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Asking for removal from acknowledgement
In most fields, I think, it is common to use the acknowledgement section to thank everyone for their input who contributed to the paper but did not enough to warrant co-authorship. As a biostatistician working in medicine, however, I have experienced it several times that researchers want to include me as a co-author, although I have not contributed anything or do not even agree with the methods they used, just to make the impression that they have a professional statistician on board. In these situations, I refuse authorship, which usually puts an end to the debate.
Recently, there was one of these cases where a researcher used a methodology that was in my view inferior and even wrong and refused to follow my suggestions. They accepted my rejection of authorship, but wrote in the acknowledgement that they "thank LuckyPal for statistical support".
I feel taken advantage of, and it smells of academic misconduct. However, the journal (a quite reputable one) has no policy of requiring consent of people named in the acknowledgement section. The phrasing "statistical support" is probably broad enough to allow for interpretations that come close to the truth, so it is not plain wrong. If the authors would actually contact the journal to change the acknowledgement, it will at least look somewhat fishy from the journal's perspective.
Is it legitimate to demand to be removed from the acknowledgement?
Follow-Up
Thank you for the very helpful dicussion here. I asked the first author to remove my name from the acknowledgements. They first suggested to remove my name and instead thank the institute, were I am employed. This suggestion has further increased my suspicion that their goal was not to actually acknowledge my time and effort. The director of my institute disagreed with this suggestion. The author then contacted the journal, which has now actually removed the statement about statistical support or expertise from the acknowledgement completely.
I am glad that it all went well without further escalation. I will refrain from collaborating with this research group in the future.

Is the paper in question published or under review?

@user2705196 the paper is published.

I'm sorry you had to go through this. You should be upset with the people and I would be if I were in your shoes.

also, see these ethics guidelines https://community.amstat.org/ethics/ourlibrary/new-item2/new-item

To put things into perspective, here's some scholarly work (possibly outdated - but directly addressing the questions at hand) on the subject.  Cronin, Blaise, and Kara Overfelt. "The scholar's courtesy: A survey of acknowledgement behaviour." Journal of Documentation (1994) https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/eb026929/full/html

Some details from this (non-representative) survey to indicate the academic norms around acknowledgements (in 1994 - things may have changed since...): 50% of authors never seek permission to acknowledge, 40% sometimes do, 10% always do.

72% of respondents disagreed that  authors should be responsible for obtaining permission from persons acknowledged by name, 12% agreed and 16% were neutral.

Current journal policies differ on the practice. For example, here is one publisher that requires to obtain permission https://bmcmedicine.biomedcentral.com/submission-guidelines/preparing-your-manuscript/reviewers-acknowledgements

In contrast, Nature Publishing Group does not require  for authors to obtain permission for acknowledgments (in contrast to authors) https://www.nature.com/nature-portfolio/editorial-policies/acknowledgements

Is it possible that the author is being honest? They sought your advice, listened to your criticism of their methodology, and your reasons for the criticism; they considered your arguments, and decided that they were satisfied that their analysis was sound; finally, they were grateful to you for helping them to feel confident, so they felt they should acknowledge your input in some way?

I suggest you do express your concerns to the authors or the journal and ask to be removed from the acknowledgements, but do not accuse the authors of academic misconduct.

@SimonCrase I cannot exclude this possibility, but in approx. 400 projects that I have consulted I was maybe mentioned half a dozen times in the acknowledgements (excluding my actual co-authorships, of course). So it seems to be very unusual to mention me for 2-3 hours of consultation, particularly given that they did not follow my arguments.

Have you considered contacting the Journal in a letter asking to set the record strait?  That you did speak, but you disagree completely with their statistical methodology, and none of your opinions where used in the paper to the best of your knowledge.  Assuming they are willing to publish this, I would think it would have higher impact than a simple removal of acknowledgement?

I think this is a problem of different cultures and expectations. If I was working on a project and someone took 2/3 hours out of their time to give me advice, I would not find strange acknowledging their effort.

In future communications, preempt this problem by asking not to be added to the acknowledgements!

The purpose of the acknowledgements is to acknowledge help and support from other people and funders. In this case the authors' did exactly that and correctly acknowledged your support. The fact that you are mentioned in the acknowledgements does not imply that you endorse the paper and therefore there is generally no need (and no policy) of journals to check whether the people acknowledged in the paper endorse the paper.
However, moving forward you might want to make your statistical support contingent on you signing off on the final manuscript even when you are not an author. That way you can control whether your name appears as part of the paper or not, and whether the language in the acknowledgments accurately represents your contribution. While in theory acknowledgements do not equal endorsement, I agree that there is (very small) implied endorsement by simply being associated with it. For example, I would not like my name appear in a fundamentally unethical study that's going to make the world wide news.

‘The fact that you are mentioned in the acknowledgements does not imply that you endorse the paper’, I think many people would see it as such though.

To strengthen your post, please add a citation for your claim that "The fact that you are mentioned in the acknowledgements does not imply that you endorse the paper" as well as your ethical claim "In this case the authors' did exactly that and correctly acknowledged your support." Many fields are different, and perhaps your has a lower bar than mine

@user438383 I do not disagree with your statement, but I would claim that those people do so incorrectly. Of course, If I write in the acknowledgements that "LuckyPal advised and approved the methods" then that would imply an endorsement. But if I write "LuckyPal provided statistical advice" it is a factually correct statement and one that strictly does not imply an endorsement.

One way to frame this question is to think of scientific publishing as not that different from any other kinds of publishing, such as newspaper articles, TV news, blogging, or whatever. And one of the things that often comes up is the subject of libel and defamation. But in general, a truthful statements cannot be libel or defamation. The situation is similar here, can "LuckyPal" claim that what was written was incorrect and harmful to their reputation. I think that's the right way to frame the question, not whether they approve of the study or whether they were asked.

For me, an acknowledgement means that the work was not substantial enough to be a co-author but otherwise it shows complete support for the paper. It never crossed my mind that someone in the acknowledgments may be uncomfortable with the article.

@user2705196 thanks for the advice, but your suggestion seems quite unrealistic. Statistical consulting is part of my daily routine. In the past 5 years I have consulted more than 400 projects. If I would demand to read each manuscript before submission, I would do barely anything else than reading unpublished paper all day long and probably I would also come across as putting everyone under general suspicion.

Among these 400 projects, I have very rarely be considered in the acknowledgement, simply because it is very unusual. So I guess there are two possible explanations. Either the authors were very grateful for my consultation (which I doubt, otherwise they would have followed my suggestions, wouldn't they?) or they wanted to make the impression of statistical expertise in their paper. Nevertheless, I am surprised that many people seem to share that perspective of acknowledgement not implying endorsement. That's definitely something that I have came to learn now, and I will consider it.

@LuckyPal It also depends how specific is the acknowledgement. If you helped them with something very specific and in their acknowledgements they state very precisely the help that you provided, then it doesn't necessarily imply endorsement of the paper in general. But if the acknowledgement is very general and unspecific, it does sound like endorsement. And from what you describe it does look like they're using your name to give more credibility to their statistics approach.

First, I disagree with the other answer.
To your question: Is it legitimate to demand to be removed from the acknowledgement?
You should object to being acknowledged without your permission.
For example, my agency has a federal policy against listing people in the acknowledgments without their consent (listed here).
Furthermore, I have had people confirm that I did obtain permission to list people in the acknowledgments of papers.
I also remember reading on an American Statistical Association list server (whose location I do not remember is behind a membership wall for privacy) that a biostatistician/statistician should NEVER accept acknowledgements.
As illustrated by your example, acknowledgements give you liability (such as people thinking you approve of their method) without reward (specifically being granted coauthorship).
If the authors refuse to remove you, contact the editor to the journal and ask to be removed.
Hopefully that will work and a correct version of the manuscript will be published.
If that does not works, here are some options:

Depending upon the amount of effort you want to put into your work, write a response article criticizing the paper.
Raise ethic concerns with journal, your employer, and ethical employer.
Do a formal ethics complaint with their professional society if they hold membership.
Complaint to the funding agency (such as NIH in the US).

Lastly, if you do not want to do that much work and stop after contacting the journal, you might just blacklist the people and refuse to help them ever again.
Sadly, you learned through the "school of hard knocks" why acknowledgements give you liability without reward for statistics.
Edits based upon comments:

In the Policy, "Individuals listed in the acknowledgements section should be notified before the scientific information product is released or published." implies the person also gives their consent to be listed. I do not have a formal citation for this policy, but have been told this interpretation by people who enforce the policy.

Statistical consultation for ad hoc analysis or questions about methods by itself would only be acknowledgements, but in the survey statisticians are usually involved with the study design, interpretation of results, and writing the paper.

I can perfectly understand being uncomfortable about an acknowledgment, but there is no way that it creates "liability" (which is a legally loaded term). If you agree, maybe choose a different expression (dunno, "assumed consent," or such)?

