text:
Is it possible/acceptable to ask for wear & tear travel expense reimbursement?
An example: I've been using some suitcase, mostly (but not only) for traveling to conferences. Gradually, the wheels have wore out, and in my last trip I was walking over some gravelly road for a while and they're now completely busted. There are also small tears in a couple of places. So, for a trip I took last week, I bought a new suitcase. Again, I'm using it for conference travel, but of course also for strictly personal use.
In your experience, is it customary/acceptable/possible to ask for reimbursement for this kind of expenses - products which travel-related, not specific to the conference you're attending, and suffer wear over time?
Notes:

I'm a post-doc in the Netherlands, so if you feel your answer is academic-seniority-specific, or country-specific, please qualify it.
I actually spent a lot less on this trip then other people from my research institute - less than half, since I didn't stay at a hotel but with a friend. So it's not as though I'm artificially inflating the bill.
I realize one answer could be "just try it / ask about the institutional policy and see what happens"; but I want to hear about norms and customs.
I'm not asking about the ethics, I think it's perfectly ethical for me to make that request and get the money.
The suitcase cost 60 EUR, to give you a sense of the amount of money we're talking about.

If this was a case specifically for transporting equipment to conferences, I think you'd be fine... but as soon as you add "personal use", I think you're going to run into trouble. Nevertheless, I'm in the U.S., so I can't speak for if that will apply to the unis in the Netherlands.

You are not asking about ethics; the rest you can get from your Department / grant policy.

In grad school, my fellowship provided an "expense account" and I could have probably purchased luggage. I would look at the fine print of your grants/funding source or ask your PI about it.

I'm highly tempted to close this as "too localized". You should simply ask your department administrator whether this is an acceptable charge. The answer will almost certainly vary between universities and departments. There's no "universal" answer here.

I would just eat the cost and not ask for any reimbursement. One way to look at this would be to ask: What if you were a young student going to your first conference, and you didn't even own a suitcase? Would your school offer to buy you one? I've never heard of luggage being listed as a business expense, and it seems a bit outlandish to ask. It seems unlikely that a school would do this, and, even if they did, you might well lose some street cred just by asking.

Have you, are you, and will you use this suitcase exclusively for travel related work? If that's so you have a good point, if not, I would not see why a grant should pay for it. Even in the industry your firm doesn't pay for your luggage, unless you are a pilot or flight attendant.

As everyone else says, this is up to the specific policies at your institution, but it seems like a very unusual thing to ask for reimbursement for. Especially once you've used it for any non-business use, regardless of the major source of wear and tear. If you had a institution-owned computer, you might be able to justify the purchase of a carrying bag for that computer (but not cash reimbursement for wear on a bag you purchased previously), but not for a bag that carries your personal items like clothing, etc.

@eykanal: I do not want this to be about my suitcase, but rather about this kind of expenses. Edited to stress this a bit more.

@J.R.: Actually, I think it's not unreasonable for your employer to pay for a suitcase if it's your first one. Employers often buy their employees laptops, don't they?

@tonysdg: But think about the laptop example I just gave J.R.: Employers often provide their employees with laptops at their own expense - and these are obviously used for personal activities, like personal email or browsing or document authoring etc. Also, with expenses, you often take a few days after the conference - for the expenses during which you don't get reimbursed (fully/at all) - for sight-seeing, and you still get the flight home reimbursed even if it's "dual-use" - just like the suitcase.

@BryanKrause: See my reply to tonysdg.

@einpoklum Have you looked carefully at the limitations on how you use that computer? The rules might state company use only even if some personal use is quietly tolerated. Another area this comes up is in tax code, for example in the US you can deduct certain costs related to having a "home office" as business expenses. But if you play games in your office after hours, the whole thing is void! Tax law is relevant to expense reports because your company/institution is probably treating those costs as expenses; if you use any for personal use it becomes a type of income and must be taxed.

