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Student gives two different answers to one exam question, one right and one wrong. How should I mark/grade this?
I am marking an exam for a course I tutor. One student has given two answers for a particular question in the exam – one answer is fully correct, while the other is completely wrong.
Each answer has full working and explanation of how the answers were derived. It appears that the student wasn't sure which method they should use, and so hedged their bets by attempting both and hoping one of them was right. (The student presented their answer as "it is either X or Y", and in later questions gave parallel answers depending on whether X or Y was correct - I don't believe it was reworking that they forgot to cross out.)
How should I mark this question?

Full marks since they produced a right answer?
Partial marks because they are "half-right"?
Or no marks because they haven't demonstrated full understanding of the problem?

Related: Test answer rejected for saying more than asked for.

Regardless which way you go, you may consider to advise the instructor to make clear to students for future exams that, when multiple answers are given, only the first (or last) answer will be taken as the one that will be graded.

Is it clear to the student that they gave 2 different final answers?  Did they not make any comments about getting different answers?

Once, in the same final exam week, I erased two right answers in the final for two separate courses and put down bad wrong answers and I didn't get any credit I believe.  I also erased at least some partial work for yet another different exam.  Bad week, but I got B's and survived.  Of course it was my fault, and not this particular situation as I had erased.

Seems to me that the rubric is the responsibility of the instructor, not the grader.

@Trunk If the student clearly stated two interpretations of the question and gave two answers, clearly stating for which interpretation each answer was for, then it's reasonable to say OP "has" to give full marks. But if they just gave two answers, there's an argument for taking points off.

In my opinion the student worked hard. Since one answer is right, I would give full marks.   Because I can not presume what was the reason for another

This is a wonderful opportunity to explain probability - since the answer is either X or Y, the mark will be either 0 or 20 (or whatever scale you use), generated through a flip of an unbiaised coin.

@Mathematics working hard is not a positive thing by itself.

The edit helps understand the situation quite a bit.  Exams that have this kind of chain of dependencies are problematic because one mistake throws off everything later.  The student has done the right thing in order to earn credit on the corollary questions.

Curious as to whether the workings for the wrong answer were using a known formula/method that solves a different problem, or just started with bad assumptions and went down the student's own path to the 'answer'

I inadvertently did this myself back when I was an undergrad: I wrote up a detailed answer, found a mistake in it, and then wrote out a completely different, detailed second answer without remembering to erase or strike out the first. The grader drew an arrow to the first answer and wrote, "This is completely wrong"; drew an arrow to the second answer and wrote, "This is completely right': and took off a few points from full credit. Seemed fair enough, though I didn't try to claim that I was offering two potential solutions for the grader to choose between.

I really struggle to understand how a ‘method’ can be correct and teachworthy, and at the same time result in some wrong result even if applied correctly. Is there a reason the student should have seen that makes the second method unapplicable?

Sounds like the student has demonstrated partial mastery of the material: they were unable to select the correct method but were able to correctly apply the method once selected. So, absent other information, partial credit seems appropriate. The amount of partial credit to give will depend on the relative difficulty and importance of method selection vs. method implementation.

With this approach, I would also consider whether the incorrect method they used for their alternative answer was nevertheless executed correctly.

This is what I ended up doing for this case, as they did have all the correct working for the right method and knowledge of how to use it, but clearly not a full understanding for why that method is chosen (and not the other one). I understand that partial marks won't be the best solution in all situations however.

I think this is fine, but it raises questions about 'show your work' and 'partial credit'. If the purpose is to mitigate the consequences of making an error in executing the solution by giving credit for understanding how the problem can be solved,  then it would not necessarily be applicable if the student does not know how to solve it - and not being able to pick the correct solution, even after having executed two candidates, is a case of not knowing how to do so (this assumes there was no plausible way for a knowledgable student to see ambiguity in the question.)

Wondering how many points they would have gotten if they had only indicated the method to be used without working the problem. Sounds to me like that is how many points should be lost.

The wrong thing to do is give full credits. Imagine a much simpler question that can be answered with yes or no, with a student providing both those answers. In such a case, I would not award any points.
Answering a question correctly does include choosing a correct way to do it. The student clearly failed at that. It is not fair to others who chose one way to solve the problem they deemed to be the right one (and ended up chosing the wrong one). If the student had chosen the wrong answer out of the two, they would have been awarded no points. To not be able to chose the right answer shows an inability to solve the problem at hand, so it would be completely OK to not give any points.
Otherwise it is an incentive to just write down any possible answer that comes to mind in the future (for questions where the student is unsure about), hoping that because the right answer might be somewhere among them, they will get at least some points.
But no matter what you do, I think it is a good idea to present your suggested way of dealing with it to your professor as Roland suggested, asking if they agree.

Your yes/no example is irrelevant since that’s very different than the situation OP is dealing with. See my answer for an alternative analysis.

The moment you started arguing about what's fair to others you lost my attention

@DanRomik It is relevant. Each question has some maximum n of bits of information that it can reveal about the student's mastery. Once a student gives two answers, they are removing one bit of information (one bit is used up deciding which answer to take). Therefore, if they got everything else right, their response reveals n-1 bits of information. In the extreme, for a true/false question, n=1, so the students is revealing no information, and should get no points. While a true/false question is different from OP's situation, it is not irrelevant, as it illustrates the wider point.

@Acccumulation to put it another way, the yes/no example is an appeal to extremes fallacy.

(to both Accumulation and DanRomik) Appeal to extreme applies if this answer is trying to say that the OP case should have the same treatment as the extreme case. Giving an extreme is valid if this answer is trying to show that [in one end we have zero mark, and on another end slightly reduced marks (for example). Therefore, something that's in between should be given marks in between as well.] However, this answer doesn't seem to do that, even though it starts with a hedge on "the wrong thing to do is give full points". So I would agree on Dan Romik that the extreme is used fallaciously here.

"Otherwise it is an incentive to just write down any possible answer that comes to mind in the future" -- on that note, I'd argue that an upper bound on the grade in this case should be 1/number of answers, assuming of course one of the answers is correct. The student may keep adding answers, but then their grade will be correspondingly diluted.

@DanRomik This is clearly not an appeal to extremes fallacy because the point being demonstrated by the extreme case (yes/no, student answers both) applies equally to the non-extreme case (e.g. A/B/C/D/F/G, student answers A and B). Namely, that you shouldn't award full marks. The extreme case here merely serves to explain the logic to the reader, not to make an argument which is wrong when applied to the non extreme case.

@JBentley, that would be correct, if this answer is like that. But this answer is missing any mention that the student answer is worth any points. It just mentions what's it not worth (not full marks, as in the first sentence), and what it could probably be (zero marks, as in the rest of the answer). It doesn't mention anything about partial marks. That's the point of my previous comment. (disclaimer: my view is that the student should be given partial marks)

@justhalf The absence of an argument that you could award partial marks isn't the same as an argument that you should not award partial marks. All this answer is saying is not to award full marks; a perfectly valid standalone answer. Even if the answer were suggesting only to give no marks, the reduction to extreme still helps to demonstrate the logic. The fact that one might disagree with the suggestion doesn't invalidate the logic. Indeed, in a MCQ with 2, 4, 10, or 100 answers, if you select 2 answers where 1 was expected, common practice is to award 0 marks.

