strain in Europe. International travel for weddings is irresponsible while there's a global pandemic.

I assume that if OP marries in Europe, that is because partner is European, so at least one of the two will have to travel internationally (I don't think weddings on Zoom are a thing quite yet).

@DonQuiKong With possibly vaccine-escaping variants going around, it would be a very stupid government that allows travel without quarantine any time soon.  I don't expect regular intercontinental leisure travel before 2023.

This answer is outside the scope of this Stack Exchange, as it has nothing to do with academia. The Asker was not asking about what to do about the wedding, and thus did not include enough details for that to be dealt with. You're also making a lot of assumptions about the state the world will be in by that time--most events being scheduled in August are not currently being cancelled. And quarantine plans can greatly reduce risk.

@trlkly It's a frame challenge answer to the question. The answer to "how do I handle going to Europe two days before the start of term" is "don't go to Europe."

@nick012000 If the argument was "consider rescheduling the wedding" I wouldn't object. But instead the argument is "don't have the wedding due to the pandemic" which is outside the expertise of this SE. It also clearly scolds the Asker.

It's not a frame challenge, it's a frame rant.

What if they're already in Europe? What if they need to travel to Europe for essential reasons and the wedding is just something else they will do while there?

@trlkly: The OP DID simply ask what to do.  The only reasonable thing to do (IMHO) is to change the date of the wedding.  As stated, holding a large gathering for any reason is irresponsible, and international travel may be logistically impossible.  Although the OP doesn't explicitly say that she's in the US, note that a number of US states have made remote weddings legal, e.g. https://www.brides.com/virtual-weddings-legal-new-york-4842735 (Just the first hit of some 29 million.)

Hopefully, Stack Exchange will still exist after the covid-19 pandemic is over.  Some other user in the distant future may find this question applicable; and this answer won't be useful to them.

@DawoodibnKareem Sure. That's why I specified that it was asked in a time of global pandemic in the answer.

Calling someone's wedding "trivial" is rude and extremely offensive. This is not the place to do that.

@jamesqf the cdc disagrees.  For starters, if everyone is vaccinated the are no limits on group size

@eps: If vaccination rates in whatver European country the wedding would be held in are similar to those in the US, it seem highly unlikely that everyone would be vaccinated.

@wimi: While marriage is certainly not trivial, the actual details certainly approach triviality.  Do you really need to spend large amounts of money on a fancy ceremony?  Would two people be any less married if it was just the two of them and a Justice of the Peace>

@nick012000 I didn't ask for your opinion on whether or not I should cancel my wedding. To be quite frank, that is absolutely none of your business. I have been planning this event for nearly 2 years, and have already had to cancel it once. Both my fiance and I are first generation Americans and the majority of our families reside in Europe.I am fully vaccinated against Covid-19, and most universities in the US will soon be requiring that all students and faculty members be fully vaccinated by August 15th. I don't see the issue here with my wedding taking place abroad.

@nick012000 You would fire me for grossly irresponsible and unprofessional conduct? That is absolutely absurd. Perhaps you're uninformed about how the EU is currently working on vaccine certificates for non-European citizens to show proof that they're fully vaccinated so they may travel to Europe for leisure (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/25/world/europe/american-travel-to-europe.html). These certificates will be implemented by the end of June. Many Americans will be traveling to Europe this summer, and I am sure that many of them will be students and faculty members from US universities.

@Sarah "You would fire me for grossly irresponsible and unprofessional conduct?" Yes, I would. International travel for anything but critical business is irresponsible and selfish, and that's not just my opinion, but the official position of the government of my country (Australia) - and the fact that we've managed to largely avoid the coronavirus scourge much of the rest of the world is suffering from is proof of the effectiveness of that strategy. Be responsible, think about other people - stay home and cancel your European wedding. Hold it locally and livestream it to your family in Europe.


text:
Citation for trade paperback edition in APA 7
I've been looking at the online guidance from APA (and others) for how to handle editions of the text other than the first. In particular, using the guidance here: https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/book-references

Whole Authored Book
...

Use the copyright date shown on the book’s copyright page as the year of publication in the reference, even if the copyright date is different than the release date.
Include any edition information in parentheses after the title, without italics.

and

Republished Book, with Editor
...

Provide the year of the republication in the main date element of the reference. Provide the year of original publication at the end of the reference in parentheses after the words “Original work published.”
Both publication years appear in the in-text citation, separated with a slash, with the earlier year first.

