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Fate of publications under review after accepting a tenure-track offer
"A", an independent researcher, has accepted a tenure-track offer* and will be starting in few months from now. "A" also has few manuscripts that are currently under review in high impact journals. Say that 1-2 manuscripts are accepted before "A" joins his/her new institution, will it be ethical/possible for "A" to contact the editors to ask them to delay publishing his/her accepted manuscript(s) to a later issue to when "A" joins his/her new institution? The rationale is that this new work won't be counted toward his/her tenure if it is to be published before he/she joins the new institution.
*This scenario is for an R1 school in the US.
Please note that "A" has discussed this issue with his/her new Dept. Chair as well as a senior mentor who serve at T&P committee (at a different school) and both advised to contact the editors for this manner.

It sounds like "A" would be trying to mislead people as to where the work was done. That doesn't sound very ethical to me...

Are you sure that the tenure committee doesn't have power to just ignore these publications? My argument: beyond unethical and rather obvious ("you put a paper on a top journal 1 week after getting the job!?"), it might be pointless.

@FábioDias, this tenure committee counts "published" work (based on the published date). The work will still show the original submission date as that cannot be changed (unless you submit the work to a different journal).

@TheGuy I naively assumed a reasonable amount of ethical behavior and forgot about appearances and the whole marketing > work... Which is weird, because I'm more cynical than this. But boy, this whole thing feels fishy to me... Is your chair that worried that you are a one trick pony? Or is he going to dump so many lectures on ya that you won't have time to do research? If it wasn't a TT position, I'd say "run"... but those don't grow on trees, so...

@FábioDias, It just happens that "A" has a unique situation with his/her publications being under review right now as compared to other faculty in his/her field and Dept. I doubt it is about teaching load/running out of ideas etc.

@TheGuy that is far from unique. The vast majority of researchers have publications under review at any given time. I agree that the "freelancer" part helps in this imbroglio, otherwise the past chair would have some choice words on the matter, but still...

This is a more extreme version of this question: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/90302/early-career-publishing-strategies-keep-publications-to-a-minimum-before-tenur

Closely related to this question: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/65174/can-publications-on-research-conducted-before-i-started-my-tenure-track-position

I could actually see this backfiring.  "Wait, so A didn't have any publications in the queue when we hired them?  What on earth were we thinking?"

@DVSA Some T&P committees care about date, some care about affiliation.

I take it this is a hypothetical question regarding how to handle the extremely-unlikely event that your "under review" papers get not only accepted by high-impact journals, but accepted with no requests for revisions or even bounced back to you for a pre-publication check. And are super-fast-tracked to publication within a few months. I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it. But maybe it's a field-dependent thing. As for ethics, be sure to also credit your former institution. You can say work done "in part" there. Especially if you're doing revisions after you left.

I do not think it is either ethical or wise to try to delay the publications, anyone looking at the researcher will be equally impressed by a paper regardless of the address on it when it was published.

I guess that is true for anyone, except for tenure committees bound by policies.

Well if you arrive at University of Sludge on Sludge with 20 papers instead of 10 it will look better for you. I assume that you are not in danger of running out of ideas of things to do. You need to start to publish on the research which you do at the new place, rather than what you used to do. I suspect that when you move location the exact things you are working on will change a bit.

@NuclearChemist I think the argument is that if the tenure committee only counts publications published "at the university", it's better to have a tenure packet with 10 prior papers and 30 "at the university" rather than 20 prior paper and 20 "at the university". -- I don't think anyone is arguing against publishing well and often once you get to the new position. The question is whether it's worth (and/or is ethical), to pad the "at the university" papers with delayed publications.

The principle I follow in situations such as this is "walk in the light". In other words, be open and honest about your situation and intentions with all those people who are materially involved. In this case, it would be A's new department chair (which you said A has already talked to); the editors of the journals involved (so I absolutely concur that A would need to talk with them); and any future tenure or evaluation committee that might need an explanation. If A is open and honest with these involved parties, then I see absolutely no problem with asking for a delay.
It's somewhat beside the point, but it's probably not very reasonable that A's value or quality as a researcher would be evaluated based on the whether or not a particular institution is listed on the same piece of work, but unfortunately, that's the reality of the world of academia that many of us live in. Since this question has nothing to do whatsoever with the actually quality or even perception of quality of A's work, then I don't see any deceit involved (unless A is trying to hide something). As long as A openly explains the situation to everyone involved, both now and in the future, then I think it is very reasonable to ask for a publication delay in order to meet institutional requirements. What would be unjust would be if A were denied tenure or promotion in the future simply because of a few months of advance publication of an article or two. I think it is an absolutely reasonable request to ask for a publication delay to prevent something unfortunate like that happening.

will it be ethical/possible for "A" to contact the editors to ask them to delay publishing his/her accepted manuscript(s) to a later issue to when "A" joins his/her new institution?

I would consider this action mildly unethical, since the context makes it clear that the action is taken with an intent to deceive A’s institution as to the date of publication of A’s paper. It is admittedly a small deception and falls within a gray area that some people might characterize as “gaming the system” (exploiting technical loopholes in rules and policies to gain an advantage in a way that isn’t strictly prohibited but involves minor dishonesty or pretense). Nevertheless, I do not think a person of high integrity would engage in such behavior. If I knew “A” and learned that they had done this, my opinion of them would be lessened a bit (the same goes for the department chair who advised “A” to act in this way). Conversely, I would be impressed with “A” if I learned that they had politely refused the chair’s advice. And I would think the department chair was doing their job well if they discouraged their faculty members from pursuing system-gaming measures in their approach to promotions; encouraged their faculty to expect more (both in integrity and productivity) of themselves; and lobbied with their institution’s administration to adopt healthy policies that do not create perverse incentives for misrepresentations and dishonest behavior among faculty having their performance reviewed. I realize that may be a lot to ask, but that would be the ideal. For a chair to advise their faculty to work around policies using dishonest measures may yield some short-term benefits and get the job done more or less, but it does not foster an optimal environment for the promotion of excellence.
To add a bit of context, until last summer I served for several years as a department chair at an R1 university in the US. Questions about publication dates and similar issues with promotion policies along similar lines to “A”’s question came up once in a while. I always encouraged our faculty to represent their work accurately and honestly and avoid system-gaming tricks. And on a few occasions I fought minor battles with our administration to make sure my faculty’s interests were protected in connection with what I thought were unreasonable or unhealthy policies.

I think it is wisest to follow the advice of your chair. First, the chair's advice tells me that the tenure and promotion committees care about ridiculous technicalities like this.* Second, you want to keep the chair "on your side" in the tenure and promotion process. Your chair is going to be slightly less enthusiastic about going to bat for you in a close tenure and promotion fight if you disregarded the chair's advice!
*My assumption is that the institution has both letters and quantitative metrics that must be hit to receive tenure. Letter writers generally don't care too much about when the work was done, they just care about overall research impact. However, internal metrics often only count publications while you are at the institution. For instance, you might need to hit X number of publications or get Y number of points (with more points assigned to a higher-impact journal). I am sure the chair wants to make sure these publications count toward this quantitative part of the review - our department had someone a couple of years ago who was 1 point short and didn't get tenure, even though that person was well-respected.

Honestly I don't see any moral dilemma here. If the rule is the puplication date then it is not only ethical but also smart to delay publication according to convenience. False stating the submission date is unethical, but so is asking about it (it doesn't matter, publication date does). The rules must be clear and not changed on a per case convenience (to whom?).
Notice that the submitted but not yet published manuscript was not counted in order to get the tenure track. So if it happens to be published before he/she joins the institution those will just be wasted work and an unfair advantage (luck) compared to those people that submitted later.

+1 … I tend to agree. It’s not OP’s fault that the rules are stupid but it seems that the administration acknowledges that this is a technicality, and there doesn’t seem to be any intent to mislead (I therefore disagree with other answers that call this unethical, although I had the same initial reaction). Delaying publication is actually somewhat common, although I’m generally not a fan of that (it slows down science …).

@KonradRudolph it sounds like the difference between saying that you are “not a fan” of delaying publication and calling it outright unethical is one of degree only. If it slows down science then that’s already an ethical problem. If your job is to do the best science you can and somebody suggests that you behave in a way that’s counterproductive to that mission (with no positive benefits to make up for that negative effects), why would you think that that was okay?

@KonradRudolph I also disagree about “no intent to mislead”. I’m willing to concede that there is no intent to mislead if, and only if, “A” plans to include a statement in big bold letters in his promotion file acknowledging that he/she contacted the journal editors to ask them to delay publication of his/her accepted paper. It’s pretty clear from the question that “A” has no such plans and that making such a statement would defeat the entire purpose of the chair’s suggestion.

@DanRomik Well I’m part idealist part realist. I recognise that doing good science sometimes requires playing along in the career game. Unlike the Sith, I don’t deal in absolutes. As for the intent to mislead, it was my impression that A, by going to the Dept Chair, is making this open and official. Of course it’s possible that A is effectively conspiring with the Chair to mislead the tenure committee. That would be unethical. The way I understand it, the Chair would be part of that committee though.

