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Should licensed code be acknowledged in Thesis
When some function library licensed under BSD is used in simulations, should it be acknowledged in Bachelors/Masters Thesis, which have no length restrictions?
In this particular case the functions are implementations of commonly known algorithms like k-nearest neighbors, A* and such. Similarly how MATLAB/Python standard libraries are seldom acknowledged, should the third party code that does not contribute theoretically be not acknowledged?
EDIT: In OR, code and the implementation is often left off. But I do not know whether it would be unethical to not cite it in a case where the algorithms used are bread and butter, without any contribution. For the journals these would not be mentioned, but the Thesis has no length restrictions, so there is no similar reason not to.

Generally in a thesis or in an academic paper in my field (numerical modeling, engineering) people try to mention which languages and library they have used to implement an algorithm or a method. If you use a commonly known algorithm which was implemented in a library (whatever the license of that library is) I think it would be most appropriate to mention which implementation of the library is used in your methodology section.
The are numerous reasons for this. First it gives credit to the people who wrote the library. You will often see on library website a paper to cite which is the "defining paper" of the library. It is good to acknowledge that. Second, if there were to be a bug found in the future in the library or some limitation, this could then be easily traced back to your results to justify surprising results. Thus it is more rigorous to state which implementation and which version you are using.
In all cases, I believe that crucial libraries that implement complex algorithmic elements should be acknowledged in the methodology section, along with the library version and a reference to it if such a reference exist.

Yes, it does depend on the field. My field (OR) tends to drop details of programming off. The problem is that they are not complex algorithmic elements, but something basic that is quite surprisingly not implemented yet in the MATLAB.

@user3644640 what is OR?

@Davidmh Operations research

Yes. In science, we cite the sources and tools we used because it helps others replicate what we did. It also gives credit to those who developed these tools. We have come accustomed to this for citing papers, but it is equally important to give credit to those who develop software as part of their scientific work -- it's a different kind of publication, but it's a publication nonetheless.

But would you cite the people behind a commercial software. I know personally some of the people that have their implementations within the MATLAB. Still MATLAB or the people behind it are seldom given credit as they are part of the engineering work rather than scientific work.

I think it would be appropriate to also cite Matlab, though the makers of matlab are not interested in getting academic credit but are in it for commercial reasons. If you use a package built on matlab for whatever you do, I'm very much in favor of citing that, though.


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Is it advisable to upload your PhD thesis on Biorxiv?
The university theses repository is not indexed in the main scientific literature search engines. This issue makes finding a thesis difficult, and it's a problem especially because after PhD many are looking for a postdoc position.
Is it a good idea to upload a biology related PhD thesis on Biorxiv.org?
Does Biorxiv.org allow it?
Is is legal on the copyright side?
Are there any drawbacks?

Same as for ArXiv I guess.  Does she intend to publish (parts of) the thesis?  If so, would placing it on Biorxiv be considered "prior publication", thus causing it to be rejected by publishers?

How will this help in looking for a Postdoc position? Put a link to the university repository in the CV.

This is not allowed on bioArxiv, consider using Arxiv instead:
https://www.biorxiv.org/about/FAQ

bioRxiv does not permit the posting of news, product advertisements,
  teaching materials, policy statements, theses, dissertations, student
  projects, recipes and simple protocols.

This is quintessential information indeed! I didn't know.

If there are no legal restrictions imposed on it by the university, it does seem to be a good alternative for waiting for possible years to get research published. Nature (http://www.nature.com/news/biologists-urged-to-hug-a-preprint-1.19384) seems to validate it by suggesting that biology is lagging behind other sciences, and is likely to catch up.
To address the other point: "The issue of whether a preprint could jeopardize the chances of a manuscript subsequently appearing in a peer-reviewed journal is also being resolved, says Inglis. Since bioRxiv launched, several journal publishers have changed their policies to expressly allow the publication of research previously posted to preprint servers."

My advice would be to submit it to Proquest (associated with University of Michigan).  This is the norm in the US.  They maintain a repository of most US theses on microfiche and electronically.  There is a nominal charge for independent researchers to get copies of your thesis (you will get very small royalties over time).  This database is well abstracted by Google Scholar, Science Citation Index, Chem Abstracts, etc.  Can't recall, but there may be a small charge to submit the dissertation and/or a copyright form to fill out.
It is the norm for chapters in theses to be modified slightly and converted into regular journal articles.  The Proquest thesis is not considered prior publication by any of the journals/societies I have worked with (Nature, Science, ACS, APS, IEEE, etc.)  Just cite the dissertation.  (Has tangential benefit of some self-citation...woot!)  In fact, I encourage you to convert as much of the thesis into "real articles" because (even though the thesis shows up in Google Scholar) doctoral theses tend to be much less cited/read than "real articles in real journals".
I'm not sure about book publication (many humanities theses are turned into real books by trade presses).  So just check on that if you want it before going with the Proquest microfiche.  If you just plan to get your own custom-bound volumes, for self/university library, etc., that should be fine...nobody will blink.

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Undergraduate Research as an Irregular Student
I am currently a Japanese college student. I am going to do research in artificial intelligence from this April.
After completing the first year of research, I am planning to go to the United States for 1 year.
During the last 5-6 months of the plan, I would like to do undergraduate research at some university in the US.
I am not sure if it is possible for an international student to do undergraduate research as an irregular student.
Of course I am not seeking any units or degrees.
How does the system of irregular acceptation of universities work in the US?

Can you clarify your academic status while in the US? That is, are you just taking a year away from your college, is the visit a sanctioned part of the program, etc?

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W2 positions at the universities of applied sciences in Germany
The W2 professorship ads of all universities of applied sciences in Germany have a passage requring (e.g., for Bavaria)

darüber hinaus besondere Leistungen bei der Anwendung oder Entwicklung wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnisse und Methoden in einer mindestens fünfjährigen beruflichen Praxis, die nach Abschluss des Hochschulstudiums erworben sein muss und von der mindestens drei Jahre außerhalb des Hochschulbereichs ausgeübt worden sein müssen; [...] der Nachweis der außerhalb des Hochschulbereichs ausgeübten beruflichen Praxis kann in besonderen Fällen dadurch erfolgen, dass über einen Zeitraum von mindestens fünf Jahren ein erheblicher Teil der beruflichen Tätigkeit in Kooperation zwischen Hochschule und außerhochschulischer beruflicher Praxis erbracht wurde.

It roughly means that you have to have worked on applying your knowledge and scientific methods 5 years after graduation, 3 of which outside of academia, or, in special cases, a minimum of 5 years most of the time in cooperation between non-academic industry and academia. Regulations in other federal states are similar.
Considering the second passage, what counts (and what does not count) as such a cooperation? E.g., does working 5 years long at a research university on BMBF-financed projects with industrial partners count?

The definition is left intentionally vague, in my opinion, so as to not further reduce the pool of applicants unnecessarily.
The general idea, I believe, is to show that you have cooperation with (and possibly support from) industry. So a BMBF-funded project with an industrial partner is just as viable as a project whose funding comes directly from industry. I think even if neither of those holds, but you have an industrial partner on a project—perhaps seen through joint publications—you could make the case of industrial cooperation.

Thanks, got it! I'm not the one to judge, so I simply upvoted because noone has raised objections so far.

The general idea is that someone who has worked in industry (i.e. the Real World (tm)) will not get quite as obscessed with petty infights that often suck up working energy at research universities. And they have a reasonable idea about how to be IBM (In Business for Money).
Go ahead and apply - if the applicant pool is small, people from such projects will be included, if not, they won't.

From my own experience, some professor postions at universities of applied sciences in Germany stay vacant for extended periods of time because it is hard to find a candidate that fulfills all requirements to a large enough extent. Because of this, the deciding committees will more often than not be lenient about the specific nature of your experience if you are otherwise a great candidate (especially if few other people are in the running).


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What are "scholarship" and "engagement"?
Let's consider an excerpt from a particular job announcement for a department head:

[...] The applicant must be committed to promoting the career development of others and to promoting a cohesive atmosphere of diversity and inclusion. The position requires a strong commitment to scholarship, learning and instruction (including teaching), engagement and outreach activities, alumni and public relations, international initiatives, and relations with K-12 school-based partners. [...]

Another example:

The College of [censored] is committed to advancing diversity in all areas of faculty effort, including scholarship, instruction, and engagement.  A successful candidate is expected to show evidence of integration of this
  emphasis on diversity into at least one of these areas.

I'm not into this elusive and vague language so much to fully understand it. I'm wondering: in these contexts, what the henk do scholarship and engagement exactly mean? And then, how on earth can one show diversity in scholarship or in engagement?

These are straightforward English words, with a good range of explanations, yet the question treats them like whole-cloth inventions of jargon designed to hide some ulterior motive. "elusive and vague" as a description of these terms makes no sense.

