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Children in the Classroom
As a new semester of school approaches I have begun updating my syllabi for the classes I teach. I have lately used a clause in the syllabus about no children in the classroom as I feel it is a distraction to both me and the other students. Having been in classes both as a student and as an instructor where children are present, I find it necessary now to have such a written statement.
However, there are a few parents who dislike such a clause. Some of these young parents feel that they should be able to bring their children to class, as they otherwise would need to drop out of school because they do not have enough money to hire a sitter. I feel that this is just "how it is," and is part of being a responsible adult.
Do other universities have policies about children in the classroom? How can I reach a happy medium of not coming across as a complete jerk, but still maintain a level of education in my classroom?
Added: I am of the feeling that we many times need to make a rule because of that "one person" who ruins it for everyone. My stand as it is right now is that we need to come down firmly in writing, then adjust with leniency as people show they can handle having their child in class. I am not ridiculous about my classroom rules, but I prefer to give it straight, then relax the standard if needed.
Also, as a matter of scope, I teach at a conservative Christian university. Many of the students married young and have a child or two.

to me it is rather weird to have kids in the classroom, I rarely ever experienced this and I don't think this happens a lot in my culture (of course there can always be exceptional circumstances). If this happens regularly (which is implied by your question, i.e the students always bring along their kids) it is quite obvious that there is a need for child-care. So this might be an momentum to step up in university politics and demand proper and affordable child-care for students (e.g. on most German campuses there are kindergartens).

While your statement is fundamentally correct, I think it is a bit naive that the OP (a master student according to his profile) is in a position to "step up and demand affordable child care".

@xLeitix maybe not himself, but it is likely more senior professors with whom he has a relationship have the same issues, and can be convinced.

I guess this is not happening only into your class ans is a global situation in your situation. In addition, having children in a university raises safety/insurance issues. You should ask your administration or more senior teachers how they deal with this situation.

@xLeitix sorry, I did not see that (from the question I figured the OP is a (junior) professor). If the OP is a TA and not an independent lecturer I would simply ask the professor for this course. Still, the main point still holds, but of course your possibilities in university politics are much more limited as a student.

These sorts of lines in syllabi always bother me because they aren't specific. Most obtusely, everyone is a child of someone else, so all students are "children."  Less obtusely, it is becoming more common for students to "dual enroll," leading to young (e.g. high school, or even middle school) students in the college classroom. Also, what about students whose parent is enrolled in the same class? (I have heard of this occurring.)  I (although not an instructor/professor) like hard and fast rules in syllabi to preclude arguments. ("But you made an exception for this case--why not mine?")

What do your collegues do about this issue?

@Haque Most of my colleagues allowed children in the classroom, but wish they had a tactful way to tell people not to bring their kids (and passionate lovers).

In my years of teaching in Asia I have had one class session where a student brought a child with him. It was an exceptional case but I was surprised he did not ask for permission. The child was well behaved (maybe 7 years old) and sat in the back not disturbing the class in any way. For this reason, I let it slide and I might be willing to accept it happening in the future.
However,  I do make it quite clear to my students, I am the captain of this airplane and I will not tolerate ANYTHING which negatively impacts the learning environment. This includes anyone who disturbs the learning process in any way. I agree with Pete L. Clark - it is not a childcare issue. You need to focus the students on it being a learning environment issue. If a student does not turn off their ringing phone, out they go. If someone dresses in a way which distracts students or me, out they go. If anything exists which negatively impacts the learning process for even one of my students, out they go.
I'm pretty strict on this and I don't generally have problem because of that.
Back to your core question: How do you maintain a level of education while not being a jerk? You focus on the real issue. The real issue is not kids, the issue is disruptions. While you can be forgiving and understanding, to do so in a way which negatively impacts your students should never be accepted.

+1 from me.  Perhaps your response is better than mine: the key is the distraction to the classroom environment.  That it comes from an unregistered person may give a particular regulation to point to but is not really the crux of the matter.  Your response also covers, say, bringing pets into the classroom.  It is also interesting to hear from someone who teaches in Asia.

Thanks for the reply. It is good to get backing from someone with experience in Asia on this topic.

This is really the most important point.  Everyone else in the class is paying a lot of money for the service of an education.  It cannot be acceptable to compromise the quality of the service that everyone has paid for in order to accomodate an individual.  If having a child in the lecture hall is a distraction, the answer is pretty clear cut.

Most universities I know have both a cultural understanding and formal regulations that the only people who are allowed in the classroom are those that are registered for the course, except where explicitly permitted by the instructor.  (Thus for instance one has the notion of "auditing" a course: this basically means that you are not signed up to take the course for a grade and will not complete the required coursework / take any exams, but you do have the instructor's permission to sit through the class meetings.)  This is a defensible regulation: without it, who knows who would show up for a course, taking up possibly limited space and occupying the attention of the instructor and/or the other students?
Children are people, right?  I would thus frame the discussion in that way: you're not discriminating against someone because they're a parent.  You're just not allowing people in the classroom who are not registered for the course.
I am somewhat surprised that this is a problem for you at all, and I wonder where you are teaching and if the cultural mores and regulations are different there.  I don't know of any American university in which people would think they could bring children to class except in some truly exceptional/emergency situation in which they have received the instructor's permission.  In any case, I would advise you to look up your university's specific policy on "unregistered attendees".  Assuming it is along the lines of what I am suggesting you should, at most, modify your syllabus to quote from and/or link to this general policy.  Don't make the issue about child care at all.
Added: I just looked at your profile and saw that you say you are in South Korea.  As I said, both cultural mores and regulations may well be different there, and if it is very common for students to bring children to class, that makes me much less confident that rules or customs are being violated.  So to adjust my answer for this: "Do other universities have policies about children in the classroom?" Not policies specific to children, but more general policies and also different expectations that mostly prevent the issue from coming up.  But I don't know what other South Korean universities do and anyway, your university is your university: it is (I suppose!) allowed to do things its own way.  If you do not find written regulations of the sort I mentioned above, I would talk to your colleagues -- and especially, to tenured faculty; I also see that you are a master's student, which also may be relevant in terms of how much you are permitted to rock the boat -- and find out how they deal with the situation.  If several other faculty members have successful "no children in the classroom" policies, then you should be able to implement yours.  If you are the only one you know in your university who wants a "no children in the classroom" policy: because you are a graduate student instructor, I would advise against pursuing that.
Further Added: Please read the comments below about "drop ins".  The policy I describe above is very standard in the United States.  It seems that in certain European universities the culture (and perhaps regulations) are quite different.

"... the only people who are allowed in the classroom are those that are registered for the course, except where explicitly permitted by the instructor." - I'd just like to point out this can be very different in other places. At the European universities I have seen, it was never thought of as a problem (not even "forbidden in theory, but tolerated") that at the very least students of the university may attend any lecture. You walk past a lecture hall of whichever subject and whichever major, you see an interesting slide being displayed inside and got some time? No problem, simply enter ...

... and have a seat, expand your knowledge into a new direction. Of course, if there is really no space left for students who really need to attend the class for some reason, one will have to decide on a case-by-case basis, but the default situation is certainly that as a member of the university (student, employee), you are allowed to spontaneously attend any course you like. (I've written at least above, because the common understanding is that external people will also do so every now and then - people interested in studying, relatives who want to get a taste of where their younger ...

... family members are studying, business visitors who spontaneously decide to get an impression of the teaching of the university that they work together with in the time they have to wait for their train or plane, etc.) From that viewpoint, your initial statement that you'd hav to register or else explicitly ask for permission by the lecturer just to be allowed in the lecture room sounds extremely restrictive to me and hence I think it is rather a local peculiarity rather than "universal and [globally] defensible", as you suggested.

"the only people who are allowed in the classroom are those that are registered for the course": Here in Finland all normal university lectures are public events, open to the general public. So "not being registered for the course" is no excuse to forbid someone from attending the lecture. ("Disturbing the lecture" is of course a good reason.)

As a third European datapoint, when I was an undergrad in the UK, the policy was that any member of the university (student or staff) could attend any lecture except medicine, as long as their presence wasn't preventing somebody who was registered for the course from attending. Tutorials, practicals and so on were only available to people who were registered on the course.

@DavidRicherby I am curious, why not medicine? Sensitive information?

@Davidmh I'm curious too but I was never quite curious enough to find out.  Sorry.

@DavidRicherby Asked it

@O.R.Mapper: Thanks for your comments.  The phrase "relatively universal" is weaselly; I took it out based on the comments here.  The idea that in some place non-students can freely walk into any lecture is very interesting.  In the US the majority of universities are private entities with substantial tuition requirements, so this doesn't make much sense.  I wonder whether in what contexts it is really okay to drop in on a course: e.g. if I read the paper and see that Artur Avila has just won a Fields Medal, am I free to just drop into Paris Diderot and watch him teach?  Really??

