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Is There a Way to List Writing Recommendation Letters on a CV?
As a PhD Candidate, I've written several successful recommendation letters for students who I've taught in my classes. Is it worthwhile to include this information on a CV, say under "Service"? I've never seen this included before on a CV, but I was hoping there might be a way for me to highlight my contributions to teaching outside of the classroom.

As a candidate for what, exactly? What is the short term purpose of the CV?

@Buffy A "PhD candidate" is just a PhD student, typically after they have passed qualifying exams/prelims (though in some cases people use the term to just mean a student working towards a PhD at any point).

I wondered if, in this case, it meant someone looking to enter a doctoral program. That would make a bit of a difference.

Hi @Buffy I'm a PhD Candidate in how Bryan Krause mentioned: I'm ABD. This would be a CV for academic teaching positions.

OK. I think his answer is good advice.

I have not seen this and wouldn't recommend it, I would not consider writing recommendation letters to be under academic "service."
If you specifically mentored particular students then it makes sense to note that mentorship, but if they were just people who took your class then writing them recommendations is just part of your teaching responsibility, it doesn't mean anything for your qualifications if your students were successful when you wrote them recommendations, those are your students' accomplishments rather than yours.

+1 for the pointing out that this is implicitly on your CV under the relevant teaching and mentorship sections.

No, you should not list letters of recommendation that you have written on your CV.
It is true that this activity requires time. When you become faculty member, you will write even more letters for students and again you will not list them on your CV. You will also (eventually) write letters of recommendation for graduate students seeking to become faculty, and for faculty peers at other universities seeking tenure or promotions. None of these activities will ever appear on your CV.
Peer review activity that does appear on your CV includes journal, conference, and proposal refereeing activity that you conduct. Of course, you never indicate specifically which works you have refereed.
One more thing: student privacy laws (at least in the US) probably would prevent you from listing student recommendation letters that you have written on your CV, even if it was otherwise a good idea.


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How to Approach the Teaching Presentation for a Tenure-track Interview in the U.S
As the title mentions, I am wondering how to approach an upcoming teaching presentation I will be giving as part of an interview. To be clear, this is a 30-40 minute teaching presentation on a topic related to the humanities-based field in which I work.
My main concern: I am fairly certain that the audience will be composed entirely of the committee, rather than students, so I am concerned about whether I will appear like I'm talking down to my colleagues if I give a standard freshman survey lecture. Or is this just part of the interview process, whereby professors sit back and act like they're teenagers again?

What type of university?  The advice I would give for University of Michigan, Cal State Chico, Duke University, Carleton College, and Providence College would be all completely different.

It’s a large public university with MA programs but no doctoral ones; it’s not ranked as a research university.

I had a very similar experience when I was interviewed for a science position at a small liberal arts college. The audience consisted of a small number of students though, (about 5), and a lot of faculty members including the dean (more than 10)!
To begin with, the only adjustment I made to my normal teaching style was that I prepared a self-contained lecture, i.e., I talked about everything one needed to understand the lecture without assuming they had any prior knowledge of the subject presented. I.e., I briefly explained the mathematical background needed to follow the lecture, the physics background, etc. To prepare the lecture I consulted with YouTube and Udemy lectures on other subjects because usually they do a good job of preparing self-contained lectures. Moreover, I always use Wikipedia to find interesting trivia on a subject to inject into my lectures.
Now during the actual presentation, I assumed that I'm the one in charge of the room (it's a psychological trick I use when I teach), so I didn't care about the audience in the sense that I wouldn't talk down to colleagues but I wouldn't disrespect anyone either. I stopped to ask questions, I discussed major points, and overall I kept the whole thing relaxed and to the point. In my mind, I was teaching a freshman class if that makes sense.
Finally, pick something you find interesting to teach (if you are free to choose) and enjoy the process. It's very important to have a bit of fun in any type of teaching situation anyway. Don't assume that colleagues will know every single thing you'll talk about. You'll be amazed about how happy people become when you talk to them about something they already know or heard about, but take it a step further. Good luck!

I think you should ask your audience to role play their students. When they ask questions as students you can both answer them as students and offer meta thoughts about what you chose not to say.
I hope they are willing to do this. If in your experience teaching you found it necessary to encourage students to participate, do that here.
I would avoid a standard "freshman survey lecture" unless that's been particularly requested. Can you start out saying this is small junior level class halfway through the term on [topic]?

Is this common to ask the professors to “role play” as students? Some people might find that to be fun, but I know others who might find it patronizing. But specifying that the talk doesn’t need to be at a freshman level is also a good point.

(A tenured professor enthusiastically playing the role of a student during a teaching demo is one of the few times in my life I've had someone raise their hand and ask me "but sir, but sir, what do I do if I can't find the derivative?!" in crisp Australian schoolboy accent.)

That’s really funny!

@Parever I've no idea whether it's common, but it's something I would do under the circumstances. Not because it would be fun, but because it would help both the candidate and the department evaluate each other.

As I write below, I think it should be approached like a normal lecture, because if you start thinking (internally), that these are colleagues it might affect your overall composure. Who says that colleagues know everything there is to know about what you are about to teach anyway?

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What level of computer skills should a university instructor expect students in a business class to have?
This question has been bothering me for some time as I had to fail a student as you'll see later on. I am hoping that another SE member has seen a student or may have even been a student like this.
During my course - a business course, not a writing course - I had a  student in my class. Every week I assign a paper based on the reading students should have done, but not based on questions they can answer directly from the text book. The questions pertain to current or recent events within the business world involving their studies.
Most students say it takes them anywhere from 2-5 hours working on the assignment that is due each week. I've never had an issue with a student not being able to finish the paper in time and I am more lenient in grading a paper that has less than the assigned pages than most.
Now, this student, I will refer to her as "A", seemed to be falling behind around the third week of the course. I quickly noticed that all of her citations for her research on the weekly assignment were books and textbooks but not excerpts taken and cited from online sources.
After a class I sat down with A and asked her why she prefers citing so many books and not looking online for the sources. I also asked if that's how her old school had required students to do most of their research.
My question was followed by that she doesn't really understand how the internet works and the only thing she really knows how to do is use a Word processor. I don't care what platform my students find their sources on from but I was now concerned because she, like I said, seemed to be falling behind.
When asked how long she spends on the assignment each week she said it takes her 3 days of going through books in the university library and the local public library. I advised her to seek out a librarian that works at my university and ask for a tutor there that I personally knew and would be willing to help her.
In the end this student kept falling more and more behind as the semester went on. An assignment that shouldn't take more than a couple hours was taking A days to complete, and with a final research project worth 30% of the grade she would have no chance of completing it on time using just books as resources without the help of the internet to at least guide her to the correct books.
Is this a common thing to happen with some students and could I have done more without giving the student "special treatment"?

Can you please clarify what type of institution (large university, apprenticeship training center, community college, etc.) you are teaching at? What type of students are enrolled in your courses (e.g., non-traditional, GED seekers, etc.)? At the schools I'm familiar with, all of the students are required to use the internet to take care of business, so I'm genuinely curious if there is something unique about your workplace that I'm not familiar with.

Sure, I teach at a mid size to large University with courses of up to 50 students in it.  Most students I see are pursing either an associates or a bachelors. I teach a course most students taking during their first semester and most courses involve computing in some way, shape, or form. All courses require papers to be typed but not all courses go beyond the textbook.

Note that the answers would be different if you were teaching a highly technical subject, which is why I edited to specify the subject in the title.

What do the pre-requisites of the course ask for? Do the pre-requisites say "basic computing abilities assumed"?

Aren't there "courses" or talks or labs or something offered for free by the undergraduate library to help new students get skills like basic computer skills, research skills, writing skills?  I've been in multiple university libraries in the past 20 years or so and I always see posters up in the libraries offering these kinds of things.  Plus individual help where needed.

Certainly it is reasonable to expect your students to be comfortable with a word processor and with basic internet research.
However, once in a while you will have a student who doesn't meet one of these, or some other basic skill expectation.
When this happens, you want the student to get up to speed ASAP.  You offered a helpful, practical suggestion for this -- gold star!
If your first suggestion doesn't work, then you may want to go to someone in your teaching infrastructure, such as a dean of undergraduate studies in your department, and let them know about the problem.  That person may take it from there, or give you another suggestion, or advise you that you've done all you can to get the student to remedy the deficiency, and remind you that sometimes the best motivation for change is failure.
Separate from the above, there is something you can do to help the student be more successful, in terms of your own teaching.  I'll give you an analogy.  Suppose a middle school social studies teacher assigns a project, with the instructions that to accompany the text, five hand-drawn illustrations are required.  (This example is taken from recent real life -- incredible but true!) Suppose a student in the class has some sort of difficulty (physical or otherwise) with hand-drawn illustrations.  Would it be fair to reduce this student's grade if the project is missing the five hand-drawn illustrations?  Of course not.  This student needs an educational accommodation, so that he can demonstrate his knowledge, without getting hung up on the form of demonstration.
Your internet-challenged student needed an educational accommodation too.  We don't want the student to get evaluated on her internet research skill if that in itself is not the primary (or even secondary) academic goal of your course.  (Please correct me if I'm wrong -- I'm assuming that internet research skills are a means to an end, not the end itself.)
You can do some brainstorming on your own when you see that a student needs an educational accommodation, and you can ask colleagues, friends and the disability office.  (Not because this student had a disability, but because the folks in the disability office are used to thinking outside the box.)  Once you've got a few ideas as a starting point, it's time to run them past the student to see if she has a preference, or any additional ideas.
I'll do a little quick brainstorming myself, just to get the ball rolling:

Ask for the student's email address, and send her three specific internet links you would like her to read in preparation for each assignment.
Once a week, print out three specific articles you would like her to read, understand and synthesize for that week's topic.
Mix it up.  Sometimes make a small group weekly assignment that requires collaboration.  Make sure everyone has gotten into a small group, and ask the students to let you or the TA know if their group isn't working out, so regrouping can take place.