@Nij Not at all. Dictionaries provide us with lots of meanings to "scholarship" and "engagement". I would hate to get engaged with people like you, for example, because I'm straight, and you might be of the same gender. The used phrases are vague.

I suspect that this question is really more of a rant than a serious question, but I'll try to give a serious and concrete answer.
Scholarship is a term that is widely used in defining the work of faculty.  It includes original research, but also often includes translational research and the creation of survey articles, textbooks, software, and other works.  In the engineering fields, the creation of patentable inventions is typically considered to be scholarly work.  In some fields, the creation of artistic works (paintings, musical compositions, novels) is considered part of the scholarly work of faculty.
As a department chair, your job would include supervising and encouraging the scholarly work of the faculty and students in the department.  With respect to diversity and scholarship, the chair would be expected to promote diversity in the department in hiring, recruitment of students, and the creation of a departmental culture that is inviting and open to traditionally underrepresented groups.  You could establish your personal experience and commitment to diversity by referring to things that you've done in previous positions.
For example, "As the chairman of the department at University X, I oversaw the hiring of five faculty members, of which three were members of minority groups.  During my chairmanship, the percentage of female students in our graduate program increased from 25% to 45%."
Engagement isn't as well known a term as scholarship, but many universities include "community outreach" or "community engagement" as one of the duties of faculty members.  This is sometimes grouped under "service", but it's really quite different from the kinds of service to the profession that most faculty think of immediately (serving on conference organizing committees, editing journals, etc.)  This particular position advertisement is for the head of a school of education, where outreach might include activities such as providing in-service training to school teachers.
Again, the applicant is expected to show a commitment to diversity in this area.  You might write "In my previous position at University X, I chaired a committee that ran an in-service training program on the Next Generation Science Standards for teachers in Urban School District Y in which 90% of the students are members of minority groups.  A new curriculum based on NGSS has been implemented across the district and test scores have improved substantially."

"Scholarship" means publication and other research-related activity. "Engagement" means various forms of professional interaction, including university service, mentoring, community outreach, and representing the university and the discipline to the broader public.
One shows diversity in scholarship and engagement by the choices you make when performing them, such as choice of research direction, mentorship priorities, or ways in which you reach the broader public. I am completely certain that you know what "diversity" means.


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Checking whether you have cited some other researcher
Sometimes you need to find out quickly whether one of your papers has cited a particular researcher given only the name of that researcher. Is there a tool for that? Assume you have used the bibtex format so far to manage your references, but your bibtex files contain much more than what you've actually cited.  You have no Zotero or Mendely and don't want to mess with them unless really necessary. You have your own webpage with lots of paper copies, and you have profiles at Google Scholar, ResearcherId, and Orcid.
Google Scholar and ResearcherID can tell you who cites you. As opposed to that, you wish to determine whether you cite someone else (or not).  To start with, a binary answer (yes/no) would do.  You would like to run such a query several times, one researcher at a time. Ideally, the query would give you some (or even all) of your papers which cite the given researcher, but it's not a must.
Surely you can do that by putting all your texts together, converting them all to text or html, and then searching there. This is tedious and error-prone, though. Is there any online (or offline) service for that, perhaps? The database in which the search is done must be a (possibly large) underapproximation of the papers you have written so far.

Just to clarify, is this a problem for you because of having a large number of papers whose bibliographies would have to be individually looked at (even taking into account that you'd only need to look at those papers relevant to that particular researcher's work) or because you're in one of the science fields in which papers tend to have many authors each and your bibliographies might only list the first two or three of the authors?

@DaveLRenfro The first.

I'd like to attempt an answer, but could you please edit your question to explain WHY you want to do this? That would help people try to offer solutions to your root issue.

Are you really interested in finding references from ALL the articles you have ever written, from ALL the artilces you have ever published (not the same thing as the prior group), or only those artilces indexed in Google Scholar, or only those articles in Web of Science, or only those articles in _______ (fill in the blank: other indexing service)? These are all different sets of articles, with different possible solutions, so please clarify exactly what you want. As I mentioned in my prior comment, explaining WHY you want to do this would help clarify matters.

@Tripartio Text adapted.

Tools like recoll can be used to search a collection of documents for keywords. This will do the job as long as the author's name actually appears in one of your papers.  However, it won't catch "et al." citations.

If you really want to search all the articles that you have written, then you shouldn't depend on an external service like Google Scholar or Web of Science to do that for you: you should assemble it yourself. Such indexes would only include the subset of your published articles that meet their indexing criteria. Moreover, I don't think that either of these services guarantee that they index the full text of all your articles that they index (they might have many, but probably not all).
So, there are at least two ways you could search your personal collection of your own articles:

I recommend that you add the full citations with the full text (PDF or word processor document) of all your articles to a reference manager like Zotero or Mendeley. Then you should assemble all your articles in one folder or collection, and then search the name of the authors you are seeking within that folder only. I recommend this solution because there are benefits to assembling your own articles into one folder beyond just this one assignment of identifying authors whom you have cited.
Another alternative is to put the full text of all your articles into one folder in your computer and then use a full text search tool to search that folder. I don't have any particular tool to recommend, but I know that there are a lot of free ones available.

Note that (up to copyright restrictions) you can put all you papers online and enter them into services such as google scholar.

Not really. If you you've published with a publisher that doesn't let Google Scholar index the full text, and doesn't let you publish a green open access version at an online location that Google Scholar can easily index it (e.g. it only allows posting on your "personal" website), then no, Google Scholar will not index the full text of all your articles. I believe that such restrictions are by design: I think this is why publishers willingly cooperate with a crippled Google Scholar.

@Tripatio Sorry, I didn't get you. Assuming you entered your publications into your google-scholar profile and linked your personal webpage copies, will google scholar index these copies on your personal webpage or not?

You can't link articles to Google Scholar that it hasn't already indexed. Google Scholar has to first find the article and index it, and then you can add it to your personal profile. Google finds most articles, but I've had trouble with at least one of my articles in the green open access grey zone, even after following their instructions at https://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/inclusion.html. In any case, even if you did get all your articles onto Google Scholar, I don't know how to search for specific keywords only within articles in a personal profile.

@DSVA You're right; my suggestion wouldn't work for articles published in such journals, but if OP knows which articles are affected, then OP could either individually search such articles, or change the citation format in their personal copy just for the purpose of this particular exercise.


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Can I post my dissertation (currently only viewable within my institution) composed of journal papers on a personal website or Research Gate?
I just got my Ph.D. degree majoring Chemical Engineering this month and I will start my research career. I am a new researcher. I wonder whether I can post my full dissertation (currently only viewable by people in my institution) on a personal website or ResearchGate?
I studied in a private university. For my university, our dissertations are only available to our university community (Faculty, Staff, and Students). In my opinion, I think dissertation should be easy access and free of charge. I know for my research area, nobody would be really interested in reading dissertations, because we all know our dissertations are just a combination of our journal publications, and I have published 4 journal papers already. But I still hope my dissertation could be easy to access by the public.
Therefore, I wonder whether I could publish my dissertation on ResearchGate? Or due to potential copyright concern, should I just leave a comment on my website like: "If you are interested in reading my dissertation, please contact me and I will send you a copy."

This question is a duplicate because the best answer is that ResearchGate is not a good site to use.

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/16870/researchgate-an-asset-or-a-waste-of-time

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/616/is-web-presence-important-for-researchers

Have you tried talking with people from your school about your desire to publish your thesis?

I don't think this question is a duplicate, because I don't think the "ResearchGate" aspect of the question is particularly important for the OP's goal to improve access to their work.

Without knowing your institution's policy on copyright of theses, it's impossible to answer your question.  It sounds as though your institution may have a policy that requires you to give up copyright.

@Brian Borchers. In my thesis, it writes Copyright @ "My Name"

It's important to consider what rights you have to your work after having submitted the bulk of it to journals, rather than to the thesis itself. I don't think it's possible to give a generic answer that will apply to everyone, because it depends on your specific agreements.
While it is common for journals to waive certain exclusive rights they have to allow you to include your work in a "stapler-style" thesis, that doesn't mean they've given up all their exclusive rights to that content. They may have given permission for the content to be in a thesis that's available within your institution, but not available publicly, for example.
You already have 4 journal articles; as you say, very few people will be interested in reading your thesis. I'd focus on just those journal articles, and make them as accessible as you can given the terms under which you've licensed them. You'll probably have to check with each individual journal, but it's possible they are already available publicly in some fashion or will be in the near future after some predetermined time has elapsed (if the journals support some level of open access; if not, perhaps this should have been a consideration when you originally submitted the papers). It's also possible they already give you permission to share on a personal web site, and it's possible that they allow for a draft of the manuscript before it went through the journal's process to be posted on a preprint archive like arXiv (or whatever preprint archive is commonly used in your field).