Fair point. From my view, that's exactly what Dan Romik and I call appeal to extremes fallacy.

I was in this situation before, on the student side.  I had time left after finishing the exam and I re-worked a problem that I had trouble with.  In my excitement over solving it the second time around, I forgot to indicate which solution was my official answer.  My professor called me over after the next class session and said something along the lines of "it looks like there's two different sets of work here. Was that intentional? Or am I reading this completely wrong?" After a brief facepalm moment, I explained what happened and indicated which version was intended to be my official answer.  He didn't dock me any points for the confusion.
The professor was certainly under no obligation to do any of that, but as the student I really appreciated his effort to ensure my score was a reflection of my understanding of the material and not of my ability to draw a big "X" over old work.  I suspect that he wouldn't have been as generous if I wasn't able to instantly indicate which answer to use (someone trying to game the system wouldn't have an answer for that question and would likely pause to think before responding).

Someone trying to game the system could often easily just ask someone which answer was right after the exam. Someone not trying to game the system could very well pause to think before responding - I, for example, often pause to think before responding to even the most basic questions. It's a flawed way to figure out intent. Your score is a reflection of your understanding, to the extent that you're able to demonstrate said understanding. Failing to properly indicate what your answer is is comparable to making a symbol that could be interpreted as either T or F to a true/false question.

@NotThatGuy Possibly, but you can read many people's body language and determine if they're being straight with you.  I, for one, have no poker face, and the professor in question was rather good at reading and understanding people.

But, assuming the grade carries some significance, the system has to be fair to all students. It isn't fair if the outcome depends on the grader's ability to correctly read a person's body language. Anyone who has played poker knows that you can't correctly read 100% of people 100% of the time.

It goes both ways.  You could similarly say it's equally unfair to penalize a student who got the question right but forgot to cross out an answer with the same severity as another student who has no idea how to do the problem at all.  Teaching/grading always requires you to make judgement calls at some level, you just have to try and be as fair as you reasonably can.

@bta Actually, I wouldn't take that argument at all. A truly fair system has a clear, unambiguous, and pre-published set of rules for determining the grade. In a formal exam setup (e.g. one which counts towards a final grade at a university or a formal qualifcation), failing to follow the exam instructions (e.g.. answering the correct questions in the correct way) does result in no marks being awarded. It might seem harsh to someone who fails to read the instructions properly or makes a mistake, but everyone knows they have to conform to the same standards as everyone else.

If we're just talking about a homework set by a teacher for a particular class and nobody will care about the grade apart from that teacher and student, then fine. Informal tests can have informal grading systems.

Edit: OP edited the question to clarify the situation, and with the edit it looks like the scenario I’m proposing below is not what happened. So my answer is no longer applicable. I’m leaving the answer up rather than deleting it, since it may be applicable in other cases that are of interest to future readers of the thread.

It appears that the student wasn't sure which method they should use, and so hedged their bets by attempting both and hoping one of them was right.

This is a possible explanation for what happened, but not the only one. The student might have written the wrong answer first, and proceeded to solve other questions in the exam. Later in the exam they might have suddenly understood what the correct solution is and written it down. In their haste (and because of nervousness, time pressure, sloppiness, or some combination of those things) they forgot to cross out the previous, incorrect solution.
If you think such an interpretation is not unlikely, giving full or almost full points is something to consider. Think of it as a case when you’ll be applying the principle of charity.
Note also that I’m only suggesting this course of action because the correct answer includes a full explanation of its reasoning. Awarding full points to someone who wrote multiple answers without at least one of them having a full and correct reasoning would be wrong, among other reasons since it would give an incentive to students to try to game your exams by trying to make multiple stabs at guessing the answer without having any understanding of the material you’re asking about.

Mostly agree with this, but strongly think it should be “almost full” and not “full.”

The student could also have given the right answer first and then lost confidence in their answer and given the wrong one.  I don;t think the OP makes it clear which was first or second.

The principle of charity does not apply here. The principle of charity is about assuming the other person is right until proven otherwise. In the case of an exam, determining whether the student knows the material is the whole point, and the burden is on the students to establish that they do.

@Acccumulation the principle of charity is about giving people the benefit of the doubt in situations involving ambiguity. There is no obligation to apply it in any given situation; rather, you can choose to apply it or not as you prefer. If you are a professor and prefer to be a harsh grader and not give students the points until they’ve removed all trace of doubt that they may not understand the material, that is your right. I suspect however your students will not appreciate this pedagogical approach. In practice it’s pretty rare that test answers don’t contain any ambiguity of this type.

@StephenG-HelpUkraine sure, as I said in my answer there are several possible interpretations for what happened, including some which reflect less well on the student. OP can choose to grade according to the most charitable interpretation, or according to the least charitable one, or anywhere in between those extremes.

In this particular case, the student presented their answer as "it is either X or Y", so I don't think it was them reworking their answer. In general though, I can see how this is a fair point to consider.

From the way the OP stated the questions it's not clear if there was ambiguity in the question which led to two interpretations and two correct answers to those two interpretations or (more probably as I read it) one interpretation and two methods of attempting to solve the problem one of which is clearly wrong. In the first case there's a strong case for principle of charity and maybe taking a point off since correct interpretation is generally some part of the test. In the second there's a decent case for not giving any points since the student has not shown they know what they are doing.

If there was only one interpretation and two different methods one of which was wrong, how much partial credit should be given depends a lot on the exact question and methods. Especially how egregiously wrong the wrong method was.

@DRF the “objectively” correct credit that should be given depends on what exactly happened that led the student to write the two answers, sure. But I think you’re overthinking this whole issue. The premise of my answer is that this underlying truth is ultimately unknowable and that it’s futile to play these guessing games. I’m simply proposing one way to approach the question of how to grade the exam in the face of this intrinsic uncertainty. It’s not perfect and I’m not claiming that it’s a more valid approach than any other, it’s just one approach that seems reasonable to me.

Fair enough on being just one way to approach it. I was just trying to claim that your way to approach it is valid if the question was: "Differentiate $ax^2$" and the answers were "$a2x$" and "can't differentiate because I don't know what the derivative of $a$ with respect to $x$ is" but not valid if the question was $lim_{x->0} \frac{sin(2x)}{x}$ and the answers were "0/0=1" and "Using l'hospital we get $lim_{x->0} 2cos(2x)/1=2$."

@DanRomik with the latest comment (and update) from OP, it's clear that the student intentionally provide two answers, as a way to show that "I know that with assumption A, you do it this way, and with assumption B you do it this way, and I know that it must either be A or B that is true. I don't know which, but I'm showing you that I can answer in the case of any assumption given."

Not an answer, but too long for a comment.
In the best of circumstances the student will provide an explicit meta answer too, something like

I  can solve this problem two different ways. Here they are. Since the
conclusions disagree, they can't both be right. I am pretty sure the
first one is, because ... but I can't quite see where I might have
gone wrong in the second.