@RichardErickson thanks a lot for your answer. I strongly to attend to agree with your view. I actually decided to ask the authors to remove me from the acknowledgement. Maybe I will also contact the journal, but probably no more escalation after that, also considering what others have written here about the status of acknowledgements. I will definitely follow "you might just blacklist the people and refuse to help them ever again." :)


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Visiting a research lab as an undergraduate?
Some context:
I'm an engineering undergraduate student seriously considering doing a masters degree in a japanese university once I complete my current degree (in two years)
In the next month or so, I will be travelling abroad for a small vacation in Japan.
Would it be wrong to ask researchers I would be interested in working with to visit their lab and discuss their research despite my lack of experience?
Considering that the scholarships available to me require early applications, it's very likely that I'll have to start applying in less than a year so having some contacts overseas would be a great bonus for me.

Normally I would answer right away and say that it's a good idea, and that I did it before. But I did it in Australia and there may be significant social differences in Japan.
So I'm hoping somebody with experience in Japanese academia may be able to weigh in.

I'd be interested in hearing your point of view nonetheless, even if it doesn't apply perfectly, I think it would be relevant.

OK, sure. I will write an answer. :)

Disclaimer: This answer may or may not be different in Japan, due to cultural differences. If my answer disagrees with one with experience in Japanese academia, I'd go with their answer. It may even be different between different labs and fields. But this is based on my experience and also on what I've seen since in other labs I've worked in.
I was in Australia on a summer internship and I reached out to an academic at a local university who worked in my field of interest, after reading a few of his papers and checking out his website. I informed him that I was an interested potential PhD applicant who was about to enter their final year of undergrad, and I asked him if he'd have some time available to chat with me in his lab. I attached my CV to the email and wrote a very brief paragraph with my history (a few sentences; don't give them a huge thing to read). He replied immediately, very interested, and we scheduled an appointment for some days later. We ended up talking for a few hours and he took me around the lab, and introduced me to everyone. I was 100% into doing a PhD with them -- it didn't work out for logistical reasons, but this is unrelated.
An undergrad taking the interest and initiative to read papers, check out the research, and reach out to potential PIs is considered a very good thing. It means that you are taking the PhD / Masters as the serious and professional endeavour that it is. Especially when the undertaking involves moving to a foreign country, it implies that you are considering not only whether you are a fit in the lab, but also how living in the country could impact you.
It's always considered a good idea to reach out to your potential advisers in some way, and not everyone does this -- many advisers get blind applications. If you meet them, it gives you both a chance to see if you'd be a good fit -- academically and personally. Both of these matter. If you don't get along, working with them could be a nightmare! And that goes both ways. That means that when the PI is looking at the pile of applications at their desk and designating their interest, they have something to look back on. It's definitely something that will make you stand out. Enthusiasm is great.
Of course, admission isn't decided by the PI themselves much of the time, but by an admissions committee (not sure about Japan but this is usually the case in NA and EU). Especially so when you are applying for a scholarship. But an established relationship with the PI is certainly helpful and it indicates seriousness on your part.
Finally: What's the worst thing that could happen? If you're already going to be in the country, the worst thing is that they could say no, and you still get a nice holiday. Just don't send many follow-up emails if they don't reply.
So personally, I'd encourage you to reach out to potential PIs and ask, politely, if they might have the time to briefly meet with you to discuss their research and your research interests. But definitely either ask somebody who has been in Japan, or google social norms and etiquette since that is very important everywhere, but especially in Japanese culture.

Pretty late for feedback, but the visits ended up being great!

Good job @JSLavertu, I hope it works out :)

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Will a masters degree from Japan be seen as less valuable?
I'm a canadian engineering  undergraduate student in the field of robotics and I'm considering doing a masters degree in Japan when I finish my bachelors.
I've talked about this with my internship supervisor (a well known professor in my subfield) and he claimed that research in Japan is usually seen as less relevant because (his words) :

they tend to stay isolated from the worldwide community and ignore
  new developpements from other researchers.

I'd really like to study in Japan as I have a great interest in their culture and also because popular culture suggests that Japan is one of the leading countries in the field of robotics (This might be wrong).
However, I would also like my future masters degree to not be seen as second rate.
Will a masters degree in Japan be seen as less valuable? and if so, how would it impact my future career?

Your internship supervisor, as he is well known in your subfield, is probably better to answer this question than us.

I'm mostly looking for other points of view. People can be biased even if they dont intend to.

Japan has a well known Robotics research community and even if they ignore other researchers, they are doing pretty well on their own. Its not bad, just different. In the worst case it is still international experience that is valuable for you and your research.

I can't answer specifically about robotics, but nearly all research in Japan is done in an insular way. There's at least two reasons I can think of for this: (1) language barrier -- most researchers even in the sciences don't have a great command of English so their ability to read and publish in the broader environment is low. (2) research expectations in Japan - the system here is geared towards quantitative approaches to publication rather than qualitative (at most universities, 10 publications including local venues (3 int. level) = assistant professor; 20 = full professor (5 int)).

I'm not sure I understand your second point, could you explain it in a different way?

I think your decision should be based on future aspirations. Specifically, you need to decide if you are heading into industry or academia when you complete your studies. If you are going into industry, companies want people who know their stuff and can actually do something. It is the application of theory through making it tangible and not necessarily the knowledge of theory that is most valued. Studying in Japan should not injury you in this regard. Having overseas experience is yet another benefit to many companies seeking employees, especially in a country that is a leader in this field.
If you decide to go into academia the advice of your professor is probably wisest to abide by. Exceptions to this would be if you choose to stay in Japan, which would not hurt with a Japanese degree or if you complete a PhD somewhere, which would help to overcome a master degree that some may see as "second rate."Explaining your reason for going to Japan in the admission process should mollify many PhD admission committees

That's a great answer! I still haven't decided whether I'd like to complete a PhD or go in the industry after so thank you for listing both options.

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Would a paper on the integration of multiple technologies make sense?
I am currently working on a project for my research internship. This basically consists in taking a few pre-existing concepts and pieces of technology and combining them into a new product/tool.
Apart from publishing results of testing the tool's effectiveness at solving the problem, would it be possible to publish a paper about its development? or does the fact that no new technology was created not make it novel research?
I work in the field of robotics applied to the human body. The device will help users maintain a proper posture.
I realize this might be opinion based, but I still feel that it's relevant.

Is there a new idea behind the new product/tool?

Perhaps you could expand the publishability of your work by also considering its applications.  You may want to look for a collaborator who has specific expertise in a field of application.  Note: I will let you fix your spelling mistake (it's -> its) to help you establish the habit of checking for that one.  (It's a common mistake -- you are not alone in making it!)

@scaaahu as far as I know, yes.

@aparente001 well its an product, not a method so I suppose talking about its applications is mandatory... Thanks for the typo correction, I didnt notice it.

The answer is very field dependent - can you give some details?

@bitwise I edited the question to clarify.

A paper about the development could be interesting!  It probably does not fit in a research journal, but perhaps your mentor in the internship can suggest where to try publishing it.

The general criteria for something being publishable is that it advances human knowledge in some way.
As you note, it is clear that a scientific publication can be made about the efficacy of your creation at its intended task.
Whether there is anything else beyond that, however, depends on whether the things that were learned during the development and integration process are interesting and generalizable in some way.  Some possibilities:

Did you have to combine the existing elements in an unusual or unexpected manner?
Was there a process that you followed that will make it easier to design more things of the same type?
Was this an example of an emerging set of cross-field collaborations that in itself would be interesting to tell other practitioners about? (e.g., is "postural robotics" an area with a lot of potential that other roboticists would like to hear about?)

It might still be, however, that there are no other papers in this particular effort at the moment---and if so, that's OK too.  Don't try to slice the salami any thinner than it should be.


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How do Graduate Admissions Committees view an applicant from Industry?
At the time of writing this, I have been working for Raytheon Missile Systems (RMS) for about 2.5 years since graduating college.
Prior to graduation, I was on track to go a more academic route due to graduate work and independent study projects I was involved in related to computational mathematics. I ended up choosing to try out industry first, however, since I had no experience with it and wanted to know if this path would be preferable for me long term.
While I have been successful at RMS and used my computational math background to achieve a lot there, I don't think industry is where I want to stay and so I am now working on applications so I can pursue a PhD and more academic career.
Given my industry background, are there any common beliefs in academia, whether good or bad, about individuals from industry I should be aware of for the sake of my application? Is there anything I should strive to highlight or avoid in my application that would help me fare better in the application process?
EDIT:
My experience pre-RMS was largely in numerical analysis, optimization, and simulation, with emphasis in nonlinear systems of hyperbolic partial differential equations. One sample project, for example, was implementing a Space-Time Discontinuous Galerkin Finite Element code to tackle a system of Hyperbolic PDEs and doing validation and convergence studies to validate the theory. I also gained decent experience via independent studies and working at NASA JPL in computer vision. Other skills gained were in parallel computing using OpenMP and MPI.
At RMS, I have worked on clusters and have primarily developed and built codes in areas like numerical optimization, adaptive sampling of unknown functions, supervised machine learning, controls, bayesian estimation algorithms, and simulations.
In terms of research, I am planning to apply to computational math or computer science programs and hope to get involved in machine learning with emphasis in Reinforcement Learning for partially-observable Markov decision problems in continuous state and action spaces.