@David: "Tutorials, practicals and so on were only available to people who were registered on the course." I'm not sure exactly what the distinction is between a tutorial, a practical or another course.  I suspect that the OP -- since he is a master's student -- may be doing teaching of this sort.  Maybe there is an important distinction here: in the US, even at large universities most courses tend to be taught in smaller sections: e.g. in the math department at UGA all of courses are capped at 40 students.  Dropping in on a massive lecture is different (who will know?).

@PeteL.Clark: I cannot make any statements about the specific rules of Paris Diderot. I can just say that in the universities I am familiar with, I wouldn't see any sane reason for denying you access to a lecture (let alone that there would neither be a practical way to do so, given that there is no entrance control to the lecture halls, nor any meaningful way to determine who is "supposed" to attend the lecture, as merely sitting in a class and listening is not linked to any registration).

@O.R. Mapper: Which universities are you familiar with?  I have been to several French Universities, and they did not  have an "Anyone can drop in" atmosphere.  In particular I remember having to be given special access in order to enter the Institut Henri Poincare in Paris.  I think their reasons for restricting access are "sane".

@PeteL.Clark: At least here in Finland it certainly is OK for you to just drop in and enjoy lectures, no matter who is lecturing. (The exceptions are laboratory work, etc.) The professors will be just happy if there are more students present than usual! Being registered for a course means that you can take part in exercises, exams, etc., your coursework is graded, and the course will appear in your transcript of studies. Enjoying lectures is mostly an orthogonal thing — in many cases the students are not required to attend lectures, and outsiders are welcome to attend lectures. No tuitions.

@Jukka: Thanks very much for that information.  I believe you.  What you describe is quite different from the norm in the US: at most US universities instructors may require attendance in lectures (e.g. by withdrawing and/or failing students who do not attend).  I scoffed at that for years, but more recently I've made use of it: it improves the students' performance.  My point is: if we are going to talk about variation in academic customs, we should be specific about it.  I don't think "Europe" is a homogeneous, monolithic entity when it comes to (for instance!) academic practice.

@PeteL.Clark: Granted, Europe is homogenous, though without divulging too much personal info on myself, I can say that I made my observations mainly in German-speaking places.

@PeteL.Clark in Spain I had a class that had more students than seats. The lecturer just took 10 min in finding a bigger room, but at no point he even asked if there was anyone not registered at the course. In fact, some of them don't even check if you are registered during the exam! And we have some tuitions, but lower than US (~2k€/year for sciences).

As a (now former) student in France, I can also say that you are never asked whether you are registered to a course when you attend a lecture. The Institut Henri-Poincaré is a research institute, so it may be different. My university also restricted access to the mathematics institute at some point, but lectures were not normally held there anyway (it was still a huge pain, however...).

It's also possible that access to a particular building or room which is normally used for teaching is restricted for some other reason. At my university, the building with all the computer rooms used for math/CS classes was an example: you clearly don't want a building with perhaps millions of euros of equipment to be open access, so access was restricted to people in the math/CS department plus students from other departments who were registered in a class meeting there. But those are exceptions, there is no reason to restrict access to an ordinary lecture room.

Also coming from an European culture, could you explain the reasoning behind the "no other people are allowed in the lecture hall" rule? I can only imagine it's that people won't get the knowledge of the lecture without paying. However, if this is the reasoning behind the rule, I don't think it's a good argument to prevent small children which don't understand the lecture anyways. So, I think "children are people too" does not make too much sense here.

Being a parent and a college student is tough. Not everybody has good access to childcare and even if they do, things happen. Surely the mere presence of a child in class can't be much of a distraction except for a few moments at the start of class. If the child is quiet and well-behaved, why not allow it? (Your policy could say that distractions, including noisy children, are not allowed.) It'll make some of your students' lives just a bit easier.

While this is true, you must also consider the aggregate impact. One quiet child in a class of 70 students might be OK but 50 quiet children in a class of 60 students could easily be quite distracting.

110 people in a room meant for 60 would be distracting. :-) I get your point, but realistically not many people would bring children to class.

@earthling: With this issue you can deal if it comes up. Realistically, it does not happen. I've seen lectures where once or twice one child was present - this does not motivate the other people to also bring their children (or to produce children, for that matter). Parents don't take their children in for fun, but because there is no other solution.

I am now a student for 3 years in Germany (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology). I tried to find anything "official" about children in lecture halls, but that was not successful.
I have only seen students with their children in a lecture about 3 times. (There might have been more children, but I probably didn't notice)
Twice, the children were silent. Only once I've heard one of them. Then the mother went pretty quickly out of the lecture and came back (with the baby) about 15 minutes later. Nobody said anything.
What I think as a student
As long as children don't make noise and as long as the lecture hall isn't crowded I can't see any reason for them not to be there. When the child is loud, then the parents should directly go out with him/her. Most lectures aren't that silent that it is bad when you hear a baby cry for a few seconds.
However, when the child is distracting other students / the professor then the child has to leave the lecture hall.
What I would do in your situation
I see two ways to deal with the issue.
Opt-child-in
You could forbid children in your lectures. But if students really have problems, they might come to you and want to speak with you about it. Then you should make clear that you can make an exception, but only if it works. That means if the child is distracting you / other students, the parents have to search a solution.
I would go for this solution if there are many children who don't know how to behave in a lecture.
Opt-child-out
Don't forbid children directly. When there are problems, you can speak with the parents. You can tell them that their child distracts other students and hence they should not bring it again to lectures.
I would go for this solution if there are only occasionally children who distract lectures.
More thoughts
You could ask parents to take a seat in the back / close to the door. This way they can quickly go out when the child/baby is loud.


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Etiquette of amending others' published work
I would like to use a psychology framework that has been published by a third party but amend one aspect of it. I intend, of course, to reference and attribute the model and make it clear that the amendment is mine. Would that approach be in line with etiquette?

Etiquette is neither here nor there in this matter, as pretty much all of academia is based on taking what has gone before, and augmenting / amending / modifying / building on it.
What matters is whether what you are doing is rigorous. Referencing, attribution, and identifying your own contribution, makes the writing rigorous. As to the crucial question of whether or not your amendment to the framework is scientifically rigorous, is only something that someone close to the subject can know.

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Attending conferences as a first-year undergrad
I'm a first-year undergraduate student in physics. Since starting my studies I've tried to get involved in research as much as possible. Recently, the team I work with encouraged me to submit an abstract about my current project (which is the first serious one that I've taken on) for an upcoming conference. I did and I got accepted with a poster.
Now my question is: How should I approach this to benefit the most? Or maybe there isn't even a point in me going at all?
I'm under the impression that most of the typical advantages of attending a conference such as networking, or keeping up-to-date with recent advances aren't really applicable to me as I simply lack the necessary knowledge. So far I've only taken a basic mechanics course and I have some working knowledge that I've acquired while working at the lab but nothing beyond that.
Additional information: the conference is obviously not a high-tier one. Judging by previous editions, about 150 attendees are expected, around 1/3-1/2 of that international (this is all in Europe by the way). Travel funding is provided by our department [active participation, in form of a poster, was part of the requirements to get that funding].

Congrats on your poster acceptance! Yes, go. It is never to soon to benefit from conferences.

"keeping up-to-date with recent advances aren't really applicable to me..."

Not so; that's a myth. Your poster got accepted, and that means you are now part of the "recent advances" in the field.
So, go. Tell people what you are doing. No, people won't flock to your poster and ask for your autograph; however, chances are, someone there will find your work interesting. You might get to talk with people who have done similar work. You might get a few pointers. You might get some affirmation that you're working on an interesting problem.
I went to a conference once where I was just starting out in the field. One of the world's most renowned experts attended my talk. Imagine my surprise when, a year later, my advisor returned from the same conference, he told me that this same expert approached him, and asked, "Where is that student of yours? I really liked his idea..."
You never know what kind of benefit you might get over the course of a few days when everyone there shares expertise in some common interest. Sometimes it's someone who can help you out, or nudge you in the right direction, or motivate you, or challenge you (hopefully in a constructive way), or merely encourage you by nodding their head as you speak, seemingly interested in what you are doing.  Maybe you'll end up with a business card and a contact number of someone who can help you down the road as your research progresses.
Likewise, you stand to learn a lot from them, too. Who knows? Maybe someone will light a spark that will ignite a passion later.
By the way, most people like talking about their own research. So, if you attend a session that interests you, but a lot of it goes over your head, try to sit with that speaker at the lunch table. I'd bet that, more often than not, he wouldn't mind explaining some of the fundamentals to a bright and curious student.
Maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I'd bet you'll come back a bit more rejuvenated, somewhat more enlightened, and a lot more encouraged.