Normally, the candidate retains the copy-right for the dissertation. Thus, feel free to publish it where-ever you want, (after you checked that you did not violate your alma mater's rules and regulations). It is hard for me to imagine a situation where you do not have the copyright for the thesis.
For visibility, the most important aspect is whether your thesis will be found by search engines. Publishing it on ResearchGate is one way, another is to have a website hosted preferably on a site with an edu extension. Having a web-site with your publications and links is important. A thesis in some cultures and languages (e.g. Germany) is already a publication since it is supposed to be freely accessible, even if this means that one has to go to the university library.
Even if you no longer have the copy-right for your journal articles, there are ways to advertise their existence. For example, you can publish the abstracts or your resumen of the article on your website. Getting people to read your papers is as important as writing it in the first place, so you need to make them easy to find and read, within the confines of your agreements with the publisher.

Thanks for your advice. In my dissertation, it says Copyright @ "My Name." But my university just made our dissertation avaiable to university comminity,

A dissertation is not really a private document and the university should be able to distribute it to the university community or at least your department. Even if you have the copyright, you gave the university permission to circulate it because you submitted it as your thesis. You have asserted the copyright with your statement, but this does not quite say that you have it. It would be rare if the university asserted the copyright itself. There might be other right holders, e.g. if there were non-disclosure agreements or if the thesis contains work that is going to be used for a patent.

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What should you do if suspect your grant submission was plagiarized by a reviewer?
I submitted a grant a few years back to a major UK research council. It was rejected at the time. Since then I was funded to do some/ part  of the work has been funded by another council and I'm thinking about going back to initial council with a new larger grant - hopefully improved with data.
I've have just found a funded grant on that councils page - starting some 3 years after my submission. There is an uncanny overlap with my original grant. It's not copied verbatim but some of the lay summary is uncannily similar. Is it worth me enquiring to the council who reviewed my original grant? Would they care or so anything about it. Would it be detrimental to my career to enquire? I'm a middle career academic

Your senior colleagues might have some good insights!

I wonder what the outcome was. Do you have any idea what happened?

You should seriously discuss with someone at your university the possibility of contacting the original funding agency.  Explain carefully the situation to see if this person can confirm that something is indeed strange.  It could be a coincidence so another point of view is essential before you go any further.
The funding agency will know who the referees were and if this uncannily similar grant could have come from someone involved with the original refereeing.  Even if you get personally nothing out of it, the grant agency might want to know how such a similar proposal was submitted.
If you decide to go that way, you should not make accusations but merely point that you stumbled upon this project and noticed the significant similarities with your old application.  Let the funding people do their work if they think something’s amiss.


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Prospective math PHD student currently majoring in CS
I'm a computer science major at a prestigious university. I've consistently achieved top grades in all my courses and have developed a strong interest in mathematics. I've completed a year-long sequence in both real analysis and algebra, along with several graduate-level courses in Algebraic Geometry. Additionally, I'm actively involved in working with mathematics professors, focusing on formalizing topics in algebraic geometry and topology using Lean.
Given my background, I'm curious whether my limited coursework in mathematics might affect my chances of gaining admission to a high-quality math program with funding opportunities. If not, what would be the recommended path to success? I am graduating next year and I am wondering if I should extend my stay at my college to switch majors.
P.S. My passion for mathematics has been a consistent part of my academic journey. Prior to my focus on pure mathematics, I studied applied mathematics, which included graduate-level courses in applied statistics and probability.

What country do you want to study in?

I was in a related position when I was finishing undergrad. I was interested in both math and CS, ended up with graduate degrees in both (one math, one CS), and became a professor of both.
One thing you should know is that there are plenty of professors of computer science whose research is basically math. This includes some graph theorists, probabilists, data scientists, topological data analysis experts, category theorists, and logicians. Some computer scientists also work on proof verification and formalization of math.
You could go to a CS graduate program, learn lots of math, research something you're passionate about in the intersection of math and CS, and finish with a degree in CS. Currently, it's much easier to secure a tenure track job in computer science than in math, because every year more and more students want to study computer science, but people with CS degrees are getting poached into industry (meaning, fewer grad students, fewer PhDs, fewer professors). Since you already have top grades at a prestigious university, this would be my suggestion. In grad school you can take more math courses if you want, while working on your CS PhD (I did the opposite, getting a math PhD but continuing to take CS courses).
Of course, it's also possible to go to math grad school and do pure math research, but I do think careerwise you'd be wise to not give up CS entirely. It's also possible to get a math PhD and do research in the intesection between math and CS but the CS PhD would be more valuable from the point of view of getting a job. Also, CS professors tend to get paid more than math professors, and often have a lower teaching load. At the end of the day you should do what you're passionate about, but maybe look into CS professors who have done work related to formalization of math, like Jim Lipton at Wesleyan University (I took many courses from him).

Spot on advice, particularly regarding the market fundamentals. I think you can pull off an approach from a math department that CS depts may accept, but you have to follow the many-lower-quality publishing route.


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Is it okay to explore other grad school options while deferring admission for other reasons?
So the school that I got into for m PhD program offers a simple admission deferral process that I'd like to apply for, for personal reasons (I don't want to use this post to discuss whether or not I should defer; assume that the personal reasons are serious enough, because they are). This could defer my admission one year, to fall 2019.
My question is, would it be very unprofessional/unethical to also apply to other schools during my deferral period? It seems silly to throw away my offer, since I would like to take it, but I would also like to see where else I may be able to get in. Would it be better to simply rescind my acceptance, rather than having the department believe that I am certain on my intentions to enroll in a year?
Edit to clarify: The decision to defer is due to the personal reasons that I mentioned above, and not because I take issue with the program to which I've been admitted. If not for the personal reasons, I would go to school now. But, if I'm going to be deferring at all anyway, it would seem imprudent to not at least try my hand and open up the future by applying elsewhere. Telling the department about the personal issues and leaving out the previous sentence, though, does seem wrong.

I would suspect that departments have an estimated probability of deferred students not ultimately enrolling. There could be many reasons why. But, if you are happy with this school, what do you think is a good reason to go somewhere else instead? And is that reason real or imagined?

@JonCuster It's just that my GRE score is the only thing that held me back from getting into a bunch of other schools as well as this one. So, if I'm deferring for a year, I feel that I may as well take it again and see what happens. I'd be interested in being able to have more living situations as options for the next 5 years, as would my partner. The city that I did get into is nice, but we probably wouldn't live there otherwise.

While it is possible that a GRE score was the sole reason, that is not guaranteed by any means. Living options (and work options) for partners is a good reason, at least to me. But, just trying to get into a ‘better’ school, where ‘better’ is not well defined, isn’t.

It does seem unethical to tell a school you're deferring for very important personal reasons (I believe you), but to use their generosity - they don't like having one fewer student now and one extra next year - to boost your GRE score and go somewhere else. Would you really feel comfortable messaging the graduate student advisor and telling them exactly this?

@JonCuster Well if you're talking about my reasons for wanting to defer in the first place, that is a different story, which is very long and involves drama and sadness and hospitals... So that is beside the point. I'm not deferring in order to apply to better programs, I think I might defer regardless for personal reasons, and figured that if I am doing that then I may as well try my hand elsewhere and open up the future a bit.

@AzorAhai I'm not sure. The personal reasons are truly the reason for the deferral, so I should tell them that. At the same time, yes it does seem to be taking advantage of their generosity to then fill out more applications. But, seeing as I would like to defer, it seems foolish not to at least try to see what other opportunities I may have. I would be nervous of trying to explain that to the department, though.

@Anonymous Personally, I would not do this (and I have considered that I may defer next year, check my Q history), it strikes me as rude and very uncool, but I'll let a person on the other side of admission answer.

@AzorAhai So what are you saying you would do, just not apply elsewhere and take the admission next year? It may be worth mentioning that I've also read through this thread which seems to be a little more forgiving than you, though my situation is a bit different.

Well, it would depend on how happy I was with the school. Declining and reapplying is fine IMO.

But considering you are having some sort of personal issue - you may not be able to improve your situation that much next cycle

Fear not, I’m not addressing your reasons to defer in the first place - those are yours alone, and different people will have different reasons. But, I see too many questions here about changing to get into a ‘better’ school, with little thought given to what makes it ‘better’ - some random ranking does not make it better. You appear to have thought through it a bit more, so keep thinking!