My question is whether a paperback printing should follow the first form or the second form, or some combination of the two.
Relevant text on the book's title page:

Title of Book
Firstname Author
Publishing House Paperbacks
New York

Relevant text on the book's copyright page:

Publishing House Paperbacks
A Division of Publishing House, Inc.
Copyright (c) 2006 by Firstname Author
First Publishing House trade paperback edition September 2007

Would the proper citation in APA 7 be:
Author, F. (2006). Title of Book (First Publishing House trade paperback ed.). Publishing House Paperbacks.
or:
Author, F. (2007). Title of Book. Publishing House Paperbacks. (Original work published 2006)
or some other combination such as:
Author, F. (2007). Title of Book (First Publishing House trade paperback ed.). Publishing House Paperbacks.


text:
Is it a good idea to cold-email someone in a museum to ask for PhD funding opportunity?
I am an international (non-EU) student and have been offered admission to an art history PhD program in an UK university. However, the offer does not come with funding, and I do not have the financial means to fund it myself. My supervisor advises that I speak to government bodies in my home country to ask for funding, starting with the art museums. This is because my research area is related to the museum’s collection and my research can make an impact on the interpretation of some of these artworks. Additionally, I can work for the museum after I graduate and return to my home country so as to ‘give back’ to the museum for funding my PhD.
I did what my supervisor suggests, and looked for funding opportunities given by the museums. The problem is, there is no mention of any funding opportunity in these museum’s websites. After some digging, I manage to find one person who is now doing her PhD while she is a curator of a particular museum, but I am not sure if the museum funds her PhD or she holds a scholarship from the university. The financial statement of the museum also does not mention anything about scholarship or funding PhD studies.
In my current situation, I am willing to give anything a try. I am thinking of cold-emailing someone from the museum to ask about funding opportunities. Perhaps I can start with the curator who is now doing her PhD, if I am able to find her email online. My questions are, is this an unusual thing to do? Have anyone of you done or receive such cold-email before? What would you advice?

It sounds like you have no alternative?

It might not be a good opportunity, but no harm in trying. But expect a 'no' - museums generally are not funding agencies.


text:
How does having a PhD affect your chance of getting into a second PhD UK university in a different field UK university?
My friend has taken a unusual route in academia. She first did a bachelor and PhD in electrical engineering, fully funded by her scholarship. However, she told me that she has little interest in engineering, and only did it to please her parents. Her real interest is in art history. Hence, two months after completing her PhD in engineering, she took up a masters in art history in the UK, which is her dream. She did very well in her masters, and started applying for a PhD in the UK earlier this year. As of now, she has received multiple offers to study for a PhD in these universities. But, she has little success in obtaining scholarship for her PhD in art history.
I cannot help but feel a bit 'unfair'? I know many students who have spent a lot more time taking art history classes, such as those who did a bachelor and then a masters, but cannot manage to get into PhD programs. Hence, I have a few questions on the process that the UK universities have in selecting PhD students. Are the UK universities quite relax in choosing PhD students who have their own means of funding (assuming that they can get a supervisor there who is willing to supervise them)? Does the pandemic causes the UK universities to relax their section of incoming PhD students? Does having a PhD in a separate field made my friend easier to be accepted into a PhD in the UK university?

Having an existing PhD is unlikely to affect universities' or supervisors' willingness to take a PhD student, if they can pay their own fees. However, it is likely to prevent her from getting funding for a PhD. Many funders have rules against this.
Re COVID: This is anecdata, but I think scholarships have become scarcer this year as universities become nervous about their finances.

Can you point to some specific examples of funders that have rules against this, because I looked into it and I couldn't find any, although it was my instinct that they would have.

@IanSudbery my own university doesn't allow it for its own scholarships, and I know of one UKRI-funded CDT that has a similar rule. Beyond that I don't know off the top of my head, I'm afraid, and don't have time to search. Maybe it is rarer than I thought!

Your university still has its own scholarships! Blimey, we havn't had those in years.

... she has little success in obtaining scholarship for her PhD in art
history... I cannot help but feel a bit 'unfair'?

Overall, I would interpret your friend's lack of success in getting funding for her second PhD as tacit rejections from these universities. An offer of a PhD without any money attached is not really an offer at all (see e.g. Is it worth self-funding a PhD to attend a top 10 university? and especially Fomite's answer to that question for more information on this point).
Note: there is a subtlety here about the type of self-funding. If a student has won an external scholarship or grant, or has some money from their own government (or maybe a national museum or gallery in the case of art history), that student would be very attractive and likely get many offers for a PhD.