Before the conference

Usually the organization will release a conference directory. Read that before hand and highlight the sessions you'd like to attend. Have one primary and a secondary in case if the primary is a total bomb you have a second choice.
Gather maps, travel apps or travel guide of the city you'll be visiting. Draft a few places for sightseeing. For guidebook, just a little one should be fine.
Double check the dimension of the poster boards.
Have your poster printed earlier. Don't wait till the last day. I usually opt for fabric posters because they can be folded and stuffed into the luggage.
Sometimes you can reuse your posters (e.g. internal research day in your university, etc.) So, don't print any conference name or date on your poster directly. If the organizer requires you to display abstract number, print that on a separate piece of paper, and display that next to your poster.
Pre-print some returning labels if you want to do some sightseeing around the city after the conference, you can mail the poster tube and conference materials back to home.
Try to talk and see if any of your friends have friends in the city. It's easier to get a closer non-touristy look of the place if you have some local guiding you.
Bring some push pins for your poster just in case.
If you're planning to give out an A4 version of your poster, it's time to print some as well.
Bring some business cards (or print some in case someone would like to contact you.)
Work on a 1-2 minutes speech that summarizes your poster.

Once you're there

Try going to the conference center the day before and weed out all the transportation problems.
Identify the room and board for your poster before hand.
When you are free to join presentations and look at posters, follow your previous chosen options. Don't be too greedy, if you aimlessly take in everything you will get overwhelmed and tired very soon.
Some conferences organize local tours and dinner parties. Take advantages of those.
Have some note-taking device ready for main points, resources or references. Also bring your phone w/ camera or digital camera with you in case you want to take a picture of a poster (with permission of the presenter.) Focus on comprehension, not recording. I have seen some conference attendants just walking around taking picture of every single poster as if they are rare birds. Meanwhile, they didn't even greet or talk to the presenters who were right there; it was sad to look at.
It's absolutely okay that you don't know their subject. Just be straightforward: "I study [whatever] so am not too familiar with this, could you tell me what are the implications or applications of your findings to the field/my field?"
Try challenge yourself by asking at least one question in each session or on each day.
When manning your poster, ask any viewer if they'd like a summary, and give that 1-2 minutes talk that you prepared. Ask them to ask you any questions. Sometimes conversations take off, sometimes not. Don't feel awkward if nothing is said.
Befriend the poster presenters around you, as they probably share the same research area as you do.
During the off-conference time, do some sightseeing.
Save all the receipts, boarding passes, etc. for reimbursement.

After the conference

Continue to travel if you have developed a travel plan.
Evaluate what you learned, assess what interested you in the process, and what kind of techniques or information you can incorporate into your research.

Generally, don't confine what to learn. Because sometimes we don't know enough to know what should or should not be learned. Just be open, pick a good mix of topics that are about 50% that you are familiar with, 30% somewhat but not sure what they are, and 20% completely over your head.
Also, don't just look at the academic side. Connect with people and learn something about how they craft their research, or how they speak eloquently, etc. It's not all about the contents.

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Sharing student recommendation forms with students
I sometimes get asked to give recommendations / opinions about students by potential employers or third party HR Firms.
Is it acceptable to share the opinions with the students once I provide them? What is the typical recommendation about this?
Mostly the companies promise they will treat them as confidential from their side but that does not prevent ME from sharing my opinions with the students, right?
Just wanted to know the pros and cons of this. My interest is transparency. For the sake of concreteness let's keep this to US University jurisdiction.

Not an answer to the question, but important:  In the United States, FERPA applies when you release information from what FERPA calls "education records."  That specifically includes grades, GPA, and anything that is formally recorded.  My non-lawyer understanding is that you can discuss your personal observations of the students, but not anything that is an "education record," with a potential employer.  To include material that is an "education record," you need a FERPA release signed by the student.

More on FERPA: There is a specific example here.
There is a specific exemption in FERPA from the need for a  FERPA release for applications to another educational institution.

I would keep it private.
The perception, whether accurate or not, is that private letters are more honest. Probably no way that would get back to the target of the letter, but it might circulate among students who in turn may, accurately or not, gossip about who is the favorite. No real good comes of that.
There shouldn't be any useful feedback to a student in a recommendation letter. If you have positive feedback for a student, the sort you might put in a letter, share it with them as it comes up, don't wait for a letter ask.
If you have negative feedback for a student, don't put that in a letter unless you intend to sabotage them (either stick to the positives or decline the request). Share it with them early and in a productive fashion that helps them improve.
If you do these things then a student should know what they are getting when they ask you for a letter.

Indeed. Also, I'd strongly suspect that 22-year-olds will not accurately understand the nuances of comments from one 40+ year old to another about students. The (to my mind) manifest impossibility of universally understandable written appraisals is a compelling reason to me to not immediately think in terms of routine disclosure of things that can/will be misunderstood... and/or the inhibition that would induce in letter writers, anticipating misunderstanding. Still, right, it's not transparent...

It is surely acceptable. There are reasons to do it, I don't think it's "wrong" in any sense. Personally, however, I'm not so keen on it, because I don't want to encourage students to discuss the contents of recommendation letters (I perceive discussions about our subject area or even general advisory and personal issues as much more constructive and a better use of our time), or to "shop around" to find recommenders whose letters they like most. Generally I think that students tend to overrate the impact of recommendation letters, and I like to adapt the time spent on them to the very limited meaning they have in my view.

Yes, you can share them, and probably should. The company is correct in promising confidentiality, but that is because the words aren't theirs, but yours. But since they are yours it is fine to share them with students.
In fact, if you have to say negative things, it is best to discuss that with the student before you write the letter so that they have a better idea of where they stand.
On the other hand, I don't think that sharing them is required or expected. But I would consider sharing to be a good practice.
I would probably object to being told that I couldn't share a letter with a student, though it hasn't ever happened to me. I suspect, however, that some governmental agencies dealing with national security issues might require not informing the student.

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What's the difference between "research grant" and "fellowship" ? (what to choose for a postdoc?)
I was wondering what's the difference between a research grant and a fellowship ?
I am currently finishing my PhD and I am looking for funding for my postdoc. I came across a call for proposal of a fundation and it gives details of Regulations about "research grants" and Regulations about "fellowships".
Should I ask for a "research grant" or a "fellowship"?
Thank you.

Probably you should use the differences stated in the two sets of regulations to help you decide that. Hard to give any advice without that knowledge.

@Buffy in Regulations about research grants: "Funding is for laboratory expenses, equipment, access to a technology platform... A fixed amount will be awarded: XXX€ max per project" and in regulations about fellowships "XXX support covers salary (XXX € for a  PhD fellowship; XXX € for a postdoctoral  fellowship)"

Then, do you need salary covered or just expenses. That is the key differences. I assume the "grant" doesn't imply salary and may forbid it.

@Buffy I do need a salary yes! but I don't think grant doesn't apply salary because its written that "the amount for the salary cannot exceed  1/3 of the total requested amount" that's why im confused

Although I don't know for sure, I suspect your actual question is a lot more narrow than the title suggests. It seems like you are trying to decide between applying for a particular grant versus a particular fellowship (each from a particular foundation). The differences between those particular opportunities may not apply to grants/fellowships overall. Without some clarification I'm going to vote to close as unclear; I think it could also 'depend on individual factors': I think you have to understand the specific funding you are applying for based on what the funder says.

Not sure what country you are in, but the usual difference between fellowship and grant funding in the UK is eligibility.
A fellowship is for somebody who does not yet have an academic position (that is, they are not a lecturer with an ongoing job). The fellowship supports them to do research that they choose and usually has a strong element of mentorship and other development.
On the other hand, a grant is for someone who already has an academic position and will lead the research. The academic wins the grant and then hires postdocs to conduct the research. The postdocs hired do not get to choose their research topic.

Senior fellowships exist (e.g. Wellcome Trust Senior Investigator). More generally, a fellowship is awarded to a person, and generally covers your salary in full (as well as the research costs), while a research grant is awarded to a project, and it is expected that the host institution pays most of the salary of the person applying (but not those doing the research) and will guarantee to do so for the whole period of the grant.

@IanSudbery True, but OP is finishing PhD so I was describing the relevant difference for that situation

Given the explanations in the comments, the choice seems clear. If you can justify a grant that is three times the salary you need, and actually have a way to use those funds in a way acceptable to the grantor, then you want the grant. This might be true in chemistry, say, where you need to support a lab.
But if your only real need is to support yourself, say as in mathematics or philosophy, then the fellowship is more likely. Some funds are needed in these fields to support publication costs, and maybe office space, but not likely enough to justify a large grant.
You need to have a justification for the money you request, whichever you choose.

Thank you but what's weird is that if we look in the amount of money, fellowship gives more than the grant...

and should I not just choose Fellowship since its in it paragraph where we can read about postdoc and salary

It appears as though the organization is willing to pay for supplemental salary (e.g. summer salary) for someone who receives a grant, but that fellowships are intended to pay the full salaries of PhD students and postdocs.  A full year's salary for a postdoc would typically be more than a month of summer salary for a faculty member.

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Circulation and submission
Are there professional standards which discourage the circulation of a submitted scientific work, in order to get feedback from colleagues?

Isn’t that exactly what Arxiv is for?