I think the question is really when do you become committed to a graduate school. Once you understand that, then you can understand how a deferral fits into that picture. Given you mentioned GREs, I am going to assume US based graduate schools.
Generally, no one considers a student as being committed to a graduate school at the time of application. We expect students to apply to lots of schools and compare offers and choose whatever is best for them (including possibly not going to graduate school). This is the driving force behind wait lists.
Once you accept an offer people generally think of you as being committed. That said, some students accept an offer and do not remove themselves from all wait lists and if they get a better offer, break the commitment to the first school. Faculty do not like this, but we tend to have short memories and are fairly forgiving of minor slights.
Once you start attending graduate school you are committed. Transfers once you are a student are rare and tend to piss faculty off unless there is a good reason for it (e.g., your advisor moved, they canceled your specialization, you are being harassed by a faculty member or student, someone dies). While we are forgetful and forgiving, we can also be vengeful.
As a deferred student, you are somewhere between having accepted the offer and having started school. No one has invested time in you, so it is not a huge deal if you back out. That said, the earlier you back out the better. I would no try to break the offer after next years decision deadline. In other words, if you don't get accepted someplace right off the bat, you cannot count on the wait list.
In my opinion, breaking the commitment prior to admissions decisions being sent out is not a huge deal. Breaking the commitment after admissions decisions are sent out, but before wait lists are being used is pushing the envelop of what I think is acceptable. Breaking the commitment after the decision deadline is too late.

Your last sentence doesn't make much sense to me-- the deferral  option is specifically offered in the case that unforseen circumstances affect a students ability to enroll. So, what do you mean in saying that this unforseen circumstance came "too late"? Are you saying that, since the decision deadline has passed, that it is unreasonable for me to consider deferment, which is specifically offered for situations like mine? I haven't enrolled yet, and that should be enough.

I do understand, however, if you wouldn't see me as breaking any commitments if I did defer, but also didn't apply anywhere else, giving the school my promise to attend next year. But, what if I do defer and apply elsewhere, don't get it, and still end up going to this school after the deferment period? Have I still betrayed the school in principle, in your eyes? It doesn't make sense to me to throw away the offer, and it also doesn't make sense to lock myself into it if I have an extra year to live life. Would you think it better to rescind altogether and reapply?

@Anonymous StrongBad is talking about the time at which you would eventually revoke admission and saying that to do so immediately in the spring you apply is least intrusive, to do so after actually starting work at the school is the most intrusive, and to do so while deferring admission is somewhere in between. SB is saying if you do apply to another school, the latest you should accept that offer is before the 2019 acceptance deadline (i.e. April in the US), to give the school you deferred time to offer to someone else.

Also, this answer seems much more reasonable to me than your position. Do you have thoughts on what is said there?

I think it is at minimum rude, and probably unethical.
In deferring, you have still accepted a position. If you use the remaining time to do things other than what you said you were going to do, you are taking advantage of the generosity of the offered deferral (which, I would add, is not a guarantee everywhere - they are generous to offer it).
I can see a couple possible exceptions:

If the reason for applying to another school is also related to a serious personal issue (for example: to be near an ill family member, to be near an institution responsible for your own care, because a certain climate is important to your health, for immigration/travel reasons).
If there is no offer of funding/support from the school, then in my opinion you are less beholden to them, and they are less impacted by if you are to later withdraw your acceptance. In this case you should almost certainly pursue other offers.
If the deferral process really is that simple, where the reason you give doesn't really matter: they are just allowing you to take a year for any reason. I think this sort of thing is more common in undergraduate rather than graduate admissions (especially for a PhD), though I don't have enough personal experience to say. I would still suggest talking to someone at the school before deciding this is the case.

I would also add that I think you could be vastly overestimating the importance of attending a particular school and paying far too much attention to ranking. While I was writing this answer, @JonCuster posted what I think is a very important comment to consider, coming from the perspective of someone who has spent a lot of time here at Academia.SE:

..."I see too many questions here about changing to get into a ‘better’ school, with little thought given to what makes it ‘better’ - some random ranking does not make it better. You appear to have thought through it a bit more, so keep thinking!"

If you do want to look at other options because you aren't certain about attending this school, I would suggest discussing this with them rather than rescinding your acceptance outright. If I were them, however, I would have much preferred to admit a student this year that actually wants to go to this school rather than waiting a year to take someone who doesn't.

I think it is mostly your exception #1 that applies to me. Like I said, if it wasn't for my personal reasons, I would go happily to the university which admitted me. And I never said anything about the schools ranking or status, I never even expressed desire to find a "better" school, so I dunno why there is emphasis being put on that. The school which admitted me is actually rather prestigious and well known in my field. Continued...

So I'm not just making a foolish decision; I have many reasons, some of which I describe here, and I do have a good idea of what my academics would be like at this department, rather than just thinking about the school's status. I have already been speaking to a potential advisor about research projects, and understand how the group there fits into (and doesn't fit into) my ambitions. In regards to your other two exceptions: yes, I do have funding from the school, though that is standard in my field, and yes the deferral process seems fairly straightforward.

@Anonymous Your statement "I would also like to see where else I may be able to get in" is a cue that you are looking for better options, as well as your comment about "It's just that my GRE score is the only thing that held me back from getting into a bunch of other schools as well as this one." I included those exceptions because in the comments you did talk about other living circumstances as a motivation. Hope my answer was helpful, and I think StrongBad's answer is also excellent (and upvoted by me), especially in terms of how commitment increases throughout the process.

The main reason why people say exploring other options is rude or unethical is that you are wasting a precious spot that could have been offered to someone else. However, this assumption is quite questionable for a few reasons:

If this assumption alone makes such exploration unethical, then transferring to a more suitable program or dropping out to explore other career options should be considered unethical as well (but they are not). In fact, these are probably more "unethical" in the sense that you have already taken up resources from the school / program. The dropout rate is >=20% even for top programs (statistic taken from a top 10 CS PhD program).

As StrongBad pointed out, breaking the offer before next year's decision deadline would open up the spot for someone else - this is the entire point of the waitlist. Or, who knows, maybe the program have already accepted someone else this year, after knowing your decision to defer.

The Council of Graduate Schools April 15 agreement clearly states that "Starting in Fall 2020, applicants are no longer required to obtain a formal release from the program whose offer they accepted, either before or after the April 15 deadline." If the school you are deferring is a member institution, then they would abide by this, since deferral is a form of acceptance.

Of course, it is definitely much easier for the school / program if all deferees actually attend. However, I wonder whether such administrative convenience is all we should take into account, especially when school choice has a much bigger impact on the student compared to the program itself.
Also, from a practical stand point, schools don't systematically share information on applicants (it's a privacy thing!), so such exploration should be fine, given that you are considerate enough to actually break the old offer before next years decision deadline.
Finally, a student is allowed to drop out any time from their PhD program, including during the deferral period, for any reason. Of course, the student should be considerate with his/her actions, but most issues have nothing to do with ethics.


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I have no academic affiliation and wrote a research paper in math - how do I publish it and get paid for the work I did?
I am an independent researcher (no academic affiliation).
If I submit a mathematical research paper to a journal or conference, how do I get any subsidies, grants, or funds for this work? Are you supposed to write a grant proposal?
What exactly would be the best course of action for an independent researcher to take if they would like to publish their paper and get paid a salary?

Does this answer your question? Does one need to be affiliated with a university to publish papers?

Maybe I'm starting to have a guess at where you are coming from, but it's still extremely unclear. Please describe your actual situation, actual problem, what you expect to happen, etc. Is it that you think academic funding works in these steps: 1) Do research, 2) Submit research, 3) Get paid for the research you did in step 1?

I'm sorry I am a total novice to this whole area. Yes, how do you get paid for the research?

@JohnnyGinger - Mathematicians are not specifically paid for their research.  Many mathematicians do it as part of their job duties in a job that also involves teaching, but they are not specifically paid per paper and rarely have specific publication requirements.  Amateur mathematicians may publish but do not get paid.

@AlexanderWoo -Thanks for your reply. So there are no possible ways for an independent researcher to get funding for their research paper?

@JohnnyGinger: I think you misinterpret how the word "funding" is used in mathematical research. In most cases "funding" means "money in order to pay the salary for a position at some kind of acamedic institution". (But somebody who holds such a position is no longer an independent researcher.) In addition, "funding" often contains money for a number of much cheaper things (especially, a certain amount of travel expenses, and sometimes publication fees in open access journals). There is no "funding for papers" in the sense that one would get paid specifically for writing a paper.

@JochenGlueck Thanks for replying. What exactly then would be the best course of action for an independent researcher to take for publishing their paper and getting paid a salary?

@JohnnyGinger Those are two entirely separate tasks, hence the confusion here and my insistence that you clarify what it is you are asking about (which it seems we eventually got around to). For the first part, I think tschwarz has started you on the right path of things to think about. For the second part, the best course of action for an independent researcher to get a salary would be to get a job with someone who pays a salary and stop being an independent researcher.