@einpoklum And as far as adding in personal travel to a business trip, the language is usually something like "if there is no further cost to the company/university" it is okay. If you stay 2 more days and pay for your own hotel but take a same-cost flight, there is no more flight cost to your institution. But your baggage spent those 2 days with you on your personal trip: 2 more days of wear and tear.

@BryanKrause: I have looked at the computer use limitations, and they were either non-existent or there was a "reasonable personal use" restriction. Now, as for taxation - I'm being taxed on these reimbursements anyway. I think. Actually, you know what, that's an interesting point, I should double-check the tax situation. As for the extra personal travel - often there is extra cost to the employer, e.g. the flight could be somewhat more expensive. But I've never seen this issue covered by official policy (never = 3 workplaces which have reimbursed me for travel).

Which is probably why others are recommending you check your employer's policies, but also caution you, as in the answer by @WolfgangBangerth, that asking might make you look petty. My institution allows for some minor flexibility with flight cost (i.e., you don't have to take a 6am flight the day after your conference if there is a 8:30 flight that costs 10% more) but I believe they do state a percentage. I've flown an additional personal inventory, such as leaving from a different city I was visiting, and had to provide documentation that the flight was cheaper than from my home city.

I guess really, why are you asking here? Do you want people's advice from their experience, or do you want us to tell you "Oh yeah you can reimburse whatever you want!" so you can use it as justification when your institution is mad at you later ("People on the internet said it was fine!")?

@einpoklum - I had thought about the laptop parallel when I made my comment, but there's often a good reason to issue laptops: standardization. When institutions issue laptops, they don't usually hand you a voucher and let you pick your own computer. Instead, they buy several identical machines which ensure that every student will be able to use all the software that may be required for coursework. I believe this helps the IT dept in the long run, too; it's easier to simply issue laptops than to contend with the tech issues that inevitably happen when a myriad of machines are in use.

@BryanKrause: The question is as it stands, we're just having some (friendly?) philosophical discussion in the comments. I hope someone says "I've seen many people's expense reports in state X and have never/occasionally seen this kind of reimbursement requested/approved" or "In universities Y Z and W, the reimbursement policy excludes/allows for such expenses".

I don't know about academia, but in industry allowable expenses often include a daily "personal allowance" to cover the miscellaneous extra costs of being away from home. How you spend that is entirely your own affair. On the other hand submitting a receipt specifically for the cost of a new case (unless the old one had been lost by an airline, or stolen from your hotel) would seem very strange, and would probably be refused, where I work.

This seems petty. You also don't account for wear and tear of your suit or shirt when you wear it at the conference. It's just one of those things you own in life, that wear out, and that you replace. The fact that you use a suitcase to transport your luggage -- in fact, the fact that you transport any luggage at all -- is your choice when going to a conference, and so it should also be your responsibility to replace it when the time comes.
All of that would be different if you were using a personal suitcase to transport things that are required for attending the conference. Say, if you were a vendor at an industry show associated with the conference, and you have to take product samples along. Or if your talk was on a new device, you took an example of the device along, and it would occupy a suitcase by itself.

With all due respect - your suggestion that taking a suitcase when travelling is some kind of "personal choice" suggests a very extreme opinion which is not in line with reimbursement policies anywhere that I know. You might as well tell me that buying food for 3 meals per day is a choice and my responsibility. Also, we don't account for wear and tear of clothes since those are: 1. very small amounts in terms of monetary worth, 2. difficult to quantity, 3. does not in itself involve money changing hands.

Sorry, but I agree with Wolfgang – a suitcase is a personal choice. (I went a long time without owning one: for a number of years I used my uncle's old duffel bag. Come to think of it, he probably gave it to me after he bought his first suitcase.) Moreover, you already have a suitcase, it just has broken wheels and a few small tears.

@J.R.: Suitcase, duffel bug, doesn't matter, same difference... I could have been using a duffel bag which got ripped. If you're saying that a suitcase is a luxury item, and there's a distinction between reimbursements for luxury and non-luxury items - that's an interesting answer and I would ask you to elaborate.