Generally, private circulation is fine. Sending it by email to some people, with a request not to pass it on, won't cause any issues.
Putting it in a public place (website, ArXiv,...) is a different matter, however, a bit more subtle and is a form of publishing. Some publishers don't object, but some do. This is true at any point, before or after submission. Some publishers want complete control, of any "publishing" actions. Just be aware.
But circulation in a private group has no issues, partly because it is invisible to everyone else. Some results, in fact, are widely known already before publication since some experts in specialized fields communicate much (most?) of what they do with each other. This can result in those most interested in an advance already knowing it long before publication.
Note that this is also somewhat field specific. In mathematics ArXiv is widely used.  And, it seems that standards for such may be loosening over time.
Also note that few papers are published in exactly the same form as first submitted due to the review and editing process. This means that at time of submission the work is still a "preprint". Some requiring heavy revision are still works in progress when first submitted though the author(s) may not think of it that way.

In the sciences, circulating unpublished manuscripts on the internet is the standard.
In order to receive useful feedback, you have to get pretty lucky.
In my opinion, the extra effort of circulating a manuscript is rarely justified by the benefits.


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Receiving a bad grade from close professor?
Hello I am doing my masters and I got relatively bad grade from a professor. I am going to do another project with him in this semester. I think I deserve a better grade but the problem is that only way to re-evaluate my report is to make a complaint to study committee or to dean. My professor is a very nice person and he is one of the best in the area may be the best,and our communication is good he even wrote "look forward to seeing you". He was very satisfied with my lab. work but I messed up writing report, because he said that I should not write lots of theory but now one of the evaluation report says I should have write more theory(He is not the only evaluator, there are 2 more sensors who I dont know). It's so sad that I got a bad result, but I also don't want to lose healthy connection with the professor. I am doing my masters one of the best universities in Europe and I want to do Phd after my masters so grade is important for me and also recommendation is important for me. I dont know what to do, do you have any suggestions?

Why are you questioning the grade?

@user2768 It is important for me to apply to Phd programs, I've done 2 times more work than I should for the project, I feel really sad about it. My work is good but the only evaluation criteria is the report.

"I am doing my masters one of the best universities in Europe" - I always wonder  what metric people use to determine that.

@existenceisfutile Why do you feel that you deserve a higher grade? Put another way, what did the professor get wrong then they marked your assignment?

@problemofficer One of Oxford, Cambridge, or Imperial, source: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/2018/world-ranking

Resistance is not.

My suggestion would be to do a great job on the project with him this semester, including the write up.

It is true that a good grade is worthy (every student wants a nice grade). However, it is not uncommon to score somehow “poorly” while you expect the best result. So, if your results are contrary to your expectations and if you have reason to believe that what you earned is not what you deserve (in the sense of your achievements in exams, presentations, written reports, etc), you may need to take some course of action as per your university’s rules and regulations.
I think, a useful first step would be to ask your professor to show you how you have been graded and what you did right and what you did wrong. That would also be a good opportunity to learn from your mistakes (if any). You may also have the opportunity to discover if there were any mistakes on the side of your professor in evaluating (correcting) your report. After talking to your professor, if you are convinced that the grade you got is what you deserve, then you have to accept that and learn from  the things you didn’t do well. If, with your discussion with the professor, you find out things necessitating revision of your marks (re-grading), that would be accomplished as per your university’s rule. If you still cannot resolve the issue after discussing with your professor, you may follow your university’s formal appealing procedures. But when you do so, have a convincing reason for why you are questioning your  grade. How much time you have devoted on the work or the fact that you need a good grade to pursue a PhD, I think, are not reasons strong enough to justify appealing. What is it that you correctly did but for which did not earn the deserved mark? Such things should be at hand. (I feel many things vary from university to university, but this is what I think you could consider).

+1. I would stress a bit more asking if it is possible to make corrections and resubmit for regrading. Some professors permit this as a matter of course. For others it would be unusual, even impossible. But it is worth asking after taking the other steps suggested in this answer.


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Advisor ill, out all year... how should I proceed?
I’m a first year grad student beginning this year. My professor was diagnosed with cancer and won’t be in, probably all year, maybe even the entire time I’m in class.
He’s a great man, and also a nice man, which are two things that don’t always go together, so I’ve spent a while just being sad, but now I think it’s time to try to figure out what I’m going to do. I don’t want to make it to obvious who I’m talking about because I don’t know if he’s announced it publicly yet, but I am studying an ancient language… So he is the only professor in my program who knows how to read it. My question is do I change my topic of study to match a different professor at the school, or do I continue to focus on what I had hoped to focus on without the guidance of my advisor?
Thanks so much for any thoughts you can give me on this topic.

I took tag healthissues back out. The tag wiki doesn't cover such a case. The OP has no health issues. Sorry to disagree with a mod. Put it back if you must and I won't object.

@Buffy : Are you say that tag should be used only for health issues of the person who is posting? Why would that be?

@MichaelHardy, Read the explanation of it on the Tags pages. It seems pretty clear that it is for personal issues. In the case here, the situation would be the same if the advisor was unavailable for other reasons than health. Health is peripheral to the issue.

Your best option, in my opinion, is to discuss it with him. You may need to wait a bit until he feels well enough to think about it, but you really need his advice about how to proceed. He may be able to help you in your current studies, or not. Depending on the illness he may also never return to work. But, if you need to change professors and projects, he can probably help you get started with someone else, and is probably the best person to do that.
If you stay with the current project you will need to prepare for the eventuality that you will have to finish on your own. If that is the outcome, you will need to find resources to make that possible. It might be possible for you to continue yourself or not, depending on many things. But the professor will likely have advice on all of that.
I would advise against just making a decision without such advice. It may be that other professors in your department can give you the best advice about how and when to contact him. Good luck to you both.

Indeed, the professor is the starting point, but the department chair is a close second. If the professor is not currently in their office at all, I would go to the chair immediately to discuss concerns and contingencies. That is part of the job of the department chair after all.

@JonCuster good suggestion, except that at my department and I believe at many other large departments, the graduate vice chair/graduate program chair will be the more appropriate person to talk to about this. I held the role of department chair for several years, and although I was happy to talk to grad students when they had something they wanted to discuss, I was not always the best positioned person to help them.

@DanRomik - Sure, but you were probably the person to start with, not least because you would know the right person to talk to next (rather than the student executing a random walk through the administration). Certainly, finding/deciding on an alternative supervisor would seem to be delegated back to the department chair by the grad school folks. And the chair is likely in a better position to know (if anyone outside the immediate family does) the severity of the diagnosis.

@JonCuster no I was not the person to start with - that would be the graduate vice chair. Anyway, that’s how things work in my department. It may or may not generalize to other places.

"You may need to wait a bit until he feels well enough to think about it …" but keep in mind that if a cancer is diagnosed early, in the "short term" the treatment may be much more debilitating than the disease itself, which at that stage may not be causing any obvious symptoms at all.

@DanRomik - fair enough. Thinking back to grad school I have no idea who the graduate chair was, if one was even named separately from the department chair. Clearly that department was smaller than yours.

As mentioned in the above answers as well, I would start with the Professor himself, asking him how he would advice you to proceed during his absence. I assume he would also take the necessary precautions for your research if he decides that he will not be able to continue being your advisor. I would communicate what he tells you to the department chair so that in case something unintended/ unexpected happens you have a backup plan already in place for your graduation requirements and completion of your work, which might include change of topic/ finding advisory committee member(s) outside your institution etc. I would like to add that it might be very difficult to complete the research and study on the language you work without the guidance of an expert on it. You will need to decide for yourself if you will have access to the necessary resources/guidance without your advisor in case that might end up being what you have to do. Hope he gets better and good luck to you!


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Is it rude to send a self-correction followup email to professor?
I was wondering if I was rude to a professor.
I am a Japanese student at a Japanese university and I'm planning to apply for a British graduate school. Then, I contacted a professor at the graduate school and asked some questions about the school. The professor replied to me very politely. Due to my bad English skills, I misunderstood what the professor told me and wrote something inappropriate. Realizing my mistake 10 minutes after sending my original reply, I sent him a message again, apologizing for my mistake with a correction. I think I did things in a very polite way, but I still worry if I made a bad impression at the same time.
Do you think the professor would see me as a rude student? Please let me know your ideas.
*I mean I made just a simple English mistake. I should've written "my" instead of "your". I did not write anything like insulting him.

Everybody makes a mistake from time to time, and in the UK it is considered perfectly acceptable to make small mistakes, especially if you correct them yourself.
The professor will probably think you have been very polite by correcting the lack of signature. There is absolutely nothing to worry about.

It's ok but kinda weird: why don't you just have a signature at the end of all emails?

I think that if he knows you are not an english native he will probably guess it is just a language error.

When you say "wrote something inappropriate" do you mean you responded incorrectly or you said something mean in retaliation?

@CaptainMan Probably more in the line of a typo or some malapropism than malice or cursing.

There is one thing I use when writing in a language I have low proficiency, is the two-way translation. 1) write what you want. 2) translate to your home language 3) translate back into the foreign language. By comparing 1) and 3) and adjusting 2) you can get your real meaning across.

@Mindwin it's unclear and that's why I asked, because the answers would differ for each situation and I want to make sure OP gets the best help possible. I agree, I think that is the most likely scenario though.

The original question was about forgetting to include a signature in the email, but it has been edited and now it is about saying "something inappropriate". Which is the actual issue being asked about?