I would award extra points for an answer like that.

Strong disagree with awarding extra points, and weak disagree on even awarding full points. The comment you have as example shows that the student was not able to determine which method is the appropriate one, hence lacking important knowledge. This should be reflected in a deduction of points. The best case scenario is when the student writes a correct answer, then proceeds to comment "I'm fully confident the above is correct, but I believe I found an alternative solution, see below" and proceeds with the wrong answer. In this scenario, the wrong solution should be dismissed as a comment.

@Neinstein We have to agree to disagree. Thinking about how you think is a crucial part of learning to solve new problems. Evidence of that is worth more (to me as a teacher) than correct answers to the questions I ask on an exam.

@Neinstein If it's a course covering the theory of alligator wrestling, then exam points should be awarded based on demonstrated mastery of the ins and outs of fighting a gator. Other coursework (graded assignments, quizzes, term projects...) can be used to reward creative thinking about what it means to wrestle an alligator.

As a student, sometimes I notice at the end of the exam that I still have time and try to redo a task that I believe I have done wrong. Or do it in a different way to be certain. Of course it is usually expected that students clearly mark which answer is supposed to be graded, but I do not think it is fair to, as other answers suggest, assume by default the stance of "this student wanted to cheat the system by providing multiple answers".
If the goal of the question was to see whether a student is able to find the correct answer, then the student managed this and deserves full points - perhaps minus a few as a gesture that they should in the future clearly mark which answer is correct.
If the goal of the question was to see whether the student is able to choose the correct approach among of few, and from their solutions it is not obvious (to them) which one must have been the correct one, it is not as clear and I would understand deduction of points. However, keep in mind that you generally don't want to punish students for writing down more - you want them to demonstrate what they know, after all. And in my opinion having one correct answer and one wrong answer is still better than having only a wrong answer.

There is another option: Always grade the first answer (excluding those crossed out) and ignore any of the subsequent ones. Ideally it should be announced as a consistent policy beforehand. It can sometimes be hard on the student, but it really drives home the point of giving just one answer. It also avoids quite a bit of discussion.

Imo fully discarding submitted work is not ok if it was not clearly communicated beforehand. I'm reading your "Ideally" as disagreeing with that. If you do agree with me, you might want to reword that to make it clearer :)

It might make more sense to always grade the last answer and ignore any of the preceding ones. It's plausible that the student wrote an answer, then realized it was incorrect, wrote a second answer, and forgot or otherwise failed to erase the first answer. On the other hand, it's unlikely that a student would write an answer and then intentionally write a worse answer that they don't want graded.

@TannerSwett They might write a worse answer later if they did not understand their first answer was better, which I'd be reluctant to reward.  This is why the order of the answers is significant IMO.

@lucidbrot Giving multiple answers when only one was expected/requested is also "not ok", and doing that should remove any reasonable expectation from the student to receive more than the minimum score between the two answers (although how exactly to mark it would be left up to the grader).

@TannerSwett Always grading the first instead of the last answer is more of a pragmatic decision, otherwise you would always have to check every exam for additional answers to the same question on some later page, or you would end up grading the first answer and then crossing that out again, which would not help with discussions. I tend to tell students before the exam that I will always pick the worse one, which certainly helps scaring them into handing in only one and properly crossing out all other attempts.

This is why pencils have erasers.

Such things need to be clarified beforehand. Now you need to read the grading rules in detail, apply what is applicable, and probably do so in favor of the student.
For the next time, you should add a rule about this. A common rule is:

When more than one answer is given, the answers are not graded. Please make clear, e.g., by striking out the other answer, which answer should be graded."

In this situation the only question for me would be to see if the student is being sneaky by putting in both answers or if they genuinely are unsure which one is correct. This can be judged by talking to the student usually. In the former case marks must be deducted (50% maybe) because the grading is supposed to reflect what the student has learned and they clearly haven't.
In the later case I'd give full marks because trying things shouldn't be penalized.

I would not give many points to the student. This incentivizes guessing and just putting multiple answers.
Extreme case: Calculate 2+3
Student answers: 5, 6
Now, if the student gets many points for that, they might start guessing entirely and provide ansers like 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12 and hope that whoever grades the exam will pick the correct answer.
On the other hand you could also argue that the student answering 5, 6 has executed two different approaches of what to do with two numbers: addition and multiplication. This shows that the student masters these two techniques, but it also shows that the student did not understand the fundamental part: what is the question about?
So in your case you could give some points for successfully executing two different approaches, but I would subtract a substantial amount of points for not even understanding the question correctly.

giving even one point for "you answered correctly to a question you did not understand" is like giving a Nobel Prize to the lucky monkey that by punching randomly a keyboard will produce a masterpiece.
Nobel Prize for Literature, clearly, the comment does not apply to the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Between the bounds
If the student was clearly unsure, then:

Lower bound is whatever they'd get for selecting the incorrect method but otherwise showing correct workings, etc: ideally they should get more than that, unless there's a very strict existing rule for "only first answer counts".
Upper bound is whatever they'd have got for using only the correct method; they should get less than that.
Either way, subsequent questions' grades shouldn't be affected by using the incorrect values from this question: any penalty should be applied only once.

Rubric suggestion
S - any score for "showing workings" or other stylistic points. A base value that is given even with an incorrect selection of methodology, so long as they show good workings for some methodology.
C - any score for giving the correct answer. S + C should be the total points for this question.
N - number of guesses.
P - Problem space untouched by their guesses. Assume a value of 1 for now (very large problem space).
The rubric would then be S + P(C/N).
In the degenerate case where there are no style points to be had, P is 1, and they made only two guesses, you'd give 50%. They're not "entirely wrong", even if the wrong answer was the first; but they're not "entirely right" either.
P is, more correctly, the portion of incorrect problem space left untouched by their guesses. For large problem-spaces like "what method should you use for this question?" you can treat it as 1. But in a multiple choice question of A/B/C/D, with A correct, the incorrect problem-space is only three items long, B/C/D. So if they guess "A or B", this would use a third of the incorrect problem-space, giving P=2/3, for a total P(C/N) score of only 33%. And if they guess both possible answers in a true/false question, then P=0, so they get 0%.
Alternative possibility
It is possible, however, that by writing "it is either X or Y", the student was instead asserting "the question does not give sufficient information to select between these two approaches, both of which could be considered valid depending how you read the question."
If that might be a valid opinion about the question (if the question could be read so that the incorrect case might apply) then you'd most likely need to award full marks, plus extra credit for being the only one to spot that.

I will first look the matter from the Student's side and hence I will give full credit for the correct answer. Regarding the wrong answer, I will be still happy for the wrong answer because the student is developing his/her analytic power to give a different argument, in other word, the student is trying to be creative. He might be wrong somewhere which led him/her to an astray but I will praise it. There can be multiple reasons as well behind the two answers. It might be that the student wanted to impress the tutor with two different argument of the same question. But I can not presume. So I will go for the student.
So I will give full marks to enhance and motivate the student.