@einpoklum - I won't elaborate except to say that I think your analogy between a suitcase and meals is a poor one. If my employer expected me to travel for three days and not eat, I'd find that unreasonable – just like I think it would be unreasonable for me to expect my employer would pay for my new Samsonite.

@J.R.: A Samsonite suitcase  typically costs upwards of 200 USD. Are you sure you're not confusing the qualitative with the quantitative here? What if it was, say, a 30 USD duffel bag?

@einpoklum - Please. I was simply using "Samsonite" as a generic term for a suitcase. (It's a well-known brand in the US, and is sometimes used conversationally as a genericized trademark). It doesn't matter what you paid for the suitcase or what brand it is.

@einpoklum -- the difference between meals, tickets, conference registration on one hand, and a new suitcase on the other is that the costs for the former are clearly associated with one travel only. Replacing a suitcase, on the other hand, is like new clothes: it likely accumulated tears etc over a number of trips, some of which may in fact have been personal. It may be true that the wheels came off on this one trip, but it's not unreasonable to assume that damage to the wheels has accumulated over years of use before. In other words, it's difficult to attribute things to one specific travel.

You will have to check your local regulations at your institution. (my answer is based on my experiences at public US universities and companies)
Tax code may also be important in determining what items you can expense, both for yourself and your institution. For example, in the US you can deduct certain costs related to having a "home office" as business expenses. But if you play video games in your office after hours, the whole thing is void! Similar restrictions apply to other possibly dual-use items, such as a car (may be a business expense, but the rules for reimbursement change to those involving business use of a personal vehicle if you use it for anything that isn't business).
Tax law is relevant to expense reports because your company/institution is probably treating those costs as expenses, and therefore they are not taxed as income. If you use anything for personal use it becomes a type of income and must be taxed, even if your institution wanted to provide it. In that case, they would have to not only provide you with an expense reimbursement, but also add the amount to your income, withhold taxes as appropriate, etc (of course this system could vary greatly by country) - this all seems like it would be quite a bother, and if I were an administrator I wouldn't be too happy if a post doc, or full professor for that matter, made me go through all of that for 60 euros.
In my current institution's policies, there is a list of exclusions for business travel expenses. The item on that list that applies to your situation is:

Statement of Policy
Following is a list of expenses which are not payable/reimbursable with university funds. [...]
Personal items and services, (e.g. toiletries, luggage, clothes, haircuts, etc.)

I tried to find some information on business travel in the Netherlands, but I was only able to find information about allowed reimbursement amounts for transportation, lodging, and meals, which may suggest that those are the only categories commonly reimbursed, but it may also suggest that there is more freedom for specific institutions to set their own policies. Also I don't read Dutch, so I was limited to documents that were available in English.
If you had a institution-owned computer, you might be able to justify the purchase of a carrying bag for that computer (but not cash reimbursement for wear on a bag you purchased previously), but not for a bag that carries your personal items like clothing, etc. If this was permitted, it would probably be purchased for you or reimbursed the way you would be reimbursed for other types of equipment, not through the travel reimbursement procedures, and the bag would be institution property, so you would be leaving it behind with your business laptop when you leave the institution.

Ok, now this is an answer :-) ... it's interesting, by the way, since in my last workplace (which was a commercial company but in the research division) they did cover laundry for clothes, even though it's a personal service. I will definitely have a look at the tax situation.

Similar to @alephzero's comment above, my institution has shifted from reimbursing for specific expenses toward a "per diem" to be used as the traveler sees fit. In practice, it mostly goes towards meal costs and personal travel (like a taxi from a conference site to where you are eating, which is not normally covered because it's just so you can eat where you want). However, the traveler would be free to skip breakfast and do laundry instead. In other cases, laundry might be an acceptable expense when it saves money: i.e., on a long trip, laundry might be cheaper than a second checked bag.

You tagged this as "etiquette."  I will write an answer focused on the etiquette of the question.
Such expenses are part of the cost of doing business, as the accountants say.  To take such a petty view (thanks for the great word, Wolfgang), makes you look like a nitpicker, not a team player, and not a scientist.
Haven't you got better ways to spend your time than nickel and dime your employer for every last bit of juice you can squeeze out of the lemon?