Does this answer your question? How can one find journals paying authors or reviewers?

As the answer of tschwarz points out, many reputable publishers will publish your work without cost if you are an independent researcher and don't have funds to cover the normal fees. You don't earn anything from submission to journals or conferences. You aren't "selling" your work. What you "earn" is reputation.
But the question of earning a salary for work in mathematics is quite a different issue.
For that, you probably need to get one or more degrees in mathematics and get hired by a university or a research arm of some major corporation. The most common path is with a PhD and a faculty position. The road is long and arduous. This path is open (but crowded) for both pure and applied math, though probably biased toward pure math. If you don't have any degree yet, the path takes about ten to fifteen years to traverse, but it can be interesting along the way - and sometimes frustrating.
Some people can get by with only a masters or even a bachelors degree if they have skills suitable for some corporation. But those jobs are much fewer. Some pay very well and others not so much. Most corporate research is in product development, not pure research. Applied math is more suited to this.
At the outside, if you have done something that can lead to a patentable idea, it might be possible to form a company on your own to exploit it. Or even sell the patent to an existing company. This is even more rare. Again, applied math might put you on this path.

Publication in many reputable Mathematics journals is free to the author and paid for by subscription. There are now many reputable journals who use an open access model, where the authors pay for publication, but the article is free to readers. There are many more predatory journals out there who  use the open access model, but do not do the traditional jobs of journals (of peer review and good editing). If you are worried about money, do not use the open access model.
If you are submitting to a conference, you promise (by the fact that you are submitting) that you will travel to the conference on your own, pay conference fees, and present your paper. While many attendees will pay for this out of a grant, a large number will still have to pay these costs out of their own pocket, as many departments do not have sufficient "travel" funds. Some conferences have found sponsors that allow them to support attendees, but this is usually limited to students.
In your situation, you need to first select a publication outlet. You can use google scholar to find papers that are similar in topic to yours and see where they are published. You will then follow the normal submission process, which is now usually electronic. You will be asked to specify an affiliation, so you will have to fill in your home address for that. The editor (or probably an assistant to the editor) will take a look at the paper. If your paper is not following the conventions of Mathematics, your paper will receive a "desk reject". Use papers with a similar topic as your style and content guidelines to avoid this. If the editor thinks that your paper MIGHT have substance and be worthy of publications, it will be send to a referee.
Please be aware that mathematicians at good universities and editors receive "crank papers" by usually well-intentioned people that do not understand Mathematics. For instance, there is a rather complicated result (that is nevertheless proven to most undergraduates in Mathematics if they take Algebra) that angle trisection is impossible. This has not prevented many people to think they solved trisection, usually by coming up with a good approximation. However, good approximations are known and are not interesting in the broader context of Mathematics. I am not saying that you are falling into this category, but if I as an editor received a paper authored by someone with no affiliation, I would be suspicious of the paper being a "crank paper". For you, this implies a need to be careful in how you write and state things. Be also aware that Mathematics is cumulative and that many things have been discovered and rediscovered by good mathematicians. If your contribution is good, it might still be well-known, for instance because it is a trivial application of a theorem. Knowing the literature in Mathematics is far from easy.
It is also a good idea to find someone with a Mathematics education to read through your paper first. Finding a Mathematics professor to take on this task will be very difficult because this is hard work without reward for them.
However, funds are hard to come by and even more for someone without affiliation. Agencies like the NFS in the US would have a hard time to give money to a private person as would the private person complying with the grant conditions. In Europe, grant administration tends to be even more complicated. Without a published record, it is not worth while asking for money. But these grant would be to support future work, not publication of already obtained funds.
TLTR: Submit to a decent journal in Mathematics carefully selected. This will not cost you money. Save time and effort by getting feed-back on your manuscript first.


text:
Do national labs in the US accept international post docs who come with funding from their own government?
I am from Finland, which provides funding for postdoc research abroad.
I want to use that funding to do postdoc research in a national lab in the US.
Will national laboratories in the US accept post docs who come with their own funding from the country they are from?

surely you are in a better position to answer than anyone else...

Do you or your PhD advisor have any connections to appropriate US national labs? Do you have any idea which lab(s) would be suitable? Does the funding source have any good connections, including previous personnel who have successfully taken advantage of their funding?

My Ph.D. supervisor doesn’t have any connections from USA national labs. The funding agency does only need an invitation letter from the host.

I don't understand from this post what the issue is and what you know and do not know. What is the step you need help with?

I suggest first trying to find scientists you're interested in working with, and then finding out what could be done. At least DOE labs may have concerns about such foreign funding, but there is sometimes more flexibility if you're officially associated with a local university despite in practice working at the lab.

@Anyon - Office of Science labs should not have issues with an externally-paid visitor. NNSA labs are a different question.

Your question remains unclear. "I have funding from my home country to do postdoc research in USA National Labs" - okay, great, you have funding for a post doc at a US national lab. "any suggestions on how it will work?" - What do you mean, "how it will work"? *"I am trying to find someone who works in USA national labs as my supervisor." * - Sounds like a good plan.

"I want to know does it really works for one who has a home country-sponsored researcher who wants to work in USA National Laboratories as a post-doc??" Do you mean to ask whether it's possible for someone with foreign funding to work at a US national lab? This seems in conflict with your first sentence. Do you mean you're not sure how to find a supervisor? Do you mean you're not sure if your post doc funding can be used at a national lab in the US vs. at a university? Are you wondering about restrictions by the Finland government or the US government?

I mean Finland provides funding for postdoc research abroad. I want to use that funding to do postdoc research in USA national labs. My question is whether USA national labs will accept me or not to do a postdoc???

What is the area of research? Some US National Labs are heavily involved in research for the US Department of Defense (DoD) and might not be able to accommodate a non-citizen postdoc at all.  Others have areas devoted to DoD work and other areas to nonDoD work and it might be possible to find a place there.

Its chemical engineering related to bioaviation fuel and catalysis. I am looking to find someone at PNNL. my area of interest is open for all as per my understanding from there website

@DilipSarwate - both Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore have non-US-citizen postdocs and staff. Hard to come up with labs with more sensitive DOE (note, not DOD) work. But they are big and do work in many different areas, some open, some not so open.

That depends strongly on the field. In nuclear anything, no it is incredibly unlikely to happen. In most biology fields, it is quite likely to happen as you already have funding and are merely looking for lab space (presumably). In Chemistry, it again depends on the area of study. This is a very vague and encompassing answer because there is little detail (understandably) in your question, so do not take it to heart and certainly try even if it is in nuclear research.
Assuming you have already gotten the funding opportunity from Finland, the area of research is nailed down. And likely the specific question is already waiting for lab space (or equivalent) to be answered using the Finland funds. If this is the case, you also likely have an idea about which national lab would be best equipped to help you with this hypothesis.
Assuming all of these things are true, check the websites of the top 5 most likely labs to host you. Somewhere on there will be contact information for whom to contact/ask that will be better equipped to answer your exact situation.


text:
Is it possible to publish an idea in a paper without a proof of concept?
I am currently a programmer and an engineering student in France, and I have a research idea which I would like to formally share with the scientific community.
The problem is that this idea is not a purely theoretical one, but one with practical implications. The idea itself is not extremely complex and its detailed explanation is not very long, but even a minimal implementation would take too long (I currently have to work and study at the same time) and would require hardware that I do not possess. Also, such a basic implementation would not be very useful, and would not prove the scalability.
I want to share my idea, so that perhaps someone somewhere can implement it and use it. In short, I'd like to contribute to the scientific community. Is it possible to formally publish a theoretical model of my idea along with a detailed explanation of its use-cases, advantages and limitations as a scientific article (like in arXiv, perhaps through my university) ?

Seek advice from a professional in the field. Whether what you have is publishable or not is something that is best determine by an expert; ask a professor in your school about it.

What you can publish depends on the rules and judgement of the publisher. You can self-publish anything you like, using your own rules.
For arXiv there are a few additional rules. If you have the rights to register with them, normally granted to academics or those who are "endorsed" by an academic, then you need to pass their moderation process, which is weaker than a true review, intended to weed out cruft and crank posts. But arXiv is intended for preprints of things that will, at some point, see more formal publication. Moderation looks for things that would be reasonable to go through a formal review process, but doesn't actually provide it. No one attests to the actual validity of the ideas in a submission.
For established (reputable) publishers such as those of commercial enterprises and scientific/academic societies, a paper is evaluated by reviewers and accepted or not by one or more editors. But the standards for this are probably higher, in most cases, than for a speculative idea paper with little or no evidence.
It seems likely that you can publish at arXiv, but much less likely that a formal publisher would accept the paper. It isn't impossible, but the standards for novelty and significance are normally quite high. A professor at your institute can probably provide the required arXiv endorsement, if they are willing.
If you want more formal publication, then you have to satisfy the reviewers. I suspect that you need to do more to get to that point. But, an arXiv paper might "set a marker" for the future development of the ideas.


text:
What does B?+ mean as a grade?
I have been wanting to know the answer to this for a very long time but have come up against none. Looking at my undergrad results from a few years ago, one of the assignment marks is down as B?+. What exactly does this mean? Is it somewhere between a B and a B+? I remember hearing it pronounced as "query plus".