Are the UK universities quite relax in choosing PhD students who have
their own means of funding (assuming that they can get a supervisor
there who is willing to supervise them)?

No. If you don't have the potential to do good research then it's likely you won't get an offer to study for a PhD, even if you're as rich as Croesus. Since your friend has been offered PhD positions, then the universities clearly think she is capable, but would rather award their funding to someone else (see my answer to your last question below for why).

Does the pandemic causes the UK universities to relax their section of
incoming PhD students?

It could be that there are fewer applicants for PhD positions, as people may be preferring to go into a more stable career than academia at the moment, or international students may be put off by how the pandemic has been handled in the UK. However, I would expect that there are still more than enough candidates to make the selection competitive and hence no relaxation or lowering of standards on the part of the universities. Furthermore, since PhD funding is decided years in advance, I don't think that we have seen the effects of the pandemic on that yet.

Does having a PhD in a separate field made my friend easier to be
accepted into a PhD in the UK university?

It's possible. Offers for a PhD are generally based on the research potential of the candidate, and obviously someone who already holds a PhD is capable of doing research. However, this clearly counts against them when it comes to funding. Most supervisors/departments would rather fund someone who doesn't have a PhD than someone who does -- who's already "had their turn", so to speak. This question and its answers discuss why doing two PhDs is generally not a good idea: Is doing two PhDs a good path?.
A final point to consider is that funding in art history is likely far scarcer than in engineering, especially in the UK where the government has placed heavy emphasis on funding STEM research over humanities in recent years.

@DanielHatton I'm not aware of rules explicitly baring second PhDs.

@astronat "funding in art history is likely far scarcer than in engineering" - I think this point could do with emphasizing. The ARHC, which I guess provides most of the PhD funding in this area gives out 600 studentships a year across ALL areas of the humanities. The BBSRC - which funds not only just biology, but even only part of biology (The MRC funds medical research, NERC funds ecological research) gives out 2000 a year. My dept (1 of 4 biology depts) gets 8 students a year funded. The whole of the humanities (from history to geography, to law, to philosophy to fine arts) gets the same.


text:
Tenure track position after campus interview on Apr 19
I had a campus interview on Apr 19, and there are other two candidates were interviewed after me in the same week. I sent out a thank you note to the search committee after I finished the interview. I believe I did a good job in the interview, especially for the research talk part. One of faculties told me that it was a good presentation and good job. I received an email from the chair two days ago and he told me that they are working on finalizing the candidate and asked me to send him the degree, transcript, and EIT designation. So, I was wondering does that a good sign to me? Am I the top candidate to them?
Thank you!

that is not an answerable question, as we can't read mind of the appointment committee. Is there a problem you need help solving?

Here is yet another classic opinion-based question that has not only been left open, but answered. Why?

There is no guarantee, but it seems that you place highly, at least. Do what they ask and hope for the best.
My best guess is that unless the required documentation shows something critically wrong, then you are likely to get an offer. But it is their process, not mine.

Generally speaking: asking you for more details means that you’re definitely being seriously considered. Rejection letters are usually short and to the point; no one would ask for more details if you’re not under consideration.
Are you the top candidate? It’s actually likely: they’re asking for administrative information which is likely needed to verify your credentials, something that’s usually done at a later stage of the hiring process. Of course, you’ll know soon enough!


text:
Passing meta-info to future anonymous reviewers of my paper
I have meta-info (about a paper I'm submitting) that could help reviewers but can't go into the paper itself.
For example, it may preempt questions like Why didn't you address the cutting-edge topic X? (The journal wants "cutting-edge" and is hard-to-get-into.) I expect this meta-info  might save review time or even prevent outright rejection by reviewers. It's all  in my submission cover letter, which the journal intends for the editor only.
Would passing meta-info to anonymous reviewers be appropriate? If yes, what of the following could work?

In the cover letter, stating "Please forward any parts of this letter to reviewers at your discretion".
Attaching a separate note to future reviewers.
Adding temporary footnotes to the paper itself.

A better option?

While you can communicate it through the editor, with a suggestion to pass it on, a far better solution is to write the paper so that it isn't needed.
The reviewers aren't the only people (hopefully) that will read your paper and such metadata might be hard to communicate to them. In any case, it complicates an ordinary readers understanding unless you make the paper as clear as possible.