I'm not sure what you mean by "the cost of doing business". I'm an employee with a low salary and zero job security.

@einpoklum - I learned the term from listening to a radio interview with a finance expert, who was explaining that when a country pays interest on borrowed money, that's just a "cost of doing business."  It turns out it is a standard phrase in the business world.  I am not finding a good, succinct definition or explanation for you, unfortunately.  This might make a good question on ELU SE.

What I'm saying is, that the "cost of doing business" is not supposed to fall on the low-pay employees, but on whoever is funding.

@einpoklum - Every individual has a CODB, a cost of staying afloat.  This includes, for example, clothing appropriate to the job.

Ok, now I get where you're coming from. I disagree, though, I mean travelling is a special aspect of business which is financed independently of your salary, which covers the kind of "cost of doing business" which clothes are. But it's a valid opinion I suppose.

@aparente001 -- you're welcome with the word. And nice reply with the "cost of doing business". I think that's exactly the right term here. One could also have said "opportunity cost". There are so many aspects related to jobs that one can call that way. Your example of dressing appropriately is one. In fact, a hot shower every morning is another. Driving the car or using the subway to work is another: you just have to do it in order to have a good job; the alternative is to work for minimum wage at the corner store two blocks down the road. I would think a suitcase falls in the same category.


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Are there any academic institutions operating on bodies of water?
Are there any (accredited/recognized) academic institutions with a significant part of their activities - administrative and academic - held over a body of water (sea, lake or river), on some floating platform?

The kind of platform could be boat or a barge; or if that doesn't exist,
then at least - buildings built directly on struts in the water without solid foundations (a-la Tolkien's Esgaroth, or Lake-town).
Notes:

Universities which have ships and/or operate ships and/or hold some classes on ships and/or send students out on trips on ships - don't count. The univesity or institute has to operate primarily on the barge/ship/floating platform.
Bonus points if it's a proper university and if what they teach is not just shipping/marine-related.
I don't want a recommendation of such institutions, nor a list of them, I just want to know if any exist.

The closest I could find is the Universitat Pirata in Viladecans, Catalonia. It's not on water, but it is a "pirate" university... Also, the legenedary Miles de Viviendas squat in Barcelona ran a "pirate university"  on waterfront in Barcelona's Port Veil, back in 2006.

It will certainly help if you elaborate why you want to know this.

@Wrzlprmft: Trivial interest, nothing more. I was talking to someone about house-boats and the conversation drifted to other things that happen on boats.

@Wrzlprmft I assumed that he wanted to teach on a boat. I really want to see if I can swing a semester at sea for my family now.

-1 I really don't get the point of this question (and the objections to existing answers are lame)...

@CoderInNetwork From the help centre: "You should only ask practical, answerable questions based on actual problems that you face." Being curious if there are floating universities is in no sense an actual problem. Plus, boat programming.

As mentioned by @DavidRicherby, this seems heavily inspired by the boat programming question. I would at least acknowledge this in the question itself.

@Bitwise: If I told you the question was not inspired by "boat programming", you wouldn't believe me (and I know this since it's already happened - see my comments above); and if I told you that it was inspired by "boat programming" you'd probably say "Ah, boat programming, so it's just a joke question, let's close it."

This doesn't seem to have anything to do with the "boat programming" question (which was intended as a rather subtle statement on community attitudes at the time), neither in spirit nor in subject. The only thing it has in common is the word "boat".

@CoderInNetwork: While one could argue whether it technically is a shopping question since there is no actual choice being made, it certainly has almost all the problems of a shopping question, namely having too many answers, a lack of an objective way of evaluating answers, and so on.

While I strongly agree that clarification on reasons would help this question greatly, I don't actually see it as a shopping question or having the "make a big list" failure mode, since it is asking for existence, not recommendation or enumeration.

@jakebeal: See third comment from the top. Perhaps I should mention I live in Amsterdam and there's a bunch of stuff on boats here (but not a university).