Generally the problematic part of this situation (for admissions committees) is having been away from academia for years. See e.g. Usefulness of prior industry experience before entering grad school?, Getting back into academics after an industry stint: what can I do while still in industry to improve my research profile?, Is it hard to start a PhD programme after leaving to work in industry?

Also Getting into gradschool from a “real job”, How to secure recommendations and apply for PhD after having worked outside of academia for two years?

@ff524 Thank you for the reference links. They are providing some useful info for me to consider with my application.

Whether your industry experience works in your favor or not will mainly depend on whether the groups you are seeking to get into favor that type of experience: on one hand, research groups which have strong ties to industry will generally look positively on your relevant industry experience, while, on the other hand, research groups which are doing mainly theoretical work may not care about your industry experience as much. Perhaps edit your question to include the type of research you want to do?

@MadJack I added some of my background and the research area I am hoping to get involved in, if that can help with anything. I do think the resources provided by ff524 help me answer the general question I was looking to have answered.

@MadJack Though I will note, any specific feedback about what I am interested in getting involved in with respect to research would be very appreciated as well.

There are several considerations that may make it difficult for you.  Here are a few based on gut instinct:
1) You are an 'outsider' - the traditional route of undergraduate to graduate school often entails nurturing relationships with other academics at your home institution and abroad.  Those relationships help grease the wheels when it comes to letters of support.  But, this can be overcome. Perhaps you already maintain relationships with academic circles.  Failing that, strong letters from higher-ups at a place like RMS are probably just as noteworthy.
2) From the PI's perspective, taking a graduate student is a long-term investment. You would occupy a spot that could be offered to someone else, so in addition to promising productivity, PI's generally prefer the person have the goal of continuing on and pursuing an academic life.  Since you've been in industry, there is always the fear that at some point, you'll simply abdicate and return to industry.
I think you can spin your industry experience 'narrative' to your advantage.  First, you can stress that your time in industry did not meet your needs for academic development.  In other words, only academics provides the platform to realize your highly technical goals.  Second, people in industry usually have a very strong work ethic and know how to get things done; something that is often lacking in new graduate students.  You might consider documenting just how productive you have been.

I am not sure I understand (1). The OP works in industry for only about 2.5 years since graduating college. He did not indicate he would have problem getting recommendation letter from the college he graduated from. Letters from RMS can serve as a plus.

Thank you for your answer. Your comments fit with the approach of my current Statement of Purpose. At the moment, I talk about how industry doesn't really provide the challenging work I seek to do, while academia does and how that makes me desire to go down a more academic path. In terms of letters of rec, I have pretty good relationships with some professors at school via projects I did under them, so I think I should get some strong letters from them. I also have a strong letter from a very senior and successful engineer from RMS with a PhD, so I hope that carries weight.


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What does it mean if my advisor decides to remove his name from a paper we co-authored?
I recently received a rejection to a paper that I co-authored with my advisor. There was nothing wrong with the content but the reviewer believed it was too simple by the journal standards. My advisor's advisor who has more that 30 years expertise in the field has suggested to combine the paper with its sequel (which I was in the process of writing) and submit elsewhere.
While I am getting ready to do the same my advisor has asked to remove his name from the paper. This worries me a little. It makes me think that the paper isn't good enough and that is why my advisor want to disassociate himself from it.
Could there be any other reason why my advisor is doing so? Should I ask him?

Should I ask him? – Yes, this is the only way you get a definite answer.

You might also want to ask if they'd recommend that you continue pursuing its publication.

It may be that, once the additional material is included, you advisor feels that his contribution equates to the role of advisor, rather than co-author.

At some point, you will likely have to defend this work in front of a committee that includes your advisor, and in a sense, you and your advisor both are standing behind the work at that point. So, if the advisor thinks the work is subpar, it would be strange for he/she to allow you to self-sabotage. Still, you should ask your advisor directly.

He's your advisor. If you can't ask your advisor a question about publication, you've got very big problems.

I would like to tell everyone who gave me wonderful comments and answers that I did ask my advisor. It is as @J-Kun said, my advisor thought I deserved single authorship after the work I put in. I was not sure if I should put this information in my question so I am just adding it as a comment. Thank you all.

Please ask your advisor politely. There can be numerous reasons he wanted to have his name removed:

The quality of your work is too bad and the paper might affect his reputation. I do not believe that this is the case. You worked together on the paper for the first submission where he agreed to be on author list. Why should he remove his name when there is better content, now?
No right of authorship: He may know that all of the work was done by you and he has too little contribution to the paper. So he is friendly by declining authorship of your work. This might be quite likely, at least this has happened for me. However, if this is the case, consider including him in the acknowledgements.
He wants you to become more independent. You may have worked rather closely on the first paper but now he wants you to take the lead and do most work on your own. This may be due to a limit of time on his side.

All in all, just ask him, you need this answer/feedback to continue your work.

I also had the second case - I included my PhD thesis director (as second author) in a paper which looked good (and ended up being very well received). He told me "I have all the publications I need, this is an excellent paper which will do you a lot of good. It would not be a good idea to dilute ownership". I of course added him in the acknowledgments, with a very warm thank you from me.

“Dilute ownership” is such a toxic concept in science. It discourages collaboration and leads to envy and unhealthy competition. It also leads to people being cheated of their legitimate ownership.

@KonradRudolph, I think the opposite problem of people claiming (often by force in case there is a senior and a junior involved) undue credit is waaay larger. I have been fortunate enough to avoid that so far, but few of my colleagues have been as lucky.

@RichardHardy It’s not a competition though. I agree that senior authors accruing default authorship is a problem. Calling it “waaay larger” than junior researchers being pushed out of papers they did work for seems a questionable claim. Case in point: many (most?) biologists by default deny authorship. The burden of proof is on the contributor to argue that their contribution was intellectually irreplaceable and substantial. You get an “acknowledgement” instead. Ridiculous. See the toxic attitude on display here: https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/95586/348

My reaction might have been too hasty, I guess. But I do not get your point here: Calling it “waaay larger” than junior researchers being pushed out of papers they did work for seems a questionable claim. I do not think I made a claim like that. In fact, I was aiming for the opposite: the junior researcher is being given the credit, not being pushed out (the advisor is giving the whole credit to the student).

@Richard Right. But “diluting ownership” usually goes the other way.

Yes, you should definitely ask him about the reason he decide to remove his name from the paper. Also I don't think it will be a huge impact on you or your paper if he still decides to get his name removed.

Your advisor just wants to give you all the credits for the paper. It is your hard work after all. Since he is so shy and goodwilling, don't bother him with such an indiscreet question : don't ask him why. Just tell him thank you for so much support.

Welcome to Academia.SE. Unless you are in close contact with OP's advisor and know that your answer is indeed what OP's advisor thought, your answer is pure speculation presented as fact. Therefore, I downvoted your answer. Have a look at J-Kun's answer for a better solution that includes the same interpretation as yours.


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Writing a master thesis in a totally new field?
One year ago I started an interdisciplinary master programme. It is now time to choose my master thesis topic and the one I have in mind is totally unrelated to my bachelor and quite distant from my current expertise.
I know, that if I were to choose this topic and write a good thesis I would have to acquire substantially new knowledge & skills.
Although I have 9 months to write my thesis, I am considering taking a year off to get caught up on the said topics, and then starting next year.
Is this advisable?
Would you take up the challenge to get acquainted while writing the thesis or only start researching after you've familiarised yourself with the basics?

What does your adviser says?

It might be different from country to country, but where I did my Masters project (Denmark) your judged on what is expected to be learned (with of course a basic-level start knowledge) within the allocated time for the project. Hence, I would not advise to take a year out to get acquainted.
However, it should also be noted that in Denmark you get money to study and so a year of would mean you would need another income. Opposite to other places (like US) where it cost you money to study.

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What's the impact of former university's transcript on PhD application?
I'm a junior majoring in chemistry and have a plan for applying Ph.D. after graduation. My current GPA is not distinct, just 3.65 out of 4 (Many people say 3.7 is competitive while 3.6 is like average if want to apply for top programs). My current school is awesome though and highly prestigious in Chemistry, ranks 10ish on USNEWS, I don't know if that helps when the GPA is not that top?
In addition, I'm a transfer student, which makes the things more complicated. Before coming to US, I spent 2 years at a Chinese university with an overall GPA 3.43/4.00 and rank maybe top 10%, which seems to be fine but not that satisfactory. The most serious problem is that I even got C for some important courses like Orgo 2 (well even I got an A in orgo 1...)and both 1,2 of p.chem. The average scores for these courses were around C and the failure rate was about 30% so luckily I at least didn't fail but just got an average score. That's terrible and I don't know if the past transcript will play extreme bad effects on my application. (Actually, I think I put more emphasis on some entrepreneur and voluntary activities, that was really time-consuming and meaningless...)
I want to do research in the biochemistry field. And it's a dilemma. The pChem seems to have no significant relation to my field of interest(ye, orgo 2 does...) but which are definitely important courses for a Chem major. And I'm wondering if sacrificing time to retake these courses is a better choice since I really want to take some grad level course during my senior year. If the good performance in upper-level courses can cover the bad grades in past?
And I know the research is extremely important for Ph.D. application. I did one in my former Univ. in my sophomore which is related to organic synthesis but was very basic. I didn't have some papers for this one I just started my second research last semester here at my current university. It's awesome the lab is closely related to my field of interest and the PI and Ph.D. mentor are really nice and helpful. But here comes the question, I think the lab is awesome and if I continue to involve there is possibility I can get some result maybe some publication? But the lab is very new and the PI just started her AP position here, definitely, she is willing to write a strong RL for me if I continue to work at her lab, but is the RL strong enough for a top program? (I know I'm greedy but... Everyone wants the best right)
I know it's a whole lot of questions and sorry for that...