If the exam was "you are in front of a fire, what do you do to extinguish it?"
What mark would you give to someone answering:

I put some fuel on the left side of the fire and I put some water on the right side of the fire.

?
You have a student that provided two answers and could not decide which one was wrong and which one was right ... so for what it matters, the student did not understand anything about the question, because in their mind both answers could have been correct.
<//edit after your additional edit that provides the X-Y explanation//>
After your comments, I am still thinking you could have awarded full marking for giving only the correct solution ("I throw water to extinguish the fire"), some marking for the correctly motivated wrong solution ("I throw fuel on the fire so it burns quickly and it exhausts the oxygen available in the sealed room where it happened") and still no points for both.

I don't think academia is so harsh

@MAS exactly so, and unfortunately so.

The wiser approach will help students to develop good habits of cleaning up their mess. In the long term the other approach leads to lower productivity for everyone including yourself. Don't give full credit.

I think the second answer should be seen as a correction of the first, so the second answer replaces or overrides the first, and only the second answer is graded.
A simplified example, in an oral conversation:
Question: "What is 40 plus 30?"
Answer: "That is 80. Oh, wait, that is 70!"
or just:
Answer: "80 [2 seconds pass] 70."
This assumes that there is no feedback from the asking person, like body language, that could indicate that the first answer was wrong. This is the case with a written exam.


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What's the purpose of 1-week, 2-week, 10-week..."X-week"... (online) professional certificates?
What's the purpose of 1-week, 2-week, 10-week..."X-week"... (online) professional certificates? I mean, they cost money, right(?) Where do they find implementation? Where can they be used?
There are famous universities around the world that offer professional education online or on campus or both, and they provide you with a certificate. And of course you pay. My question is if this kind of certificates help in finding a job either to the market or academically.

Can you provide any examples of the kind of things you are talking about?    Which "very famous" universities?  What kinds of programs?  Please, be more specific.

University gets paid, student (hopefully) learns something.  What other "purpose" did you have in mind?

@John Gordon: What my question implies is if they "count" in someone's CV...(?) Nothing strange to my question...

For a 1-week course, I would hope the result is not called a "degree", but something else,  perhaps a "certificate".

@GEdgar: Sorry, yes, they call it certificates. I have changed it to my question...

Generally speaking, the purpose of short courses it to equip students with knowledge and skills required at their workplace without a significant break from their workplace. You can think of it as training, but focused not just on  skills, but also on a more theoretical knowledge and ability to apply theory in practice.
The specific purpose depends on a particular degree.

Thanks! One last question! Do they offer something in the CV for possible academic position ? Do they offer something in the CV for possible professional position ?

@just_learning "Do they offer something in the CV for possible academic position?" Probably not. "Do they offer something in the CV for possible professional position?" Impossible to say without knowing the specifics of the training, and the field in which the student is engaged.

@just_learning - I know people are cynical about these kind of courses (and I'd not do loads of them), but where I think they have a place on a CV is when you're retraining or trying to enter a new area - essentially, you're showing a willingness to put time, money and effort into the new area that you're hoping to focus on. It's not a match for experience, but still shows some commitment, and that you're likely to not be completely ignorant of the subject. That might help get a role which has the subject area as a minor part, or a really entry level position.

What's the purpose of 1-week, 2-week, 10-week..."X-week"... (online) professional degrees?

One of the main purposes of this kind of professional degrees is to bring revenue to the company that offers them.

What I think you need to do with all these quasi-qualifications is check if they are independently certified.
Without independent certification, you have no way of knowing how qualified the staff who will be teaching it are, aka if they know what they are talking about.

"independently"

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A university does not allow its employees to use its affiliation on papers done in spare time; how normal is that?
Together with a colleague from a different university, I wrote a paper that has passed peer review in a respectable journal and is currently in press. The topic of the paper is very far removed from our usual research areas; let's say that my colleague is a chemist but the paper is about history (all details changed). We collaborated and wrote the paper in our spare time.
Now my colleague spoke to some university administrators and was told not to use university's affiliation on any papers that are written in the spare time / are outside of his or her direct responsibilities. As a result, my colleague wants to remove their affiliation from the paper.
I should add that my colleague is a senior researcher employed by the university, and that it is quite a well-known university in Western Europe.
My question is: How weird is that? Is such a policy common?
I was under impression that universities are only happy when their affiliation is used, and unhappy if it is not used.

My first reaction: what academic has "spare time"?

How do you define 'outside your field' when you have tenure and freedom do chose your field? Might be common, but I do find it weird...

@Fabio: I am not sure my colleague actually has a "tenure" (or a local equivalent). They might not. But I think it is weird even outside of tenure: e.g. I am a postdoc but would naturally want to put my current affiliation on any research paper even if it is outside of my main field of interest/work.

@StephanKolassa When else would they do research?

My first reaction was similar to Stephan's: how do you tell which papers are written in spare time, and which are not? Do you have to use a punch card or something? How do you separate work time and spare-time-during-which-you-are-doing-research? They seem like the same thing to me.

Seems like the university is just trying to do the right thing, in terms of saying "we don't want to take any credit for work you do on your own side projects; you should keep it all for yourself"?  Which would be strange/uncommon, but in a good way.  If you've been doing independent research, why wouldn't you want it acknowledged as such?

@aroth: Because the affiliation can be interpreted to be more about background info on the author and a point of contact than about taking credit.

Maybe the author wants to be affiliated with the *well-known university in Western Europe", but not the other way araound? University have some (internal/external) guidelines on what research they do. Anything from military, or political or .... might be off-limits.

Let's call a spade a spade here:

This policy is not common. I have never heard of a faculty member in a developed country being dictated to in which area to publish or being limited in using their university affiliation only when publishing in certain areas and not in others.
This policy is not logical. Let's see, who is more competent to judge if a faculty member is qualified to produce high quality research on a subject?
(a) The faculty member and the editor and referees of the journal they submitted their paper to; or
(b) some clueless university administrator?
Simply put, this policy ignores centuries of history that have developed academia into the bastion of creativity and free thought that it is, and proved that the academic model is one of the best models humanity has discovered for creating new knowledge. (Yeah, yeah, to the cynics among you, go ahead and feel free to kill me for this comment, and bring up everything that's wrong with academia nowadays...).
This policy is not surprising. This story establishes that there is at least one university somewhere in Western Europe that has at least one policy-maker who is, let's say, not the sharpest tool in the shed. I am shocked, I tell you. Shocked.

A agree with bastion of wossname and all that. But how does telling someone to go ahead and publish, but without their affiliation, have anything to do with who is qualified to judge the quality of the research? Generally speaking the key element of the bastion is held to be peer-reviewed publishing, not academic affiliation. Isn't it? I mean sure, it's annoying to publish your history paper as "Dr. Joe Bloggs, no fixed abode" instead of "Dr. Joe Bloggs, Senior Researcher in Chemistry at Dumbass University", but they aren't trying to prevent it being published.