@einpoklum Ah, thank you --- my mistake for overlooking that comment.  I still like the question and think it's better without the "Boat programming" allusion.  The information that you just added further clarifies in a useful manner.

@jakebeal: I kind of resent having that removed when, say, questions like this one don't even get a comment mentioning "boat programming". Ah well.

@einpoklum Since all of this is community curated, feel free to be the one who raises it on that question. :-) For your question, though, I think it will have a much stronger chance of remaining open without the allusion.

Just a reminder that the final bullet point under "When shouldn't I comment" is "Discussion of community behavior or site policies; please use meta instead.".

Presumably the edit is designed to rule out my answer, but Semester at Sea holds all, not some, classes at sea. Meals are served at sea and the students sleep at sea. All student activies are at sea (except when they are in port). It sounds like you want the professional administration part of the university to be done at sea.

@StrongBad: No, the edit wasn't designed to rule out your answer (which I upvoted); there was another "university which has a ship" answer.

@jakebeal: Come on, you know I was going to get trampled on regardless. I might as well have kept it.

@einpoklum fair enough. The phrasing of the previous title ("Boat academics") was the main thing which suggested to me that the question is related to the boat programming question.

The Semester At Sea program is an established and respected program run by the The Institute for Shipboard Education, which I think only does this Semester at Sea program, and Colorado State University, which obviously has a lot of land based activities. The program offers a range of classes, but does not offer a degree (as far as I can tell).

See also Seamester. @einpoklum: Semester at Sea was formerly called "University of the Seven Seas" and later "World Campus Afloat". It's not clear what your objection is. CSU is a sponsor, and shares academic resources with it, but it's not a part of CSU. As Wikipedia says, "the program itself is run on a cruise ship."

The California Maritime Academy is an accredited part of the Cal State system; much of the instruction takes place on the Academy's ship, The Golden Bear.
While the curriculum has a Maritime focus, the Bachelor's degrees granted are in Engineering, Business, etc., and applicable to non sea faring pursuits.

+1, but they just send you out on a boat, the boat doesn't house the university, or a faculty. When you go on a boat it's like going on a field trip.

Not sure if that counts, but there is a very well rated university in Venice, Ca' Foscari. Its main building is in the center of Venice. I do not know in specific if this applies to it as well, but in general the buildings in Venice are constructed on wooden piles planted inside a layer of mud. In addition, it is quite common for Venice to be partially submerged due to high tides ("Acqua alta").

No, this doesn't count; if it were to count I could also list the University of Amsterdam which has buildings in blocks surrounded by canals. Venice was built on solid foundations.

@einpoklum If venice doesn't count, then why did you reference Tolkiens Esgaroth? Its the same principle. Lots of buildings in Venice do not have a solid foundation (some have, but not all), and Tolkiens used lots of things that suggest venice was a strong influence (masters of lake-town/doges of venice. If Venice shouldn't count, then you shouldN#t use Esgaroth as example, as its pretty much the same thing.

@Polygnome: No, it's not the same principle: Esgaroth is built on an actual lake and there are no foundations, just wooden struts/pylons. I agree Venice must have been an influence, but Esgaroth is "on the water" in a way Venice isn't. Even Esgaroth is not what I was really after, just a second-best thing. Sorry...

@einpoklum I do not follow your reasoning. Venice was build in a lagoon, on the water. How is that less on the water then in a lake? Wiki says "Constructed entirely of wood and standing upon wooden pillars sunk into the lake-bed [...]", which is exactly how Venica was build. So yeah...

@einpoklum The only difference is that they planted a lot of wooden pillars (and also consists of a few starting islands) https://venicewiki.org/wiki/Fondazioni_degli_edifici_veneziani . I suppose that the objection is that what's below the buildings is more "very watery mud" than water, but calling it "solid foundations" is a stretch

After Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in the fall of 2005, Tulane University housed a significant number of displaced students and faculty in a cruise ship moored on the Mississippi River. However, from what I understand classes were not held onboard and this arrangement was only in effect during the Spring Semester of the 2005-2006 school year. Tulane University press release from 2006.