What country did you do your undergrad?

This was in the UK.

Probably a typo?

Have you asked your instructor or undergraduate office?

Not a typo, it's on the official transcript and as I say, I've heard it mentioned before. I could ask the office, indeed. It's certainly unusual.

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because we can't answer this question, but your school can.

I'm surprised, I would have thought it was a little more common. Maybe not. If no-one knows I'll contact them at some point soon.

At my university and department, the required grade for completing preliminary courses is B- . As giving lower than a B- can severely impact someones funding (and plans for graduation), some professors have resorted to giving B-* to poorly performing students in order to not ruin their academic careers. I wonder if your B?+ arose out of a similar system.

As far as I can tell, this is an Oxford (or maybe Oxbridge) thing.
From Too Many Words – A Life in the Law 8:

The Oxford system in 1962 marked scripts by classifying students into alpha, beta, gamma, and then, within each class, adding plus or minus, or double plus or minus, or triple plus or minus, and in between using query to further distinguish. So the available range of marks ran downwards – alpha triple plus, alpha double plus query plus, alpha double plus, alpha plus query plus, alpha plus, alpha query plus, alpha, alpha query minus, alpha minus, alpha minus query minus, alpha double minus, alpha double minus query minus, alpha triple minus, alpha beta, beta alpha, beta triple plus etc.

So B?+ is between B+ (which is higher than B?+) and B (lower than B?+).
Other references: Oxbridge: beta-minus-minus

There comes a point when just giving a numeric score seems justified...

Yes, this seems to be the most logical answer. I would have thought that B+ and B were enough, but the academic obsession with incremental accuracy apparently extends to grades too [at times]. Thank you for that.

Anyone else reminded of George Orwell's 1984 and "doubleplusungood" by that grading scheme?


text:
Meta-analysis of previous published dataset - who to include as coauthor?
I recently published a paper, which includes a link to a data repository in which that data is available. Now, with other researchers, we are combining our datasets in a meta-analysis.
I was wondering what the etiquette was regarding inclusion of the co-authors of the first paper (who are not involved in the meta-analysis, but were integral to collecting my initial dataset).
I think I should send them a courtesy email saying "I'm doing meta-analysis with these other people using our dataset that can be downloaded by anyone".
Should I do more (beyond this, and an acknowledgement in the paper)?

Please clarify your specific problem or provide additional details to highlight exactly what you need. As it's currently written, it's hard to tell exactly what you're asking.

I edited to add some paragraph blocks which maybe will make the question easier to read, but I don't know what made someone choose the "please clarify your specific problem" in review; the problem asked about seems quite obvious and clear to me.

I think the applicable principle is that authorship isn't transitive. If someone doesn't contribute directly to a paper they aren't an author, but may need acknowledgement as you suggest.
But it is a good idea, as you also may be suggesting, that you offer those others the opportunity to participate and thus become authors. I realize that might not be your actual intention, but suggest you stay open to offers.


text:
How to deal with two bosses in academia?
I got a new position recently as a deputy lead of a research group (this position is at a level comparable to assistant/associate professor in my country) at a famous institute. This means that the lead gives me tasks and I regularly report to him. In addition, the head of the department (to which my group belongs) is also giving me tasks, as I have been hired to help them both. However, this makes me overloaded and it is almost impossible to complete all the tasks assigned to me.
In addition to all this, I have to manage and work on 4+ projects (which are in their mid-lifetime) and write grant proposals, but so far there is no one in the group I am leading to help with this work.
I feel it is beyond my capability to manage all these things alone. Any advice?

Have you talked to either of your bosses about this? Is there a financial split to your position (i.e., X% of your time is paid for by one, Y% is paid for by the other)?

I mentioned that I need time to grasp everything because it is simply too much.
The head of the department is the boss of the leader (who works in our institute as a part-time leader). They initiated this position so that this deputy lead can co-lead the group and partially help the head of the department. This means that the money comes from a single source and cannot be split because it is one department.

"I mentioned that I need time to grasp everything because it is simply too much" - this does not seem the same as saying to them explicitly "I am getting tasks from both my direct supervisor and my supervisor's boss, and I cannot accomplish all of them. What should I do?"

@BryanKrause Well because I knew this but did not expect it to be like this.

@Samy Now you know, so why not discuss it directly with them?

Isn't "at a level comparable to assistant/associate professor" somewhat at odds with "the lead gives me tasks and I regularly report to him"? (Not a snark, just curiosity.)

@JochenGlueck you are right and that was edited by someone else. In my comment, I said, "Research Group Lead" is comparable to an assistant/associate professor. That's why it is better to suggest an edit to the OP and not to edit it directly. The comments are also deleted :(

This isn't a specific-to-academia question so you may want to search through [workplace.se] for similar questions. If I remember correctly, beyond having one boss declared the main one, getting them to be very explicit about deadlines will help.--and pushing back. "If this is due by Friday, what about project Y which is also due Friday?"

Schedule a meeting with the three of you together, preferably face to face. Express your concerns and work out a solution. If each thinks they are your primary supervisor this situation is bound to happen.
But, you can't try to play them off against one another. You need to find a mutually (all three) suitable solution.
One thing that may help (or not) is to try to get everyone to copy everyone on tasks and such, perhaps through communication through a mailing list or similar.
An even better solution, if you can arrange it, is to have one of the "bosses" filter requests through the other one. That can prevent the situation in which every request you get is "highest priority - due ASAP". But this isn't the easiest thing to arrange.


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Writing ads to attract female PhD candidates
As a researcher in computing science in Western Europe, I get depressed seeing the number of female students in our department. (Hint: near-zero.)
I recently heard that certain words in a PhD candidate ad seem to "scare" female applicants off, for example, "excellent", "commitment", etc. (I got my information from our anti-discrimination representative and a female researcher. I did not check the information myself. The latter claims having spoken to students herself. I agree that the ad is not the only problem with skewed gender distribution, but if this contributes to the problem then I definitely want to eliminate it.)
Is there a list of DOs and DONTs when writing ads to ensure that female students are encouraged to apply?

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

It is believed that the use of "gendered" language in job ads can make ads appeal more to men or women [1]. See no reason that this should not also apply to ads for PhD students.
There are several websites that claim to test your job Ads for gender bias based on the word lists in [1].
E.g.
http://gender-decoder.katmatfield.com/
or
https://www.totaljobs.com/insidejob/gender-bias-decoder/
The other common advice is to avoid specifying requirements that are not really requirements, but actually nice-to-haves. Widely cited research [2] suggests that men are far more likely than women to apply for a job even if they don't meet all of the requirements. So for example, if you say that you require students to have taken a class in X, but when it actually comes to it you get no good applicants that have, but decide to take a student who is really good in all other ways, but does not have class X, then class X shouldn't be specified as a requirement, but a nice-to-have. Saying in your ad that applicants must have X is then biasing against women.
Mind you, I always follow all this advice (the gender checkers even rate my ads as slightly feminine bias), but I still get next to no female applicants.
[1] Gaucher, Friesen, and Kay, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, July 2011, Vol 101(1)
[2] https://hbr.org/2014/08/why-women-dont-apply-for-jobs-unless-theyre-100-qualified

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

This is an indirect answer from my experience hiring software developers.
TL;DR
Stop focusing on the ad itself and instead focus on where people see the ad, in particular get small groups of people to learn about the opportunity in an intimate setting.
As opposed to focussing on the language of the ad, I find it's more effective to focus on where the ad gets placed.
For example, I have posted several jobs on LinkedIn using their "easy apply" feature. Sure, it's easy to apply but applicants also generally have a picture and some personal information on their profile which can create a stigma for potential minority applicants owing to the bias of recruiters, which is unfortunately very real. The net result is that you get fewer quality minority applicants.
You may not be searching for applicants on LinkedIn but I suspect that you are in a male dominated field (like software) which itself can create the same stigma.
My suggestion is to change your recruiting tactics. During my last search for a developer I posted the ad on LinkedIn but I also reached out to local developer meet-ups and asked for referrals from current employees. The more informal and more personal recruiting effort resulted in qualified women applying to job at a rate of 2:1 compared to men despite no substantial change in the local candidate pool.
Did recruiting in this manner take more effort? Yes. Was it worth it to create a great, well balanced team? Definitely.