"Please correct me if I'm wrong -- I'm assuming that internet research skills are a means to an end, not the end itself" The course itself doesn't revolve around internet research but does revolve around research in general. As I stated in paragraph 6 of my questions students can do research through any means they choose. However, I am a business teacher and employee in the field of business and Internet research is very important for any business position even if you get in information from a book - in the jobs I have worked your boss will ask for an electronic citation of it even if

the company needs to spend a few dollars to get an e-copy. Just for ease of access.

This is a very interesting observation. Before suggesting anything, I would tell you to avoid the words like country. Because it seems your student "A" represents that whole country. Now come to your question. This is very natural to have some typical students who are not interested to update themselves. They just love to be in their old fashions. I have seen many such people e.g. instead of using a calculator for big multiplications, they use pen and papers to waste time unnecessarily.
As per your queries, following minimum computer skills should be expected from any University students:
1- Knowledge of Word processing, Spreadsheet and Presentation (e.g. MS office, OpenOffice etc.)
2- Web browser basics
3- Email and ability to use an online learning forum
4- Computer security (Skills to keep secure the personal information and computer data)
5- Understanding the software and hardware
6- Skills to make good presentation

Somewhere on that list should be Email and ability to use an online learning forum

I'm surprised at the specific requirement for MS Word etc., rather than for word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software in general. By most standards I'm a computer expert, but the most recent version of MS Office I've used is 2007. I switched to OpenOffice and/or LibreOffice.

I believe MS was specifically mentioned because that's what most Universities install on their own computers on campus. Correct me if I'm wrong. To have @Kayan elaborate - what do you mean by "Understanding to software and hardware"? Such as parts to the computer and what things are called when using a software such as MS or software and hardware knowledge in general?

I think the use of Word and Excel specifically (as opposed to word processors and spreadsheets in general) is a requirement for a high proportion of jobs. I don't think it's too much of an issue though, as most of the time the people who use other software are the ones who understand enough to be able to work out a different program. That might be changing now though as Macs are becoming so much more common.

Downvoted for specific products, and for disagreement on spreadsheet.

@Memj .. You are right.. Software here are Office and other computer softwares which is essential to understand.  Hardware here refers to the basic computer parts such as its keyboard, batteries, UPs etc etc ..

To answer your question I believe the following should be the basic knowledge for students
1. Word processing application
2. Ability to use an internet browser

The thought process for this list was thinking of a student who does not own a laptop/computer. The closet technological resource for the student on campus is library computers or a computer lab. Most library computers will have IE and MS Suite products. All the student has to do now is learn how to use them by teaching themselves or asking someone and the rest should follow.
For the latter part of the question, it isn't common for this to happen but every student comes from a different background. What is most important is that this student wants to learn and doing her best do to so the way she knows. Why don't you teach her the basics? I wouldn't call this "special treatment" since you are an educator and you're helping her learn a skill that is necessary in this day and age, and you're not doing her assignment.

Teaching someone the basics is time out of my other duties such as grading, and reviewing the next weeks work and lectures. I mentioned sending the student to be tutored in basic computing skills, which she was.

Have to downvote for the specific reference to individual products rather than classes of products, and because I doubt most students come in with experience with presentation tools or spreadsheets.

@keshlam I don't see the same comment for 6 item list above me.

My reaction was the same there; I just didn't explain twice. Since it bothers you...

The ability to use the internet (web search, email, etc.) and use word processing tools are usually considered assumed skills at university level.  So yes, you can reasonably assume that students should have these skills, and it is reasonable to set tasks that require these skills.  (It is not necessary to specify these as explicit prerequisites for courses to do so.)
As to your teaching, there is no need for you to worry about giving a student "special treatment" by helping them to bridge a gap in prerequisite knowledge.  That is a legitimate part of teaching, and there is no disadvantage to other students by providing this student with some assistance for developing basic study skills.  Most universities have some kind of Skills Centre where students can go if they need help with basic study abilities like this, so it is usually not something that course lecturers need to do themselves.  I would recommend you look up the learning resources at your university (sometimes these are run through the university library) and see if you can refer this student to some teaching on these areas.

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Self Studying over lectures
this is my first post here, I'll copy and paste a recent answer I asked in the physics and resulted a little bit inappropriate. I do physics so I'm mainly looking for answers for people in the field that maybe had some similare experience, but I think any opinion could be useful, so if I'm not out of context, thank you for any answer and here's my question:
I'm just starting what's basically the master in theoretical physics (I'm sorry, I'm not sure about the correspondence between italian and USA/UK studies. To be clearer: it's basically two years courses after the bachelor degree).
I'm having a little problem with the lectures and professors and I'd like to study and prepare exams on my own, but I'm not quite sure about this choice. The problem is that theoretical physics is very mathematical, and I don't ask you not to use it, but I require that you, as a physicist, don't put aside the physics to do just math. That's the point, we're doing all the math, all the calculations but we lack of things like physical interpretation of what we do, or physical reasoning, which, added to the abstractness already present on its own in theoretical physics, makes those lectures look like mathematical lectures. It's like those lectures could be done without any problem by a mathematician(with all respect to mathematicians). I'd like them to teach me how to do physics and give me tips and insights to get it, which is in my opinion the hardest thing. I can work out the mathematical passages on my own or look for them, but for the physics, at least in my case, it's way harder to figure it out and really get the physical meaning of something.
So basically I'm looking for opinion and help, to get me towards one, or the opposite direction: I'm so insecure cause I always followed lessons and this would be the first time i quit lectures and study just on my own, but I just can't stand me "paying" for physics and them "selling" me math.
So can someone help, give opinions and advices? Thanks again.

Chances are the mathematicians would not be able to do all of the calculations in theoretical physics because they would have a stroke every time the physicists say "the group SU(2) is isomorphic to the group SO(3)" ...
On a serious note, I don't really understand the question.

I don't really know how to explain it better, I was trying doing it in this comment but I end up repeating what I already wrote in the post, I'm basically asking for an advice: Doing something I like, on my own, that would make my exams harder, or doing something really gives me nerves but will make my exams way easier. Following lectures makes exams passing easier but I feel like I'm wasting important time I should spend studying physics for real, not the math used in physics. And since I'm no Newton I don't know if I can afford losing all this time

From my non-physicist POV, it sounds like you're finding that your view of what physics entails is different from the institution's view. Is it possible that another institution would do things differently (i.e., more like your view)? Alternatively, is it possible that you've misunderstood what the subject involves and all institutions would teach the subject similarly? I don't have the answers, but the questions seem, at least to my lay-mind, worth considering.

If I read your question right, I think you're asking: Should you study for exams/masters/PhD? Or, should you just keep studying theoretical physics at home without even thinking of what's happening at school? Am I close? Or totally off track?

@Ian_Fin I can talk about just another institution and I can say they do things a little bit differently, let's say more physical, sadly I couldn't join them. It may be aswell that almost all institutions teach it in the way I don't like, and to be clear, I think that what they teach are things ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY for a physicist, the problem is that there are other things even more important than those things, and they are sometimes ignored. As I said i can use two hours to work out the math on my own, but physical reasoning and insights are way harder to grasp and they have to be privileged

@scaaahu You're right there, I still wouldn't like to totally isolate. I want finish the master and get the phd, in order to be still in the field and have the chance to talk about physics, share ideas and work with better physicist than me, who can add something to my life, my mind and my understanding of the subject

@Angeloferrari You say in your question that you've just started a two year degree. Are you sure that all of this physical stuff that you consider to be even more important won't come later? Mikey Mike's question suggests you need to learn the maths before you can learn the physics. Perhaps you're in this first "learning the maths" stage now?

Suggestions for possible immediate use (without addressing your underlying problems/concerns): If you're not familiar with The Feynman Lectures on Physics, you may want to start there and see whether this helps. Also, simply looking through the books at you university's library might lead you to some useful reading material. Finally, you can try googling various phrases you are interested in physical intuition about simultaneously with phrases such as "physical meaning", "big picture", "what it means", etc.