@SteveJessop you're right, the university isn't preventing Dr. Bloggs from publishing, but it still behaving foolishly and counter-productively by (as I wrote) "ignoring centuries of history ... creation of new knowledge". Specifically, there are many examples where a researcher from discipline X made a breakthrough discovery in (seemingly unrelated) discipline Y. The university's policy might discourage such a researcher from pursuing the research in the worst case, or at least make the university look very stupid when the discovery comes out without the university's name being involved.

Generally the opposite is true in the United States -- the university wishes to have jurisdiction over all work done using university resources -- which includes the laptops and computers we use. Since faculty are exempt employees presumably we have no "free time," but instead work 24x7 for the university (except for the summer months for 9-month employees). So basically any idea that I come up with from August to May of the calendar year and that I use my school resources to work on, is the property of the university unless specifically disclaimed.
Just ask your patents and licensing office to sign a document saying that your university hereby releases you of all possible intellectual property and inventions that may come out of your paper (even if it's in History!) and see if they change their tune.

Note also that many American universities require their faculty to fill out a "Faculty Activity Report" every year that details all of their publications (as well as service/teaching work). The university uses it internally to determine promotions and retention; but it also forwards this data to organizations such as the National Research Council -- that determine university and department ranking using criteria such as number of publications.
Thus it is in the university's best interests (both for IP and for ranking purposes) to capture every single faculty publication that it can. So I would think your scenario would be implausible for most R1 universities in the USA, at least.

Cool idea! Putting a cost on it is a nice touch. Reminds me of the climate change discussions, where bets were taken on whatever position the proponents were espousing.

So basically any idea that I come up with from August to May of the calendar year, or that I use my school laptop to design, is the property of the university unless specifically disclaimed. I believe this is wrong. First, exempt employees do not work 24-7 - that's a ridiculous statement to make even figuratively. Second, at least in California an employer cannot claim ownership of IP an employee generates in their spare time that is unrelated to their normal work duties. I don't have a reference but was told this by a lawyer some years ago in connection to a discussion about patents.

"A. An agreement to assign inventions and patents to the University, except those resulting from permissible consulting activities without use of University facilities, shall be mandatory for all employees, for persons not employed by the University but who use University research facilities, and for those who receive gift, grant, or contract funds through the University. Such an agreement may be in the form of an acknowledgment of obligation to assign. " http://www.ucop.edu/ott/patentpolicy/patentpo.html

Basically use university resources (work computer, e-mail, network services, design software, etc.) and what you do belongs to the university.

I did clarify my language to better reflect what it's the University of California Patent Policy language.

@RoboKaren thanks for clarifying the post. Yes, inventions that were developed using university resources are a different story, so you're right about that. By the way, I assume you're posting here in your spare time, so if you still believe you work 24-7 for your university, be careful not to post anything of commercial value, or you may find that your obligations to your employer are in conflict with the license under which content on A.SE gets posted.

And I'm using my work laptop. Good that my work that I do on the engineering side tends to get released as GPL licensed or put into the public domain.

If they do indeed own it then that means they get to decide whether and how it's published, not that they necessarily want their name all over it. So I think this answer misses describing the connection between how common it is to assert jurisdiction and how common it is to want the affilliation mentioned in the paper.

"Since faculty are exempt employees presumably we have no "free time," but instead work 24x7 for the university"? So they have developed ways not only to own your every minute, but to remove the need to sleep or do anything but work? Wow!

+1. Thanks a lot for your answer. I liked both your answer and the one by @DonRomik and could not decide which one to accept. After some hesitation I accepted DonRomik's one but yours is rewarded by several more upvotes. It's a neat idea about asking the university to sign a document; I don't think my colleague is interested in fighting this fight though.

tl;dr: Endorsing such paper bears high risk and promises a low reward.
Long answer:
Not many academics these days write outside of their narrow scope of expertise. Clearly, there is no general policy or practice of how institutions deal with such rare situations as they occur; every administrator probably comes out with an ad hoc solution based on their personal understanding of what's appropriate.
I can think of several reasons why a University may want to disassociate from a Paper written by a Professor in a new Field.

The Professor may think they have made a breakthrough in the Field, whereas in fact (s)he only scratched a surface of a subject, or understand it completely wrong. One example is Fomenko's New Chronology but I'm sure there are more.
The Field may be highly controversial by its nature (e.g. politics, social science, religion) and Professor may lack understanding how to present the argument in a way which avoids potential conflicts and accusations. The University does not want to be involved in potential scandal, and avoids it.

The higher risks of endorsing the Paper come together with a reasonable low reward. It is less likely that someone completely new to the Field come out with a suggestion which will have a transformative effect. Unless the Professor articulates that they firmly decide to move to this Area (change Departments, attract new research grants, develop new programs, supervise new PhD students), the University does not really benefit much from the Paper.

This doesn't answer the OP's question, and furthermore I disagree with your explanation. The risk is not high, and the reward is neither lower nor higher than for "normal publications". And as for controversial research areas, plenty of researchers have a full time position doing research in such areas, yet presumably they would be allowed to use the university's name.

I imagine that Florida Atlantic University would not like to be associated with Professor James Tracey's "work" on the Sandy Hook shooting.

Exceptions not withstanding, as others have pointed out, the risk for a university is low and the reward typically high. I find this answer neither factually correct nor helpful.

@dan1111: "The peer review process should (...)" - basically, I agree with you. Unfortunately, every once in a while, I stumble about one of those "new discovery" articles in the media (the kind that reaches the general public, such as newspapers) that presents something more or less interesting, but then provides the enlightening information: "The research has been submitted for peer review by researchers from the university of ... ." In other words, the research and its link to a given university sometimes reaches the news before peer review has been conducted.

@DanRomik I believe, both Qs of OP are answered in my comment: (1) This may look weird to some people, but not to me (this part is opinion-based); (2) This is not a policy, since there is no universal policy -  particular administrators deal with such a rare event differently.

Most papers aren't written by people who think they've made "breakthroughs" and most papers aren't in controversial fields. Most papers aren't "transformative" but, rather, make a small, incremental contribution to the sum of human knowledge. One would also expect the peer review system to spot cases of "author thinks it's a breakthrough but actually it's trivial or wrong" and probably also "author's lack of understanding causes conflict and accusations."

@DavidRicherby Perhaps the University is not interested in  "most" papers; it is interested in papers bringing the "profit" in terms of grants, students, publicity. Peer-review system is not ideal and occasionally let computer-generated articles through.

@DmitrySavostyanov: I do not quite understand your comment. In your answer, you were referring to cases where the university does not want to be connected to a so-called breakthrough paper. In your comment, you now seem to be talking about cases where a university very much wants to be connected with it, as it brings, as you say, "profit".

@DmitrySavostyanov: With that said, it seems rather easier to argue for getting a grant based upon a steady publication record in a given area than by pointing out a highly cited, but one-off publication. This applies even more to students, who will probably not cling to a particular single paper when establishing contact with an institute, but get an overview over the general directions and topics mentioned in the various recent papers.