What level of "something inappropriate"? If it's inappropriate grammar, or inappropriate factual information that's one thing, but if you sent an inappropriate angry response to a perceived slight, you have a bigger problem.

Hi kkk, welcome! Note that the word "inappropriate", like it is used in your question has a different meaning in that context. Here it means "very inappropriate", like a real insult. Like "You are really boring" or worse.

I made a simple English mistake mistakenly. Sorry for a confusing explanation.

Don't worry about his, the professor will just be mildly amused for a few seconds and move on. I had a friend who mistyped 'Regards' as 'Retards' and then shot off an apology mail. It didn't lead to any negative consequences.

Different cultures have different standards of politeness. Educated people tend to understand that. By UK standards you were more polite than you needed to be, but by Japanese standards, perhaps, just right.
Don't think of it as a mistake. There should be no issue at all. In fact, I'll guess you've made a good impression.
The opposite problem, in which a person isn't polite enough in the local culture is a bit more of a problem, of course. I hope that if I were to meet you in Japan, you would forgive me for my seeming lack of politeness in some situations imagining (correctly, I hope) that it isn't intended.

Thank you for answering. Do you think was it rude that I replied him based on my misunderstandings of his words though I made corrections after sending it?

@kkkk, no, it was fine. "No worries" as they say in Australia.

@BallpointBen "Mate" is implied by the closing quote.

In the former maritime parts of the US northeast, "Matey" is used in a somewhat (at least) different sense. "Want to step outside and talk about that, Matey?" Usually with unpleasant results. Australians may also use it in that sense, I suppose, but in other, more friendly senses, as well. ("Bub" is a synonym, as is "Mr. Man".). In some contexts, if you are called "Sir", duck or apologize.

Generally, that is culturally appropriate for British and American.
Politeness aside, the mistakes matter as well. If it's more serious, like you meant Department of History but wrote Department of Anthropology, or misspelled the reciepient's name, or got the meeting date wrong, those are definitely justified.
But if it's something akin to "Oh, no, by time difference it should be evening there, I should not have written 'Good morning,' let me send a correction." Then it could be trivial, but definitely not impolite.
Moving forward, an advice I often give to students may be useful for you: when you write an e-mail, proofread it. And to avoid clicking the Send button too fast or by accident, fill in the contents of the e-mail first, then fill in the recipient's e-mail addresses at the "To:" slot the last.
Overall, don't be too nervous about this. Take effort to talk more with the native speakers, use English all the time, and your fluency will skyrocket.

In addition to the answer by @Buffy, if you were already having correspondence with the professor and if you replied to a message which the professor sent to you, I think, the professor will recognize the sender very well. Especially, if you are using your name as your username, the professor will be able to recognize you easily. But generally, when you have correspondence with your professors or anybody else, it is a good habit to read and re-read and edit the message you composed before sending it out.
I found this post on how to e-mail your professor, employer and professional peers very useful.

No, it's not rude. In fact it happens all the time, e.g. "Our meeting is at 3pm today" and then a few minutes later "Correction: our meeting is at 3:15pm today".
Having said that, I think you don't need to send such a correction email in the future because today's email services collect the entire conversation. The professor will not only be able to see who the person sending the email is, he'll also be able to see which conversation the email is referring to.

Not all methods of reading emails show conversation view (thankfully).

As far I know, Japanese culture has a strong super-polite flavor. I see a strong chance that your message wasn't even inappropriate, or it was much lesser inappropriate in the eyes of the Prof.
I think the best correction email is if you only state positive things. For example, once I accidentally addressed a very important person as "Dead Mr. X" instead "Dear Mr. X".
The important thing is, that don't reply the mistake even by negating it. Thus, "No, I did not want to write that you are dead", it had been another mistake. What I wrote: "I am really sorry, I wanted to write "Dear Mr. X".
Another important thing is, that the Prof has an idea what is in your mind, just as you have an idea, what is in the mind of the Prof. And he is probably rational and mainly cooperative. By understanding that your intention was absolutely not inappropriate, then rationality dictates that essentially nothing happened.
Profs get typically a lot of mail, every day, since years or decades, and answering them is not the most loved part of their job. Furthermore, they are communicating with stundents with a lot of different languages, English level and cultures. Thus

Most likely they will easily adapt.
Most likely they find similar uncommon events very often,
And they forget them on the spot after they've solved it.

This is the point of view of an American who taught part-time at a local university for about 8 years (future advice).
Things you need to consider:

Culture. In some cultures it could be consider disrespectful to do this. I don't know enough about British culture to give you a straight answer. Perhaps it might be good to ask a classmate that was born and raised in the U.K.
Ego. Some people's ego are simply way too big and might take offense to this. I used to tell my students on our first meeting that I acknowledge I am human and as such I can make mistakes. So, I challenged my students to correct me if they think I give them erroneous information. Of course, I emphasized that you must do so in a respectful manner. As a student, I had to deal with professors that were too closed-minded to admit they were ever wrong so I know this is a difficult thing to do.
Email could be too impersonal of a medium to communicate something this important. Also, he or she might not get to your email in time. Or worse, his or her email might be read/filtered by an assistant.

My advice to you is: DON'T USE EMAIL. Instead set up an appointment to see him or her and frame your issue in the form of a question.  For example: "I thought 'xyz' was true, but in your lecture I thought you said otherwise. Can you help me clarify this?"  There are two things in place here. The first one is that you are asking for a clarification instead of flat out coming out and "accusing" the professor of putting out incorrect information.  Second, and most importantly, you are putting this on you by saying you probably misunderstood (I thought) what he or she said.
I am certain that, if you do this, your professor might be more open to the indirect criticism and might even thank you for bringing this to his or her attention.
Going back to your question: Will the professor see you as a rude student? Who knows. A true professional should be able to accept your apology and move on. It also helps when these sort of incident doesn't repeat again. You need to assume your professor is a true professional and won't hold this single incident against you.

Extremely rude, telling the Professor that you didn't check your work enough times to make a mistake, it tells them that you didn't take the time or didn't care to fix it.

Extremely rude seems like an exaggeration to me - and I think we've all been too quick on the trigger finger, hitting that send button before every detail is perfect. Perhaps our difference is geographical? If you don't mind sharing, in which culture are you active? In addition, the follow-up email would seem to signal some "care to fix it" in my opinion.button.

Ok, so I guess my comment is a case in point... Please disregard the spurious 'button' at the end of the comment.

The question specifies that the professor is British or, at least, working in the UK. In that context, it is absolutely wrong to suggest that it is "extremely rude" to make a mistake in an email, without even knowing what that mistake was. Furthermore, one would expect a British professor to be reasonably understanding of a mistake caused by a non-native speaker misunderstanding something.

The professor is English and I am Japanese


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Is it possible to count the citations that a paper has received in a particular country using Web of Science?
I'm new in the use of bibliometrics. I was wondering if you can help me out? Consider this situation, an author "x" of the country "c" , publishes a paper "p" with a(n) international collaborator(s). If I want to know how many citations does the paper "p" has received from the country "c", is that possible? Is that so, three situations can happen.
One is that "only" author(s) of "c" cited "p", in which I will count 1. The second case is that there is a mix between author(s) of the country "c" and international authors, in which I will count a fraction of the authors belonging to "c" divided by the total authors of the paper that is citing "p". The third case is that only papers with international authors are citing "p", that I will count 0.

WoS allows you to look at all the papers citing a given paper P, and there is a link to "Analyze Results", where country is one of the options. (It defaults to a minimum count of 2; you'll want to drop this to 1)
For a randomly selected paper from a recent search, here's an example:

There are 11 citing papers; of these, seven have at least one US author, two at least one Czech author, etc. This would give a value of 0.64 if your original author was American, or 0.18 if they were Czech.
The obvious downside is that you need to do this for each paper P; you can't do it automatically for a hundred at once. But it's a start...

Edit: you can do this through Scopus as well. Select the paper, find citing papers, "analyse search results", and you get this:
Here, there are a total of three papers citing P, two of which have German author(s), one Austrian, etc.

With Scopus, you can do the analysis for a large group of papers, but it won't help you very much. From your initial search result, select all items using the checkbox, and click "view cited by". Then analyse search results again, and you get the stats for all papers citing one or more of the original search results. However, this won't help answer your question as to %age of papers with overseas citations - they're all bundled together and not segregated by cited paper.

You are the best, I will have to do this for a large volume of papers... So I need to find a way to automatize it... I heard that people can write scripts to do it... Thanks a lot!

Yes, this is possible with WOS.  You can use the WOS API.  Using python it is very simple to download the data and make specific queries.  The data can be fetched with SOAP as an XML format document.  You can then parse it with a few lines of code to extract the data you want by searching the address fields of the citations.
You can get started here: http://ip-science.thomsonreuters.com/m/pdfs/wos_workbook_en.pdf

It's important to note that the standard WoS/WoK API only provides basic metadata for a given article, and it no longer includes citation metadata - http://wokinfo.com/products_tools/products/related/webservices/ws_faq/ . For the citation data, you need the premium service. It seems this is now available with an InCites subscription. http://www.eprints.org/tech.php/17932.html

@Andrew , If you are using through a university IP, you are almost always going to have the premium service.