@DaveLRenfro I'm familiar with Feynmann books, I loved them and studied for them(especially volume 2) during my undergraduate courses. Anyway you're suggesting me to look for textbooks where I can study the stuff on my own if I'm correct.

@Ian_Fin Yeah it's a 2 years degree, I think it's called master in USA, it follows the bachelor degree which I already have in physics, so I already studied the basics of math and physics, and I'm not "unwilling" to learn the math and the "new" math required, that is absolutely necessary, I just hate doing just that, just the math.

Much of what you appear to want probably comes from group/study sessions with fellow graduate students. However, from what you have written, I suspect that you are not involved with this and that you tend to study on your own, which is why I made the "study stuff on your own" suggestions.

Yes I rarely do group study with my friends, but I don't think they could give what I look for, a professor could do that, or a very talented student (a top physicist of the next generation), and none of them are available at the moment, or I simply didn't notice someone in my classrom. Thank you for your advice anyway.

I do not know if one can actually give a good answer here; from what I read here you are unhappy with your lectures because they seem to give the math and methods not enough perspective towards physics. If you feel that way, that is what it is.If you can not stand those lectures do not attend them and learn on your own. If you work through the lecture notes and the exercise on your own I think you still have a good chance of being successful in your exams. You could also talk about it with your profs. (if you have not tried that already). Out of curiosity what lectures are we talking about?

We're talking about a course on quantum field theory, a course in relativistic quantum mechanics and a course on statistical mechanics. I haven't tried talking to them even cause I don't want to be disrespectful or ask them to change their methods just for one student (the others are mainly worried about the toughness of the subject, not about the subject itself). Thank you for your advice

Please edit the post to include an actual question.

@JeffE  Edited, hope it's fine now.

OP's question touches a subtle point.
Physics looks like it is a form of math, but it is very different in how it is approached. This complicates the physical interpretation.
Let me start with a tacky comparison - think of the following: physics is like programming in a dynamic language (say Python), math is like programming in a statically typed language, (say C++). In the latter, you declare all ahead of time, make the assumptions clear and build things up just as if you knew where you wanted to go all along.
In the former, on the other hand, you can build up your concepts just on the fly, as you go, and, while in programming that's probably bad practice, that's what actually happens in physics.
The property of physical concepts are, even if they are of mathematical nature, essentially "duck-typed" - you use whatever feature you want from them, and when it fails, you tack on some other concept, just as required. Just look at pseudo-vectors (e.g. angular momentum) - they are indistinguishable from vectors for almost all operations, except when you mirror them (in 3D), that's when the equivalence breaks down.
A mathematician would exclaim in horror that a pseudo-vector constitutes the wrong concept and the right thing to use instead would be a 2-form. It is clear that the mathematician would have wanted the concept to be defined/agreed upon in the beginning, while the physicist is happy to adjust his interpretation post-hoc, as phenomena (in this case, a computational/theoretical one, but it could be experimental) are discovered.
This causes the main misunderstanding between mathematicians and physicists; and I believe it is also at the core of your question - when you ask, where is the physics, I suspect you find it difficult to disentangle where one just runs down a mathematical/computational formalism, and where true (physical) assumptions are made.
For this, I recommend actually taking the mathematician's stance and to pull apart what the assumptions are in a model from the computations that follow from these assumptions. The idea is to make it precisely transparent what is a physical assumption/property of your space, and what is a mathematical consequence. It is then the job of the physicist to fill the conclusions with physical meaning/interpretation.
You are not being taught to do proper modelling and interpretation? No surprise, this is not something that happens often, usually only at paradigm shifts, so your professors will be out of practice in this respect. No, your professors most likely do not sell you math. Rather, I suspect, they sell you some conglomerate of mathematical notation and derivation, "duck-typed" with physical assumptions throughout.
There are some books which are a bit cleaner about separating the levels (e.g. Wu/Sachs for General Relativity), and I am sure there is more, but I am out of the field now and am not up-to-date about further good literature to get a clearer handle on things.
In short: It is not the math-heaviness that you most likely suffer from, but the lack of clarity which part of the discussion presented to you is physical assumption, which part is abstraction, and which part is technical derivation.

Although this answer makes some reasonable point, it needlessly parodies mathematicians' viewpoints on things...

Thank you for your answer and your help. I have to agree with you, I'll start from the end, the "in short" part: that's exactly what I meant, I don't despise math-heaviness, I actually like it when it's clear what we are doing. You expressed my problem in a better way, so thank you. About the paradigm shift part and the reason they can't teach me proper modelling and interpretation, I'm not sure I got it, so could you elaborate it more?

@paulgarrett I studied mathematics and physics and found myself, during my TA time the goto-point for students from both topics to understand the "others" viewpoint. Above, I simplified the situation description because I believe it is useful to help OP understand what the problem is - I have actually great sympathy for the mathematicians point of view. It is not meant as polemics, but rather to help the OP see straight what the problem is, instead of a even longer-winded, verbose explanation.

But I disagree that what is portrayed is "the mathematicians'" viewpoint, simplified or not. Perhaps that of math grad students or undergrads, and certainly a common belief among physics grad students, and so on. But this caricature disserves all parties. Lengthy observation does suggest that undergrads and grad students often do have somewhat exaggerated viewpoints, but I'd claim that working mathematicians do not necessarily share those simpler caricatured outlooks... exactly because they are inaccurate and unhelpful.

@Angeloferrari Good point, I was too brief on that: when a technique is discovered and introduced or a concept is generalised, its inventors know how/why this happened. They have a clear picture of the needs/gaps that are closed by this new concept or experiments. After a while, the technique becomes common knowledge/routine. Explanations and contexts are forgotten and often not taught anymore. Perhaps they can be taken for granted, but the student doesn't know that. Often, active scientists do not practice this type of justification, because in much of the day-to-day work, it's unnecessary.

@paulgarrett The OP obviously found the explanation helpful. I do not know how to reformulate it so that it won't offend you and would continue to make a crisp point. Yes, we are talking students here, so I am happy to change that, if that's the point of contention. Feel free to make a suggestion how to improve the formulation without losing clarity.

@CaptainEmacs Thank you, I think I get what you meant now.

I think it's just that factual inaccuracy tends to be not a good thing. It is a palpable fact that factually inaccurate explanations are often more palatable than accurate ones. It's not that mathematicians universally insist on "logical order" and never work heuristically or iteratively or invoking physical intuition, I can attest. So to explain (to a beginner) that their mathematical difficulties are due to viewpoint quirks of mathematicians is an unhelpful misattribution: it is the beginner's own inexperience with the mathematics... and possibly incomprehension of this by people... [cont'd]

[cont'd] ... who could be clarifying helpfully. There is no need to ascribe exaggerated behaviors to mathematicians/physicists to discuss the several different threads of thought in doing any kind of science... I only mention this because such stuff too easily turns into demonizing of "the other", probably not helpful in the long run, etc.

I speak from my very own experience, and I believe that I have the right to do so as long as it was my honest observation. What you call "exaggerated" behaviour was a pretty accurate description of my own experience. I am sure that mathematicians have a whole batch of intuitions working for them, but in every single collaboration with mathematicians I ever had (not just as student), I had a hard time talking to them, unless I managed to precisely "declare" what am I talking about in a quite precise "syntax". Which is perfectly fine. I do not see what this has to do with "demonisation".

If you have a different experience, that's fair enough. However, either by luck, coincidence or misfortune, this is mine. So, actually, what I said in my answer was not even meant as a caricature - it reflects my own experience. That being said, I only ever worked with mathematicians from continental Europe, esp. Germany, which may, of course, colour my perception.

Although many physicists tend to like more the physics than the mathematical details, it is crucial for a physicist to master the required mathematical details. Understanding all the mathematical concepts  give you a high level of mathematical techniques which can be applied to various theories in physics. My advice would be to go to the courses, and also to study in great detail what you really like in your spare time, perhaps guided by a professor. Unfortunately, in physics, one must learn the mathematical language, and then the physics associated.

I totally agree about the importance of math which I personally love, and for a theoretical physicist is required a deep knowledge of math in my opinion. But to do physics you need way more than just that math, if it wasn't like that, mathematicians would do physics. And it's the lack of the physical aspects in my courses that bothers me, not the mathematics. It's the use of math without thinking about the physics you're doing. Hope I'm clear now.

if it wasn't like that, mathematicians would do physics — So?  Many mathematicians do do physics.  Is that supposed to be a bad thing?

It's not a bad thing, it just isn't the same thing. You can't simply do physics with just mathematics, that's what i meant. You need math to do it but if math is all you need we would just have mathematicians doing it, not physicist.