Do you still have chance to retake those two courses at the current university in the US?

Every field (chemistry vs. mathematics vs. history) is different and every PhD program at different universities you apply to is different. Also, who serves on the PhD admissions committee may change year-to-year.
Yes, many top-tier programs will look at your GPA. How much weight will they use to judge your application is variable. I can imagine a situation where the five professors on this years admission committee decide to stress class grades for incoming students.
Yes, many program will seriously consider any research you do, even if you never published anything. Simple being involved in an processor's research laboratory will most likely give you an advantage. I can imagine a situation where the five professors on next years admission committee decide to stress undergraduate research in incoming students.
My point is the following: You can't predict what will get you into a PhD program because it may change year-to-year.
What I would do: It would be nice to find a way as an undergrad to research something, but I wouldn't stress about it being publicly published. It may be enough to have a strong undergraduate thesis, similar to a senior-project, that shows your research ability. That with a good recommendation letter from one (or more) professors you work with will be the building blocks of a strong application.

Welcome to Academia. Sad that this question didn't get an answer sooner.

I didn't even notice it was from 2016. S/he is probably graduated by now.

Well, maybe not graduated, but I hope is doing well. We have a badge for (I think) Excavator for bringing up old questions and getting up votes on answers.

Thank you! I did graduated in 2017 and get admitted to a decent PhD program.

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


text:
Postdoc vs Assistant Prof - which is better for a career academic?
All questions are hypothetical as of now.
I work in the health / biomedical sciences. I have been a postdoc for about 2.5 years and had to leave the postdoc after the lab closed. I have been interviewing for both junior faculty and postdoc positions for the last 3 months but none have worked out (pay cut, rejection etc)
I have an upcoming postdoc fellowship interview with X lab in University A, which I applied for towards the end of the application deadline 1st week Feb. The independent academic committee has determined I am fully qualified for the position and no rebuttals were needed (unusual I know; this is a Scandinavian university). This is a position that will take me out of my comfort zone and give the opportunity to develop new quantitative skills - if the mentors are good (YKWIM). This project is supervised by 2 mentors and both have very impressive h-indices, and one very experienced researcher and another younger researcher but very impressive credentials. I will have teaching responsibilities.
However I applied for an asst prof position in Y lab/dept in the same uni A, which has a much later application deadline. I believe I have a good chance of getting this gig because I have run many projects in this exact area of research and have all the training and certifications needed. I guess I won't be developing any more technical skills and moving on to project management / teaching / administration. This is unique as the position already comes with a project and a longer term of employment, and is still supervised by 1 prof. The yearly salary is not much different from the postdoc and the potential impact of the research is lower.
The academic's goal is to get a faculty position but it seems the asst prof position would be of little value since this is not my grant. It is also not clear if this is a tenure track position.
Hoping I could get some advice from more experienced researchers because my focus  is on building a career, although I do hope to make great scientific achievements in the process.
Cheers and I'll be hanging around if anyone has questions.

I am surprised - to my knowledge assistant professorships in Scandinavia are typically tenure-track. Source: I am an assistant professor in Sweden.

Are you sure that the second one is a position of assistant professor? I've never heard of an assistant professor being supervised by another academic. Also the fact that it's with a specific topic and duration makes it look more like a postdoc position.

@Erwan yeah I've read the job posting many times..it does look like a postdoc but it's for an asst prof. I had to submit a research plan and teaching statement. The paygrade appears to be the same as that of an experienced postdoc.

If you want to quote from or link to the job announcement, that would help with figuring out what is going on. No pressure, of course.

@TommiBrander This question being hypothetical, let's assume the said job ad IS for an asst prof. How important is a title for long term job prospects, all things equal?

@FrostedCentral afaik being assistant professor is supposed to be more advanced in the career ladder, so it's more prestigious. On the other hand, when your contract ends people might assume that something went wrong, especially if assistant professor are usually tenure track in the country. It looks a bit weird to me, normally the title corresponds to a specific status in the academic hierarchy. But I'm not in Scandinavia, it might be a local thing.

In the US, I think it would be clear that the assistant professorship is preferable to a post doc in nearly every case. The exception would be the opportunity to work with a superstar as a post doc.
Again, in the US, assistant professorships are (almost) invariably tenure track, though there are a very few colleges that don't offer tenure at all. But that isn't likely to be a factor.
For most, a post doc is really just considered to be a stepping stone to a real position and a way to continue to advance if the job market is poor at the time.
But ask the institution itself about tenure and also about the likelihood of actually earning it.


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Google scholar "sort by date" returns articles from last year only?
I am doing a pilot study for my research. When I search in google scholar, it gives me about 10 thousand results for the keywords that are anywhere in the article. I want to narrow my search down to abstract, title and keywords only but when I click on sort by date it only gives me articles from the last year only. Is there any option which I am missing so that I can refine my result to abstracts, keywords and titles from all previous years rather than only from the last year?
Any help would be appreciated.

First, you should realize that Google Scholar is not the same thing as a "free" equivalent of a commercial scholarly database (e.g. EBSCO or ProQuest). Although it's great for finding grey literature and relatively obscure topics (not to mention tracking citation counts), it has some serious limitations for general literature reviews. In particular, it does not permit you to do many of the focused searches that commercial scholarly databases. I suspect that this is for copyright reasons, rather than technical reasons--the journal publishers probably wouldn't permit Google to search their copyrighted articles in depth without paying for it.
What this means for your purposes is that, in general, you cannot do a title-abstract-keyword search on Google Scholar. The exception is that you can search for abstracts only, but only for articles added to Google Scholar in the last year. That's what you get when you click on "Sort by Date"--it's not obvious, but that means "Sort articles added in the last year by date". This is only useful to find what's new, but is useless for any general search on what exists in the literature.
The solution is to search in a commercial scholarly database (e.g. EBSCO or ProQuest). Your library pays them for the right to access them, they pay the journals, and so the journals authorize this kind of search.

It is very strange, is not it? Each of the search results, when sorted by default (by relevance) comes with its date. It is a trivial task to reorder them by date. I could do it quasi by hand, importing them in any kind of software. Why on earth would anybody forbid doing that in the scholar search itself??

@მამუკაჯიბლაძე, no it is not strange. This is how I understand it (though I might be mistaken): journals and scholarly databases make a lot of money from indexing scholarly articles. Although they are willing to cooperate with Google Scholar to some extent so that their articles are more visible, they would never permit Google Scholar to become a free replacement to having to subscribe to their paying services. So, they only let Google use their data on the condition that Google Scholar's capabilities are limited. So, "why on earth"? It's all about money.

authors: მამუკა ჯიბლაძე


text:
Does an admissions committee check if a student retook a class
Many schools around me (in asia) allow a student to retake any class, regardless of grade, and replace it on their transcript.  Is it normal for an admissions committee to query if the school an applicant is from allows this, or is it not thought of at all?

If the class shows up twice on your transcript, the committee will know you retook it.  But they probably won't care.
If it doesn't, it won't even occur to them to ask.  (At least in my experience.)

So if a student had one year inbetween applying to grad school and finishing undergrad, you would advise that it is a good idea to retake any classes to improve their GPA, as no one would think they have 'inflated' their gpa.  Given they would not be doing other more interesting work?

Just for context, this question came about because of a recent question I saw where they asked, should i retake a class for gpa or do research.


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What is the scholarly value of a report containing experimental results and the procedure
I have performed some experiments on approximately 400+ data sets, my PI is thinking of publishing online a report that contains some background information, the software and the procedure used to obtain the results and a detailed table of the results and maybe some analysis and conclusions of the results.
Both the software used to do the tests and the data sets are publicly available, and we didn't contribute in establishing them, i.e. we didn't code the software, nor did we collect or produce the data sets.
He expects that this report will get cites in the future, at least by his group's future work.
My question is: What is the academic value of such report for a student who wants to pursue a phD?

I am confused by the term "report". Is he going to send this report on a journal (and make it a paper) or just want to upload it online?

"performed some experiments on [...] data sets" might bear explaining.  I normally think of "data sets" as things whose existence can result from experiments (but not only from experiments), not as things on which experiments are done.