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Collaborator published paper on ArXiv without my name
In the last four months, I have been working on a project with a friend. After the completion of writing part of paper, I started searching for conferences and found that my friend had already submitted a previous/incomplete version of the paper on ArXiv.
Now my friend claims ownership of the idea and copyright  as it is now already  published in a pre-print. At present we both have the completed paper, codes and results. In reality, I did the most of the analysis in the project although the idea came out of discussion between us.
My friend wants to publish it on their own without giving me any credit. I even agreed  that they can be the first author, and I will be second, but they keep on insisting that they will not include me.
Even if I submit this in a conference, I am concerned that my submission will be rejected as the other author already has a proof of that work. I also hold the proof that I did the writing and computation part because most of the time I emailed them these results, but due to his cheating, I have no way to prove that I did the major work in this project. Any suggestions will be very helpful on how to tackle this problem.
Does a pre-print of the paper (containing the idea and some incomplete results) in their name, gives them an advantage if we both try to publish it?

Also, could you add what is your hope: that you get the credit that you deserve or that you can even continue a healthy working relationship with the other guy. The advice that can be given will be different in these cases.

Next time use a version control system with all documents you make. It's not at all hard to use but they provide timestamps and diff about what exactly you did, so they could constitute proof of your contribution. Using an online repository is especially good, since in this way the timestamps are given by the neutral third party. (for example bitbucket unlimited free private repositories).

@DCTLib It's already clear that the OP doesn't have a healthy working relationship with this person.

@Bakuriu version control systems do not provide proof of contribution.  The timestamps are not given by a third party.  You can change the time of a commit http://stackoverflow.com/questions/454734/how-can-one-change-the-timestamp-of-an-old-commit-in-git.  It is not too late for the OP to use a free private bitbucket repository with commits that predate the arXiv submission.

@Kimball True - I should have used the word "restore" instead of "continue".

have you contacted your university (or company's) legal department? they will have much more to say about this topic, as well as a vested interest in protecting your (and their) stake in the matter.

@emory Timestamps are not the only information contained in a version control system. The commits contain information about which files where change and how. Faking all of this is not a trivial task, assuming you never had a place in it, because you must find a possible logic history for the result, how it developed etc. Moreover I'm pretty sure bitbucket keeps track of their server time (i.e. a 3rd party time) when you access your repositories to perform push/pull moreover such services do periodic backups, so you could ask bitbucket if their backup from 1 month ago contained the repo.

I would say that the fact that your collaborator has published the paper as a pre-print should not change whether you can prove anything about it or your participation in it. It may make it more difficult to convince other people of it, though, but convincing people and being able to prove something is (at least in theory) to very different things.

"My friend wants to publish it on their own without giving me any credit. I even agreed that they can be the first author, and I will be second, but they keep on insisting that they will not include me." -- Sorry, I am not sure how many are your "friends" in this conflict from reading this paragraph. I think this is an important point.

[…] he claims that the idea belongs to him and he also has copyright for it as he already has published a pre-print for it.

Publishing content does not give you copyright for it; creating content does¹. There are exceptions if you sign over your copyright, but that would involve an actual contract, which I assume not to be the case here.
If you wrote parts of the paper or generated figures, publishing the paper without your name and consent is a copyright infringement. Hence, if you have proof of this, you have a legal case against your “friend”.
Moreover, publishing this paper as a sole author and thus denying you authorship constitutes a severe academic misconduct, which may very well end your “friend”’s academic career if you can convincingly prove it.

Any suggestion will be very helpful on how to tackle this problem.

Collect and secure all evidence that you contributed to the project, in particular any statement from your “friend” that implies this. Get a time stamp for the full paper as soon as possible.
Assuming that you do not want to or gave up to save your relationship, take the issue to a relevant authority, e.g., your advisor, your “friend”’s advisor, your university’s legal department, the ethics board, or similar. The best choice here depends on the detailed situation and relationships. For example, if you are both students under different supervisors who are friendly with each other, I would take it to your supervisor first.
You might also be able to take the issue to the ArXiv. I am not sure about their protocol for such cases and whether they have any, but I do not expect that they will just leave the paper as it is if you can convince them that you are a worthy co-author.

Does a preprint of the paper (contains the idea and some results,not the complete one) in his name, gives him an advantage if we both try to publish it?

If you fail to convince others of your authorship claims, yes.

¹ In any reasonable legislation and in particular every legislation that complies with international copyright conventions.

Regarding the arXiv issue--it's not clear from the question if the original arXiv post was entirely the friend's work or not. @Virange, perhaps clarify?

@Kimball: From the original version of the question: “[…] when I start searching for the conferences, I came to know that the other guy had already submitted a previous/uncompleted version of the paper on arxiv.”; from the current version “I started searching for conferences and found that the other guy had already submitted a previous/uncompleted version of the paper on ArXiv” – I consider this a clear statement of the asker that he was not involved in the ArXiv submission.

Yes, it's clear the OP wasn't involved in the arXiv submission.  Though I wasn't sure if the arXiv submission happened before the OP started collaborating on this project.  (It's unclear if they started the project together, or the OP joined an ongoing project, though upon rereading the second paragraph of the question, I guess the arXiv submission happened after they started working together.)

Excellent advice. Use your (and his) supervisor as leverage.

@Kimball: We both started working together as I mentioned that the idea came from our discussions. He submitted a previous version of paper which I wrote initially just to include broad idea and some results.

@Virange Then you should definitely look into having the arXiv paper retracted.  Gather your evidence and  contact the moderators.


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How to evaluate student team members who did minimal work on a team assignment?
I have this class where at the beginning of the term the lecturer pretty much randomly creates groups of 5 people (who usually do not know each other at all) and assigns them a project.
At the end of the term we do a presentation and a written exam. A friend of mine who took this class before told me that the lecturer will ask me to evaluate the other members.
Three people in our team were just terrible. They did not care at all, they did not even respond to emails, never arranged any workshops, and only came once or twice to other workshops we suggested, with the only one person remaining in the team besides me; so two of us pretty much did the project.
However, I really do not want to tell in the paper that they did not do anything. I do not care that they did not do anything, and I do not feel comfortable talking behind their backs. It should be the lecturer's responsibility to figure out who did what by asking the right questions in the exam and in the presentation, I believe.
So do I just leave those parts blank in the exam, or explain how I feel?

Just explain the facts of who did what, precisely. Leave out all opinions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77XISzgj_9Q

I point to my answer at http://academia.stackexchange.com/a/31961/20457

Suggestion: if the projects involve writing text files or other documents: use a version control system (and maybe an online private repo for convenience [I'm fond of bitbucket for unlimited free private repos]): then hand the repo to the professor. He can easily scan the commit log and see who made the commits and check exactly who wrote what.  This works wonderfully for things like programming but can be used for any type of document (although probably less practically).

@Bakuriu, from the question that would be too late for the OP.

(Not so) fun fact about a team project I was in a few years back. My thinking at the time was similar: I don't care they did nothing, it's the lecturer's responsibility to figure out who does what. Problem is, the lecturer does rely on your evaluation of your peers to do just that. When asked how the project went we said little and gave the idea we all had done some part of the work and there had been no freeloaders, when in fact one of the member did nearly nothing (<5% is being generous). That member end up having a higher grade than me; by a small amount but still...

You can just bring it up in meeting when all of the members are present, and ask what should you report to the professor as each member's contribution percentage. In that situation I think it would become much harder for the members with a lower contribution to ask for a higher percentage when others are present.

I recommend taking a course with a professor who, unlike this one, isn't an idiot.

While it's unfortunate you got stuck like that, I'll tell you in the workplace, this kind of malarkey happens all the time. One of the reason there's such an emphasis on leadership skills is because of situations like this where your bacon is at the mercy of others.

Since it appears that you did actively try to engage the other members of your group in the project, I will answer based on that assumption. If you did not actively try to involve them, well that is a different problem to address.
I have had a number of such encounters throughout my time in school, and my response was to be as objective and honest as I could be without looking like I was trying to put them down. Just state exactly what they did to help the project, nothing more, nothing less. If they didn't do anything, say that. Their grade is not your responsibility, so if you are asked to review their work, don't make it your responsibility to make them look good. Simply state exactly how much work by each person, and leave it to the professor/instructor to assign the grade.
Be careful to not let personal feelings get involved, and to grade everyone by the same standard. You could even create a rubric or break down involvement by sections of the project.
In my opinion, trying to make it look like they did more in the project than they actually did, so that they get a better grade is actually doing a greater disservice to them, than giving an impartial review that shows they didn't really do much. The reason for this is that it can reinforce their theory that they can get by without really doing much work, and relying on other people to pick up their slack, and if they continue on like that, it will most likely come back to bite them later. Better that they do poorly in a course now and learn they can't, than learning it later by possibly getting fired from a job.
Note: Be sure to consider whether or not you and the other active member in your group may have shut out the other members from participating, thus relegating them to a position where they weren't able to do much to help with the project.