I concur with the majority of answers that say that asking for a delay (for this reason) is unethical at worst, tacky  at best.
However, when the new excellent paper does appear in the highly rated journal the author's current (i.e. new) institution should be clearly indicated, even if that happens before the actual employment start date (which is unlikely). That way readers will know how to contact the author, and some prestige will accrue to the institution. A note saying where the author was when the work was done might be in order. I'm pretty sure the editors will agree to this change in the manuscript.


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What to do when your PhD advisor offers the suggestion to change labs? Could I change PhD programs?
I am a first year PhD student in the US. Up until now, I knew that the work I was producing/presenting was subpar/only the minimum. My advisor has repeatedly told me that PhD students become experts in one field and that requires more than superficial knowledge. Consequently, he expects me to have more solid understanding of basic knowledge in my field- which is reasonable.
Today apparently was the straw that broke the camel's back. He asked me about how I did my data analysis but I could not explain it well, saying that I found a package that computed it. Afterwards I looked into it and explained it to him.
He then told me nicely that to him, it appears that I do not have an interest in the work that our lab does. Research should incite your curiosity, prompt you to look into things you don't know, and find out more about it. This process should be natural. And, above all, it shouldn't make you unhappy.
He concluded that I should look into other research areas that I would actually find interesting.
I am not sure what to do. I have been unhappy due to my lack of progress; it's incredibly frustrating because my advisor had high hopes for me and I was really looking forward to doing research with him at the start.
What should I do? I don't want to quit after I recently made up my mind to put in more effort and actually feel better/enjoy my research more. At the same time, I'm not sure if I want to work with my professor who demonstrates a lack of confidence/large investment in me now.
If I do need to change labs, I'd like to change my program altogether. I don't want to remain at my current department. How could I change programs?

Well, so far you do not seem to have given your professor a reason to have confidence in you. And, if you continue to act the way you are, it is unlikely that some other professor would have confidence. So, you need to change what you are doing. Whether starting to perform well would regain trust with your current professor is the real question, or if you would have to change groups and perform well there is needed.

I realize that this probably isn't the answer you want, but I think your advisor is trying to kindly steer you in a more appropriate direction. Since you asked for advice explicitly, I would suggest you look into other labs/programs at your university and see which ones appeal to you the most.
To be a bit blunt: while one anecdote doesn't represent a whole year, saying your data analysis is done by a package that you don't understand is not just an "oops", it's toeing the line to scientific misconduct by way of negligence. If you continue in this lab, you'll need to invest a lot more time and energy into understanding your methods- and it's absolutely valid to realize that this isn't for you and you'd prefer something else.
While it's great to be motivated for a topic in general, your PhD is composed of years of day to day research work, which can be very different from the big picture (e.g. pipetting vs "curing cancer"). For example, research in my field involves writing a lot of code, and while that's not directly related to the science, someone who hates programming would be absolutely miserable.

Research should incite your curiosity, prompt you to look into things you don't know, and find out more about it. This process should be natural. And, above all, it shouldn't make you unhappy.

I think that this is beautifully put. It should be fun and exciting to get a chance to review and solidify your grasp on the field. In mine, it's extremely common for PhD students to get a bit overexcited and go down a few rabbit holes when reading up on new methods. You say that you've made up your mind to put in more effort and to "actually feel better". I'm not sure that you can just decide to be passionate about a topic, and I don't think doubling down with more effort on things that don't seem to be working is the right move.
You're not a failure, or somehow a worse scientist or person, for deciding that you don't like a specific topic (or subfield) as much as you originally thought. Change may seem scary, but since you are only a year in, I think your professor is right to suggest that you go for it and try to find a project that truly makes you feel as described in the quote. While it may seem safer, 4+ more years of "resolving to be happier" sounds like a very long slog.

I would take your advisor's words at face value. He might have your best interests at heart and be trying to free you from any sense of obligation to stay in his lab. I would not think of this as "the straw that broke the camel's back" nor take his advice as an attack on your talent or work ethic.
Reading threads here on academia.SE, I've come to realize I was very fortunate to have a wise and kind PhD advisor who put real effort into developing me as a person and as a mathematician. Nevertheless, we once had a conversation much like the one you are describing. I'd been splitting my time between my master's in computer science and my PhD work with him. Since pure math requires a lot of learning before you can even start doing research, we were still in the "reading course" phase. But in computer science I was already proving results that would go into my thesis. I used to mention them to my PhD advisor, often along with an apology for why I had not made more progress in our reading course. He once suggested that I might be happier (and have a happier career) as a computer scientist, and I felt mortified, like he was rejecting me. But now, looking back on that moment, I realize he was just giving me an option, as well as some spot-on advice about the relative difficulty of securing an academic position in math vs CS. As an advisor, I think back on that moment a lot, and try to remind myself how much students can look up to their advisors, and how easy it is to accidentally hurt their feelings if they misinterpret what I meant. Anyway, after that conversation, I did buckle down a bit and make more progress on the math side, and my advisor never again suggested we stop working together. I don't think he meant to do this, but it does seem conversations like this sometimes light a fire under a student (in a good way).
Ok, so to your specific questions.

What should I do? I don't want to quit after I recently made up my mind to put in more effort and actually feel better/enjoy my research more. At the same time, I'm not sure if I want to work with my professor who demonstrates a lack of confidence/large investment in me now.

Hopefully my story convinced you that the "lack of confidence" thing might not be fully accurate. Advisors know that each student is a work in progress. You can respond "I thought about our conversation, and realized that I really DO find this research interesting, especially X,Y,Z. It's finally starting to 'click' and that makes me very happy. I think it's premature to switch labs just yet. Is it ok with you if we proceed with the research and come back to this conversation in a few months?"

I have been unhappy due to my lack of progress; it's incredibly frustrating because my advisor had high hopes for me and I was really looking forward to doing research with him at the start.

Those feelings are super common in grad school. You can find a zillion posts here expressing the same feelings and getting advice from professors about how it gets better.

If I do need to change labs, I'd like to change my program altogether. I don't want to remain at my current department. How could I change programs?

You can apply for other programs as a transfer student, and there are lots of threads about that here on Academia. The consensus seems that you usually take a step down or a lateral move in terms of quality of institution. Plus, your advisor's letter would probably matter. Therefore, since you said you'd rather stay, I advise you to stay and show your advisor that you are in fact making progress and are not disinterested.

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Doing PhD on computer vision with an engineering background
I'm coming from an electrical engineering / telecommunications background; I studied extensively in hardware-related areas and took lots of courses in wireless communications and signal processing. Although I took several classes in signal processing, some image processing courses, and some classes in mathematics (e.g. calculus, linear algebra, probability) during my bachelor's and master's studies, I lack the typical computer science background where one is exposed to courses like data structures, algorithms, and specialized software engineering courses. I also never took a formal computer vision course at the university.
I recently developed a passion for computer vision, and I'm convinced that it is the right path where I would like to develop myself, publish, and obtain a PhD degree. I'm planning on building an academic career around computer vision. However, when I look at and go through the papers from top-tier academic computer vision conferences such as CVPR, ECCV and ICCV, I realized that although I can follow most of the arguments and math in the papers, I certainly need some fundamental academic knowledge on computer vision if I want to produce such publications myself. Based on my technical abilities, I don't think that creating the necessary (research) software would be the main problem but rather, coming up with the algorithms and making effective use of the building blocks of computer vision would be very challenging for me. Especially, some necessary techniques from machine learning and optimization are not very familiar to me. Moreover, although I have some up-to-date knowledge about the recent methods such as deep learning with convolutional neural networks, I do not really know the working details of the older, classic algorithms (e.g. SIFT, SURF, HOG) that could have many applications under different branches of vision.
Considering my background, how would you recommend me to proceed on my way to doing research on computer vision? More concretely, should I first go through a full computer vision course online (unfortunately, since I'm not at a university, I can't go on and attend to a real lecture), or should I first try to fill the wholes in my more fundamental knowledge such as machine learning, optimization, and matrix computations/linear algebra? Another (more practical) possibility would be to go through an OpenCV book such as this one, and develop an all-around working knowledge more quickly. I'm more apprehensive about this approach since I'm afraid it would not give me the more solid theoretical knowledge that I need to be able to come up with creative solutions to computer vision problems. How do you think one should approach to the balance between practical and theoretical knowledge from a beginner's point of view?
My second question is: How can I find an interesting problem in a certain subfield of computer vision, which I could take on as a PhD topic? I have already figured out that I'm more interested in the semantic understanding of images/videos rather than geometrical or 3D scene modelling. For example, I like problems such as multiple person tracking and pedestrian detection. However, I'm having a hard time coming up with a concrete research problem that I will devote my attention to and bring together in the end as a coherent PhD thesis. This confusion is mostly caused by the lack of a supervision from an experienced researcher, since I don't yet have an official supervisor/professor who would give me a research topic. I know that is unusual, and makes one question whether obtaining a PhD is feasible at all in my current research environment, but that is just how the things are. Unfortunately, in my situation, it is hard to approach a professor without any concrete research proposal and even some initial results in hand.
Thank you for your time and kind interest, and I apologize for any possibly vague parts in my question. I would be happy to clarify and elaborate.