@Alexandros upload it online as he thinks it is not acceptable journal material.

It seems perfectly conceivable that whatever it was you did (but it's not clear what that was) could be a contribution to knowledge and not available from just the data sets and the software.  Your bottom-line question seems impossible to answer without knowing the nature and customs of the academic field you're working in.  There's an immense amount of variation from one field to another in such things.

@MichaelHardy yes, these data sets exist from experiments done by other researches/scientists and we are just using them to obtain duration of execution results to test or benchmark an algorithm implementation that is commercially available. The point of the tests is to show that there might be some room for improvement on the algorithm implementation.

@MichaelHardy the field is computer science, mainly software optimization

@MichaelHardy Running experiments on standard data-sets is fairly standard practice in computer science, where the gathering and curation of datasets is often separated from the tasks people would like to do with them.  Dataset collections allow better comparison of methodologies because people are using similar benchmarks. Some well-known examples include the UCI machine learning repository, and the TIMIT speech corpus.

Short form: if the contribution is scientifically useful, then it will also be useful for your career.
It seems to me that the implicit question within your question is whether you should be investing your energy into something else instead, like try to turn it into a peer-reviewed publication in a high-impact-factor journal, and whether this sort of less formal publication is a "waste of time."  If your PI is well-experienced in journal publication and decides this isn't well-suited for a journal publication, then I would be inclined to trust your PI's judgement.
The nice thing about doing a more informal publication like this is that it can also potentially be much more lightweight to prepare and publish: you don't have to follow anybody else's formatting requirements, nor worry about what peer reviewers will attack you on.  You can just write it up nice and simple and the way you'd like to and post it online.
Then, if it's useful to other scientists, it will be cited and you will get credit.  Not as much as for a journal paper, but quite likely with a similar "value for effort" ratio for you.  Moreover, computer science is a particularly friendly field for getting credit for such alternative forms of contribution, in which many scientists have become famous for their tech reports and software projects rather than their journal papers.  And if it turns out not to be useful to other people, trying to publish it "higher" instead would likely be a worse use of your time in any case.


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How can I (and should I) approach a teacher with a difficult attitude in lessons?
She's not exactly a terrible teacher, but she doesn't relate to students well, and the way she teaches in class discourages us from participating. For example, when asking someone to translate a sentence, after someone spoke out and tried to translate, she interrupted the student saying words to the effect of "No, that's wrong, you've forgot about this." Obviously a valid point, but her tone and the way she cut across was rude, and when she asked the next question, none of us really wanted to give an answer. I could find other examples, but I don't think it's relevant: the point is, the way she teaches - not the content itself - is problematic because it creates a bad environment in class.
The first question is: is it a bad idea to approach her directly to talk about it? Should I bring it up with the department office, or the department head, instead? I figured it would be better to talk to her in person, rather than flag it up with the department, as it's not technically their business, and maybe it could get her into trouble. But I'd appreciate advice on this all the same.
The second question is: if I do talk to her about her teaching style, what's the best way to go about it? I was considering visiting during her office hours with 2 or 3 other students, and trying to explain why we're having issues with her teaching style. Again, if you think there's a better way, or would strongly advise against this, please let me know.

"why we're having issues with her teaching style". Who are we? You and your friends?

Something to keep in mind is culture. Since your example was "translating", and it is common for language teachers to be very familiar, or even native speakers, with that culture, there are some societal differences that might be coming into play to make this more of an issue than the students or teacher realize. This is a great example of what I mean - between "Western" cultures and specifically, "German" culture

I disagree that you should instantly resort to official channels. As an adult, in any environment, when you disagree with someone, or someone's methods or attitude, it is only fair to first allow the person you take exception with to know what they might be doing which upsets or discourages others.
As your teacher keeps asking questions, she is clearly interested in an interactive class, and probably wonders why feedback dies down. If you tell her courteously during office hours that some are intimidated by the way she formulates her corrections, she quite possibly appreciates that you let her know. Tell her to give feedback with a smile, to thank people for chiming in, and to maybe help the person when answering by letting them discover their error themselves ("You said X; but in this context, what about Y?" or such). If she doesn't change anything after meeting her, or it is clear she resents you for bringing this up, you can always escalate up the ladder.
Concern is mentioned that this could lead to retaliation after you politely make constructive suggestions.
As said above, I doubt that; and if she would retaliate, this is against all sort of regulations. This would endanger her standing at the university. You can never exclude the possibility, but if you don't stand up for yourself, and your classmates, now, when will you learn to? You will face similar disagreements throughout your career, and want to be prepared for it.
This applies particularly when your teacher is still working on tenure. Those many years are fairly brutal even under good circumstances. There is no need to have her summoned to her department head for something she isn't even aware of,

One way to minimise the chance of offending this teacher is, instead of criticising what she does, ask for what you'd like to happen instead. In this case, instead of asking the teacher not to interrupt students when they try to answer a question, the OP might say "I'm trying to get better at catching my own mistakes. To help me with that, when I answer a question and you notice I'm making a mistake, could you wait a few seconds to see if I spot the mistake myself?"

@mhwombat: There are lots of good suggestions you could make - yours is certainly one. My main point is that making them is constructive, and probably helpful; just complaining anonymously not. :)

I have been teaching for fifty years, and have always appreciated it if a student approached me in a friendly manner with a problem about some teaching method. It was really useful when the student was specific and described the effect on him or her-- e.g. "I would really like to contribute, but you very seldom call on me."  In this case, it turned out that her seat was behind a big guy and I never saw her hand. Sometimes I simply said no: "I miss a lot of class. Could you put your lectures on E-campus?"  I told her she was welcome to ask a friend to tape them, but no. It all depends on the student's attitude. And no one wants students to go to the dept. head first, including the dept. head. A good head is likely to say, "Have you discussed the matter with the instructor?"

I would say it is not necessarily a bad idea to speak to her yourself, but it is probably easier to bring it up through official channels. You shouldn't worry about "getting her into trouble". As a paying student you are entitled to good quality teaching. If you are the first to complain they may speak to her officially, or offer her training in teaching techniques, she would not be fired just because one student complained about her. If this has been an issue for some time then she really should face disciplinary action as she is not being a good teacher, therefore not doing her job.
At university level you should have some sort of system for feedback on your courses. This may only be taken formally at the end of a course, but you could find out who is in charge of this and try to speak to them about it.
At my university (in the UK) we have Student Representatives, an elected student from each year who has responsibility for communicating the concerns of students to the department, so I would bring it up with them first if you have one. We also have a member of academic staff who is appointed Head of Undergraduate Teaching (or Postgrad teaching, depending what level you are) who would be another point of contact for this kind of thing.
The advantage of going through these channels instead of speaking to the lecturer yourself is that she may be upset by negative feedback and by going through the department it will be anonymous, whereas she may take a personal dislike to you if you speak to her directly (this would be totally inappropriate of course, and she should not let it affect her professionally, but sometimes it is hard to control our emotions, hence why other channels are put in place).

"At my university (in the UK) we have Student Representatives" Huh. I am a student representative for my department; it's funny that this fact didn't remotely occur to me. I'll resolve to bring it up in the next meeting. I hadn't thought about the anonymity thing either.

Not everyone is a "paying" student. The argument about money is irrelevant. Even in EU countries where undergraduate studies are free, these are still paid by taxes etc.. So, either someone deserves a proper education (regardless of him paying or not) or he does not. Limiting this right to paying students (those with scholarships should not complain?) is wrong.

@Alexandros Sorry if that came across wrong, I didn't mean in terms of paying personally, but that the lecturer is employed by the university to teach, so if she is inadequate at her job that is an issue. Many lecturers consider teaching to be a burden and something they will spend as little time as possible on while their research is their "real" job, but this should not be the case because their wages are paid for by the fees paid by (or for) students.

It's difficult to say, but generally, coming through a formal/escalational route has a good chance of making the class unpleasant. A lecturer that gets some "official"-style reprimand/comment/remark, or where an official route is even just implied will likely adopt a strictly formal attitude if they have a good lawyer.  You may get - formally - acceptable interaction, but very little beyond that. Unless there is clear evidence that the lecturer is going be ignorative or antagonistic to it, a friendly request of a change in  interaction style is the way adult humans should initially interact.

First, decide whether you think this professor is hopeless, or if this professor could be gently coaxed into making some improvements that would make the class more worthwhile for you.
If the latter, here's what I would suggest.  Start with a course evaluation form.  If the department doesn't have one, or if you don't like the one they have, make one.  Collaborate with a couple of other students to make it.
You might need to move up the course evaluation date, or create an opportunity for a course evaluation.  That's where your department administration comes in, if you are fairly confident they'll support you, and not just get defensive.  If not, just discreetly hand it out to all the students as they are leaving the classroom one day.
I would give them the opportunity to either fill it in by hand or online (e.g. Google Form).  Include a question "Would you like to volunteer to help process the results?  If so, please email such-and-so address."  Now you have some allies.
Make sure the evaluation form has several different places where students can mention positives (e.g. What do you like best about this course?), and places where constructive suggestions can be made; these areas of the form need to leave LOTS of space for writing.
When you present the results to the professor, include a cover letter explaining that this is a useful tool for all instructors to get better acquainted with what works best for this semester's particular students.  Maybe you could cite some research about the usefulness of guiding one's pedagogy with student feedback.  Also perhaps: "We really like this course, and we want to like it even more."
If you're uncomfortable with the professor knowing the identity of the questionnaire organizers, you can email her the results, from a throwaway email address.