I do not agree with your response approach, the paper went through peer review in a respectable journal(as OP says), and the paper is accepted in the community and from these standards it is correct, and should be published with the university affiliations.

@MikeyMike My answer focuses on why the universities do this, not whether or not this is "correct" by any metric, or what "should" happen in some ideal world. My answer describes managerial culture, as opposed to academic culture. It is OK to disagree with it.

I have certainly never heard of any such policy. It makes no sense. The university is giving away free good publicity for being named on another research paper. And an individual faculty member being successful by authoring another paper is also good for the department, the university, and everyone who's in this together. The policy simply makes no sense unless the paper is so bad that it would reflect poorly on the university (which doesn't appear to be the case here).

Your last sentence kind of suggests that you can assess the quality of a paper you've never seen.

@Dmitry, in any case the university managers/lawyers who advised to remove the affiliation did not see the paper either, I think they were not really aware of what it was about or in what journal it was going to be published. Their rule (as far as I understood it) was simply: if the paper is outside of your field, do not use our affiliation.

@DmitryGrigoryev -- I was just using a hypothetical. There may be cases where a university asked a faculty member to take down an individual paper that they know about (through whatever channels). Say, a university hears about a faculty member who submitted a paper to a holocaust denyer journal. -- -- -- But, obviously, in the case at hand, whatever strategy the university is following makes no sense whatsoever.

@DmitryGrigoryev OP said that the paper was peer reviewed and accepted in a respectable journal, so it seems like at least the basic quality test passed successfully, so it is likely not bad (maybe not good, we don't know, but at least not bad).

A point that has not been directly raised in earlier answers and/or comments: while one's tenure or other confirmation does confirm one's competence in a certain bailiwick, it does not confirm universal competence. There is a well-known fallacy, with various insulting-to-unfortunate-individuals eponyms, that (exterme, let's say) competence in one arena begets competence in ... any other that might be desired. Well, duh, that's obviously not going to be universally true, although there might be instances of instances...
I do not know the particular "institutional" motivation for inhibition of "affiliation", but if I were "the decider" for faculty (and affiliates) doing "research" for which they have no detectable credentials, I think I'd be entirely happy to have my institution's name not linked. (Don't get me wrong, the ideologies and philosophies of ... apparently ... most of these institutions are venal, etc., but, still, manifest crackpottery doesn't help anyone, truly.)

Paul, this research was apparently accepted for publication in a respectable journal according to the OP, so your comment about lack of detectable credentials, and your use of sneer quotes around the word research, are off the mark IMO.

While the tone of this answer is harsh, it is a rather plausible explanation of the situation. I was about to post something similar, though more diplomatic.

I second this, I can think of one reason for such a policy: the university might not want that its name can be used to legitimate research done outside of the researcher's expertise. An example could be the colleague is a History professor and the hobby research is about the benefits of a controversial "alternative" form of therapy.

@DanRomik, not "sneer" quotes, just quotes showing some coloration of the sense of the word. Also, I don't wish to disparage the people writing the papers, but only to explain the probable thinking of bureaucrats who seek a "simple rule".

The answer does not support interdisciplinary research. In physics, Phys. Rev. X aims to link various approaches and directions. If the OP passed peer review in a respectable journal, then the paper is good and valid.

@MikeyMike, it's not that my answer itself doesn't support interdisciplinary research. Rather, it points out a potential fallacy, that might indeed be on the minds of policy-makers and/or bureaucrats. Also, on a different point, it is unfortunately not reliably true that passing peer review in a respectable journal guarantees correctness or other virtues. Not that I'm claiming that it should or should not, but, rather, reporting on the observable situation in mathematics.

The university actually doesn't have the right to make such demands. If an author is affiliated with institution X then mentioning that in the article is just a statement of fact, it's not meant to be interpreted as an endorsement of the paper's content by the university. So, the author should ignore this request from the university.
The university will, of course, take measures against employees who during work or in their free time engage in activities that have a negative impact on the university's reputation. But that's not the case here. Consider also the case of giving an interview on radio or t.v. on some topic that may be totally unrelated to your work at university. There is then, in general, no reasonable case for the university to demand that your affiliation with them should be kept a secret. It would be a different matter if you were employed by the CIA.

How about this real-life case:  A tenured professor in Electrical Engineering, publishing papers about "Holocaust's truth".  Should he use the University's name while being introduced as a speaker on the subject of Holocaust?

You're making the same mistake that a few of the other answers and comments make, which is to latch on to extreme situations, and to ignore the existence of similar extremes among faculty who are publishing in their "official" area of expertise. The EE professor could be publishing very good quality research on the Holocaust; certainly the fact that it was accepted for publication by a respected journal suggests that that's likely. Conversely, a faculty member doing "official" research on the Holocaust (or in EE) could be publishing complete garbage. ...

... In other words, the policy described in the question draws a completely imaginary and artificial line in an attempt to separate research that's likely to be "reputable" from research that's likely to be unreputable. That's very misguided. It's simply not the administration's business to act as an arbiter of who can publish good research on what subject. No amount of rationalization or citing of anecdotal examples can change the fact that it's simply an illogical policy that will only discourage good research from being performed and/or make the university look stupid when it is.

@DanRomik: Note that while I disagree with this position, it may be what motivated whoever made that policy (which in turn could be some PR person having no idea of academia whatsoever). So it can explain the existence of this policy and needs not even be CCL’s opinion.

@Wrzlprmft all kinds of things "may be" what the writer of the answer intended to say, but did not say. If someone wants to say "I believe this is what motivated the decision-makers, but it's not my opinion" then they should say that explicitly. Citing incorrect reasoning to explain someone else's silly decision without explaining that you think it's incorrect is misleading and is in my opinion more harmful than not citing that reasoning at all, since you risk creating the impression that you agree with it and lending it whatever credibility you have.

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text:
I'm unhappy with my Master's. Should I drop out?
I know there are lots of other similar "Should I drop out?" threads, but I think my case is a bit different from what I've seen.
I'm currently a Master's degree student in Computer Science, about to start the second and final year (I've finished all required courses, now there's only research left to be done). My problem is that I'm unhappy with the program itself and my dissertation subject. I don't have any motivation to actually do research, I don't like scientific writing (My adviser says I write like a novelist, and I enjoy writing like that as I like literature, and I find scientific writing way too boring and soulless...).
The thing is that I started doing Masters because I've finished BSc with top marks on my final research project, and I had previously worked in industry and didn't have much of a pleasant experience, so I believed I would fit right in to academic life. Plus, I thought it would be an easier way to find a job or study opportunity abroad, and finally leave my hometown (I've no love for this city, there's nothing for me to do and I've got almost no friends here). As it turns out, however, I got frustrated from all the classes I had (even if I had good grades in all of them), and from what I've seen of my colleagues', adviser's and other professors' academic lives, it just isn't the kind of life for me. Even if it helps me get out of here, it's no use if I end up just as unhappy. I think to really enjoy academic life, your motivations should be academic, and I now realize that my motivations certainly aren't.
I've also been told that every grad student thinks about quitting at least once, and I know many others like that, but that doesn't make the situation better. Actually, it makes it worse for me, because it seems that nobody has any confidence in their work, and nobody is expected to have that confidence whatsoever. I find that extremely unhealthy and demotivating.
Summarizing, the problem with going on with masters is that it makes me unhappy, and it is destroying my self confidence (really, I hate myself when I'm doing it). I don't enjoy the things I do, and I can never appreciate the results I get. I don't see why I should finish a degree that I don't see myself using in the future, so to me it just seems like a waste of precious time. (I'm 24, by the way)
The problem with dropping out, however, is that I'm in a scholarship, so I'll have to return the money that I've received so far to cover for the program's fees. While I do have that money, it would be quite a setback considering that I intend to make a big trip soon. I thought about starting freelancing in software development so I could work from just about anywhere in the world, but I'm not sure how feasible that actually is. Even so, I'm not sure that's what I would like to do for the rest of my life. The upside in dropping out now is that I would gain a whole year to actually focus on my life, instead of focusing on some research I'm not willing to do just for the sake of not paying the scholarship back.
Does anyone have any advice or similar stories to share? I know the decision is mine to make, but I would like to know other people's opinions on my situation.