I can recommend the Coursera machine learning online course by Andrew Ng - he's excellent.

I went from a maths background and have a research topic based in computer vision. When I started my PhD, I built up my knowledge on linear algebra, classical vision techniques (e.g. Chris Bishop's pattern recognition and machine learning) and trying out loads of the existing techniques in Matlab/OpenCV. In my case I found it better to have a more general knowledge and then found my niche as I developed. Don't know if that's any help, but that's my experience!

Thanks, I agree that understanding the fundamentals deeply is very important for serious research. The most important question here, in my opinion, is how deep one really has to go in a certain fundamental field (e.g. optimization or linear algebra) given limited amount of time to do research on the actual topic of interest (in my case, computer vision).

Machine Learning is also a focus of research in electrical engineering departments and math departments. They tend to publish in different places (e.g. IEEE journals). To do novel research you will need to study it at the graduate level first anyway, so you aren't particularly behind those who took undergraduate versions of these topics.

Firstly, I would definitely recommend taking an online course (a commenter mentioned one from Coursera, and EdX also has some good ones as well) associated with a reputable university. Taking some kind of structured course designed to build a fundamental understanding of the topics and math involved is a great way to jump in and get started.
Once you do that, you'll know where the biggest gaps in your preexisting knowledge are, and you can address those with books/resources covering the theory and math involved, and other resources involving the practical application of what you want to do.
Since you mentioned in interest in pedestrian tracking, a topical and interesting thesis question could concern pedestrian tracking by an autonomous car, and an algorithm for reading "clues" from pedestrian motion to detect what they are likely to do next so that the car can make a choice about whether to slow, stop, or keep going and monitoring the situation. (Just an idea, but there's tons of practical applications for being able to track things).
Once you gather some fundamental information, and know what direction you want to go in, you would probably be in a position to start talking to some professors. If you can demonstrate that you understand the concepts involved, that you have an idea about what you want to research, and that you're serious about doing what it takes to be successful, most professors would be willing to listen and advise you from that point forward. The idea you bring to the table at this point does not have to be your final research idea, but bringing something realistic that you're interested in allows you to both show that you're serious about the research, and also to have a starting point for coming up with a final research plan with input from an experienced researcher.

Thanks for the great advice. I will look for a good online course. I agree that many professors would be interested in advising someone who seems to know what he/she is doing and is serious about their research area, so it seems like a good point that I should be able to demonstrate that I understand the fundamental concepts of computer vision.

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How do I get to a European university after Dutch MBO 3
First of all, I would like to explain my current education situation.
I have moved a lot when young, and have been part of different educational system, when 10, I was in the UK for 2 years, when 13, in Brazil for one year, and from 13-19, I was in The Netherlands, and from 19-22 (current), I was back in Brazil.
Computers have always been my main interest, I started programming at a young age (12 years old), and when 15, I had my first backend developer's job, however, I was never a good student, I got kicked out from a few schools, had some low grades and etc. In The Netherlands, the school systems works a bit differently (for the dutch readers: I was doing MBO), which is a like a "low technical school". I wanted to go to the university and start studying what I really wanted: Computer Science and Computer Security. So I finished my MBO 3 (you can only go to a university after 3 years of MBO 4), so clearly I was not allowed to enter the university. Fair enough.
When I arrive in Brazil, I decided to give a go, and translate my Dutch education papers, and voila, I was allowed to officially start a Bachelor of Computer Science, and so I did.
It's been 2 years now that I am studying a private university. However, I would like to return back to Europe, due a few personal reasons (I am completely alone here, and the way my current university works is not how I like it, mostly because they don't really care about anything, and so do the students. There is no organisation, and it seems I am not involving much, professors don't seem to be able to answer most of your questions and etc).
However, every university I tried to apply back in Europe, they ask me for my high school degree, and of course I "don't have any!" because of the MBO I did in The Netherlands. So I decided to get a transfer, again, all the universities I tried asked me for my High School grades. I tried one in which accepted a "university transfer", so I sent them my university papers, and my MBO paper (hoping they would accept me), well, no, they sent me a letter saying "due to the school you did in The Netherlands, we are not allowed to accept you".
This is starting to make me very upset, so I am trying to make a decision weather I should drop out of university, return back to Europe and start doing some certification on the area I mostly like. Though I am not sure if this is a good idea. It saddens me because I really like to be part of a university (not the current though). Currently, my aim would be to follow as a independent security researcher.
How worth is dropping out of university? What should I be aware and what are the main steps I should follow to be a security researcher on my own?
Update
If relevant, I have the following citizenship: German and Dutch.

You might want to rephrase the title question. 'Should I drop the university' is something only you can answer. 'How do I get to a European university after Dutch MBO 3', if I read your question correctly, is a question this stack can advise you on.

This question appears to be very specialized to your very unusual situation, and it also doesn't appear generalizable to graduate studies. I'm not sure if the question is a good fit for this site.

Unfortunately, as Drecate indicates, this question is both far too specialized to be of general help to other site users, and directed at undergraduate admissions, which are also off-topic here.

Dutch HBOs accept people with an MBO 4 degree. After passing the first year (propedeuse) you can make the switch to a Dutch university. At this point your high school does not matter anymore. See if you can somehow get MBO 4. Netherlands also offers a test as an application to many programs if you're over 21. Just google "21+ test". Just some ideas :)

I bet that the Bazil Uni is much easier than the Dutch one .Why not finish the Brazil Stuff then return to Netherlands.I guess you have EU passport .If you have your Brazil degree your chances are much better.

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What do you think is the best way for me to get into grad school?
So, I completed my bachelor's in mathematics a month ago, and I'm planning to move to another country to continue my studies. I really love mathematics and I want to apply to a master's program in pure mathematics.
I am fluent in English and got a band score 8 in IELTS. So, I am planning to apply to a program that is taught in English.
I have applied to 8 Canadian universities. I passed their minimum requirements, but due to high level of competition, I've been rejected by two of them so far, and I am waiting for the rest. But I am worried that I will also get rejected by them too.
I was wondering if there are universities in other countries that are easier to get into. Like there are some requirements and if I pass them, I get admitted. I have checked the websites of many Canadian universities, and they all say the program is very competitive and admission is not guaranteed even if you pass the minimum requirements. And as I have understood, it is way more difficult for international students.
Unfortunately, my financial situation is also not good enough to pay 20k a year for grad school; so I am looking for a university that provides funding or waves the tuition.
What do you think is the appropriate country for me to continue my studies? If you could also provide the names of some universities that you think fits my situation, I'd really appreciate it.
Any other advice is immensely appreciated. Thank you in advance.

In the U.S., and, I think, Canada, you'd not be admitted on the grounds of having sufficiently good credentials. Graduate departments have limited capacity to adequately advise and mentor students. Not to mention limited funding and/or tuition support, etc., for students. It's all limited, no matter how wonderful the prospective students are.

@paulgarrett What about programs taught in English in European countries like Germany?

I do not know much about the current situation in Germany...

Thank you for your response, really appreciated it.

... for that matter, I'd worry that if places admit all qualified students, that there'd most likely be inadequate mentoring/advising...

@paulgarrett, That makes sense. My resume is rather competitive actually, but it is still hard. I will try my best and hope. thank you

@paulgarrett I don't know where the OP is originally from.  In many countries it is normal for university programs to have a set score on an exam where you really will be admitted purely on the basis of hitting that requirement.  Canada doesn't quite have that system, but for undergraduate programs, they will be pretty explicit about what you grades you need to get in, and I think for programs that aren't super competitive, those are fairly accurate.  This is all out the window for graduate programs, of course.

Waterloo will even tell you for each different province in Canada which high school courses you need, in addition to the expected average: https://uwaterloo.ca/future-students/admissions/admission-requirements Some programs (mostly in engineering and math) say "Individual selection" but for Arts and Science, it's basically if you're over the cutoff, you're in.

Many/most Masters programs don't offer scholarships or waivers. If you need these things to study, consider a PhD program instead.

Apply to countries other than Canada.  For a variety of boring technical reasons there's a much bigger disparity between admissions for domestic vs. international students in Canada than in the US.  Furthermore, due to some complicated political circumstances, right now pretty much every university you're likely to apply to in Canada is in a fiscal crisis and can't afford to be generous toward international students.  Unless you can't get a student visa there for some reason, I think your chances are much higher in the US (I have less knowledge about and thus can't comment on other Anglosphere countries, but in all situations I know, they have much worse funding for international students compared to US universities).
EDIT: Buffy's comment below reminded me: don't apply for master's programs in the US.  Apply for Ph.D. programs so you can get funding.  Even if your goal is just to get a Masters.

Masters students in US are unlikely to be funded, though. Unlike doctoral students.

Professor Webster, thank you very much for your response. Actually, I also applied to Waterloo University, but unfortunately I was rejected due to the high level of competition.
As you have mentioned, I guess the student visa process is also much harder in the US, but I guess I have to try my best.
Thanks again for your time.

@Buffy Well, depends on the school, but yes, you're right.  I had meant to say that in the US you should apply for Ph.D. programs (even if you want a Masters, start a Ph.D. program and then quit), and somehow it slipped my mind.