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Lab computers: high end now or average system and repurchase in a couple of years?
I have been asked to recommend systems for upcoming computer labs. I see 2 options.

Buy high end systems now. They will be expensive but will last longer.
Buy average systems now and buy again in a couple of years when these become obsolete.

Option 1 makes more sense to me with the bonus that the lab systems will actually qualify as high-end for some time. Option 2 may seem cheaper now but current systems will become dinosaurs in a couple of years and new systems will have to be bought. The total cost of both options may actually come out to be the same in the long run. However, Option 2 involves scrapping systems in a couple of years which I see as needless waste.
Can anyone here comment on this?
NOTE: I understand this may not be the right forum for this question. If so, I will be happy to be pointed to one that is.

What will the computers be used for? high end activity? or just basic office software/internet/email/etc.

High end use - Matlab, Mathematica, graphics editing and rendering, network simulations. To give an example of Option 1 recommendations, I would suggest 32GB memory even though the applications I mentioned run fine in 8GB. The idea is that when applications needing 32GB come around, these machines are still capable.

It depends so very much on use case.
undergrade labs where it needs to have like 100 PC all running locally, would be totally different from research use where a whole lab might be servers from weak machines that use SSH (or remote desktop) to connects to a small number of very powerful machines.
I feel to the extent that you have been asked to recommend systems, but feel you can not. The responsible thing to do might be to admitt it and find someone else in your area who can, because the local knowledge we don't have is essencial. But this is such a interesting question.

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because I think it should be migrated to ServerFault.SE

How is this lab funded? Is this a one-time funding pot, or will there be money around for the "repurchase later" strategy?

In general, I would argue in favor of getting the best available system that fits within your budget at the time of the purchase. You might be able to save some money now by buying a less powerful system, but the danger of doing so is that you can't necessarily guarantee that in N years, when you plan to buy the replacements, that you'll have the money in the budget to do so. Long-term funding guarantees really aren't, and what is promised today might not hold up several years from now.
By getting the best available system now, you postpone the "must replace" date a while, which can give you more time to find a replacement (or the funds to replace it, as need be). Also, if your money is time-restricted in its use (you have to use it this year, for instance), there's no real incentive to skimp.

Unless all infrastructure is really very well unified and maintained, moving to the new workstation costs significant time so also money. Taking migration costs into consideration, changing hardware on a yearly basis may not be the best option. If ten researchers spend four days each getting own workstation into working shape again, it is forty person-days!
Migration costs can be reduced by making machines very network-bound, with nothing important stored locally. However this approach seems challenging, for some reasons near always being too slow and near always having not enough space on the server. I have seen many attempts to implement it and have never seen a true success.

The answer really depends on what hardware is needed. Look at the products that change significantly overtime, products that change most would be consumer and workstation models. Particularly latest solid state drives for more powerful workstations. Video cards last a while and will be used by your engineers. DDR4 is too new to worry about at this stage. You can go for it and future proof, but DDR3 will hold a stance for almost the next decade I would say, then it will be obsolete. Servers change less often, but they are no longer using traditional SCSI either XD.
Workstations: Go with latest generation Intel core processors, they are a tighter product line than all of AMDs, I would say, for most consumers. Go with solid state, that's new. Regular hard drives are getting old. But do consider SSD brand, as that will determine the lifetime.
Servers: Honestly, you shouldn't need to future proof or go with those HP mini servers where there's like 4 per 2U, bare with me I forgot the name. Server architecture doesn't change often due to long term support and reliability. Go with whatever is most cost effective.

authors: Дмитрий Абросимов


text:
Is it appropriate to show concern for a professor's well-being?
I am an student and in one of my college courses, the professor seems stressed or frazzled. He is always running late and unprepared, which seems odd because the Powerpoint slides are already done and he uses previous tests and quizzes. The tests, homework, and most of the quizzes are computerized and graded automatically. So, He can't be overwhelmed with grading. Which leads me to believe that he is having problems at home.
My question: would it be appropriate to ask him if he is okay, either by email or face-to-face?
I don't want to invade his privacy but I don't like seeing anyone in distress.

I'd be careful about jumping to conclusions ("which leads me to believe that he is having problems at home").  For example, he might be experiencing stress from conference submission deadlines or grant applications.  It's fine to inquire or express sympathy, but it's safest not to assume this is connected with his personal life.

If your goal is to help another human being, then you could just be friendly toward him without prying. If he is having issues, a few friendly or encouraging words might help. There's really no need to go beyond that or to mention that it looks to you like he is having problems. If you are extremely worried that he might be near some kind of psychological breakdown, contact the undergraduate director for that program and let him or her know your concerns.

thank you everyone for the comments and insights! It has been very helpful.

I find this question interesting because of the asymmetry.  If the roles were reversed, and a student were showing signs of personal problems that affected their work in a class, I think most people would agree it would be appropriate for the professor to start a conversation.  Indeed, many universities give their faculty "Student in Distress" brochures that more or less insist that they do so.  Yet the other way around, it's controversial.

And most of the arguments seem based on generic ideas about relationships between arbitrary human beings: some think it's more important to show caring, some think it's best to respect privacy.  But none take into account the asymmetry of the relationship which seems to be crucial somehow.

@NateEldredge students are generally young adults and many are away from their parents for the first time. The university is often considered to be at least somewhat a parent replacement; since the prof works for the university they can also be seen as a fractional parent. Profs on the other hand are adults with jobs and their own support networks. While the department chair or other profs might reach out to a colleague in distress, for a student to do so would be odd. Why should there be symmetry in this case?

@KateGregory: Well, there are a lot of generalizations in your comment.  Many of my students have lived in this town all their lives, whereas I've lived here less than a year.  Many have full time jobs, and some are older than me.  I'd venture to say many of my students have much stronger support networks than I do.  I agree that it's considered "odd" for a student to reach out to a professor, but the asymmetry comes from the authority in the relationship, not because the professor is somehow inherently more likely to have his life together.

@NateEldredge: I'd strongly disagree with a professor approaching a student about their private issues, and I'd consider it a severe breach of privacy that would be deeply inappropriate. I may not take action against the professor, if I were the student thusly approached, but I would probably feel really awkward and try to avoid the classes. University is not elementary school, and a part of successfully mastering university is being able to deal with one's problems oneself (e.g. with the help of friends or relatives) and accepting that one's professional contacts are just that, and will ...

... not jump in to help fix one's personal issues. That is not to say that in the case of any problems, the student could not approach the professor to ask for, e.g., leniency in a deadline, but the professor's part in that situation is deciding about that deadline, nothing more and nothing less. Certainly, it does not include reaching out the student if they don't say anything; at a university, students should be responsible enough to call out when they need help and not expect that someone will be there to fix their problems if they just wait.

It could also just be the professor in question is / always has been "stressed or frazzled.' and doesn't conform to your standards of how a person should behave. Verify if this is the case first before you go and push your "which seems odd" parts. Have you considered maybe the person is just 'odd' ?

@O.R.Mapper: Well, at least at many US institutions, you'd find yourself on the wrong side of university policy.  The last university I was at specifically instructed faculty to reach out to students in distress, either directly or through other student service offices.  I might add that this policy was instituted following a disturbing (and widely reported) string of student suicides.

@NateEldredge: Interesting. That sounds very intrusive to me, but of course, university cultures vary a lot by the culture they're embedded in.

He either has personal issues, or he doesn't focus on teaching.
If he is having personal problems, it is wrong to approach him like a friend and expect him to give details. You are the student and he is the professor, and his personal issues are private and he will share them with someone close if he wants to. As an adult, he probably knows how the process works.
Either way, the only thing that matters is whether he is doing his job properly. If you think he is not doing so, then you should give constructive criticizm, such as when you are in class and you don't understand, you can say that for the last classes you are having difficulties understanding and putting it all together and suggest a method so that you can benefit better from his course. Or, you can send an e-mail about how certain things can be improved without sounding very negative.

Yes, I know he is adult and knows how the process works. I am not looking for him to spill his guts out to me. I was wanted to know if asking if him if he was okay was appropriate and if it would help him feel better that a someone/student is showing a concern or it might show that his "behaviors" are more outwardly then he realizes. Also, I am not the only student that has made comments.

@JaneBorn I understand, but we don't know him and you didn't give any details about your relationship with your professor. So we cannot know or estimate how he will react. He can simply thank you for your concern, or he might say that it is none of your business which can lead to problems, considering his possible condition. In such a case, the best way is to keep it simple and keep it professional. And I think the fact that you are asking this question here shows that you don't know how he will react. What I mean is, if there is going to be a talk, it should focus on performance, not privacy.