European academic recruitment happens in the weirdest of places, but thankfully at least currently, LinkedIn is not one of them.

It may seem against some ideologies out there, but as a husband, a father, and a colleague of numerous women in academia I can approximately tell you what women considering career in academia want to see in your ad.
How family friendly is your work environment? Any benefits for parents? Not just women, their husbands too. Vacations, breaks, holidays? Available housing close to campus? Hospitals / kindergartens / schools nearby? Public commute options? Low stress, friendly work environment? Stability of employment?
If you want a more accurate opinion, ask some women what they want from an academic institution to consider a career there.
Then write your ad describing what your institution has to offer women. Specific, succinct, and solid offers. No 'maybe', 'if then maybe', etc.
Then you will attract top talent. Sure, many under-qualified will apply, but you can reject them based on their CV and pick the best.
Don't present requirements as 'requirements'. The people you really want will have requirements for you. Instead, ask applicants to please include in their resume 1), 2), 3), etc. without using the word 'requirement'.
One thing that won't work for sure is making a flashy ad like for selling a vacuum cleaner. With career decision of such critical importance, there is no chance fooling anyone into it. Especially smart, young women. Age 24-30 is a good time to make a family, give birth to a child, and put a down-payment on a house. And smart women do want it good.
In fact, many people disagree with such a pragmatic view, but I honestly don't understand why. It works. The question is not about letting women to participate or not. I am assuming there are equal rights. The question is about attracting talented women.

How are any of those desires specific to women?

@astronat Time is factor. A man has more risk tolerance because he can make a family after 30 and will not feel at a disadvantage. A woman will. In my experience, there are very very few women who put career above family. In fact, it is a theoretical few I read about and saw in movies. I am yet to meet one in person.

@ArthurTarasov I've met several women who put career first. Especially at the Phd application level, it doesn't play a role for many, yet, in practical terms. Still, statistically - from a personal experience pool - you are right that these are things that are more likely be of interest to woman because, a) there is a higher percentage of single female parents (who have full/main custody) and b) apparently more of them think about these things before actually getting a child. Once a man is a father, I think this also applies equally to them as to mothers.

That aside, I find it's an aspect that gender-independent doesn't hurt, and may have a slight effect on attracting women. Many companies do include references to flexible working times, i.e. what are the core times and whether there is an option to work part-time.

@astronat: They're not, but in our society, it is less likely for women to ignore them, and in couples (which either have or are likely to have children), more likely for women to need them or expect to need them.

You are talking about stability of employment and low-stress work environment when the ad is for a PhD position ... ?

@Szabolcs there is a difference between guaranteed employment for four years and "we'll decide if we keep hiring you every year", for instance.

This. Exactly this. But clearly pointing out that the one that would like to have "paid breastfeeding time" included in her phd contract, as is in most companies around here, is my wife and not me would make me look a sexissssst piggy to some...

This answer almost had me, somewhere until the last paragraph. As an (apparently) theoretical woman, I can appreciate that an academic environment supportive of family life is very likely a great place to work, regardless of whether I have a child/family. But the end of your answer seems to be implying that unless I want to "make a family, give birth to a child, and put a downpayment on a house" at the age of 24-30, i.e. the goals you find "good", I am not a "smart woman". And here I naively thought that my smarts would be judged by my publication output, not child output, at least in academia

tl;dr-  Apparently Carnegie Mellon University recently got an incoming first-year undergraduate class that was 48% female for Computer Science.  They seem light on the details, but their press release stressed a focus on social activities in the curriculum.
Maybe try whatever Carnegie Mellon did: increased social focus?
In this question's chatroom, @ElizabethHenning had pointed out that Carnegie Mellon University has recently reported near-gender-parity in an incoming class of first-year undergraduate Computer Science majors:

Women make up more than 48 percent of incoming first-year undergraduates this fall in Carnegie Mellon University's top-ranked School of Computer Science (SCS), setting a new school benchmark for diversity.
[...]
Women and men are judged by the same standards for admission, and retention rates historically have been the same for both, he noted.
-"Women Are Almost Half of Carnegie Mellon's Incoming Computer Science Undergraduates" (2016-09-11)

This was a goal that they'd sought for a few decades now.  How'd they do it?

Blum was instrumental in establishing Women @ SCS, a faculty/student organization that helps women make connections across the school, and in recognizing that it's the computer science culture — not the curriculum — that needs to change to accommodate women.
[...]
"Computer science at Carnegie Mellon has a very social atmosphere," Blelloch said. "Most of the classes encourage students to work in groups, developing skills they will need to function in teams in the workplace. It's one of the reasons employers like our graduates so much."
-"Women Are Almost Half of Carnegie Mellon's Incoming Computer Science Undergraduates" (2016-09-11)

Still, if Carnegie Mellon only provided a more social environment, that'd seem to help explain higher retention rates, but not higher enrollment.  So, presumably they somehow advertised this more-social-culture.  I'm not immediately seeing the details about how they accomplished that.
There're other issues that aren't so obvious.  For example, apparently the same people claiming credit for this have been trying to increase female enrollment for decades now.  So, why success only recently?  Did they finally figure out some secret or fine-tune their process?  Did their strategy take time to start working?  Was this a fluke?
Whatever the case, a lot of the information and claims on this topic seem like bunk.  And since Carnegie Mellon appears to have empirically demonstrated a method, it seems like they'd be a potentially interesting case study.
For further reading, Carnegie Mellon has a women's group called women@scs.
Their page includes papers and a FAQ.

This is exactly the point: "it's the computer science culture — not the curriculum — that needs to change to accommodate women." And you have to communicate your culture. My university has a computer science program for women that advertises the group work, the collaboration, the insight into real business cases. Ther is no sudden magic words you can put into an ad to attract a diverse population, it has to be a culture change over time that gets communicated. It takes a lot of work.

Something else they did was to stop making previous programming experience a requirement for entering the major, because it was found that this screening requirement had no effect on the outcome of the quality of the graduate. But it had a very strong effect on the number of women who were qualified to be admitted to the major.

On enrollment vs retention: note that potential applicants to top-tier universities generally do a pretty large amount of research, and will discover information that's out there even if it's not literally an ad, whether it's through current/former students or official literature about the program. On the latter, if you look at the department's "Mission & History" page, one of the top-level values is "A supportive culture that brings out the best in people." So maybe official department information is a place for the OP to look too.

@Jefromi "Supportive environment" might sound like HR-BS, but it's actually very important. (Of course, it's even more important to have clear ideas about how to make the environment supportive and actually deliver on them.) People from non-underrepresented groups often don't understand how much effort URGs routinely expend while trying to either fit in or educate the people around them. This is extra friction which wastes energy that could be put into actual work. It's up to the program to step up and minimize this friction so that URGs have a more equal chance to succeed.

@ElizabethHenning I'm sorry if something in my comment made me sound dismissive - I was trying to say that the quoted sentence was a good indicator about the school, that would make it more appealing to underrepresented groups, and the kind of thing that encourages enrollment, not just retention. (And more generally, that the "advertising" that this answer mentions is all over the place, not just ads.)

@Jefromi I didn't think that. I thought you raised a very good point.

Carnegie Mellon simply employed technically good women in CS throughout the ranking. Senior women started attracting other women - that's how it worked for a few I knew.

Most of the job ads I see suffer from different, more important problems:

The ad doesn't clearly say who is expected (say, "researchers from all areas can apply"), but private talks point out that some areas are already full.
There is a mismatch between the required documents according to the job and the documents that the web form requires.
The job ad in your country's main language and the job ad in English don't match: they are not a translation of each other.
It is unclear to whom the application has to be addressed.
Precious space is spent on advertising the environment (city, university, "vibrant community", "major impact", public transportation, and the like). If the applicant is going to do the research job properly, she/he won't see the environment too much anyway, and they know that.  They either know the surroundings (and are aware of the "major impact") or don't care. Usually, such a para smells fishy. E.g., Saarland is often claimed to be in the middle of Western Europe; this can be made true in some sense but doesn't help them in any sense...

First, make sure that your job ad has no issues in the above sense. Only then tackle the gender issues.
An overwhelming majority of the job ads I've seen so far have a para about welcoming female applicants; the strength of encouragement varies. However, this para drowns in other boilerplate-language paragraphs. Therefore:

Add a para about family/kids friendliness. After all, it's mostly women who give birth to kids and raise them up, and it's unlikely to change. You will get more women who are already pregnant or thinking about getting pregnant soon. It is a matter of discussion whether you really want it.
Mark your paragraph about prioritising applications from women bold and increase the font size! HTML allows you to do that!
If allowed by the legislation, don't use "they", don't use "the applicant", don't use "he/she", use "she/he" or "she", adding a disclaimer that men are also meant.