I think you should ask this on the Physics site too.
It sounds like this department might be a mismatch for you.  You might want to look around for a different school to transfer to.  Before deciding, visit some classes that you would take next semester and next year.  Maybe the professors you have this semester are not representative of your department's approach in general.
I understand your trepidation, your reluctance, to stop attending lectures.  On the other hand, I understand the temptation.  Not attending frustrating lectures might give you more time and energy to focus on your self-study.
I would suggest that you avoid an all-or-nothing approach.  Pick one class to experiment in with your non-attendance idea.
There is the tiniest chance your current state of mind could be part of a change in your medical condition.  It couldn't hurt to go get a check-up and let the doctor know how school is going for you.
But I think the mostly likely explanation of your current frustration is that
(a) not all physics teaching is good;
(b) sometimes a class is taught well but it's not a good fit for an individual student;
(c) you may have had bad luck this semester -- the ideal scenario is to have a variety of courses at any given time, so you can do some work that emphasizes mathematical manipulations, but have balance out with experimental work that helps you grasp the physics in a meaningful way.

Sorry I mistyped and added the comment before i was finished. I didn't really get the medical condition part. You're saying that my frustration and state of mind may affect the body negatively?

@Angeloferrari - There is one possible red flag in your Question.  If you were a friend or family member I would suggest you check in with your regular doctor, for my peace of mind.  The possible red flag I saw was that what you are proposing to do is rather drastic, and your level of frustration is pretty generalized (all three of your classes).  From the limited information I have, I would guess that the chances of something going on that a medical professional might be able to help with are < 10%.  The most likely explanation is a mismatch with the dept, bad luck with the semester,...

... an imbalance in the design of your program of studies, bad luck with your instructors, or some combination of those.  You know, balance is very important.  Yes, one has to do some math in order to do physics, but if you had wanted to do nothing but math, you would have joined a math department.

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


text:
Will my stressful year be seen as a negative?
I am an undergraduate student in mathematics. My academic performance is really good but many people tell me "you are too stressed up", including people who know me for a few weeks.
Due to some serious family issues the last few years have been hell.
As the time passes everything is returning to normal but the professors who don't know about those events might think this is how my personality is.
I am going to ask letters of recommendation from those professors for a graduate school application. Do you think this will negatively impact my application? What I can do about it?
edit: It's just the air around me. Some professors mentioned this: "You are too tense, don't worry you will go alright". Not sure how to explain this better.

I don't think there's enough information here to get a reasonable answer.  Maybe if you told us some specific incidents that came about due to your stress, or some specific behaviors your letter writers might be worried about.  More importantly, have you tried talking to your letter writers about this?

There's an outline of a question here. It would be better if it were fleshed out, but it is complete enough for me to provide an answer.

As long as you are professional in what you do and not offending/shouting at people, it is your business only (and that of your family/close friends/doctor) how stressed you are. But it sounds like they may be more worried than negatively oriented towards you - you may want to clarify.

It sounds as if they honestly only want you not to worry, but you are taking this somehow as a criticism.

"Stressed out" could hurt you insofar as people who would give you otherwise positive recommendations might be tempted to tone them down.
When asking for letters of recommendation, discuss these issues candidly with the prospective recommenders. Some might not care. Others might "care" but they might also be open to a discussion of extenuating circumstances. A few will have their opinions shaped by your behavior. If and when you identify such a person, you might want to withdraw your request for a recommendation from them.

When you ask a professor for a letter of recommendation, ask him or her: "Do you think my recent high level of stress will make it more difficult for you to be a reference for me?"
If you get any solid yeses, then I would recommend that you see a doctor to get some documentation about your mental health situation.  Take the documentation to the student disability office at your university.  They will work with your professors to help them see past the symptoms.
That last paragraph is totally hypothetical!  If there are no symptoms, or if the professors have not noticed any, then you can ignore that whole paragraph.


text:
Parts of my e-mail address can be seen as controversial in Western countries. Can this affect my Ph.D applications?
I have already finished my Mathematics Ph.D. application form for several universities. However, I noticed that my email address in my CV and personal information contains the number "666", which, I recently learned, is the number of devils. I'm not a native speaker of western countries. I'm from Asia and "666" means auspicious in my language. I've used this email address to apply for Ph.D. programs at several universities in Germany and the U.S. I'm wondering whether this would make me get rejected by universities' committees.

Some discussion, mostly about numbers in different cultures, has been moved to chat. Please see this FAQ before posting a comment below this one.

Don't worry.
I would find it extremely surprising if a European reacts very negatively to 666. Most people would be somewhat aware of a connection to "The Beast" in the biblical book of revelations, but they wouldn't really care. (I've grown up in Germany and spend most of my career in the UK, for reference.) On the other hand, it does not seem to be that rare for people in the US to feel eg uncomfortable with a bill of $6.66, and to buy a little bit extra to avoid it. But even in the US, I expect that the overlap between people doing that and people sitting on admission committees for Math grad schools is small.
Your email address isn't really what people evaluate, and most will just ignore it. Having numbers in your email address may be read as a little unprofessional. If someone notices the 666 they might think you're trying to be a bit edgy by flirting with satanism, but almost no one would care. People applying for PhDs tend to be young, and thus have a decent excuse for appearing a bit unprofessional and/or trying to be edgy.

In terms of the general applicability of this answer, email addresses someone finds genuinely offensive might well be a problem.

@IanSudbery Yes, there definitely are email addresses sufficiently offensive to cause problems here. But I can't really imagine anyone picking one of those by accident.

Yes. There is a story of a female prof recieving an application from someone with an email address of MenAreSuperior. Sender must have been aware.... But then why bother to apply?

@Arno actually, I was quite surprised how many numbers are considered dog whistles for neo-nazis. Apparently it's common knowledge in Germany, but I was very surprised by their list of banned number plates, you can't have any sequence containing "88" or something? I don't actually remember why, and my Google Fu is not doing well today.

@Arno anyway, I would hope that people would assume innocence for a foreigner, but I wouldn't bank on it either. Probably rather more of an issue than satanic associations.

@Clumsycat 88 stands for HH (8th letter of the alphabet), which in turn stands for "Heil Hitler". But when seeing an email address with an 88 in it, I'd think "year of birth" long before "f**king neo nazi". And the rest of the dog-whistle numbers are sufficiently obscure that I don't remember them.

@Arno 88 is also referring to 88 precepts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/88_Precepts), more commonly seen as a part of fourteen words, 14-88, or whatever the spelling is. I'm not actually sure if HH was also the original meaning in Lane's writings but also, in fairness, not motivated at all to find out. 88 as the year of birth, sure. 1488 - I have my doubts this is a reflection of being a huge fan of Royal Netherlands Navy.

@Clumsycat:  There's no general ban on license plate numbers with 88 in them in Germany.  The plates on my car inlcude the number "884."  88 as the above mentioned code for Hitler, along with his birth month (4 for April.)  It was simply the next number available when my plate number was assigned.  I thought nothing about it, not being a neo-nazi type of person.  It wasn't until later that I learned of the neo-nazi code numbers.  Nobody has ever said anything about my license plate number - and Germans as a rule are rather sensitive to the subject.

I do know of one range of license plate numbers that was forbidden for a while, but which was released in the 1990s.  License plates in Germany are composed of serveral parts.  First there's a series of letters (one to three letters) designating the regional license plate authoritiy, then there's a space followed by another letter designator that is usually assigned starting from A and counting upwards through up to three letters (A-ZZZ.)  At the end, there's from one to four digits (1-9999.) (continued)

The AA range was forbidden for the Limburg region (LM.)  LMAA is the abbreviation for a German phrase that means "kiss my ass." (Leck mich am Arsch.)  Up until sometime in the 1990s, you couldn't get a plate with that combination.  Limburg started running out of numbers that would fit the assigned scheme, though, so  they allowed the use of the AA range - which was sold out to people requesting that range within a short period.  That's the story I was told back in the mid 1990s by coworkers in Germany.

@JRE: I find this anecdote hard to believe. Limburg license plates allow three digits after two initial letters. This scheme allows 2626999=675324 combinations. That means that opening the AA block for plates would add an additional 999 combinations – that's about 0.1 percent of the total number of possible combinations. If they ran out of combinations in the early 1990s, they wouldn't have made it into the 2020s. What probably happened is that Limburg introduced the two-letter scheme in the 1990s in addition to the earlier one-letter scheme, and people grabbed the AA combinations quickly.

@Schmuddi: Running out of the two letter variants.  Some cars (mostly imported US models) have smaller licensplates where you need a short license plate number.

@JRE The license bureau aren't Mozart fans, I suppose.

@Ray:  Current usage is "Leck mich am Arsch."  The "Leck mich im Arsch" is older and not really in current use.  It was also used by Goethe.  If you speak German, this is a rather entertaining take on "am" versus "im."

FWIW as an American, I've never actually experienced someone being outright uncomfortable with a bill of $6.66 or other occurrences of 666. The most I've seen is that someone would comment on it, like "hey 666, that's funny", but most of the time it just passes unnoticed. So my experience is that it's even less of a thing than this answer implies. (Of course, my experience is not necessarily typical, but my guess would be that in general it is even less of a thing than this answer implies.)