@Kogesho I am not sure how to describe a relationship, if there is even one but I am interactive during class and had a few discussions with him about our similar backgrounds.  But its a small class and maybe that is why its more apparent or I feel incline to act on a more personal level.

It would be interesting to see questions like this on appropriate behaviour on the proposed Etiquette site on Area51.

This is an incredibly bad idea.  While I'm all for developing friendships between faculty and students, this does not seem to be what you're discussing.  It's not clear from your question, but you make it sound as though you've never had a conversation with this professor (and if you've had some short ones about the class, that doesn't change my point).  EDIT:  I see from comments that you have had some more conversations with him.  I don't think this changes my underlying point.
In general, you should move very slowly in developing a personal relationship of this sort with a professor.  I might have been OK with asking such a question of my advisor by my last year of graduate school (but probably not), but I can't imagine doing it with any other professor earlier in my career.  Asking someone you barely know a deeply personal question that could easily be read as an implicit indictment of their teaching (which ultimately, it seems it is) will lead nowhere good.  I think the best case scenario is that they laugh it off as eccentric, but the worst case is they're hurt or insulted; you don't want that coming into their mind when they're grading or writing a recommendation later.

@BenWebster-I see your point and I would try to make it a broad nonspecific question. But I think it is probably best that I leave it alone. Like I mentioned before, I think the smaller class (>10) makes seems a little more personal and it probably be different story if it was large class.

Some people are just naturally frazzled. They could be having the greatest and most relaxing day ever, and show up to class 4 minutes late, hair all wild and uncombed, wearing odd socks and having forgotten to bring you your marked assignments. They may be remarkably easy to frazzle or they may not even feel frazzled, they may just look it! Asking if everything is ok, especially if you say why you are worried and point out you see a pattern, will probably offend this person.
Or perhaps something really is bothering your prof. I use "the same slides" every year (except that I read them over, tweak them, add some, rearrange others etc) and reuse some aspects of the tests and quizzes. You may not know this, but that's not the hardest part of teaching. Nor is marking. And the only profs who teach a single course are adjuncts like me who have a whole 'nother life off campus, or super distinguished researchers who've had their load lowered. So you are not the only dance this prof is dancing, and you may not be the most important one, either. Your belief that the workload for this class is easy doesn't mean that the prof's overall workload is easy, by any means.
But hey, perhaps you're a very perceptive person (I'm not, but I know some) and you've nailed it: this prof is going through hell with something personal. I have had to show up and teach while going through hell (a dying parent, for example) and about the worst thing that could have happened is some kid (everyone under 30 is a kid to me) asking me if I'm ok and if there's anything they can do to help. Some kid who doesn't even know me! I'd be so humiliated that my distress had shown through. I get my support from a variety of people, and I choose who I want support from. I would have trouble even stammering through a sentence like "I'm sorry if my performance isn't up to your standard this week, I have a lot on my plate that I would rather not discuss."
I just can't see this question leading to a good place if it was asked of me, even if (and it's a big if) your assumption of a personal problem is in fact accurate. And if it's inaccurate, that's even worse. There's really no upside.
Here's the furthest I think it's ok to go. You're having the usual conversation that you do after class, with questions about your field etc, and the prof either flat out says "I don't have time to discuss this now, I have to go and deal with something" or you get that perception. You could carefully say something like "Sorry, I didn't realize you had less time than usual this week. Hope things let up for you soon." Most likely the prof will just grimace, say something noncommittal, and head out. But there is a chance you'll get a reply like "I hope so, I can't take much more" or "no, I'm afraid it's going to be like this for months and then it will get worse" and those are openings for you to say something pleasantly supportive like "oh dear, I'm sorry to hear that. How can I help?" But without that opening, even if it's obvious to you what's happening, maintain the fiction that it isn't. That can actually be a form of help.

@KateGregory-I didn't mean to make seem that professors have it easy if the coursework is laid out already. I am sure that there is a lot I don't know about. But then again, I guess I don't understand how he acts so overwhelmed/distracted to tweak the slides or tests. The last test had duplicate questions and questions from previous sections. Oh the other reason I think it is personal cause he let us out of lecture early and was late to lab cause he had to go home.

Well, as I say, you may be right - you have more information than I do about your prof - and if you're concerned, go ahead and ask GENTLY but only in the moment. Don't ask like "hey, is everything ok about whatever it was you let us go early for a week ago?" React to opportunities to be supportive, but take your cue from the prof.

I think since I am having doubts and after reading the comments. I think there is too big of chance of it going wrong and I don't want it be awkward the rest of the semester.  Side note: he may be distracted or late but he always is dressed nice (tie, sweater, & slacks), clean shaven, and hair done.

Professors are human beings, just like everyone else.
If you have a concern about a professor's health or emotional well-being, then there is absolutely no reason not to ask in private. I would recommend doing it face-to-face, as anything said should be an off-the-record issue, an I don't think a faculty member who is having issues will want to "publicize" that in an email.
However, if you are a student of the professor in question (or a subordinate), the professor may not want to reveal any personal issues, again because she might view such sharing as inappropriate. On the other hand, so long as the professor is not a sociopath, she will appreciate the concern you're showing.

"so long as the professor is not a sociopath". Hmm.....

This answer is fine, but do take care to note that your relationship is a professional one. Your question should be phrased broadly and you should take care not to appear prying. Location, the professor's attitude, gender, the nature of the class, previous interactions; any of these factors can cause a simple inquiry to turn into something uglier. I hate that I have to post this, but particularly in the US issues have been raised over interactions smaller than this.

I guess I kind of knew the answer to my question that its probably better not to say anything since it can be taken as inappropriate question for a student to ask a professor instead of genuine concern.

On the other hand, so long as the professor is not a sociopath, she will appreciate the concern you're showing.  You must have a very loose definition of sociopaths.  I don't think it would be sociopathic to read such a question as a hurtful critique of their teaching, or as a totally inappropriate invasion of their privacy.  These aren't necessarily helpful, but it doesn't make them sociopathic.

It depends on how you ask the question. If you make it sound like you're being a busybody, of course it's going to come across offensive.

@aeismail Right.  Why would you, as a student, trust your ability to judge whether a professor will think you are being a busybody?  It's all risk, no reward.

Perhaps this is a personal bias—someone doing exactly what the OP is asking about made a major difference in my own life, allowing me to catch what turned out to be a major health issue before it became a catastrophic one.

I think we forget that professors also experience a range feelings such as happiness, anxiety, sadness, frustration, etc. The fact that he runs late and is unprepared is not acceptable behavior for a professor. However, I/you can't judge him because we don't know what is happening to him personally or professionally.
Professors are under a great deal from their supervisors, the school, and even the students. There is a possibility his job is in jeopardy & so he may be spending the time searching, rather than preparing. He may be up for a promotion, award or maybe he needs to submit the last chapter of his book that he's struggling to write. Obviously, these are all speculations but my point is it may not be "problems at home" that are stressing him out.
If your relationship with this professor is close, then asking if he is ok, face-to-face only, would be acceptable. The key is express your concern and not make him feel like you're judging him. Let him share what he wants to. If you feel you can, you may offer to help him. It will be his decision whether or not he accepts.
From my personal experience:
I had a very good professor my freshman year, who felt comfortable confiding in me about his professional, & when I graduated his personal challenges. During this time, we have built a friendship of 15+ years.

After reading the comments and thinking, the conclusion that I have came up with is that everyone is humans and deals with personal or professional issues and that some people are just more compassionate/sympathetic then others. I think that if someone shows genuine concern without being obtrusive to a subordinate or supervisor shouldn't be a problem with the proper approach, timing, and relationship. If a person, does act poorly to a genuine concern then it just shows that the person doesn't know how properly deal with the problems and probably should be a concern to others.


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How can I get access to the computer science journals from top publishers through a single subscription in Europe?
Is there any possibility to get access to journals from all the top publishers from a domain through a single subscription in Europe?
For example, let's say I'm interested in Computer Science and I want to have access to the following: ACM, IEEE, Springer, Elsevier via their Digital Libraries.
It would be ok even if the tax would be 1000 euros per year for a single person, or up to 3000 euros per year for a single institution.

Two questions here: can you have a multi-publisher subscription, and can you have a "subject-specific" subscription?
For the first, I suspect the most likely answer is "you can't". I'm not aware of any service (either for institutions or individuals) that offers a subscription with an arbitrarily selected set of journals from across multiple publishers. Generally speaking, you'd have to set this up with each publisher.
For an institution, you can get close to a single subscription model by using a subscription agent, who will handle the details of your subscriptions for you and send you one invoice, but even then it's still potentially quite a lot of work to actually get each one working, and - as we saw with Swets last year - no guarantee it'll be a stable solution long term. I don't know if similar services are available for individuals; I've certainly never noticed them advertised.
On the second question - more or less, yes. The publishers usually offer three approaches  to subscribing - a manually selected list of journals ("I want A, and B, and C..."); thematic packages (Elsevier, for example, has relatively broad "subject collections"), or an everything-included deal, which isn't much use for you. The first option is usually more expensive if you want a large range of titles.
Using the thematic packages, you probably could just get computer science journals - but this might be quite loosely defined. (Elsevier's set includes, for example, the Journal of Rail Transport Planning & Management!)

not necessarily interested in thematic packages, but rather to just have accounts to those 4-5 publishers all-in-one.... so that I don't have 5 different accounts and end up paying more...