You may well get admitted to one of the remaining places. But if they are all similar in some "ranking" then getting rejected by one means you are likely to get rejected by other similar places. The problem isn't the country. When you apply, cast a wide net of institutions, not just all top places (nor bottom).
In the US that would be a good strategy. Here, it is also the case that most math doctoral students are funded through Teaching Assistantships for which you assist in undergraduate courses by grading and holding study and Q/A sessions. But those aren't normally available to masters students. On the other hand, a masters isn't a requirement to begin doctoral study here. And it isn't likely easier to get into a US program than a Canadian one, and mostly for other countries as well.
But most countries have a range of institutions, any of which can and do provide a good education.

It's been noted that one of the secrets of top schools is that they try to admit the students who would get a good education anywhere -- despite the school, if need be.

Thank you very much for your response professor Buffy. The universities are not all in the same ranking; I guess I have to wait for the rest and apply to some US universities for the PHD program. The problem with this is that I plan to study a master's program to decide my favorite subject for the PHD more accurately. But I guess there is no other way.

In a US math doctoral program you will have a lot of time to decide on a sub-field. The first task is advanced courses to help you pass qualifying exams. They generally cover a broad range of areas.

That's very good to know; I didn't know that at all. But I guess the deadlines for the fall entry have passed? How many admission cycles are there in the US each year?

Usually only one. See the answer for the US here: https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/176908/75368

Really appreciate it. I will look for universities and hope to find some with open deadlines for the fall. Do you think it is likely for some universities to still have open deadlines for the fall admission?

Sorry, but I can't guess. Possible, I suppose, if not especially likely. Good luck.


text:
Individualized Instruction Summer Course Question
I am a grad student but have an out-of-state bachelors that does not meet teaching cert requirements, so I have an undergrad class that I need to take as well. My advisor offered to do it as an individualized instruction this summer.  What does this even mean? That he would make it available for me to take in the summer instead of winter?

Sounds like a conversation you should be having with your advisor.

Sounds like your advisor would do a special, one-on-one class with you to fulfill that requirement. Likely over the summer since there would be a bit more time in their schedule to work with you.

In some places such a course is actually just an "independent study" under the direction and review of a faculty member familiar with the requirements. It is normally someone who has taught the course before.
You do readings, maybe assignments, and probably some exam set by the instructor. There are no lectures. Office visits (or Zoom meets) would be a normal component so that you can ask questions.
And, yes, if you are willing to work several days a week on it, it is feasible to be done over summer rather than a regular term.

I'm currently taking an individualized instruction online language class at my local major university. Let me discuss how it's run and some questions you could ask your advisor.
The class I'm taking is a large-scale production which has been run for several years at least. There's a professor assigned to it, but a Ph.D student is the coordinator and there are nine tutors including the coordinator that take online 15-minute sessions. There is a very detailed syllabus, an online app for making,  changing, and breaking appointments. You self-study the book and workbook and there's a large online website with resources. You can arrange to have online sessions if you have questions about the material (ungraded) or graded sessions where you perform dialogues, work on new situations, etc.
Now a language class is essentially a lab class so to give you an idea of the requirements, for a 4-credit hour semester class you have to do 49 graded 15-minute sessions. You're allowed to reduce the credit hours--I did when some relatives needed a lot of help so I reduced to 2 CR a few weeks ago, so I only have 4 more to complete for a total of 23 sessions.
If this course is more lecture-based, it should be easier to complete as independent study. If there is a lab component, you'll need to ask your advisor about that portion. My guess is that it's something like "History of State" and lecture-based.
Now for some comments and suggestions.
Summer sessions tend to be compressed. What's the schedule going to be like? Does your advisor have a detailed (or any) syllabus that you'll be following? Is there a list of learning outcomes/goals? How often will you meet? How will you be graded? Can you take it pass/fail?


text:
As an undergraduate, how risky is it to aim for academia?
I have just finished my first year at University, and after a slight tweak to my major (two very similar degrees) I'm ready to start my second year of computer science in September.
At this point, is it reasonable for me to plan to get into the world of academia? I ask is that I've heard getting into academia is very competitive, and I don't want to end up spending all my energy focusing on something with very low acceptance rates, like a first year bio major declaring that they will get into med school. If getting into academia is very difficult and competitive, I should probably start making back-up plans.
I've also heard that my interest area (quantum computing) is getting a decent amount of funding, but I'm not sure if that will make it any easier to get into. I plan to get into research ASAP, but unfortunately I've heard from a professor that they aren't interested in anyone who hasn't finished at least three years. I've been doing self-study about quantum computing so that maybe I can get some research in this area between second and third year.
Thank you for the help.

There is a great deal of overlap between industry and academia in many branches of CS, so if you want a safer route, you may aim for these. Even if you don't, the skills you pick up in CS are very transferable to industry, so you will still have routes open.


text:
10 minute PhD presentation on previous research experience
I have a PhD interview soon and I was asked to make a 10-15 minute presentation on my research work. As I am preparing the powerpoint presentation for the same, I am confused whether to put the results in detail, or to put them in a single slide. I am not sure whether my previous supervisor will like me including the results as they are not published yet. I need some advice on this.

The best and easiest thing to do here is to send your previous supervisor a quick email and ask their opinion.

"whether to put the results in detail, or to put them in a single slide" - I think you need to answer the question of what will be the best way to use the 10-15 minutes you have to impress them

The interviewers are probably more interested in the nature of your research and whether it has successfully reached conclusion than they are about the specific results obtained.
I suggest it is enough to say that you have papers in preparation or submitted with the results in any printed (i.e. powerpoint) materials.
They want to know about your abilities. They aren't reviewers of your work. But decide in advance whether you want to say something about the results if asked and how much detail you want to give.
I'd guess there is little risk in disclosing the results. These people aren't there to try to scoop you. Just be a bit cautious about what you commit to print.
And, as noted in a comment, have a chat with your supervisor.

Ask your previous supervisor whether you can present all your results. Unless there are some confidential issues at play (like IP protection) most academics will be totally ok with you presenting work like this for interview purposes (i.e. to other academics). There's a sort of unwritten rule that that is what (and how) it's done. But do check with your previous supervisor because it's their science. Chances are they will say yes of course and good luck.

If you have only 10-15 minutes, then focus on the question, approach, main results and implications. Do show some results, but don't swamp them in details. Polish polish polish. The shorter the talk the more time it takes to prepare it...
Have some back up slides ready with details that you can use during the Q&A.

Number of slides is an utterly irrelevant metric. I have given 10 min presentations with a gazillion slides, and full hour with just two.
Decide on the content first, the order you want it and the introduction it needs second, refine it until you are confident it fits in the time you have. Then decide on the number of slides, which may even be zero.
But if you want some nudging, in my experience, people tend to cram too much on each slide. Nobody is going to charge per slide: if you want to show two plots, put them in separate slides; and then side-by-side on a third slide, if you want to compare them to each other.
And remember to practice it. You should have it completely memorised, without even using the slides.

I am not sure whether my previous supervisor will like me including the results as they are not published yet.

That is something nobody here can answer. Ask them, it is a very reasonable question.


text:
Quickly pulling together thesis after unexpected failure of oral exam
I failed my oral exam unexpectedly. My advisor had the impression that it would be less formal than it was (or at least that is what he told me) and I wasn't prepared. I thought it would be more along the lines of a project proposal, but instead my committee wanted my thesis to be close to half done.
It is not. The problem I have been working on is fairly unique, and there wasn't a lot of existing work for me to base it on. I've needed to run a lot of numerical tests to ensure my conjectures are correct before trying to prove them. Consequently, progress has been slow. But there have been some results, and I know that it is a good idea.
My second oral exam will be at the end of spring, and if I do not pass then, I will be removed from the program. I'm sure I could finish this in time to graduate, but with a hard, career-endangering deadline in sight, I'm becoming very worried about the timeline. I didn't expect to be in this position.
I've contemplated switching problems to something with a more predictable timeline, but at this point, starting over seems like a poor option, even if the new problem would be faster. I've thought the same about my advisor. It seems like time has locked me into playing what I thought was a good hand, but am now realizing may not be.
Are there any suggestions or advice for how to pull research together quickly for a deadline? (Other than work like hell, which I am doing.)

Are you talking about the thesis proposal or the thesis itself? Please clarify. Thanks.

The proposal needs to be detailed enough to pass as (or be) about half of a dissertation.

What country/continent is this?

You should be absolutely  explicit about what level the prgoramme is.  By some interpretations this could be PhD level, but by others it could be Master's level. Timescales and the expected degree of independence both depend on which it is.

Maybe you could give us an insight in the relationship between you and your advisor. Somehow your expectations of the oral exam were quite differently which could have a variety of reasons. Did he fail to tell you or did you fail to read the thesis guidelines? You can't really pull your research together quickly; maybe there is an option to move the deadline back.