"so to me it just seems like a waste of precious time". Dropping out is a waste of the time spent at passing the courses. Sticking it out for an extra year in exchange for a MSc degree is not a waste of time (or money), it is a compromise.

Everybody studying I know had moments of despair, usually near year end (burnout, mostly). Do not decide on your future until you have a quiet time (say near the middle of summer vacation or so). Other than that, this depends heavily on your personal preferences and situation, so it is off-topic here.

What is different between how things are now, and how they were when you successfully completed your BSc.?

If you like writing, and write well, you may want to consider options that mix science and writing (e.g. science media/journalism). I have no idea how good the job options are there, so you may want to keep software development as a day job, though. Generally, I recommend getting the degree, however, if you got that far already.

The difference between now and then is only me, I guess. I've traveled a few times during this first MSc year, so I learned a lot of stuff and had plenty of time to think about my situation, enough to realize that I don't fit the academic scheme, and that I don't want to work with Computer Science for the rest of my life.

@TheLunatic: Surely the vast majority of people getting master's degrees in CS are not even considering pursuing an academic career.  Moreover, no matter what you mean by "industry," it is far from monolithic: just because you were not happy in one part of it does not mean that you couldn't find a suitable job in another part of it.  Dropping out of your degree does not seem to open any doors for you.

Dont drop out ! Employers  dont like quitters .Even if you never use your degree it doesnt matter.I have music qualification but no innate ability but I finished.It would make me laugh to myself when I was wlorking as a doorman.I specialised at repeating  certain electrical engineering papers from certain lecturers but I did not quit .I am glad that I didnot .I was the only repeat undergrad at uni that had a research job .

While I definitely sympathize and have felt like you feel, I have to second @PeteL.Clark and Alexandros' comments.  At the end of the day, you will have to live with the consequences of your actions, so you have to be realistic about what the benefits/costs of dropping out and continuing are.  Everyone is unhappy with parts of their lives; quitting your job, finding your "dream job," breaking up with your SO, etc. is not going to magically make you happier.  I should reiterate how much I feel for you, though

I think to really enjoy academic life, your motivations should be academic, and I now realize that my motivations certainly aren't.

No human being can -- or should -- have only academic motivations.  In this statement I find a kernel of truth: "An academic career is not a good one for those who are not motivated by a love for and a desire to work in their academic subject."  But also I find a kernel of falsity: "The only worthwhile reason to have degree X in subject Y is a love for and a desire to work in subject Y."  That's really not true: in modern life, degrees -- and increasingly, "advanced" degrees like master's and doctorates -- are necessary credentials in order to attain any of a variety of non-academic jobs.
If I understand your current situation, then:
(i) With one more year and with full financial support, you can complete a master's degree.
(ii) If you drop out now, then not only do you not get the degree but you will have to pay a financial penalty.  (So you say, anyway.  In the US, students who drop out of a degree program do not have to pay back their stipends.  It sounds like you are outside of the US.  It might be worth exploring -- carefully -- whether this is actually true in your program.)
In other words, looked at in non-academic terms you would be paying a nontrivial amount of money for the privilege of extricating yourself from a master's degree program and sparing yourself one year of doing something that you do not enjoy (but are doing well in; you seem not to doubt that you could get the degree with one more year of work).  Okay, if you drop out of the program right now, you will do....what??  If the answer is that you have a lucrative and long-term job lined up now, it would make sense to drop out (and try to put your degree on hold, if possible).  If you do not have something specifically positive lined up but are just looking to release yourself from the drudgery: I don't think that's a rational decision.  Ten or twenty years from now you may well look back and wish you had finished the degree.
I am not going to pick apart your entire message, but at several points your reasoning seems predicated on faulty assumptions.  Just a couple examples:

I had previously worked in industry and didn't have much of a pleasant experience, so I believed I would fit right in to academic life.

That makes no sense to me.  For many values of X and Y, liking X is positively correlated with liking Y.  I have never heard anyone say, "If you don't like this, then I know you'll like..."  I have a friend who made the same mistake in the other direction: as an academic he found himself weighed down by his colleagues' and superiors' expectations of how he should spend his time and conduct himself: he found these expectations both too numerous and too nebulous.  So he switched to an industry job to correct it.  Suffice it to say, he didn't stay in that job for terribly long.  There are (at least) two problems with this reasoning: (i) There are more than two walks of life...many more.  The majority of human beings are not working in either academia or industry.  (ii) Not all forms of unhappiness can be cured by any change of location.  Some of them are more internal.

The upside in dropping out now is that I would gain a whole year to actually focus on my life,

Not being a graduate student is neither a necessary or sufficient condition to actually focus on your life.  Try focusing on your life while completing your master's degree.  Yes, it's challenging...but worthwhile.

I've also been told that every grad student thinks about quitting at least once, and I know many others like that, but that doesn't make the situation better. Actually, it makes it worse for me, because it seems that nobody has any confidence in their work, and nobody is expected to have that confidence whatsoever. I find that extremely unhealthy and demotivating.

Then I have good news for you: in five years of graduate school, I never thought about quitting -- not once.  I had my better and worse moments, and yes -- at times my confidence lagged -- but I was at all times completely confident that I was doing what I wanted to be doing with my life.  My graduate school cohort consisted of people who were amazingly (indeed, intimidatingly) competent, enthusiastic and successful: the vast majority of people around me reinforced my interest and inspired me to work harder.  You don't sound like you're in a very positive cohort.  If you did decide to stay in academia past your master's degree (which I am not recommending if you continue to feel the way you do now, but it is possible that you could have a change of heart), you should make it a priority to place yourself in a positive academic environment.  It makes a world of difference.
Good luck.

+1 Strong point: the cohort/environment makes the difference. A huge difference it makes.

"The majority of human beings are not working in either academia or industry." I was struck by this observation, since it made me realize the unreasonable extent to which academics in technical fields tend to think of "industry" as synonymous with "not academia".