I'll note the last time I did this I simply looked up the rubric used, by the professor, to grade the project and used that to evaluate each team member (which did help with objectivity)

Internal peer reviews can provide information that an instructor simply can't glean from a written exam and oral presentations.
I am currently teaching a course where the students have to do an end-of-semester presentation on a project they've been working on for the last six weeks or so. Each team has six members, and the time schedule we have available means I have just about five minutes per group to ask questions. That doesn't give me a lot of time to investigate group dynamics and decide who was productive and who wasn't on a meaningful level.
I therefore rely on a peer evaluation to help understand what went on in the group. Did everyone contribute their fair share, or did a few people "freeload" of the rest of the group? Did people work together well, or was there a lot of friction inside the group? Sometimes I can tell this from the presentation, but a lot of times, I can't.
However, this only works if everybody participates honestly. You can choose to decline and say nothing about what the other group members have done or not done, but then you also have to be willing to live with the consequence that those students will get the same grade as you have earned without doing anything to actually earn the grade.

Yup, this is how I do it too. My wrinkle is that the peer evals go to me only; I find that helps people be honest.

@D.Salo: You confuse brutal condemnation for honesty. Secrecy is how the Star Chamber and Stasi worked, and why in our justice system an accused is entitled to be faced by their accuser. If five freeloaders accuse the lone worker of laziness, how do you judge the truth? You should be reported for this blatant abuse of authority.

@PieterGeerkens: Well, first off, presumably the person who did the work will say so. Then, you talk to everyone in private. So nobody gets punished without a chance to defend himself, and without overwhelming evidence—not just hearsay. Secondly, this kind of system with peer reviews going only to the instructor is common at many universities. Should all of them be reported as well?

@aeismail: A practice being common does not make it sound; defendable; fair; or just.

@PieterGeerkens: In this case, the collection of information In and of itself is not an abuse of authority; how it's used is what makes it problematic..

@PieterGeerkens I'm sorry your students are so awful to one another. Mine never have been, nor have I seen the level of outright lies you suggest. Indeed, if my students are overly harsh with anyone it is with themselves, and that is easy to triangulate based on groupmates' reports of them.

@D.Salo: Process and policy exist not only to ensure that justice is done; but to ensure that justice is seen to be done. When everything is enabled to occur behind a professor's closed office door, with no oversight or visibility, then there might as well be no policy at all - because there is nothing in place to prevent the arbitrary abuse of authority that policy and process are intended to prevent. No matter how honest and upright you may be, or consider yourself to be, this system is ripe for abuse and should not be encouraged.

Hide your pride and give them the praise for the things they did well (but don't lie). Of course, you can take more credit saying you "led the project", but don't throw others under the bus. This will help your professional reputation, they will know they are indebted to you (whether they ever pay it back, it's okay if they don't), and you know not to work with them in the future if you don't have to. Really, it's a choice between pissing someone off or doing someone an (unintentional) favor when it doesn't really change anything to you (since you already did the project and it likely won't change your grade).
As aeismail stated, from the presentation and the writing in the exam it's quite obvious who did the work, so there's no reason for you to go at them. A simple "Johnathan did a good job getting the information for the introduction of Section ###" where that's the section they sent you 1-2 sentences; that's all you (and the other that did the work) have to hint to the lecturer to get the point across (especially if that's all they said in the presentation).
In total, if the lecturer doesn't see it, then you're fighting a losing battle where you can't really gain anything. So you might as well be nice, but tell the truth in the nicest way possible.

When I was a student a very long time ago….. (Just before the web was invented.)  We had a joint project in teams of 5.

At the end of the project we were each given 100 points
Told to divide them between the other 4 team members in relationship to the contribution they made.
Each person had their highest and lowest points drops, leaving the 2 middle set of points.
No one was told how many points they we given, so even if you know what points one person gave you, you could not work out what someone else did.

The mark was divided between the team members based on the above.


text:
How should I cite?
I am a medical student working on my thesis... I found a couple of theses online that have relevant info to my thesis subject...
I took this information but rephrased them with my own words and then I copied and pasted the references from those theses! Is that ok?
If not, can I cite those theses?
Or what should I do at all?

I don't understand: "then I copied and pasted the references from those theses! Is that ok? If not can I cite those theses?". Do the other theses you took ideas from appear as citations in your Works Cited / Bibliography or not? They have to.

No they do not appear.. i basically took an idea from one of those theses then i went to the bibliography of that thesis and i copied some of the references and pasted them in my bibliography.

At first I thought, the question is about literature review. But it isn't. Autch!

Yes, you must cite works you use in your thesis.
Failing to do so is plagiarism. Also worth noting: copying and pasting work you yourself have written but for a different publication is also plagiarism (see self plagiarism).
I would argue that one of the main goals of a thesis is to demonstrate that you are capable of independent research by finding, critically analyzing and synthesizing existing information.
Showing you have done research is part of the point, you show that by citing other publications.
EDIT The original comment was edited with more detail very quickly after I started answering; let me elaborate.
Broadly, you should cite anything you use in your work that comes from another author. If you mention another author in your paper, your examiner (and other readers) should be able to find the work you're referencing in your works cited. Think about where the ideas come from and how you're using them.
More concretely, if the other thesis itself synthesizes works of many people and you are only interested in the broad conclusion, you could cite the thesis.
Suppose the thesis author cites Bayes in their thesis, and you write something like

thesis author (2010) is not in total agreement with Bayes (2008)*

or

thesis author (2010) is not in total agreement with Bayes

you need both in your works cited, because that's what you cited. You don't want to leave the reader (examiner) saying "who's this Bayes character?"
Do you have to read all the works the thesis author cites? Very likely not, but it's probably a good idea to read the foundational works the thesis cites in order to understand the thesis itself.
Conversely, as Guillaume has pointed out, don't cite a work you aren't familiar with (meaning: if you need to cite it, familiarize yourself with it).

I see... i mean i don't have to read each article (or whatever source) the other theses' authors cited?

You should at least have a big picture idea about each and every reference you cite. Citing a reference without having read it will get you in trouble when you defend your thesis, for example if somebody asks what a reference is about, and you answer wrongly because you did not read it (while they read it). This happened to me with my master thesis. Never again. :-)

To add to my first comment, at least in my field you can spot such "never-read-anymore-but-important-so-people-cite-them" kind of articles in the literature, and it's interesting to read them and see how their meaning drifts as other people cite them without reading them. Another reason to go read your refs: the work you found them through might have cited them wrongly in the first place!

@Guillaume I think you could definitely compile this into another answer. I'd upvote it :)

You should at least have a big picture idea about each and every reference you cite. Here is why:

Citing a reference without having read it will get you in trouble when you defend your thesis, for example if somebody asks what a reference is about, and you answer wrongly because you did not read it (while they did). This happened to me with my master thesis (and the professor who asked me told me later that it had happened to him when he was a student). Never again. :-)
At least in my field, you can spot such "never-read-anymore-but-important-so-people-cite-them" kind of articles in the literature, and it's interesting to read them and see how their meaning drifts as other people cite them without reading them. This is another important reason to go read your refs: the work you found them through might have cited them wrongly in the first place!

And of course, as already mentioned, you must always cite everything, i.e. the work you found interesting and the references cited by this work that are also relevant to your own work. When there are too many such "second-level" references, for example because the primary article you cite is a review, you can also cite this way:

for review, see Doe et al (2010) and references within.

But use this with moderation; it is too easy to cite reviews without ever reading primary research articles, with the risk pointed out in point 2 above.


text:
How to revise the manuscript (one reject and one accept in first decision) and what could be the final decision?
I just received a decision letter from IEEE ACCESS with resubmission option(first decision came in one month). The recommendation of reviewer1 is "Accept (minor edits)" and the recommendation of reviewer2 is "Reject (update and resubmit encouraged)".
Reviewer 1: Accept (minor edits)
compare the performance of proposed method with conventional methods are given in ref[] & ref[].
Reviewer 2: Reject (update & resubmission encouraged)
Comments came like grammar check and typo corrections are needs to be done...
some notations, abbreviations are need to be corrected...
Add expression for proposed technique and also explanation with performance cure...
I am doing revision on my manuscript as per advice given by the journal reviewers and going to submit ASAP....
If anybody has the similar kind of experience, please share what could be the final decision?....
Valid points are welcome & appreciated....

The final decision depends on the quality of your revision...

If you have already decided what to do, why are you asking a question?

Carefully check your grammar. The fact that the two refs decision are different it is just because of the bulleted choices offered by the journals. I would be very optimistic.