There is also the Peace Boat with it's 'Global University'.

That's like a week long, according to the video. They don't have a university or a research institute on the boat. I mean, it's called a "university" but that's just a name. Still, it's really interesting so +1.

University at Sea exists to give 'practicing professionals' the chance to earn continuing education credits in their field. The courses are taught aboard cruise ships.

Providing CEU credits is not really what a university does

The OP asked for "academic institutions", which I interpreted in the broader sense. I assumed that mention of "University" was an example, not a requirement. Perhaps the OP can clarify?

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How/where do I publish a 50-page-long writeup?
I've written this document developing a new theoretical model, with many definitions, some examples (with diagrams), and some fundamental uses of this model which are closely intertwined with its definition (specifically, without them it is not clear why it's interesting at all). It does not present nor discuss experimental results.
So, this thing is shaping up to take somewhere between 45-50 pages (still working on a few parts of it). Granted, that's in 1-column mode and in the default font size of the article document class, and there are generously-sized diagrams, a TOC, references and an index - but still, pretty long. I don't think that a reasonable 10-12 page conference paper can be cut out of it: Either it would have no grounding and be based on hand-waving; or it would be bits-and-pieces all over the place; or it would be a long series of definitions which doesn't go somewhere very interesting. On the other hand, this is not book-length material.
My question is: How / in what kind of venue could I try to get this thing published?
Notes:

I'm in applied computer science, even if the document is somewhat theoretical/reflective.
I'm open to outside-the-box suggestions

You can always publish a shortened version in a journal (which generally have higher page allowances) and link to the full version on ArXiv, but that is probably not the preferred method for you.

@malexmave: I wonder if it's not the only method though.

Can some material be moved to an appendix? I am in Econ and many theory papers include several appendixes, including proofs for minor results etc.

A book chapter in LNCS series is a possibility?

@Memming: I'd be the only chapter in the book (un)fortunately; but - if you can write a couple of paragraphs that could be an answer for people in generally.

@Dawn: That might work for 20-page writeup, not 50.

There are journals in computer science that publish long papers. Logical methods in computer science is an example, although perhaps it is not the right venue for your current paper. However, I think it is likely there are journals in your specialty that would work.

@AndrésE.Caicedo: Are you sure that long-paper journals exist in many/most subfields of Computer Science? If you are, perhaps you could make this comment into an answer, with some examples.

Are you sure that 50 pages is too long for an applied CS journal paper? I'm in pure math and have several papers that are 50-70 pages long, and that's not too unusual in many areas of math.

Your paper has an index? Really?

@DanRomik: 1. It's not really a "paper". If I told I wrote a booklet you wouldn't be surprised. 2. My writeup defines multiple Foos, scattered in different places. So I have an Index of Foos.

The options are really to either find a place that will publish in the format that it is or to figure out how to break it up.
The first thing I would do is try and get an accurate estimate of the length. A 50 page document with the standard LaTeX font and margins that includes a TOC, index and big diagrams may not actually be too long for a lot of journals. Depending on the complexity of the article, you can try creating a "preprint" to get a pretty good approximation of length. A 20 page article can probably be made to stay under the maximum length requirements of many journals. Getting a 40 page article to work will likely not be possible.
In terms of breaking it up, you need to figure out how to chunk the work.

Either it would have no grounding and be based on hand-waving; or it would be bits-and-pieces all over the place; or it would be a long series of definitions which doesn't go somewhere very interesting.

Trying to publish bits-and-pieces all over the place is going to be painful. Most reviewers want some sort of cohesive story. The other two options sound like dividing the work into two chunks. The first chunk seems like something you could publish in a good journal if somehow the theoretical grounding was published.
The second chunk seems boring that no good journal is going to want to publish. I see three approaches to getting it published. The first is to publish the second chunk as a stand alone item. Depending on your field you might be able to publish it as a methods article or in a methods journal. You could also target a low impact journal/conference that is targeting work that is slightly better than pay-to-publish quality and doesn't really care if things are interesting. Finally, you could use something like ArXiv (or whatever your field uses) to self publish the work.
The second option is to publish the second chunk as supplemental material in a journal that allows that. Here is an example of what APS supplemental material can include.
The final option, and probably the most difficult, is to find a journal that allows big appendices.