If it helps, your failing is probably more representative of your committee criticizing your adviser rather than you alone. Let me guess -- you work for a assistant/junior Professor or a tenured professor who has fallen out of political favor within the department? My guess is they are "beating on you" as a proxy for your professor because that is how academia works.
My advice to getting out of this rut is to suss out who on your committee is your adviser's enemy and work more closely with them. To handle a similar situation I had in my PhD I attended "enemy" group meetings and presented updates on my work directly to "enemy's" group. I could learn any objections to my work from the "enemy" right away before presenting in the exam. Over time the deadline for retaking exam became more flexible. I ended up satisfying it a few months before defending my dissertation. Enemy turned to friend and helped me with providing materials and access to characterization tools. Enemy-turned-friend wrote stellar recc letters and helped organize job interview for me. I ended up drafting and publishing 5 manuscripts from the research, on 2 of the papers I offered "enemy/friend" coauthorship and he/she declined. After graduating enemy-turned-friend became department chair and took away my adviser's labspace and used my PhD apparatus for his/her own research.

While it's certainly possible, nothing in OP's post particularly sounds like this is a department politics issue. What I read more is that OP's advisor is quite inexperienced, and did not prepare her/him well for the exam. That said, your solution (talk more to other professors in the committee) is probably still useful.

I have seen these issues first and second-hand so many times I have to offer the OP a credible explanation for what comes as a surprise to him/her. I have also seen the reverse case -- an unaccomplished/unprepared student breezing through oral exam due to the PI being respected/feared/liked many many times. It is important OP puts the events in a broader perspective; success in the oral exam is in large part politically motivated.

+1 OP should definitely talk to other members of the committee and not rely on the advisor, as it sounds like the advisor has failed (be it for political reasons or not).

"Let me guess" Guessing is not very useful in my opinion.

Wow, I’ve never heard of anything like this. I don’t doubt your accounts that this has happened but it must have been a highly dysfunctional department. As a default guess for OP’s situation it sounds grotesque. The prior should be that OP failed for legitimate reasons. The rest of your advice is solid but the first paragraph is really not.

I’ll be speaking out of turn here given my inexperience. But hopefully this may be a boon rather than a deficit.
Are you familiar with Occam’s Razor?
In short, the simplest reason is often (but not always) the correct one. In this case, let’s focus on your first paragraph.

I failed my oral exam unexpectedly. My advisor had the impression that it would be less formal than it was (or at least that is what he told me) and I wasn't prepared. I thought it would be more along the lines of a project proposal, but instead my committee wanted my thesis to be close to half done.

Before going into the first exam, how did you prepare? What information led you to presume that the exam was just a proposal? Analyze your information sources and deduce what is missing. If the missing link is input from the committee members, then it would be wise to reach out to them and cover your bases and get their opinion.

It is not. The problem I have been working on is fairly unique, and there wasn't a lot of existing work for me to base it on. I've needed to run a lot of numerical tests to ensure my conjectures are correct before trying to prove them. Consequently, progress has been slow. But there have been some results, and I know that it is a good idea.
My second oral exam will be at the end of spring, and if I do not pass then, I will be removed from the program. I'm sure I could finish this in time to graduate, but with a hard, career-endangering deadline in sight, I'm becoming very worried about the timeline. I didn't expect to be in this position.
I've contemplated switching problems to something with a more
predictable timeline, but at this point, starting over seems like a
poor option, even if the new problem would be faster. I've thought the
same about my advisor. It seems like time has locked me into playing
what I thought was a good hand, but am now realizing may not be.

You have a thesis plan. You have a timeline. But I ask, given the restrictions, can you reasonably modify it to fit the new deadline? If not, what options would you have? Defend an incomplete thesis? Continue and complete your research as a post doctorate? Request an extension?

Are there any suggestions or advice for how to pull research together quickly for a deadline? (Other than work like hell, which I am doing.)

I would urge caution and a different approach. Working like hell is good, but burning yourself out will not help you perform well in the long run.
Work smart as well as hard. Contact your committee members for their input as well as your advisor. If you have other commitments (like work, volunteering, etc) reconsider whether or not it would be possible to keep your commitments moving forward.
Lastly, remember to leave time for yourself. No one operates on 100% at each moment of the day. Remember to eat, exercise, and find time to socialize. Practice a holistic approach to keep you at 100%.


text:
Etiquette of applying to current institution
I am a postdoc and am currently applying to tenure-track faculty positions. I am unsure whether or not I should apply to my current institution.
On one hand, I would be happy to get a permanent position where I am. However, it seems like this might violate some social norm or custom. If I were to be rejected, that would feel rather personal, given that I see those who decided every day. Also, sitting through the competing job talks and meeting other candidates would be rather odd.
What is the standard etiquette for this situation? Should I ask someone before applying? If so, how should I raise the subject? I assume the answer also depends on the area and country -- this is computer science in the US.

There a too many reasons to be rejected to take a refusal personally. You can be rejected even if everyone, in the jury, as a very high esteem of you, just because you research topic will interfere with someone else's, or is not in the lab priority, or they try to hire someone from that university to create a partnership, etc.
So, if you feel qualified and would like the job, I do not see any reason not to apply.
Also, if ever you ask to someone in the jury whether you should apply:

if he/she says no, then it's maybe not worth applying;
but he/she will probably say yes, just for you not to take it personally, even though he/she knows they will eventually reject you. So that might be a forced encouragement to apply.

In short: don't take anything personally!

In general, you can apply if you feel you're qualified.  If they don't want to hire you, they'll reject you, but it's not inappropriate to apply.
Tenure-track jobs get huge numbers of applicants, so statistically, it's extremely likely that you will be rejected.  If that's going to seriously disturb you and affect your ability to succeed in your current job, then you may want to think twice.
Some departments might prefer "fresh blood", which would put a strike against candidates from inside.  On the other hand, if you've been particularly successful and it's clear that you really want to stay and would take the job if offered, that can be a plus, since it reduces uncertainty for the hiring committee.
If you have a trusted contact or mentor within the department, you could talk to them about whether they think you might be a good fit for the job, or vice versa.
If you do apply, then you should make yourself scarce while other candidates are being interviewed.  (Unless of course you have already been rejected by then.)  Don't go to their talks and don't try to meet them.


text:
Professors/Teachers only replying to part of my email
I've been a Computer Sciences student for 4 years now, give or take, and my experience with emailing teachers/professors (teachers from now on) has been either of two cases:

they reply to my entire email
they read the last sentence or paragraph and reply to that.

Generally, if a teacher fits in one of those categories, they always respond like that.
However, for me it's quite frustrating to receive an email back (within 5 minutes, an hour, a day) with a reply, to only one point, and then having to mail back with my other questions, removing one question at a time.
To note: my e-mails are always very respectful, neatly written, and without spelling or other mistakes.
What can I do to get a higher percentage-of-questions-answered-per-email response?

For what it's worth, you run into this with people in the business world too. It's an email thing, not an academia thing. Learning to cope with it now is an important skill no matter what you do with your life unless you wind up not often using email in your daily life (and being a CS student, I find that... unlikely...)

Related: Why do academics frequently write very short email replies?

Please don’t write answers in comments. It bypasses our quality measures by not having voting (both up and down) available on comments, as well as having other problems detailed on meta. Comments are for clarifying and improving the question; please don’t use them for other purposes. Existing answers-in-comments have been purged.

Professors are busy and receive a lot of mail (> 50 per day, not counting mass-mailings). It's rational for them to skim past the salutations and introductory parts until the end, where you usually find "the gist". Obviously, this filter is fast but imperfect.
To ensure that you get a response to all of your questions, write very short and very neat emails. Also make it as clear as the day what you want the respondent to do. Finally, don't bother asking questions to which you can simply look up the answer:

Dear Professor Foo,
this is about our discussion after the last seminar on FooBar.

Should I hand in my essay before or after the last session? I couldn't find this on the syllabus.
I was also wondering if you could recommend a textbook on BarBaz.

Kind regards
Foo Baz

There really isn't more you can do. If you still get partial responses, write another mail about only the remaining items (as you do).

Short is important. I've seen (and been guilty of in the past) emails that are full of polite, wordy fluff, which ends up just being tedious stuff to wade through to find the actual content. I've find you get much better responses with a format described in this answer.

And when email particularly egregious non-answerers, keep it to a single question and potentially bold the important parts.

In my (non-academic) experience, it helps to use numbered questions.

@TRiG That's a good idea, and I actually meant to number them. (Edited now.)

+1 for numbering questions directly. As a TA, I hated having to parse through paragraphs where the actual question was interspersed through the paragraph between filler sentences, apologies for stupidity, qualifications/justifications for the question etc. With a number system it automatically puts my brain in check list mode and I am cued into responding directly to each question in my reply email.

I've tried numbering points for people who notoriously respond to only 0 or 1 question. Didn't work.

I think the numbering is actually the most important part of this technique. Not only does it give the recipient a literal follow-the-numbers template for their reply, but it forces the sender to carefully parse their questions. It can also help to specifically call out the number of questions in your email, i.e. from an actual email I received: "I'm so sorry, but I forgot to ask three questions in my previous email." followed by an enumerated list. This technique works for other kinds of communication, too. But NB some folks will only ever answer 1 question at a time, no matter how you ask.