"If the applicant is going to do the research job properly, she/he won't see the environment too much anyway, and they know that"
I completely disagree with that. Doing your job properly doesnt mean not having time to go to a city for a drink or sightseeing. Being located in a nice place is always a nice bonus.

Expecting your new applicant to spend all their waking life on your job is EXACTLY how you keep women away.

@Empischon The competition is huge, and you might simply not surive it if you go for a drink and do sightseeing too often. And if you don't do it often, you care less about how many possibilities for a drink or for sightseeing you have.

@CCTO That's EXACTLY what you have to tell to the person asking the question. Then he/she will have to take a decision about what is more important: progress in job or hiring women. This is exaggerated, of course: I knew women who were obsessed with their work, too.

@LeonMeier Giving up to this US-borne paranoia is one of the huge factors destroying scientific community and I, for one, refuse to hop on this band-wagon. No great discovery, not even a relatively-important discovery was made by pulling 14h/day 7days/week insanity.

@Empischon NOBODY FORCES YOU to hop of this band-wagon. Proceed your usual way but don't tell others how to proceed.

@LeonMeier "The competition is huge, and you might simply not surive it if you go for a drink and do sightseeing too often." [citation needed]

@JiK You have to believe me on that: it my area, it is hundreds of good cadidates with supportive supervisors per position. Source: private communication.

Problem is that grad students are treated like warm bodies to be drafted rather than early career professionals worthy of recruitment and competition.
In real situations, such as hiring for professors, any desirable attribute in prospective candidates is rewarded with improved offers. So to attract more female PhD candidates your department should identify capable applicants and offer them better stipend offers than they would get elsewhere. Making better worded recruitment materials should at least give you a better pool to recruit from but doesn't fix your stated demographics problem of bringing students in and supporting them through the PhD process.
It should also go without saying that your department should have female representation at every faculty seniority level. However many do not so I will say it. Having some token female assistant professors that you cycle through every 5 years in perpetuity doesn't count.


text:
BME Jobs in Industry: Do you need a PhD or Masters?
As an incoming Senior, I am currently having the debate that many before me have had: Masters, or PhD?
I'm a biomedical engineering student who wants to get an advanced degree to better position myself for high-end R&D and engineering jobs in industry. From what I've gathered, it seems like a Masters can do the trick, though getting a PhD may put me in an even better position. BME seems to be different than other fields when it comes to advanced degrees. It seems to me that the PhD's have more opportunities than Master's upon graduation in the BME field.
So if I ignore all factors, and want to maximize my chances of doing high-end R&D engineering at a good medical imaging company, it seems that PhD is what I should get.
However, here are some considerations that I have.
1) The time and effort required for a PhD is significant. A PhD in BME takes a longer time than average, and is quite difficult. I don't quite enjoy the idea of entering the workforce at the age of 27.
2) However, PhD's are funded fully, so there appears to be no financial burden/debt (apart from the fact that I won't be earning like my Bachelors/Masters counterparts during my PhD years).
3) PhD programs are harder than Masters programs to get in to. I believe I could get into a top tier university for a Masters program, but not a PhD program.
4) Masters requires less time and effort, and seems to get me qualified for more jobs than a bachelor's.
5) A Masters, however, may not qualify me for the high-end R&D that a PhD might.
6) I may be wrong, but funding for Masters programs is limited. I could obtain significant debt.
Number 6 is a big problem for me. Do Masters students incur debt, or do they generally get enough funding to get by? I read in a lot of top universities that no guaranteed funding is available like there is for PhDs, but TA and RA positions may be available. How common is it for Masters students to get such positions?
If Masters students do get funding, then my plan is to enter into a Masters program (hopefully at a top 15 BME program), and apply for jobs at the end of my degree. If I get good opportunities, I'll take them, otherwise, I might apply for a PhD program. (I am worried about one thing; does this extend the amount of time it'll take for me to begin work? Or can I apply the work I've done in my Masters towards my PhD?).
However, if Masters students do not get enough funding, and I could incur debt, my idea was to apply to PhD program and potentially opt out with a Masters if I can get good job opportunities, or if my PhD is too challenging. How frowned upon is doing this (I would imagine that my advisor couldn't be too pleased)?
Any advice would be appreciated! I want to know if my assumptions are reasonable, and if my plans are reasonable as well!


text:
Can I justify paying for an unfunded master's if I'm changing disciplines from undergrad?
I'm in a predicament. I'm about to turn 29. I finished undergrad a few years ago and have been working in what jobs I can since then. I got an undergrad degree in a completely different field than what I hope to eventually get a PhD in: my BA was in English, but I applied for graduate programs in Near Eastern Studies/Civilizations/Archaeology with the ultimate goal of getting a PhD in archaeo/history of art. I was advised against applying directly to a PhD because I don't have a background in archaeo/Near Eastern Studies, which I agree with, even if many PhD programs give you a master's on the way, I still have nothing to prove in the field yet. So I applied for terminal MA programs with the plan of doing a thesis and then applying directly to PhD programs.
Thing is, since I have basically nothing to prove in the field, I actually ended up getting into some really solid terminal MA programs--without funding. I got into Yale's 2-year MA Archaeology program and would get to do a legit thesis and take classes with grad students for about $50k. Obviously I've applied for external funding so still waiting on that. But in my case, does it make sense to pay for a master's given that I have to transition into another discipline?
Thanks!!

Is this for US study? And, who advised you against a direct doctoral application. In the US, I might advise otherwise.

Yes, this is in the US. I even reached out to POIs who told me I'd need more experience through a master's first.

I’m voting to close this question because ... no one but the OP can make this decision. It's a personal trade off between pursing an academic interest versus finding employment.

The general advice is plain and simple.
DO NOT GO TO GRADUATE SCHOOL IN THE HUMANITIES.
The job market is absolutely brutal.  There are several PhD graduates for every permanent academic position available.  Since many people are applying for a permanent position for several years after their PhD, until they give up, there are several hundred applicants all applying for the same five or ten jobs that are looking for someone in a specialty that you are remotely qualified for.
Getting even a full-time temporary position is difficult.  Part time positions pay you about $3000 per course - good luck surviving on that.
Keep in mind the vast majority of universities have precisely zero faculty in archaeology or Near Eastern Studies - you're looking at about 100 total departments around the country, most of which have 3-5 faculty members, which means they're each hiring about once a decade.  That's if most of them don't end up closing down by the time you finish your PhD - every year some school or another announces they'll close a few of their less popular humanities departments.
There are precisely zero non-academic positions for which a PhD in Near Eastern Studies is a better qualification than your BA in English and several years of experience, which you could get starting right now and get paid for it.
Now - if spending ten years in poverty, making no savings towards retirement, ending up almost certainly competing for the same jobs you are competing for now is worth it to be learning and researching your favorite topics for those ten years - I'm not going to argue too hard against your preferences.  However - doing that and accruing $100K (counting interest) or $500K - if you go on to an unfunded PhD - in debt that you'll basically never have the ability to pay off (which means you'll never be able to borrow money for anything else, such as a house) is foolhardy in the extreme.
I agree this is all really sad, and our society ought to do more to support scholarship and education in all of these areas.  If I ever somehow get a $10 million windfall I'd endow humanities research.  Unfortunately, we live in the world we live in.

I would generally agree. I did an unfunded 1 year MPhil to help prepare me for doctoral programs but I was changing from humanities to an in-demand scientific field with many academic and non-academic job opportunities when I finish. Unfortunately, when it comes to this we do have to think strategically.

"several PhD graduates"  You mean several hundred or several thousand, right?

@AnonymousPhysicist: The numbers are not that bad - for philosophy (a reasonably large market for which the professional association keeps decent statistics, in part because it's a well-defined discipline for which statistic-keeping is relatively easy) there are about 3 new PhDs per permanent academic job advertised.  Statistics can be found at https://www.apaonline.org/members/group_content_view.asp?group=110435&id=918649 - of course as I mentioned, this still means  there will be 100 people applying to the same 10 jobs in your specialty.

@AlexanderWoo I did not realize there were so few philosophy PhD graduates.  I do wonder how many of the advertised jobs actually resulted in a hire - searches are cancelled sometimes.

@AnonymousPhysicist: I think a bigger issue is that some searches end up hiring someone who already has a permanent job elsewhere.

@AlexanderWoo I fear you've made a leap here by conflating the possible cost/benefit ratio of an unfunded archaeology masters degree with a personal view of future post PhD job prospects which wasn't part of the question. I have a mphil and PhD in archaeology and am gainfully employed (and even much respected!). Poster: I'm American did an unfunded MPhil in the UK which was buckets cheaper than the US. I used it to springboard a funded archaeo PhD, and now I am professor so-and-so. Consider looking outside the US. Europe is cheaper and tons US archaeos do their masters in Europe.