Does CS regularly do books with chapters and/or monographs?  50 pages in the humanities is a perfect fit for a chapter in a book.  Or alternatively, could it perhaps be beefed up and published as a short-ish monograph?

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Refereeing papers on behalf of a professor: should it be listed on a CV?
My professor sometimes asks me to referee papers for him.
Should I list the corresponding journals in the professionals activity section of my CV?

Yes, if your professor explicitly lists you as a reviewer or sub-reviewer with the program committee of the conference/journal; no if your review is then edited by your professor before submission.

This is a very good point.  If you are an official referee, recognized as such by the journal, then you can certainly list it on your CV.  If you are just helping your advisor out behind the scenes, with no official recognition, then you shouldn't list it.  The reason is that listing it on your CV shows two things: that you are doing your duty and that editorial boards view you as an expert.  If you're not the official referee, then you are still doing your duty, but it's not a sign of expertise (your advisor might have asked you more as a learning experience than to get your expert opinion).

I disagree with the last point; even if your review is edited by your advisor, you are still a coauthor of the review and you still deserve credit.  Do not agree to review "on behalf of" someone else without explicit permission from the journal/conference. The editor might be seriously unhappy with the idea that your professor isn't actually writing the review that they agreed to write.

Yes. It is the very prototype of service to the professional community that you want to show that you are willing to perform.
The question that Scrooge linked to has good advice for how to do so.


text:
How can one learn from poor teaching evaluations?
I teach at a large R1 state university, and I just received my teaching evaluations for Fall 2013. Usually I get excellent evaluations, but this time my evaluations for Calculus II were an unpleasant surprise. My numerical scores were mediocre, and representative student comments included: "Answers were obscure"; "can sometimes be cryptic when answering questions"; "didn't really answer questions".
These comments do not appear to be sour grapes, as the same students didn't complain heavily about the workload or grading of the exams. Moreover, I got excellent teaching evaluations when I taught Calc I a year ago, at the same university, with the same philosophy and style, with similar course policies, and with a comparable workload. Clearly, I did something wrong with regard to this course in particular.
I e-mailed both of my TAs, and only got encouraging comments ("I thought you did a good job"). I then e-mailed the class, and explained that my teaching evaluations were poorer than I expected, and asked students to offer criticism and suggestions for the benefit of future Calc II students. No responses.
So, apparently my teaching left room for improvement but I have no idea what to improve. This is quite uncomfortable -- is there anything useful I can do here?

From the students' homework/exam, can you tell they understood the contents of the course? Calc II is harder than Calc I. Could it be the case that Calc II was just too much for them? In other words, must it be your problem? not theirs?

Clearly, I did something wrong with regard to this course in particular. I don't think this is clear at all.  Perhaps you just got a little lucky last year, and a little unlucky this year.  All sorts of factors (obviously, the set of students, but also the time of day, etc.) can strongly impact the evaluations.  I don't think you should ignore the comments, but I don't think this obviously requires a dramatic response.

As a current student I thought I could put a little input in, but as busy students finally done with a semester and moving on to different things, I'm not surprised you got didn't get any responses to your second email about your poor evaluations. Students are slow and often don't even do the first round of evaluations, and a second response is even less likely. From they're responses it sounds like students didn't have a core understanding of some of the content.

I'm an average teacher myself. I attended my friend's class, who gets the highest evals. I really couldn't tell why the students liked him so much: I thought he was not very rigorous and nothing special. However, two things were clear: he smiles a lot, really a lot, and looks like he's having fun, plus he grades generously. I noticed that if you return generous grades to students half-way through the course, they'll be very happy (I don't bother myself as I don't care about my evals). Were you going through a stressful time personally, lack of sleep, on a diet? Could make a difference!