@1006a the only thing that has worked for me was nailing it down to the most important question and figuring out / guessing the rest. Oh. And calling. Calling people works.

@MikeA. http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1047 continues to be relevant.

"I was also wondering if you could recommend a textbook on BarBaz." is answerable with a Yes/No.  "Please recommend a textbook on BarBaz." is more direct.   "I was also wondering  ..." adds little.

@chux true, but for me it sounds a bit to curt to be still polite.

Short is important, granted, but that email example sounds pretty impolite (at least, it would in my country). No "please", no "thank you for your time", just a salutation and questions... It gives me the impression that your professor is your dog, or that he/she is there just to provide answers like an oracle. Obviously I don't think the sender would like to give that impression.

I've been guilty of this kind of thing.
The emails I receive can be roughly taxonomized into two categories:
A. Those I can quickly answer while waiting in line at Starbucks, sitting on the bus, waiting for a late thesis proposal to start, etc. These emails usually get a very prompt answer from me.
B. Those that will require me to sit down and dedicate large amounts of time to a reply. These go into a priority queue and I have the best of intentions to try to answer them quickly, as soon as I first answer emails from the funding agencies and school administration; finish that grant proposal or paper due next week; finish that late paper review the editor has been harassing me about; write that recommendation letter for that other student; answer my colleague's email about a discrepancy they've found in one of my old papers; prepare the lecture for tomorrow class, .........
So, I'm standing in line at Starbucks, and get an email from you with a list of questions:

When is Assignment 3 due?
I'm having trouble on problem 6. Here are 3 pages of poorly-written work. Can you help me find the problem?
Are we allowed to work in teams on problem 7?

Now, I could treat the whole email as a Category B, and get back to you with complete answers to all three questions in a few hours, days, weeks, ...
Or I'll fire off a Category A email answering only parts 1 and 3, under the assumption that you'll ask me again about part 2 if it's important to you, or with the intention (perhaps misguided) of remembering to answer the last part sometime later.
What's the fix?

Try to send emails containing only one question per email;
If you must include multiple questions, make sure they're all Category A questions;
If you get back a reply with only a partial answer, email about the missing parts again.

Keep it short. Bear in mind that professors have lives too and verbosity costs them time. (Moreover, it's hard to handle long emails on mobile devices, and yes, professors use those too!)
In the first line of the email, state what you need and when. For example, "Hi Professor, I have three questions on the assignment you set for ECON302. Would you mind answering by Wed, April 4 so I have time to complete the assignment? The questions are below. Thanks."

(Regarding #1, as a very long time email user I've noticed a cultural change in what an email represents. Used to be like a memo or letter. Now, it's more like a text message. I'm sure the rise of mobile devices has something to do with it.)

Use email Subject line as well as first sentence of the message.
Subject: Is Econ302 due on April 6, or later?
is better than
Subject: Question
(H/t to the Overload Forum.)

... but then repeat the question in the body!

What can I do to get a higher percentage-of-questions-answered-per-email response?

Your post here is a good example of what you are doing wrong: it is too verbose and contains a lot of information that is not necessary for answering the question. Here is how short you could make it without sacrificing anything important:

I am a student. When I email professors, often they only reply to what I said in the last sentence or paragraph. My e-mails are always respectful, neatly written, and free of mistakes. What can I do to get a higher percentage-of-questions-answered-per-email response?

This illustrates the principle that the email should have as high a signal-to-noise ratio as possible. I think this will go a long way to improving the response rate.
The suggestions made in other answers to number your questions, and to limit the number of questions to the absolute minimum (ideally, one per email) are also excellent.

I've encountered this issue both in and outside of academia. I have found success in only asking one question per email/text/post/IM. This ensures that answers are not diluted, and no questions are missed.
I will usually not send further questions until the previous one has already been responded to. This keeps me from being "spammy", and also helps in case one answer changes the nature of my follow-up questions. It also keeps my questions "modular", in case I want to rotate my questions between profs, TAs, etc.

I would not want to receive many singular messages. If someone has 3 questions to ask me, I would expect them to write those 3 questions in a single message.

Do one of the following:

Send one email per question or request (often impracticable since it feels like nagging to get 5 consecutive emails from the same person, and related to boot).
Try coming to office hours or even scheduling phone calls if that's an option.
Start your email by an "executive summary" of sorts, e.g. "I'd like to ask two questions and make a request", then explain whatever you need.
End your email by saying you would be glad if they could answer your N questions or respond to points 1 through 3 above or something to that effect, so that if they just read the end of the email they'll have to go read more.

Don't forget to observe whatever guidance your instructor has provided about communication. Personally I don't like responding to individual emails from students about things all students would benefit from knowing, and I ask students to ask questions on our online forum except for personal issues. Still, I get many broad emails filling up my inbox, so they get a lower priority.

TL;DL: Be very concise. Add a TL;DR sentence in the beginning of the email.

they read the last sentence or paragraph and reply to that.

There's your problem. As others have mentioned academics are incredibly busy and receive ~100 emails per day. Most of them won't have the time to read paragraphs of text.
How to solve this:

Learn to be very concise. Most emails can be shortened to less than a paragraph. It's understandle if you cannnot do this easily right now but you can improve.
Add a TL;DR part, just how I added in this answer, especially if your think that it's important to explain a lot of details. This is what I do with my supervisor and he appreciates it.


text:
How can I evaluate the strength of a chemical physics program?
I can only find evaluations/rankings for departments such as chemistry or physics, but I am not sure how to evaluate a combined program of chemical physics.

Could you please clarify a bit more what you are looking for? What do you mean by "strength" and why are evaluations and rankings not providing you sufficient information?

What are you taking as criteria ? the number of passes? the number who go further ie take up PhD posts, who gets the most funding? who has the longest experiments? who gets the best paid jobs? We can't decide for you.

@jakebeal -I mean 'strength' as in courses and research.

I am looking for a place that teaches strong courses and has good research.

@Dina Rankings are often used as a proxy for this information. You can also look directly at the courses offered and the research published by faculty. If these methods are not being sufficient for your needs, can you enunciate what you need that you are not finding through them?


text:
Second PhD and conference biographical notes
I am sending a conference proposal as a Ph.D. student. I am expected to provide a biographical note. I already hold another Ph.D. and I am not sure should I stress it or not in my biographical note.
I was wondering what is the best practice here. Should I focus on what I am doing right now or provide information about my previous work and achievements too?

Biographical notes are completely your own choice to share your achievements with readers. Alongside your current work, I don't see any reason for not sharing information about your previous PhD and achievements.

Sounds good.  You can be more succinct when listing the previous PhD area work and more detailed about your recent work in your new field.


text:
How to put a position you could not attend due to visa problems in CV?
I was offered a PhD position from university X with a research assistantship from company Y both in U.S., but I could not attend because my US visa application got refused. Now I am wondering if I can put that in my CV. And if so, how?

What are you using the CV for? And why was your visa declined?

I'm using it for academia. The visa was declined due to Trump's travel ban policy for Muslim countries.

"attend" is not the right word, I think. What is the right word?

@PeterMortensen Accept?

The combination of unpredictably tightening immigration policy, and then COVID, has unfortunately made this far from unique. Therefore, old conventions don't really apply.
I've recently been reviewing resumes on the borderline between academia and industry (tech-related). I've seen three approaches being used in the CV itself:

Listed in the Employment/Experience section with a notation like

University of Atlantis, Blorfindal Lectureship, 2020 (offered, not accepted)

Turned into an item in the Honours/Prizes/Fellowships section.

Offered Blorfinal Lectureship at University of Atlantis, 2020 (declined)

Polite silence, with (optionally) a placeholder in the CV if the gap is felt to be provocative.

Independent researcher, 2019-2020.

In any case, state the facts (and emphasize achievements) in the CV, don't provide excuses. Hiring committees understand what's going on. If you feel it's important, you can provide brief context in your application letter instead.
To the extent you can, demonstrate your resiliency by highlighting elsewhere in your CV and/or application how you kept on ticking in spite of the challenges. So mention "draft, in preparation" papers you might otherwise have censored out (or have finished and submitted by now if you had been able to take the position), or the course you taught at a local school, or even the completely unrelated job you took for 6 months. If, conversely, you aren't able to do this, that's fine too: committees understand as well that conditions have been tricky, and in some parts of the world, everyone just needed to move down a few levels in Maslow's Hierarchy. That shouldn't explicitly penalize you, though unavoidably your competitive position will be somewhat disadvantaged versus those who had the privilege to be able to continue to be productive.
All of this is what to do now, while we're in the thick of things in 2020. Hopefully, your career will get back on track soon, and the next time you need to update your CV, you will censor all this out and focus on your more recent accomplishments, not the paths you were unable to take!

Asker's comment suggests COVID was not relevant.

@AnonymousPhysicist: Sure, but Houska only states that covid made it more common, not that the approaches mentioned depend on covid being a reason.

I would not do it.  Only list things you actually did, not stuff you turned down.