@DavidZ there's a difference between $6.66 as a coincidence and someone intentionally opting to put 666 in their email address, though, no? OP has stated that they explicitly chose the address, so it's more likely someone would try to derive meaning from it.

@David I've seen it as a cashier. No one in my area (South) of the US would leave their total at $6.66. Probably not as much of a thing in other areas of the US, though.

@TarHalda. I've seen similar. Generally I would have to say that it's consistently not been the type of folks you'd expect on a grad school committee of any kind though, so probably not a reason to worry.

@AN I doubt it makes much difference. I mean, I think most people who would react negatively to an occurrence of the number 666 are not going to think about whether it was coincidental or intentional.

While I agree with the answer of Arno that this shouldn't be a problem, there is a technological fix.
It is probably easy for you to create a new email address, say at Gmail, and forward everything from either of them to the other, as you choose.
FWIW, there are other numbers with negative interpretations, 88 for example. And some email systems generate addresses with numeric elements as well.
Applying from an academic institution's email address is sometimes advantageous (minimally) and you might be able to get one from your current institution for purposes of application. You will probably get a new one from any institution you join in the future.
If you are a member of a professional society in your field then they might also make it possible to use an email address with the association name: buffy@ubw.org, say (UnderwaterBasketWeavers).

I don't wee how this would help. OP says "I've used this email address to apply for Ph.D. programs at several universities in Germany and the U.S." Having the email forwarded to a new address is not going to magically change the email address on the applications.

@CrisLuengo, yes, it applies only to the future or to others who may be in a similar situation but earlier in the process. What's done is done.

Another little-known one - if a user at gmail does not exist, then it removes dots from user part and delivers to that.   eg: If "b.u.f.f.y@gmail.com" does not exist, it will try "buffy@gmail.com"   So OP could send their address as   "fred66.6@gmail.com" and it would go to fred666 which looks slightly different.

@Criggie, yes, but AFAIK,  only gmail does that. With gmail, even if you register a name with the dots, tony.soprano@gmail.com, it will still work without them.

What is the negative interpretation of 88?

@AgnishomChattopadhyay It's used by neonazis for HH, or Heil Hitler, because H is the 8th letter of the alphabet. Ruining it for people born in 1988 or in the French département of the Vosges.

Make sure you don't create an infinite loop by forwarding from acc A to B, then B got a mail right? so forward it to A, B, A, B, A... until we all die.

Yes, multiple addresses work, but one has be careful when replying as most software by default will use the forward address as the sender address (that the receiver will see). And then they might use that address for all future correspondance.

You’re a member of UBW? Can you put in a good word for me? I’ve got a second-hand snorkel already.

69 maybe. 88? Yeah, no. I ain't feeding no trolls; there's nothing wrong with 88. And there's nothing wrong with holding you finger in the shape of an ell or w/e TF these poser kids are doing these days (stick your palm above your shoulder like you got a pair or stfu - so that I know to cross the street). That being said, if there's a 666 on anything, I take it out just so people don't think I put it there intentionally.

Just make sure you don't apply using an email address from the National Educational Welfare Board, the statutory agency in Ireland. They use addresses of the form xyz@newb.ie.

@tell. ...@newb.eg would be much more correct :)

A side aspect not mentioned so far but very important is the remainder of the email address.
There is a huge difference in perception between the email lucky.fella666@spam.email vs. jon.doe.666@university.edu. The first would most likely be considered unprofessional, whereas the second would definitely not.
Based on my experience, any email address not containing your name, some abbreviation of your name, or being from a professional (e.g., university/personal) domain could easily be perceived as unprofessional, i.e., seen as your spam/childhood/teeny email address. However, perception might vary vastly depending on the professional area and their culture. I.e., computer scientists would most likely not care if the email itself is sufficiently professional, whereas law professionals might have an entirely different attitude. Given that you say math I would suspect a reaction closer to computer science than to law.

While you may not be flat-out rejected for using '666', it is possible it may be interpreted differently from what you fear. Namely, without knowing you or the reason behind your choice, some people might think you as "cheeky", as some kid trying to be "a bad kid", similar to the style of some heavy metal bands. Such bias might have some negative effect; for example, while they will not avoid talking to you when you talk to them, someone might avoid initiating contact, or might avoid joint work, etc.

Second this. I would agree it's less likely someone will reject you because of a Satanism connection, but more likely someone would think you are immature for including an unprofessional / juvenile tag on your professional email address.
A friend of mine had a childhood email address which ended in 69. He made it before he knew the "adult" connection, and never bothered to change it. I don't believe he ever lost a job offer over it, but it definitely caused some raised eyebrows which were totally avoidable.

It's going to depend on the rest of the address. john.smith666 won't attract much reaction but satan.child666 would. Unfortunately there's a bit of a grey area in the middle, and if you have a foreign name that people don't recognise, it may fall into the grey area.

@StuartF. The latter can be easily rectified by changing your legal name to something other than Satan. Lucifer or Beelzebub are nice names that come to mind.

I suggest for applications going forward, change. Anything that distracts from your merits as a student should not be present on your application. While the odds are low that anyone will even see it, getting a new email address is fast and easy.
OTOH, if you already sent them in, don't worry about it.

It's like a first date with someone you really like. Do you wear your old ratty shoes that she would be fine with if you were dating? Or do you want to wear your nicer shoes on your first date to make a good first impression? Most people would wear their nicer shoes.
It's not a big deal, but say if even 1 in 200 applications get rejected for it, do you want to lose that chance? I wouldn't. I would have a slightly more professional email address to use.
BTW this wouldn't be offensive to anyone in academia, but it's an "edgy" thing that a teenager might put in their gamer tag. If it affects your application it will be because it will give an appearance of silliness and immaturity when you are applying for something very serious.

"Most people would wear their nicer shoes." TIL

@StephanBranczyk. To be fair, I suspect that's based on anecdotal evidence that does not account for people that have only one pair of shoes

If they think you thought it was amusing to choose an email address with 666 in it, then yes, it could work against you. They won't have the fact that it's considered auspicious in some Asian cultures uppermost in their minds.
If on the other hand it's clear that's it's an institutional address and you just happen to have been allotted the number 666, without you having any say in the matter, that's different. I don't think that would affect how they consider your application one way or the other. (In Asia, though, it would probably be to your benefit.)

All of these comments in my opinion dancing around the issue. If you feel for one second this may have an impact on your potential admission to these Universities, go with your GUT and just make a new email solely for applying for these things. It takes two seconds to do and all of your doubt/fear is eliminated instantly. With respect to the ones you have sent though, It could have an impact and it could not have an impact. While we would all hope to live in a perfect world  where these things do not matter, we don't, and especially in the United States, people will kill/lie/cheat/ect for their religion. It is just safer to make a new one, but don't worry about the ones you have already sent out.

From the general mood and trends of comments and answers, it seems to that the majority of people in Academia:SE never had to deal with the pious, white collar America.
In short: as long as you are dealing with academics, whether you have 666 or Satan or Iblis or Shaytan or Mara in your email, you will be fine. As soon as your email is screened by someone non-academics (for example: secretary office of some full professor, secretary office of some head of department), in some "burocratic" functions, your email is most likely already involuntarily screened out by the spam filter set up for the institution (may apply also to academics) or voluntarily sent to the spam folder.
Email was born as an informal mean of comunications for nerds, it became a super formal way to reach out to people. Please remember that whatever you write in an email is, in general, forever reachable and readable by everyone ([think of an email as a postcard])2 .
The western world expects the email to be in the format

name.surname@somethingserious.com/.org/.edu
n.surname@somethingserious.com/.org/.edu .

Anything else is likely to be filtered out by AI-powered algorithms or pious-powered secretaries.
Good luck!

Do you have any evidence? It's common for people to have emails with numbers in for disambiguation (e.g. in a large organisation); some organisations number jsmith2, jsmith3, jsmith4, jsmith5, but people who have the choice may use their date of birth or something else which is easier for themselves to remember (not least because it may create conflict to use sequential numbering if jsmith5 is more senior than jsmith).

@StuartF People who have the choice may use whatever they want, but giving out personal details (such as birth date) may seem a good idea, however it is terrible in the general framework of digital security. On the other hand, using a number may trigger an unconscious (or semi-conscious) response (in fact I find this question very interesting).
I would not be surprised if the automatic filtering relies on an external defined list of harmful words and numbers, which built up by over-zelant contributors would include anything, from the birthday of Hitler to the age of Bin Laden.

You are not likely to have a problem. Western countries are on average less religious when it comes to observance despite being of christian heritage .Along with this they are generally less superstitious.

You have not traveled much around the most Western country of them all I take it :)

Yeah no... This isn't going to be seen as controversial by any respectable institution.
In Europe, it's entirely a non-issue since society is basically secular.
Even in the the United States, you should be fine as academics tend not to be religious fanatics. If you do have any issues because of it, you probably wouldn't have wanted to work in those institutions anyway.
It's also worth adding that discriminating against someone on the basis of them potentially being a Satanist would be massively illegal in basically every western nation.