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How much informal writing should there be in a research article?
I am starting to write a research article in computer science area. While writing, I am using very formal terminologies and sentences which occasionally get quite boring. Sometimes, funny side of my personality pops up, and I end up writing some informal sentences which I have to delete later, picturing a very serious looking reviewer reading my paper draft. I always have this idea that a research article should be narrated like a story (keeping the facts and assumptions valid) to make it interested for the readers and stories often get quite informal. Don't they?
So the question is: How informal can I go in writing a research article even if my assumptions are correct? Do reviewers mind if the language used is not quite formal?

yes that's fine you edited it. @user37208 You know the sort of language we use in everyday life. If the article fulfills its purpose of showcasing my research effectively then what is the harm if it also amuses the readers to go along with it ;)

You get to write an amusing blog alongside the serious stuff.  /  Find an author you like, who manages to get a bit of personality, maybe a bit of warmth and humor, into his or her scientific writing, and use that as a measuring stick.

For informative humour in scientific texts, see the book "Numerical Recipes". I believe that a humorous streak is legitimate as long as it contributes to getting the message across, but in writing it needs to be done very carefully, and without outright jokes. You do not know the audience, and that means - take care. When I know my audience in a talk, I permit myself more humour than when I do not do. More important is that it needs to be informative. If it helps understanding, disarm/neutralize it as far as possible to avoid offending people. If it creates a side-track, leave it out.

...funny side of my personality pops up...which I have to delete...

Good. Keep it that way. There is absolutely no place for jokes in academic writing*. This includes funny puns or things like that. The purpose of a research paper is to communicate science. Unless you are researching humour, do not do it.
What good can come out of it? Do you envision someone thinking "oh, that's a funny guy! I should hire him!"? No. This does not happen.
Jokes and what is considered good humour changes with time. Things you find funny now were not funny 10 years ago, and vice versa. Once this gets in a paper, this is forever in the scientific record. No matter how funny or witty you think you are now, you will most probably look back regretting that you did. This is also a cultural thing: things that are funny in Europe may not be funny (or even offensive) in Asia. There is also a language barrier. Some people may not even realise it's a joke and try to understand it in the context of the paper. This can only lead to unnecessary confusion.
As a reader I want to understand the science, and only the science. If you want to be funny, open a Twitter account, write a blog, post it on Facebook, put it on a poster and hang it on your office door.
*Humour is acceptable if you're a distinguished professor that made abundant contributions to science and you're writing an opinion paper. You'd have to be over 70 years old for that. And even then, use it sparingly.
Also related:

Amusing remarks in papers
Should academic papers necessarily carry a sober tone?
How much of humor in a formal academic writing is considered as disrespect?

+1 for Things you find funny now were not funny 10 years ago, and vice versa. It didn't cross my mind before.

The personality of the writer showing through the prose is generally fine if it is feels natural and normal and follows expected forms in all other aspects. It is an affectation to 'include' it on purpose and the author tends to look not like a somewhat interesting idiosyncratic guy so much as potentially a piece of work who is kind of 'full of himself'..

Thanks for such nice advise. This forum helps me a lot in putting things straight.

authors: عبدالرحمن الشهرني


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How to confront advisor about the expectation that I will support another student's project for extended period of time?
I work in a collaborative scientific research group at a public university in the US.  Specifically, my lab has two graduate students: myself and another who is expected to graduate shortly.
I'm told that once the "senior" graduate student stops working in the lab (to start writing dissertation) the remaining graduate student (myself, in this case) is expected to finish off the more senior graduate students' data-taking (whether it be for a month or a semester, has not been made clear).  The more senior graduate student would be the first author on the paper resulting from this data.
I have been assured that the current senior graduate student did his fair share of data taking for the graduate student who preceded him.  I would like to talk to my advisor about this, but I have serious doubts about whether she would care about my opinion on this matter.  In  fact, I feel like by bringing it up I could only make things worse.
Although this is the "lab culture", it seems unfair to me.  Has anyone had success confronting their advisor about this sort of thing without being too hostile?
UPDATE:
I should mention that I spent the first 2.5 years of my research time supporting his (the previous grad students) project full time.  It is not until after he is gone (and 1-5 months more of me supporting his project) until I can even begin my project.  This is the primary concern: I will have spent over half of my graduate career supporting his project full time, meanwhile my advisor says she thinks I can graduate in five years--- that leaves between 2 to 2.5 years to complete my own project.  I will have spent more time on his proj than my own

Can you elaborate on what makes it seem unfair?  This style of research isn't common in mathematics, so I have no direct experience with it.  However, it doesn't sound crazy for the sort of lab in which students are assigned projects.  You would be making a modest contribution to the senior student's project (compared with their years of work), for which you would be recognized with non-first authorship, and you would also be broadening your own experience.  This could be implemented in problematic ways, but it doesn't seem necessarily bad.  Am I missing something?  (Is there more context?)

@AnonymousMathematician Maybe you should make this an answer. Barring more info, this is pretty much what I would say, too.

At what point are you in your studies.  This technique is common in labs around me for new grad students.  Any new grad student is probably unaware of research practices, and by putting them early in their research career to work on a more established project gives better insight for their own future work.  Even a semester of work would not seem abnormal.

It seems that your question is about having to work on another students' project, not about getting first authorship on the paper.

@ff524 Yes -- working on "his" first-author papers for 3 years total.  Typically, in our department, you need several of your own first-author papers to graduate.  I don't mind helping others, but I cannot even start my own project until after his projects are done because I am supporting him full time+.

@user1938107 I am starting my third year, but it looks like I will be continuing (for the third year) to support his research full time+.  I will not even start my own project until beginning of my 4th year.  If I am to graduate in 5 years total, that means I have only two years to do my project (after having spent 3 years on his).

But it's not that you think you should be first author on this paper - you just don't want to work on it anymore. If that's so, you should edit the title and tags, since this isn't really a question of authorship after all.

Do you have any joint publications from working on the previous graduate student's project?

Do you by any chance have a contract that limits the number of hours per week that graduate students can work on duties given by the advisor?

Has anyone had success confronting their advisor about this sort of thing without being too hostile?

Fundamentally, I wouldn't view it as a confrontation.  If someone is doing something unethical or abusive, then confronting them could be appropriate, but it's not clear that that's the case here.  Instead, I'd approach it from the perspective that you'd like to learn what your advisor expects, his/her reasoning and motivation, and how much flexibility there is.  Right now, you are unsure whether the amount of work required would be a month or a semester.  That's a very reasonable thing to seek clarification for, and there are plenty of other natural questions.  For example, how should you deal with any interruption to your primary work?  Is there flexibility if you're at a particularly crucial or delicate point in your current project?  Will your advisor help make sure it doesn't derail your work or delay your graduation?  You could also ask about the motivation.  If doing this doesn't seem valuable to you, instead of starting with complaints about that you could ask about structuring things to ensure you got valuable skills or experience out of it.
If you take this perspective, I don't think it will come across as hostile.  You're just asking reasonable questions about what's involved and how it can be handled smoothly and productively.  I hope the answers will be reassuring.
Of course this may be fruitless: your advisor could be a control freak or jerk who won't respond well to friendly questions.  However, if that's the case you've got worse problems than just this issue.  I certainly wouldn't start with the assumption that a confrontation is the first step.
It's also worth carefully thinking through why this arrangement seems unfair.  As a mathematician, I have no experience with this style of research, but it doesn't sound unreasonable for the sort of lab in which students are assigned projects.  You would be broadening your research experience, and your contributions would be recognized with authorship (but not first authorship since the senior student would have contributed much more to this paper, the same way you'll be first author on the paper that comes out of your main project).  This sounds potentially worthwhile, so you need to articulate more clearly what's wrong with the particular situation you face.
If this is far outside the norms of your field, then I hope you'll be able to convince your advisor to do things differently.  Otherwise, I'd just accept that you and your advisor don't agree about everything and, within the overall constraint of how the lab is run, focus on fine-tuning things to fit you better.

In fact, I feel like by bringing it up I could only make things worse.

This is the part that bothers me the most.  Maybe you are just worrying too much, but it suggests something's wrong.  Perhaps with how you tend to bring things up, perhaps with how your advisor responds to reasonable concerns, perhaps with your overall relationship with your advisor.  Whatever the cause is, this is something worth trying to understand and fix.

In response to the "update" on the original question": I don't know enough about your research area to say how unusual or inappropriate that is, but it does sound worrisome. Do you have a mentor other than your advisor to discuss this with? That could be helpful for determining whether it's a major career danger or just a frustrating but manageable situation.