Say you were offered but declined, e.g.
Fellowships

Bigger Name Fellowship (2019-2020)
Big Name Fellowship (declined)

Do note that simply being offered a PhD position or a job is not especially prestigious; in fact I don't think I've ever seen either in a CV before. Add it if you don't have better things to put in your CV, but remove them as soon as you do.


text:
My PhD supervisor is against external collaboration. What should I do?
My PhD supervisor discourages me from initiating a collaboration with people outside of our group. He never explicitly told me that I could not do it, but I can realize it from his reactions (e.g., digressing the conversation, asking me to wait for now, or suggesting me to talk to someone in the group first) whenever I bring up a discussion about the possibility of external collaboration.
The fact is that my research topic is relatively new and is different from what other people are doing in our group, so none of the group members (including my supervisor) can actually help me, and I have to go all the way through my research on my own.
I was wondering how I can settle this? One time I also tried to discuss this issue via email. I sent him an email saying that I prefer to collaborate with researcher X from university Y for these reasons, but he never replied to me.
Any suggestions are very welcome.

Do you need him to introduce you to someone outside your university or is it "just" about getting approval from him?

I just want to get approval.

You seem to have got either a secretive-type supervisor, or one who has had bad experience with collaborations (yes, that does exist, do not be mistaken). In the latter case, he may know more than you. If you do not know the community, tread carefully. There are very aggressive communities which do not think much about ripping a research idea from a PhD. There are other, friendlier communities, where it is bad form to "invade" the research idea that a PhD student is just working on. First, understand what is going on before making decisions. Go to conferences/workshops on the topic.

Actually, I already know some postdocs/professors in my fields who also know me well as we had done joint research before during my master's, so they are totally trusted. Maybe I need to clear this notion of trust with my supervisor.

Following on your previous comment, probably just mention to your supervisor who you intend to talk to.

@Prof.SantaClaus I did, but no response.

@sisaman What is your funding source? Are you funded by a specific project? Also, could you add which country you do a PhD in? In my experience, the different academic systems in the different countries lead to a different base attitude towards collaboration.

@DCTLib I'm studying in Switzerland, and a project funds me.

Since you wrote that you are funded by a project, I'd like to mention one possibility, without knowing whether that's really the reason or not.
Project funding, especially for more applied funding schemes (e.g., EU Horizon 2020), typically come with obligations, such as reporting, or having to work on certain problems that were promised to be worked on in the funding proposal. This is possibly a reason for why you are working on a topic that neither your advisor nor other group members can help you with: because it has been promised in the proposal for some reason.
Now as you mention your best bet to get support is by collaborating with externals. Scientifically fruitful collaboration is often quite dynamic: the actual research question addressed may change a bit during the collaboration, and in particular it may move away from what was promised in the proposal. From a scientific point of view, this is how great ideas are developed, but you end up getting results that your advisor (grant holder) does not know how to sell as fulfilling the obligation that comes with the project funding. Also, you may end up getting results that your advisor may be unable to use as a proof of competency for future funding proposals, which is important to maintain the flow of funding.
Both of these would be problematic for your advisor, which is why he/she may be unwilling to give up control over what you are doing by letting you collaborate with someone not under his/her control. Also, once a collaboration has been started, if would be problematic for your advisor to ask you to end the collaboration if he/she later gets the impression that the focus of the collaboration is not what he/she needs or wants - at that point your potential collaboration partner already invested time, which has to be respected.

The answer would depend in part on the kind of collaboration you have in mind. Without recommending a particular course of action, your options might include one or more of the following examples:

Meeting for coffee or other relatively informal discussion to discuss research;
Establishing semi-regular meetings to discuss research ideas;
Agreeing to proofread outlines or proposals for substantive work;
Agreeing to proofread substantive work;
Agreeing to co-author research not directly related to your PhD work;
Agreeing to co-author research that is directly related to your PhD work;
Providing technical assistance or advice specific to your research;
Being named as a member of your advisory panel;
Providing infrastructure or other assistance relevant to your research;
Providing data specific to your research.

An important judgement call for you is deciding which of these you should probably get approval from your advisor for, which you should simply advise your advisor of and which are really none of their business.
In some contexts, for some people it may be appropriate to engage in any or all of these. The answer to this will depend on a lot of things, including your own working style and theirs, and the academic culture in the department, institution and country you are working in.
In most systems PhD candidates are encouraged to consider 1-5, and while it may be good protocol to share things openly with your advisors not everyone would seek approval for this kind of engagement.
6-10 would probably depend on the policies, norms and protocols particular to your institution, discipline and context, noting that some of these may entail formal changes to the administrative arrangements around your candidature while others may not.
I hope that helps! :-)


text:
Referring students to external resources
I am a grad student and this is my first time as TA for a course which requires me to grade essays. I usually grade assignments with more objective answers (think late undergrad science labs). A problem I have been facing while grading these is whether or not I should refer external resources to these students like Mendeley or Grammarly.
The course is a very introductory course with mostly freshmen taking it. It is very evident that a lot of these students don't know how and where to cite their work. The instructor has provided them with links to read about the citation style. I usually leave comments telling them where a citation might be needed but there are wrong ways of citing which I see often (like putting page numbers in APA citations for everything, not just quotes). I provide them with a link to our University's guide, but sometimes I feel like it would be much more useful to the students if they learnt how to use Mendeley (or any other reference management software for that matter), but I am not sure if it is right to do so.
Another important thing that I also come across very frequently is that since there are a lot of international students in the class, for whom English might not be the first language, they have very poor grammar. I usually point them to our university's academic skills centre but since usually there are points for grammatical correctness and writing style, I hate it when they lose points for something they can't do anything about. They are freshmen who probably haven't had enough time to learn the language yet I think. I would like to point them to Grammarly, but again, that might become an easy way out for them and might not be the right thing to do.
What is the best idea in this kind of situation? Is it usually okay or even allowed to point them to these kinds of resources?

How come "there are points for grammatical correctness and writing style" (even more in English!) in an "undergrad science lab" assignment? This is not something that should be taken into account at that stage. You are simply penalizing students that after all might be enormously better than the rest.

I have no hand in making the rubric. I did discuss this issue with the CI, but he said that I should just point them to the skills centre if need be

And this is not an Undergrad science lab. This is an introductory course to earth sciences. I said I usually grade undergrad science labs. Sorry for the misunderstanding.

Citation
Citations are important. It's usually going to take several classes to teach undergrads how to do it properly.
"The professionals" (i.e. career academics) use tools, like Mendeley and BibTex; it's perfectly alright for students to learn to do it too. Actually, writing a long paper without a reference manager is a really bad idea. You're going to make more mistakes doing it by hand. And f you have to change style, you're in trouble if you have to do that by hand. For example, if you submitted a paper to one journal but get rejected, and want to submit to a different journal that requires a different citation format. If you use a reference manager then changing all your references can be done relatively easily.
But to use tools correctly, you do have to have an understanding of the underlying process. So you should also require the students to be able to apply a citation by hand, if required.
I would say that this calls for a two-part exercise, first learning to apply two different citation styles by hand ("Cite this journal paper, proceedings paper and book according to standard X, then according to standard Y"), and then as a second exercise using a tool ("Enter the data, then export a reference according to standard X, then export according to standard Y"). So instead of just pointing out the existence of these tools, actually push your students to learn to use them.
Grammar
It feels childish to grade academic content for langue: it ought to be substance over form. But in the real world, form matters. Consider what could happen if an article is written poorly:

It may be hard to read. Fewer busy academics will read it.
It may be hard to understand. Will convince fewer academics of your ideas.
It may be misunderstood.
What the text actually ends up saying, isn't what the author meant it to say.

All of these are bad, both for the author and the academic community. Good writing isn't a frivolous form over substance thing. It's important.
If the language in a paper is really bad, then that makes the paper bad. Even if the ideas and research were good. The medium fails the message.

I usually point them to our university's academic skills centre but since usually there are points for grammatical correctness and writing style, I hate it when they lose points for something they can't do anything about.

Yes, they can do something about it (avail themselves of the academic skills centre, get language training). And they have to, in order to graduate as good academics. By subtracting points for poor language you're pushing them in the direction where they need improvement.
(Nobody said it was going to be fun. It's good to be compassionate; it's not good to shield people from the push they need to improve.)

So what does that mean for tools like Grammarly? Well, it's good to support yourself with tools, but if you have a serious deficiency in English then the tool isn't going to fix that.
I would say discuss the tool in class:

Why is good language important? (So that people understand you and take you seriously.)
What can the tool do for you? (Catch common mistakes, signal bad style, find things you overlooked.)
What are the limitations of the tool? (Generally tools have trouble when you meant A, but wrote syntactically correct B. Computers are good at doing what we say, not what we meant.)
What can you do if the tool is not enough for you? (How to evaluate if you have a deficiency, what can you do to fix a deficiency?)

Designing exercises to help them learn citations is a good idea, however, what would be the way to go if we don't really have as much time to do things like that? We actually have similar exercises designed to introduce students to other concepts like scientific vs non-scientific writing by making them write the same essay in a Journalistic style and then a Scientific style. But this usually is done over two weeks. In between the submissions, we usually clarify some concepts, point out major differences in style that they need to be aware of, etc.