Even academics who don't believe in the devil are going to see this e-mail address and judge that the sender is immature, at least, and possibly some kind of radical weirdo.

That's really not the case in my experience...

@workerjoe I would expect such a person to listen to rock music and be among the finest people running around...

It isn't a Theocracy (yet).


text:
Should I do a group project on my own? If so, how?
Recently in one of my courses I have been assigned a task to be done in small groups (of 3 people). It turns out not to be too long (especially with some previous knowledge that I had), so over the course of an evening I have done roughly 60-70% of the work and the remainder would probably go even faster for me.
However the task was a group task, so I would feel that it could be quite inappropriate to just do all of the work and leave my other two friends nothing to do. I wouldn't like to make them feel left out and I wouldn't like to come across as a know-it-all. At the same time, I know that thanks to said experience not only will I need less time to complete the work, but also it is quite likely that the quality will be higher, potentially leading to a better grade and so benefiting all three of us.
Whatever I decide to do, I think I'll probably finish the task just for educational purposes, so the way I see it I can do one of those:

Tell them that I have the task complete. Apart from the disadvantages mentioned above they may feel compelled to also do all of the work, but forcing them to do so is absolutely not what I intend--if they also want to do so for educational purposes then they are of course welcome to, but I'd prefer to avoid them feeling like they have to do more than their fair share of work.
Pretend like I've only done some parts of the work and assign the "missing" pieces to them. First of all, lying about such matters seems to be a silly solution and also I feel like it could be easy to get caught and eithet be in worse position than 1) or have to lie more. Second of all, as I said when they complete their parts, it is possible that I'd feel obliged to make some changes to their work, potentially changing enough that it stops to look like their work, for us to get a better grade, which would be in all of us' best interest, but that would bring out some of the issues from 1)

How should I approach this topic, how should I communicate my ideas in the best possible way? Again, I don't want them to feel I treated them wrongly, but a the same time I wouldn't like our grade to suffer (in one of previous homework tasks I did give in even though I knew I was right at some points when discussing our solutions before turning them in, since I didn't want to come across as the smartass correcting everyone on everything, but our grade did turn out a bit lower then I would've gotten, had I turned all those tasks in by myself)

Does "especially with some previous knowledge that I had" mean that you did some extra courses, are more senior student, or something like this? Or how comes you are better than everybody else? ("Just smarter" might be a valid answer, too)

If you are more comfortable with this assignment you should review your peers work to assure the same quality as the one you can produce. They could learn from you and get a higher grade.

This question's unnecessarily wordy.  If you rewrite it more concisely, folks'll be more liable to read it.

You also have to consider the teacher's perspective in this. They would probably not be too happy if they found out you did all the work and your classmates just put their names on it. The goal of the assignment is (presumably) to get you and your classmates to learn something, so make sure that they do.

To directly address your question:

Should I do a group project on my own?

No.  It is a group project, assigned as such and expected to be performed as such.

If so, how?

Not applicable.
As to your narrative:

...over the course of an evening I have done roughly 60-70% of the work and the remainder would probably go even faster for me.

That means you, and your group, are ahead of the game.  That's a good position to be in.  You have two choices:

Complete the bare minimum (which is sounds as though you can do solely), or
Go beyond what's required to demonstrate your, and your groups mastery, of the subject matter.  Identify acceptable ways to expand the scope of the project that you and (more importantly) your group members can contribute to.  Where are they strong that perhaps you are weak?  How can they leverage your work to learn the material (the primary objective) while expanding the group's knowledge and capabilities?  Even if there is no where further to go academically with the material (hard to imagine), how do you have to present the material?  Written report, poster, etc.?  Work as a group to learn a new piece of software to expand your capabilities in this regard and thus work together on the final presentation of the material.

...I would feel that it could be quite inappropriate to just do all of the work and leave my other two friends nothing to do.

Your feeling is correct.  If they are in the same class, they are capable of, and expected to, contribute.  Perhaps the direct objective of the assignment was well within your abilities, but there are no doubt other ways that your group members can contribute.

I wouldn't like to come across as a know-it-all.

Describe to your group members that you have background in the material and was able to fulfill the needs of the assignment.  Discuss your work with them and show your approach (and caution them to cast a critical eye because you may have made a mistake).  If everyone is in agreement that you're correct, see #2 above.  If there is disagreement, that's a great time to meet with the instructor to (a) demonstrate that your group was diligent and attacked the project early and (b) to help determine the correct approach.

I think I'll probably finish the task just for educational purposes, so the way I see it I can do one of those: ...

Option 3: Describe the situation to your group members and ask them how they want to proceed.  A major goal of group projects is to build communication and team coordination skills.  This is a perfect opportunity to do so.  Furthermore, group projects are meant to use the group's collective skills and abilities to outperform the skills and abilities of any one member.  You've showcased yourself, now let them contribute to create a better final result than you could have alone.
Incidentally, if the project is effortless for you, is the purpose truly educational?

Thanks a lot for your perspective! I'll definitely try to approach it in the honest way you described. As for the task, perhaps effortless would to to strong a word, as I'm a bit rusty in the subject matter, so this exercise actually serves me as a good refresher (hence the educatonal purposes I was talking about)

A group project in class isn't the same as an assignment at a job.  The teacher doesn't need this project done and isn't paying you to do it.  The project is assigned for your benefit and it was assigned as a group project because not only is course material to be learned but also teamwork skills are to be honed.  Use this opportunity to practice working with a group.  Hone your interpersonal skills and see how good you can make the result in spite of having less skilled teammates.  That's really the point of group projects.


text:
How to approach professors for funding after acceptance into PhD program?
I have been accepted into a PhD program in the US for Mechanical Engineering, but the graduate school did not give me funding for the first year. Being an international student, I do not have opportunity of funding through government fellowships, etc. So, I am planning to contact professors for opportunities in their groups.
What should I mention in the email? I am trying to understand proper way to approach professors for funding after admit. Also, what other funding sources you will suggest?

You should ask if you can be a TA, otherwise be ready to prepare a bank statement saying that you have $40,000 in your bank account to pay for your first year. Why would a PhD program admit someone without funding?

What field are you in?  Expectations and practices differ radically between, e.g., computer science and theatre.

First note that what has happened to you is a failure on the part of the academic community to ensure appropriate employment conditions for junior researchers. A PhD candidate is a junior researcher - someone who will do research work, albeit of a limited scope, and with initial meandering, and with some supervision - who should be paid.
This perception will also guide you regarding what to do about funding. If you ask Professors for a handout - because you're a nice guy with high grades - you'll probably not get it. You will essentially be asking to be "posted" in their group as an employee, in which case they will (hopefully) be inclined to pay you a salary already.
For every lab you're considering:

Check, if you can do so easily and outright, whether the lab has paid/funded open positions. If you know that it doesn't - it's not relevant. (That is, since you didn't say you know what you want to do research-wise; otherwise most of my advice is irrelevant.)
Make sure the research work there actually interests you. Otherwise you'll sort of be scamming them for your salary - which is quite legitimate considering the situation the university has put you in, but is psychologically difficult for all concerned. This means, in particular,
Go visit the lab, physically. Try to arrange meetings with grad students and/or postdocs in the lab, to hear about what they're working on. This is common practice for new grad students and usually encouraged. During that visit (and not just then),
Try to figure out how your experience can be relevant to what they're doing - or to something they're not doing, but would contribute to their research objectives. It can be either in advancing their research proper, or in building things, or using some software you're proficient in, or writing code, or using materials or processes you've had experience in etc.
Now write your email, asking to meet with the PI to apply for the open position. Or, if you can schedule such a meeting directly when visiting the lab, based on some 'hook' of a suggestion from somebody there - that's even better. Base your pitch on your experience and conclusions from the previous phases.

Note these phases may not happen in this order, or in any order (i.e. these may overlap). Also, you probably want to parallelize this for different labs rather than go one-by-one.

I think this answer better describes the European experience than the American. Here doctoral students are often (usually?) students, not employees. It is quite different in Europe.

@Buffy: PhD candidates are effectively employees, even if they don't have that official recognition. The lack of recognition, again, is due to the collective weakness of the academic staff. However, this is gradually changing. A historical ruling marking this shift is 364 NLRB 90, Trustees of the University of Columbia vs UAW.


text:
Get in touch with potential advisors, although I have no clue what my topic might be?
I am in the Humanities, and I have a rough idea about the general field I want to work in. I have identified several professors who also work in this field. However, I am not sure how I can now find a topic for my dissertation. I am reading and reading, but as of now, I do not have a great idea.
I was thinking of getting in touch with the professors who might be potential advisors, but I am not sure whether that's a good idea considering I do not know my topic at all. I do not want to come across as naive - esp. since they are all at prestigious institutions.
If you think it is a good idea to get in touch, then I am still clueless about how to go about this, and what to write. I want to be honest but would like to avoid looking like a fool.
PS: I am in the Humanities, I think it's important for this question.