Thanks for the reply. I know my reasoning when choosing MSc was faulty, and that's why I'm trying to compensate for it now. I'm just not sure what I can do with CS that is neither industry nor academia. You're right about me not being in the US, but I do have to pay the stipends back. I feel that pressing on with this degree wouldn't be worth it, as I don't see myself actually using the degree for anything. I reckon there must be people who don't think about quitting. I do, though, and it makes me think even more that this just isn't for me.

@The Lunatic: Getting life advice from someone who doesn't know where you are in the world is a bit fishy.  I know very well that in the US, it is increasingly true that any "white collar job" either requires or much benefits from an advanced degree.  It can be very helpful to have a master's degree in anything -- the subject does not have to be at all relevant to the job.  Having said that, CS is just about the most broadly appealing master's degree I can think of.  Even the implied skill in things like webpage design could make you more desirable than many others for a range of jobs.

Whether that is true in your country, I don't know.  Moreover, it is unfortunately beyond the scope of this site to tell you all the various things you could spend your life doing.  Most universities have personnel that can help you with this, however, and if not there are books ("What color is your parachute?" is a classic of the genre.)  But bottom line: unless you have another job offer to take right now, I think the smartest choice is to do all your soul-searching / future career planning while you're getting your advanced degree.  What magical benefits does unemployment confer?

@TheLunatic Another point to note is there are no such monolithic things as "Academia" or "Industry". Like Captain Emacs wrote, there are better advisors, and there are worse ones. There are better bosses in industry, and worse ones. If you (or whoever's reading this) found a certain experience distasteful for xyz reasons, that doesn't mean you couldn't have had a better experience for abc reasons literally in the group next-door. At my first "real job," I liked my boss' boss more than my direct supervisor. Upon realizing this, I spent more time with him, and my life improved dramatically

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How long does one give coauthors to review a draft before submission?
I am a somewhat new PI, and have gotten a request to submit an invited article. My PhD student whom I have asked to author the paper is taking a long time to finish a draft, and the second deadline for submission (I already had to ask for an extension) is fast approaching.
I am trying to arrange my schedule now so that we both working together can finish the draft in time, but there are some minor co-authors we have to include on the paper. I was wondering how long is typical to give these minor co-authors a chance to review the draft before submission.
My field is chemistry/materials science. If it matters, I would add that these authors have only done the bare minimum work that would ethically make them co-authors. In the past, for similar levels of work that I have put in, more senior PIs have only given me a couple of days - which was fine for me, but I have no idea if that is normal...

This will likely vary not only by field and country, but by PI or author... If I were one of your coauthors, I would appreciate having a full week, and more importantly, being informed ahead of time. "On February 1st, we will be sending you the manuscript and ask for any comments to be returned by February 8th so we can work them in and submit by the hard deadline on February 10th." That way, people can prepare, perhaps block time for this. And then, of course, do send by that date.

This sounds like your actual problem is not with the coauthors but with the PhD student. Even if you magically know the coauthors need 3.14 weeks of time, that just sets another, weaker deadline than the one your student already missed.

For me it does not matter if they are minor or major contributors. I send the manuscript to everyone with a generous deadline for comments - usually 3-4 weeks if it is the first reviewing round, and 1-2 weeks after addressing their initial comments. The amount of time I give in the second round depends on how much changes they requested initially, e.g. if only grammar changes were required then 1 week or less seems acceptable.
If you have a time constraint and you cannot send the manuscript early, then I would tell the co-authors in advance that they should expect to receive the manuscript for comments on the date X and that they will have Y days to send back their comments. In this way you allow them to plan their schedule accordingly.
I learned to never ask for feedback/actions without defining a deadline, the chances of never hearing back from people is very high.

I agree with the general structure here, but personally, I'd probably reduce the timescales by an order of magnitude - 1 week for inital comments, 1-2 days for a final check/grammer check. Generally, for a minor contributor i'll say something like "I plan to submit on day X. I'f I don't here back from you by Y, then I'll assume you are fine with it as it is. If you do have comments, but don't have time by Y, please let me know before then". If I was writing something commissioned, the timeline for the whole thing may well only be a month from commission to submission.

@IanSudbery Yes, I also use the "silence means you agree with the submission". 1 week in my field is too short, I have clinicians with packed schedules as co-authors that couldn't accommodate such deadline. Maybe if I tell them in advance when I will send it for comments.

almost certainly discipline specific. I also tend to warn people that its coming, like you.

As someone who was once a somewhat new PI in Chemistry/Materials/Nano Science, I will offer up some tangential unsolicited advice.
As your career progresses, you will get plenty of opportunities for invited articles. It's ok to say no if you aren't in a great spot to have something of quality completed (with the idea that it's not just the work, but the writing, and editing, and approval of all authors). In my relative youth, I have agreed enthusiastically to many invitations only to have to disappoint the editor and miss deadlines. Why? Because my grad students didn't work as fast as I would like. Because my collaborators get hit with other deadlines or more important things. Because I made mistakes in realistic time management. The good news is... it's OK!
Keep doing good work. Publish when ready. Foster strong collaborative relationships (doesn't matter how minor their contributions may be). It's a marathon.
As noted in other answers, lose the concept of minor or major contributor. They are part of the team that is putting together the story you are going to publish.
To answer your main question. Just be honest with your collaborators. Tell them you have a deadline that you really need to hit, give them a reasonable 1-2 week turnaround time. Most people have been in the same place and will be sympathetic. Those that aren't are either not the nicest people, or they themselves have learned to say no because they simply have too much other stuff on their plate to make your deadline. Those that you can count on and are willing to be flexible collaborators are the ones you will want to keep working with as your career progresses. Those that are not communicative or unwilling to help are likely not worth your time going forward.

Your real problem is of course your relationship with your Ph.D. student. You have a duty to educate your Ph.D. students in how to write papers, and if they cannot do it (yet), you might have to decide how much of their task you are going to take over, and how you plan on getting them to be able to write papers.
You should inform your minor co-authors as soon as possible about the status of the paper. Maybe have a conference with them using a draft of the paper, and make it clear to them that there might be very little time for them to look at the finished product. Email is usually not a good medium for this. You setting deadlines is not a great idea, but co-authors are in general very helpful to get the paper sent off.

The last sentence doesn't make sense to me. See the last two words: "seen of". Do you mean "sent off" or something else?


text:
What to write in the followup email to a professor for a graduate teaching assistantship
I will be pursuing masters from UT Austin this fall.I have mailed professors for the position of  a teaching assistant. Some of them replied and some did not.
What should I write in the followup email to the professors who did not respond.
Thanks!

Do you know how teaching assistants hips are awarded in that department?  This is typically not under the control of individual professors in the US.

In such situations, it is always beneficial to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they have either (1) not seen your email or (2) seen it, but forgot to reply. Seeing that many academics are busy, let's assume that with such schedules any of the above two options are viable.
You can perhaps write something to the effect of "...I am writing to you once again, because I don't think you have received my earlier email...".
Good luck!