The only way I can think of of doing this is to have them do these exercises within those weeks. And thanks for the advice about Grammarly, I will do that next time

I can't really help you rebalance your timetable mid-course :P When setting up for the future, you should take into account that tools like BibTex, while powerful, do have a steep initial learning curve. I'd make the exercises more about making a good effort and learning something, than about scoring points for getting it perfect the first time. It's not uncommon that learning these things is repeated across multiple undergrad courses, and eventually it sticks.

Yeah true, my timetable cannot really be changed right now anyway. I would rather avoid introducing LaTeX since I have found from a lot of my colleagues that they don't really use LaTeX a lot most of the time. So I am not sure if that would be as useful to them. And also there are regular workshops on using LaTeX at our university which also cover BibTeX. I think asking them to use Mendeley would be fine.

I don't have any experience with Mendeley. LaTeX is a bit of an all or nothing affair - if you're in some disciplines/departments, it's pretty much the standard. Outside there, it's pretty rare. Personally, I'm in love.

As a general strategy, I'd say tell them they can use tools like Mendeley, and it's even encouraged; but they do have to add a few sentences describing which settings they used. Just to show some understanding of what they're doing.

I use LaTeX all the time. I am in geophysics so it is pretty much the first thing I learnt when I was doing my undergrad project since there are so many equations. I even used to (and still do) my homework in LaTeX. I myself learnt Mendeley a few months ago. I plan to tell the students to use Mendeley and then make sure that everything is there. eg - Mendeley might not be able to recover the issue number so you might have to input it yourself. If it is missing from the reference, it might be an indication of them not knowing what they are doing, which I can then call them out on.

I am gonna try your suggestion as well


text:
Should I phone a professor if they haven't replied to my email?
I'm a Master's student in Physics. The summer vacations are coming up, and we need to do a few projects under various faculty to know their work and field. I'm interested in experimental high-energy physics, and there is only one faculty available for it.
I contacted her six days ago regarding the project. She hadn't replied to the mail, so I did again and yet again—still, no reply. I went to the department, and it turned out that she hasn't come to the office for two months or so. They said that she was working from home. Now, I have to know whether there is a project available so that if not, I can contact others. Meanwhile, other faculty have taken students, so places fill every day. I don't have time.
The office member said that they couldn't contact her via phone but only by mail, And she also didn't reply to them for many days.
What should I do? Is it right for me to call?

Do you have the professor's phone number? If so: Did they personally give it to you, or found by some other method?

Yeah, I got it from her Website.

... from her website: Then her phone will ring in an empty office.

@Marianne013 Some professors have mobile numbers on their website, or redirect their office phone to some mobile.

Don’t call. Don’t wait.
It could be your emails are going to her spam folder, so you might consider asking someone in the department to email her asking for an update but since time is important consider instead changing projects (even if another project does not align with your preferred topic). For some reason this person is not responding to multiple emails, which is the most obvious way to contact her.  Do you really want to work with someone who is so unresponsive?
Put another way: if this person shows minimal interest in answering your emails now, why do you believe she will answer your emails later when you are in need of advice for the project?

I'll admit that I've been guilty of this before. I'm not trying to say that's ok not to respond to emails, but I do think it's reasonable to expect that response times may be different for a student that a professor is currently working with versus a student who contacted that professor out of nowhere.

@MichaelMior Agreed, although in this case there is a (presumably known to all) time pressure in fixing projects, so one would think that a professor would not let a student in limbo for too long.

If you've worked with them before and they gave you their number, then it's OK to call (sparingly - depending on your relationship with them). If they have not given you their number, then do not call them at home. What if they're sick? What if they're taking care of someone who is sick? Professors have lives, too.
If you've already emailed them three times (waiting an appropriate amount of time between each) and you don't have an email back - you have your answer. Sometimes no response is a response.

Sometimes no response indicates that professors are busy people and prioritize things and kind of procrastinate low urgency tasks. And the OP is low urgency to the professor even when it is important for OP. This does not mean rejection, but only that someone is too busy. Yeah, that's not ideal, but very common in academia.

Definitely call the faculty member as soon as possible.
Since you don’t have much time to find a position, as you said, it is better to try to contact the professor immediately and get a decision. It could be that you will be unsuccessful in contacting her by phone call, too, since even your office staff has apparently not been able to contact her on her phone. If the same thing happens to you, then drop this project and pursue a different opportunity.
In case you are successful in contacting her by phone, be sure to ask her about her schedule and her preferred method of contacting, including the mean time of response you should expect. The pandemic has thrown many people’s lives into chaos. In "normal" times, I would agree with the advice in the answer by User ZeroTheHero, but it’s entirely possible that this faculty member will make adjustments to supervise you properly if she agrees to take you on as a project student. Better to find out for yourself, if possible, instead of assuming anything beforehand.
(Of course, in the absence of direct information, you could ask students who have worked with this faculty member about her style of supervision, but I expect you would have already done this sort of standard background check anyway.)

Yeah! I talked to one of her Ph.D. students. According to her, She might not be replying because she isn't interested in taking any students. I'm taking that! and looking for someone else.

@YoungKindaichi great, that sounds definitive. Quickly find and move on to a different opportunity then. :)

It's possible to do remote supervision but not answering emails from a student in your program seeking to do a project is a big red flag IMO

I absolutely disagree with this recommendation. Never ever call someone who has indicated (even indirectly) that they are not open to being called.

@GregMartin if they do list their phone number on their web site as contact details, I'm not sure it can be all bad trying to call that number in a case like this. What would the number be there for if one couldn't ever use it?

Well, you could, but it is unlikely she would answer you unless she is specifically hiding from the department. Maybe she is off the grid now and will be for a while. Or maybe she has found a job in another country without anyone knowing. Or gotten sick. Or maybe she is put off by your barrage of emails (and your communication needs clearly do not match). There are plenty of reasons for someone to be unresponsive and not up for you to discern them.
Reach out to other faculty. Be prepared to navigate the situation where she does get back to you, but way too late. Ideally write her just one more email once you decide upon working under someone else.

I really do not understand some of the other answers. If your professor gave you their phone number, you should call them if you need to. It's not that big of a deal. I feel you are overthinking this.
I and my PhD advisor called each other all the time. It is just another form of communication.
That's the fastest way to get the information. You should not feel that it is inappropriate, like showing at their front door...

I in turn do not understand your answer.  Given  "The office member said that they couldn't contact her via phone but only by mail" the odds are overwhelmingly that the person will not answer her phone.  Your situation is different: your supervisor has already a commitment towards you and they chose to give you their phone #.

I said if your professor gave you her phone number... Again, in that case, I do not see anything wrong with giving her a call. So what if she doesn't answer? I believe that he should try everything he can without insulting the professor. Maybe I come from a different culture than you, but seeing a missed call from one of your students will not hurt anybody, at least not where I'm from.

@gnometorule That was additional information that was not available in the moment when I wrote an answer. But having this in mind, I'd say that things are even simpler now. That means that OP has office number (and office is empty) so he can call as much as he wants, but the nobody will answer.

You already have your answer:

The office member said that they couldn't contact her via phone but only by mail, And she also didn't reply to them for many days.

When she cannot answer her staff, why should she be able to answer you?
I would try to go another route. Can you talk to someone of her team about your matter? For many things it is very likely she would delegate it to someone in the team anyway. They may be able to provide help until you get an official answer. It may even be an advantage, when you may be able to start working on your project before it gets officially registered (and deadlines may be defined and so on).


text:
Contacting potential advisors before applying to graduate program - PURE MATH
I have seen a few similar questions, but the answers are not usually specific enough to math, and it seems this is one of those things which varies heavily based on field. In many math programs, the student does not have an advisor until 2 or more years after being admitted to the program, so I'm really not sure how relevant contacting individual professors could be. Should I or should I not attempt to contact faculty with whom I would be interested in doing phd work? Do students who reach out to potential advisors generally have an advantage over those who don't in the admissions process, and are they more likely to actually end up working with the desired advisor?
Are there any cases known when contacting professors in this way has actually been harmful to a student's career? Suppose I have read some of Professor X's papers, and I like his style and the areas he works in, but I don't have specific questions about the papers -- then is there even a point in writing to him? Should I try to come up with questions for the sole purpose of writing?
If anyone knows of a post where these questions are addressed specifically for pure math, please let me know.
By the way, I am an undergrad in the US and applying to US math programs.

I do not think there is anything math specific about the answer.

I disagree.  Perhaps there’s other fields like math in this way, but math is an outlier in terms of students choosing fields and getting advisors very late.

The expected behavior here is that you talk to faculty after you’ve been accepted to the program, not before.  That way you have more information to make your decision about where to go, but faculty aren’t spending a lot of time with students who aren’t going to be accepted.
Contacting a faculty member is unlikely to give you an advantage in admissions if you don’t already know them, what can give an advantage is if you have a mentor who knows faculty at the school you’re applying to and puts in a good word.  It’s not likely to hurt you either, as long as you’re polite about it, but you’re likely to get no reply or a short reply saying that they’re not on the admissions committee.  They’re more likely to be annoyed than to help, but in 9 cases out of 10 it just won’t amount to anything.