Are you enrolled in a graduate program somewhere?  How far along are you?  Do you have an advisor?  Are any of these people employed in your university?  In your department?  Are you interested in any of the researchers employed in your department?  Have you read any of the published work of these people you're interested in?  For me to be able to answer, I'd have to understand a bit more about your situation.

I don't think it is a good idea to contact them for several reasons. First, by your own admission, you do not know what you wish to focus on. Bear in mind your competitors probably already have a specific research question in hand. Second, even if you do have a research question at hand, academics in social sciences/humanities generally do not respond (of course, I can't speak for everyone) to potential candidates' emails prior to their official submission or consideration. That is to say, your prior email, in theory, has no effect on whether the professor would positively view your application that way.

oh, is this really so? I did not know that! Are we talking about the UK system here? I thought I had to at least first get in touch and discuss whether we are a good fit, before applying and maybe realising later that I do not get on with that professor. How does one mitigate such risks then?

If this community can’t provide you will a clear answer, you should ask the people who you will be requesting recommendations from what they would do. They will know the norms of your field.

@R.Kohlisch The supervisor cannot tell if you are a good fit unless they see the kinds of questions you are able to pose and your analytical abilities.

This is not a good idea. Do not do this.
(note I am speaking from Humanities/Social Sciences, and I asm speaking from Europe/UK/NZ/OZ; USA may differ)
Researchers in the humanities who do interesting work get MANY emails that are, essentially, "I am interested in your topic generally...HELP!" I get at least one a week. But it isn't my job to teach an infinite stream of stranger potential PhDs what a knowledge gap is, and doing so for even one person sucks me away from the research that was so appealing in the first place. If a potential PhD approaches me with just a general interest and not a well-defined research topic (it doesn't have to be perfect, just interesting), I give them a kind "no". Other researchers don't even respond and even find such communications offensive: they feel the potential PhD didn't even try.
The issue isn't just that you will appear naive, the issue is that you will appear needy. In the locations I mention above, your research proposal or even just your research idea is how a potential supervisor decides if they want to spend their time on you. It shows that you are thinking like a PhD level researcher and that you are able to identify intriguing gaps in our knowledge about your chosen topic. While a potential supervisor might help you define that gap a bit better, they have to see that you are a person who is capable of identifying a gap. If they do that identification for you, they have no way to gauge if you are "PhD material": if you have the kind of analytical capability to do humanities PhD work. It isn't a perfect way to gauge this, but it is all we have.


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Writing thank-you email to professor for agreeing to write a LOR?
I asked my professor to write a letter of recommendation for me. She said she would in general be happy to do that. I am quite self-conscious and worried, I would like to send an email back and say thanks, but I don't want to sound overly grateful. Since English isn't my first language, I would like to ask you how you would write something like this. Or: Would you maybe not write back at all, since the professor's email box must be super busy and sending a simple thank you email might annoy them more than anything else?
I'm so not sure about this, thanks a lot!

You're over-thinking this. It's almost always appropriate to say thanks when somebody does something for you. You won't be taking up more than a couple of seconds of your professor's time if you send a quick "thanks!"
Suppose that you'd asked for the reference in person rather than by email. You wouldn't say, "This professor is really busy so, the instant they say yes, I'll save two seconds of their time by running immediately from the room without thanking them."

As a super busy person who writes lots of LORs, a "thank you" is never, ever unwelcome. BECAUSE I am so busy and BECAUSE recommendations take up my precious time, a thank you for one just feels...nice. A thank you email is also a bright star in an email inbox of horror.

If her email being busy is an issue, then put in the title “thank you for the reference letter”
So, if they want to read it they can or they can save it for later - it’s always nice to receive thanks...

Agree. LORs take time/effort and professors typically write them for students who excel. One of my professors even addressed this in class -ie If you ask me to write you an LOR, make sure you were a good student (showed up for class, applied yourself during class, etc.)
You should say thank you.

You mention

the professor's email box must be super busy and sending a simple thank you email might annoy them

Why not just buy a card and send it through the postal mail? Most professors have a campus mailbox usually listed on their directory page. I am guessing that many of them would be more than happy to receive mail that wasn't about some journal/conference/vendor show.


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Does a PhD by monograph make you ineligible to be a lecturer at a university?
I heard that a Ph.D. by publication is better than the one by a monograph.
Does that mean academic positions are available only for a researcher who has a Ph.D. by publication? In other words, if she/he has a PhD by monograph then she/he cannot be a lecturer at a uni, where a lecturer need to have some publications,

This certainly isn't a general worldwide rule.  It's possible that some institutions in some countries have such a rule, but you'd have to look at them specifically.

Even for my monograph I needed to have several papers. So these two approaches are not mutually exclusive...

Several fields in some countries (e.g. history in Germany) would make the exact opposite claim: If you haven't written a "real" book (meaning a book weighting less than two kilos) you are not a serious academic. (I am only slightly exaggerating) So the answer really depends on the discipline and the country.

I have never heard on a difference between the degree. If you've finished a Ph.D. in some subject, you have finished a Ph.D. on the subject. You've done the research necessary and was approved by your committee and the university's senate (or whoever approves it there).
Whether or not you get a job depends on the quality of the content of your dissertation, your reference letters, networking skills, and just plain luck with timing.
Even if we agree that Ph.D. based on publications is better, then the only difference is that it might give you a slight edge with regards to the content of your dissertation. But ultimately, it's about what's inside rather than what form it ended up in.

Thank you so much.

No. Even if we accept your premise (which sounds dubious to me), there is no reason to assume that academic positions are only for those P.h.D.s.
Of course, it could be that a certain person who is hiring has a certain bias. You probably cannot do much about this anyway (and, very sadly, gender bias seems to be much more common..)
I don't understand your title, by the way.

Thank you so much for your answer. I just headed that if I awarded a PhD by monograph then I cannot be a lecturer.

For what it's worth, I've often heard people say that a monograph thesis shows more that you know well a your field than a research paper thesis does. (Of course, you should still publish papers!)

One downvoted seems to disagree with me, however -- could you state your opinion?

+1 I agree with you that instead of downvoted, people should express their idea.


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Assignment extensions for no apparent reasons (USA)
I recently started teaching activities in an American institution.
I have had a couple of students asking for extensions for problem sets / project deadlines for medical or family reasons, which is obviously acceptable. More unexpectedly, other students asked for extensions because they also had problem sets, quizzes and projects due for other classes during the same period (end of semester). Note that there is a buffer period between classes and exams, so we are not talking about conflicts with finals here.
I studied in a different country, in a notoriously work-intensive institution, so the idea that having homework for class X would somehow be an excuse to turn in homework late for class Y simply never occurred to me. I feel that no class should have priority over other classes - if it was the case, differences in credits would reflect that (my class is not a "small one" with little credit). Yes, sometimes students have a lot of work - but is it not part of real life too? On the other hand, the fact that students made these requests so openly makes me think that it might be normal here in the US, and I wouldn't want to be more strict than the local standards.
Is there any kind of norm regarding what is considered as an acceptable reason to ask for an extension?

Do you give deadlines far enough in the future that students should be able to plan around them?

"is it not part of real life too?" - Although I'm in academia still which you can argue might not be real life :), I run into situations in my work where I am juggling multiple projects all the time. Sure, sometimes it's appropriate to stay at work late nights to get a project done, especially when there is a fixed external deadline (grant deadline, conference date); other times it's just as appropriate to talk to my boss(es), let them know what's on my plate, and either outline a revised schedule or ask for priorities. In the real world it isn't inappropriate to ask.

If you don't want to given an extension then don't. This sounds like more of a respect problem with students testing how much they can push you for. I give out a lot of extensions (with grade penalty) but it doesn't work out particularly great in many cases. The worst students quickly find the new level they can sink to and continue pushing downward from there.