There is no real way of knowing what the outcome will be without seeing the feedback. It honestly depends on the primary reviewer. Depending on what the formal process is for IEEE ACCESS, either one reviewer will have the ultimate say, or both reviewers will have to agree on a result.
I've been in this situation a few times and it has gone both ways. Looking at your feedback summary, there's nothing fundamentally wrong with the research which is always a good sign (I've had more than my fair share of reviewers simply disliking the premise of my research which is a complete non-starter). Ultimately, you need to work hard on the revision and write a cover letter that addresses each of their points.
The cover letter is a really important part of this process as a lot of reviewers will use this as the basis for their decision. Be sure to respond to each of their comments methodically, and clearly. Try to avoid using vague language such as "We've added more detail to the conclusion", but instead provide a clear description of the changes you made.
It sounds like reviewer two had an issue with the language used. If you've got any strong English language researchers in your department, it's worth asking if they are able to proofread the document for you. Services like Grammarly are also useful to improve typos and grammar. Make sure you emphasise how much effort you put into improving this when responding to reviewer two's comments. This may be enough to nudge the needle in your favour.

I'm assuming that on top of the two reviewers also an (associate) editor had a hand on this, because this is how I know things, although I don't know IEEE ACCESS.
In that case, if you address all the listed issues appropriately, you should normally be fine. If the paper is not rejected initially, the editor should make sure that you get all information required to produce an acceptable resubmission. Otherwise it would be pointless to ask for a resubmission.
That said, there is no guarantee because 1) the editor may not have paid attention but may have a deeper look in the second go (not good behaviour but it happens) or 2) after the amendments you make, reviewers/the editor may discover other issues that they hadn't spotted before because they had missed something, maybe because of bad writing.
Another thing I don't know about IEEE ACCESS is whether reviewers have the option to pick something between "Accept (minor edits)" and "Reject (update and resubmit encouraged)". If they don't, the situation is better for you because Reviewer 2 may just have expressed that some proper work needs to be done, despite being generally positive. If there is a "Major Revision" option on the other hand, the current choice of Reviewer 2 is more negative. There exist journals in which "Major Revision" is an option and others that don't offer this.


text:
I am between academic institutions. If I submit a paper what do I say my affiliation is?
Basically, I was a student at University Y when I wrote a paper. I am no longer a student there, but work at Company Z.
Do I still list University Y as my institutional affiliation? Their resources helped make the paper possible and all of it was written at University Y.
But on the other hand, I am currently working at Company Z.

After I left my previous academic institution, I co-authored a paper with a former colleague.  My affiliation was "Independent Researcher", and I used an email tied to my personal domain (instead of, say, my personal gmail).

Actually, this has been asked several times in different forms. Look at the posts with [tag:affiliation] for more.

A note updating contact information should be fine. Like university xyz. X. Y. is now at zyx.


text:
If I wrote a textbook, or other form of academic material, is it okay to use problems found online?
Lets say I decided to write a small textbook, similar to how people have all sorts of "Learn to Program" books, but for other subjects like Calc, Chemistry, or similar. If I used examples problems, say from https://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~kouba/ProblemsList.html
or
http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/Classes/CalcI/CalcI.aspx
(for calc, popular sites used for practice)
Would it be legal to just copy paste those problems (not the whole webpage but pick and choosing certain problems) in the book?
The reason Im asking is because Ive seen a few books like this, and always wondered if they had to come up with problems on their own, or if they pulled from a bank. Obviously lots of calc problems are similar to eachother, or the exact same, so I figure there is no copyright on any given problem, but I wasnt sure how it worked. Interested to find out!

Just because they are online does not mean you have any legal right to copy/paste them and claim them as your own work.

@JonCuster Thats what I figured, so even though these problems appear in multiple places exactly, you would have to cite the problem from the source you get it from? That or create your own example?

Note that citing it, alone, is not enough. That doesn't absolve you from the law. You still need permission. Citing only helps you avoid plagiarism, not copyright violation.

Copy-pasting is almost never a good idea in academia; even when legal, it is usually considered plagiarism, and even when not plagiarism, it will make you look  like a plagiarist who can't be bothered to build his own sentences. Copying the ideas while stating the problems in your own words, however, is usually considered okay unless you are copying many problems from one and the same source.

In general, no. You may not republish materials found on the web unless you attend to copyright laws in your jurisdiction. These laws vary quite a lot, but for your intended purpose - inclusion in a book - you will need permission in most places.
Sometimes the original publisher will explicitly give permission on a web page, such as a Creative Commons permissive license or a statement the the material is public domain. But even a license comes with restrictions, such as, perhaps, attribution.
Sometimes the original publisher will include something like terms of service like these from Lamar University. Your use is bound by those unless you make other arrangements with the copyright holder.
In the absence of any statement to the contrary, you should probably assume that the creator or other copyright holder "reserves all rights".
When in doubt you can and should contact the creator of any materials. Both of the links you provide actually have contact information.
In addition to copyright law, for which you can be sued, there is the question of plagiarism. It is considered unethical to claim any work created by others as if it were your own.
I'll note for the record that there are a few exceptions to copyright law, but they don't include republishing the work of others. If those problems have "value", then that value is owed to the creators.
Also, copyrights generally expire, but the terms are normally very long - something close to 100 years at this point.

There is one subtlety, however, that partly explains why you see the "same" questions in multiple places. Note that it is words and "expression" that is the subject of copyright, not ideas. The only "ideas" that can be protected from reuse are those covered by explicit patent. That is a completely different thing. There are some things, however, for which there may be only one way to properly express it in a given language.
"Integrate f(x) = sin(x)"
is one of those things. The sin function and integration are ideas with common terms. There are very few other ways to write that problem. So it will appear in that form or one closely similar to it in most calculus books. In general, the ideas are free to use.

Finally, you seem to be asking for legal advice and no one here can give it. In particular, no one here can give you permission to do something that is illegal to do under civil or criminal law. I am not a lawyer. My advice is conservative to help you avoid stepping into a problem that is best avoided.

Thanks for the answer, so in general, even a problem that appears in multiple places over the web because it is a common calc or chemistry question, has to be cited for the place you specifically grabbed it from? How would they know that you didn't just "create" the problem from memory of something you once did in class or something? I feel like it would be very difficult to prove you took it from THEIR website versus others... but in general, a citation of one would cover it?

You are confusing plagiarism (citing) and copyright violation (needing permission). They are not the same, but both apply.

I guess Im confused a little on which apply when in this scenario. So if I wrote a book, and in that book I had question 1 from http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/Problems/CalcI/DefnOfLimit.aspx as an example in there, and I solved it similar, but not word for word, how they did in their solutions, and they saw my book and noticed its the same problem, would they have a basis for any kind of action? How could they prove I didnt just come up with something that coincidentally is what they used? Simple problems like this would be easy to come up with, and the solution the same

See my update on the distinction between "ideas" and expression of ideas. But if you are thinking of it as copying, then you are probably not doing the right thing.

Just noticed your edit, and thank you that clears it up a bit. Im not asking for legal advice for me, it actually was just something I thought about while reviewing a book while I was tutoring. I came across 2 problems that were nearly identical and it got me thinking how the law works in these cases! I do appreciate your response, it makes sense

In any field, there are some problems that are so basic that almost any book should include something like them. If this is the case, you do not need to cite them, even if you got the idea for including them by looking in a textbook. For example:

Find ∫ x sin(x) dx.

But it's a bad idea to copy more complicated problems verbatim. If there is a substantial text component of the problem, then you are probably violating copyright by copying and pasting. And if you don't know the field well enough to tell the difference between basic problems and complicated problems, and you can't modify problems to avoid committing copyright violations, then you shouldn't be writing a textbook, or putting problems on your webpage.


text:
Requesting a professor I barely know a recommendation letter for postdoc
I met a professor (a big name in our field) at a workshop and we worked on the initial idea for a paper as part of a group project. We stayed in touch for a couple of weeks but our conversation ceased as the other group members stopped working on the paper and the project ran out of steam. I was applying for postdoc fellowships at the time and one of the fellowships required four recommendation letters. I only knew three researchers in our field well enough that I could ask them for recommendation letters. Since I felt like I impressed the professor from the workshop while working on the paper with some good results, I sent him an email explaining my situation and asking whether he would be willing to write the fourth recommendation letter. I never heard back from him, so it's most probably a no. However, I now worry that his impression of me has been tarnished since I feel like I asked him for a letter after doing only a small amount of work. How do professors look upon these things? How badly have I messed my future prospects given that he is a big name in the field and sits on various funding committees? I don't think I will be able to see him face-to-face for a while.

Recommendation letters for students one knows well are relatively easy to write.
Recommendation letters for students one doesn't know well are very difficult to write and potentially take twice as long as the ones for students one knows well. Asking someone who doesn't know you to write one was a stretch, and though it would have been more polite of that person to kindly tell you "no", this was very likely a silent "no".
Think of it this way: recommendations are sort of a covenant we have with the students we teach, postdocs we supervise, or colleagues we work closely with. It is part of the reward that comes with doing well in your studies or research, you don't just get your marks or your degree, you get the recommendation too. If you haven't earned that with someone, it's just a time suck for them to try to come up with something to say about you based on the CV you give them.
I doubt you have messed anything up permanently; they may not even remember this happened. I don't think ill of anyone that I've opted not to write a recommendation for. I'd just be hesitant to ask anything more of that person until you've earned it via collaboration.