@Anyon I think they have enough time; the majority of the students turn in their work on time and do a really good job, so it's clearly not an impossible task. Maybe those who can't do that have more work, but then I think it's a matter of how well they manage their time (submission dates are announced in the schedule on the first day of class)

@BryanKrause - True, there's "hard" and "softer" deadlines in life; I guess it's a matter of deciding in which category class deadlines belong. As you probably guessed, I'm more of the opinion that academic deadlines are not as flexible as work deadlines; the semester is only that long, and I think assignments should be completed early to improve learning. I think work schedules are inherently more flexible in research than in other professional contexts

The short answer is that opinions on granting extensions vary between institutions and even departments. Some universities view extensions as a way to support student learning. They argue that they want students to be able to get the most out of each assignment and so when the student completes the work is less important than that they do eventually complete it and are able to focus their full attention on it.
Other universities hold the same perspective that you do, that learning to manage deadlines is an important piece of being a student, and that allowing for extensions whenever asked is doing a disservice to students.
The chair of your department or even the other faculty should be able to give you insight on expectations that you should follow and on what is customary. I strongly recommend that you talk to them, since they know your students.
Another option is to pre-emptively institute a limited extension system for all students. The mathematics and computer science courses at my undergraduate college used this tactic to great success. On the first day of the semester, the professor told the students that each of them had a certain number of "late days" (usually 4 for a class with weekly assignments), which would grant a student 24 hours of automatic extension. These could be used at any time on any assignment except for group work or exams. Students did not need to provide a reason for using a late day, although they did need to inform the professor/a TA that they were. There was usually a form online for students to fill out. Students could use them as they wanted- all at once or one at a time. Some professors gave small amounts of extra credit for having late days remaining at the end of the semester, and some allowed students to earn extra late days throughout the semester by doing extra credit work, handing in assignments significantly early, or going to relevant talks, etc.
The benefit of a system like late days is that most students will feel less stressed and more in control of their own time. It thus enables you, as the professor, to hold a quite strict "no other extensions unless absolute emergency" policy. It was well understood that if a student used up all of their late days early on and then got minorly sick or had a job interview or had something else come up, that was just too bad. They would turn in what they had. Further extensions were typically only granted if the student or a family member was in the hospital or if they had formal accommodations through the college itself.

A system like this could be discriminatory against students with legitimate medical or disability-related reasons to request extensions- which may well need to be longer than a couple days.

Some American students, as members of an individual-oriented consumer culture and economy, will push to get away with as much as they possibly can, in any circumstance, without bounds. The "completion agenda" has given the signal for years that institutions will do everything in their power to guarantee graduation and certification. Especially if students detect that you are unsure or less than confident, they will attempt to get away with more. The US is generally a dog-eat-dog environment.
I sympathize entirely; my first semester had all kinds of missteps on my part like this. The best bet is always say a very clear, confident "No" to any request that you have any doubts about. Maybe say "No" to the first public request no matter the validity to set the tone that you have that in your vocabulary. (E.g.: Once a student asked me, "Can I do X?", and I responded, "Okay, remember, X is prohibited by the syllabus page two...". So she did X anyway and later challenged the penalty mark by saying "But when I asked you said 'okay'!").
Whenever this topic gets brought up, many commenters want to frame it as a debate between (a) good to teach students responsibility vs. (b) good to give students flexibility to learn at any pace. This tends to leave out (c) necessary for the instructor to budget their limited time. Presumably you have some time set aside for grading and assessment and then need to move on to other tasks. (And also (d) good to give speedy feedback on assignments back to the class as a whole.) There's no reason why you should sacrifice your productivity for late student work. They will ask, and there's nothing you can do to stop that. Just say "No".

Asking if there is a norm for what is “acceptable” assumes that students care about such norms, but sadly some don’t, and will always try to push the boundaries of what is acceptable. It is up to you to set limits, and this is not especially difficult, and certainly not considered unreasonable in the (U.S., large public university) environment I am familiar with.
I suggest that the next time you start teaching a new class, you include a statement in your course syllabus saying “Deadline extensions for course assignments will not be given except in exceptional, justifiable circumstances”, or something to that effect. Then if students ask, all you need to do is point them to the policy. Problem solved.
As for this semester, assuming you have not had such a written policy that students were expected to have read, it might be reasonable to be a bit more merciful if you are so inclined. But you would still be perfectly within your rights and common sense not to give extensions even then.

I would recommend against the practice in general, but with a variation. It is good to tell students at the beginning what happens if deadlines are missed and to stick to those rules except for emergency situations.
You can certainly publish in your course materials the consequences of being late. My own practice would suggest about a 5% (half a grade) penalty for missing the deadline with a limit on how late it can be and still be accepted.
One thing you want to guard against is those few students who want to be late so as to get some feedback from peers before completing their assignment. The penalty will help with this, but also will make the consequences clear.
Some folks even give a small bonus for early completion. This helps get some students moving earlier, which is good for them in general.
Another possible solution is to permit re-work and regrading after the deadline with the rules stating that only a portion of the points lost initially can be regained. This means that some students will submit incomplete work on the deadline and use the feedback you give to improve the work. This can be very helpful to some students and works well if the number of students isn't too big. It isn't as hard to do for the instructor if students doing re-work turn in the old with it (in a folder) so that it is easy to see why points were lost. For some courses, such as computer programming, having the students also mark their changes in the new work makes regrading very quick and easy.
But, whatever your rules, publish them and make them clear at the start of the course. In particular, don't assume that the very strict rules you grew up with are understood generally, or even that they are the best rules. Think about your teaching goals and how to accomplish them.

"about a 5% (half a grade) penalty" Did you mean 50%?

@Stef, no, 5% of the total. Five points out of 100,  with about 10 between grades.

Some institutions / courses build an "assessment schedule" prior to the semester starting so that the load on the students for any 1 week can be seen.
Then, assessments can be moved slightly so conflicts can be reduced / avoided. This means that the excuse  assignment X conflicts with assignment Y is no longer relevant.
The medical / family excuse is always possible, but asking for evidence can reduce that.  One of my professors told me that she had one student (this was in France) that he had to go back to the UK for his grandmother's funeral so would miss class and two exams. Unluckily for him, she was on the same bus to the UK/ France rugby match with him, cue difficult conversation... :)

We do have such a schedule. But we have dozens of students, all with different classes; moving the assignment would create as many problems as it would solve. But my question is actually (if I were to formulate it in a very "direct" way): "why should the instructor care?" ie. is it the instructor's responsibility if students chose too many classes / are unable to manage their time correctly?

If that is your question, it is not at all clear in the original... The case for students choosing too many courses is very particular...

@Mowgli What are your goals as an instructor? To make sure your students leave your course with certain knowledge they didn't have before? To identify students that understand the best using grades? To test students' time management abilities? To minimize interference with your other priorities? To make sure students prioritize your course over others? To get good instructor evaluations to put towards promotion/tenure/department good will? Likely some weighted combination of these and others?

@SolarMike: I agree with Mowgli, this seems infeasible. He didn't say "students choosing too many courses", he said there's great variation between different students in a given cohort. This is completely common in the U.S.

I did say, which seems to have been missed, moving the assignments PRIOR to the course starting. Also, Mowgli’s exact words are “if students chose too many classes”...


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Applying for research assistant (What can I speak about?)
I will be applying for a research assistant position under a professor at my college (master's program). I have an interview with her on phone (competition will be stiff, many students have applied). What should I be talking about? How do I put forward to her that I can manage my time well between studying responsibilities and research? More importantly, how do I show my eagerness for working under her and towards the research work at hand?
This will be my first time - giving an interview for a research position and I don't know what I will be questioned about or how do I impress my interviewer.

I've been interviewing students recently and there are three questions I ask myself after talking to the student:

Motivation. Is this person independent and able to solve problems on their own?
Overlapping research interests. Is this person genuinely interested in the type of work that I'm doing?
Technical ability. Is this person going to be able to complete tasks without being hindered by a technical limitation?

It is difficult for me to accurately answer these questions from a short interview, but you can learn a lot from just talking to someone. My advice for you would be to figure out how you can honestly answer those three questions for the professor. Some things for you to brainstorm about: Have you read some of their papers? Have you worked on any class projects or side projects that may be relevant? What do you want out of the position? Do you have an interest in publishing or going on to a PhD?
Of course, there are other factors at play. Can the student communicate well? Will our personalities clash? But those are mostly out of your control.

Thank you for your perspective, Austin! The course has just started and the professor in question is someone I don't know that well (goes both ways) because her course hasn't started yet. I believe it would be quite difficult for me to get my interest and motivation across, particularly on a call, hence, I'm a little worried. Should I speak about my interest in working for her even if she doesn't ask something like that in particular or will that look too trite?

@user585380 Not knowing the professor is to be expected, but being unfamiliar with their work would be a major red flag for me. Look at their website and search for their papers on Google Scholar! You can certainly guide the conversation to your prepared talking points ("Your research about X really interested me because Y... I think my experience in Z could help with that.")

@user585380 I'd add that some level of interest is quite important for a research assistant position - if you don't know what this professor researches why are you so interested in the position besides needing a job? I promise at least some of the other applicants will be interested in the particular position. It'll be important for you to have some answer to those questions in mind, even if they aren't explicitly asked.

@BryanKrause it won't be a job - no payment, nothing. I'm only doing it for my own interest in research. I know what the professor researches - in fact, I do know what I will be working on if I get the position. By saying that I don't know her, I meant I don't know her personally - never spoken to each other at length.

@user585380 Ah okay, where I am from research assistant implies a paid position. I'd be hesitant to take on unpaid research work especially as a graduate student, but that may depend on field. It sounds like you have the interests part covered though. Best of luck to you.

@BryanKrause Thanks, Bryan! As you might have noticed, I'm primarily worried about not being able to convey to her -  how interested I'm in this position. So any suggestions you could add about speaking in an interview are welcome!