Addition to AlexD's comment:  As a former student, it's waaaay too easy for your email to your students to just look like you want someone to blame.  I'm not surprised there were no responses.

@PatrickTs comment is good - looking enthusiastic about your topic is insanely important for being perceived a good teacher.

@PatrickT, as a student I can definitely say the smiling and happy teachers help so much when taking a class. When I think about it all of my teachers at least acted liked they enjoyed teaching the course and had a passion for the subject. Having that 'electric' attitude can resonate a lot with students, and not just make it seem like a boring lecture. I think if you add in the smiles, joke a round a bit in class, you'll be able to connect a lot better with students. Not just seeming better either, I think it will more actively engage them and grab their attention.

@Alex D, agreed, but in the joke department you must tread carefully, I only go for the safe kind!

@PatrickT of course, one of my ECE professors always went for the corny kind of jokes your Dad would make, they're so bad you have to laugh, and nothing that could even get close to crossing a line. We always new when they were coming, but no matter we were still laughing.

There was a study (couldn't find the reference) that was showing that the feedbacks from undergrads does not measure the quality of the teaching at all. So it is wise to take those feedbacks with a grain of salt.

Ben Norris's answer is excellent but I would add one additional point to it. When you are asking for constructive feedback from the students, you must do so in a way that students feel completely comfortable that their honesty is not going to come back to bite them.
At the end of every semester, I email all of my students a web-based survey with some open and some closed questions specifically so I can get their honest opinion. Again, the key is that all responses are anonymous. I believe if I asked them to email me (not anonymous) I would get nothing but praise, which does not help me improve at all. While I do still get many positive comments, there are usually some small gems in there which help me improve.

I don't think anonymity is the only way to convince students that honesty won't bite them.  Offering some type of reward would also do that.  You have to evaluate the ethics policy at your university, but for a student to receive a small gift card ($10) or a school logo shirt from the university bookstore in exchange for spending an hour offering very detailed feedback on a course seems quite equitable.

@scaaahu I have to agree with Ben. Anonymity is not the key. The key is what 2st paragraph of the answer explains: the trust that good negative feedback won't be punished. I usually manage to build such a relationship with my students (based on being fair, friendly etc.) that after the term they are willing to simply give me some feedback openly when I approach them.

@BenVoigt:  The point of anonymity is not just getting the students to give feedback, but trying to help with gathering useful feedback.  I agree with earthling that students are less likely to provide constructively critical comments in non-anonymous feedback.

"if I asked them to email me (not anonymous) I would get nothing but praise": throughout my undergrad, at the end of each semester, I emailed my feedbacks to prof.s directly; they contained harsh criticism, observations, positive points, all sorts of things, but above all the points I made were realistic and I didn't mention anything that I thought was really important. I understand the importance and the reason behind anonymity, but when people know they will only give feedback without getting any response to that feedback, they might be somewhat unrealistic.

@onurcanbektas There might be a cultural difference here.

Here are two things you can do:

1) Since the comments you mention have to do with the way you answer questions in class, perhaps it is time to explain your approach.

Sometimes all you need to do is explain at the beginning of a course why you are doing certain things. For example, if you do not like giving full answers to questions so that your students still need to work out part of the answer (and it sounds like that is perhaps the case), explain on the first day of class why you think this approach is beneficial. Perhaps you noticed that your students were more engaged and did better on exams after you started this approach. Let your students know that! It will help them buy in to the strategy. Explaining potential peculiarities of your instructional approach is especially useful if you are teaching the second or third course in a sequence, and you did not teach the earlier courses (this is the case). The students are used to different styles. If they were used to an instructor telling them the complete answer all the time, then they will not like what you do unless they understand it. You probably had fewer objections when you taught calculus I, since you set the expectations for those students on how a calculus class would go.

2) Ask some of your colleagues to periodically sit in on your class.

This is a good way to catch negative behaviors that you might be unaware of. The other benefit is appearing open to constructive criticism about your teaching. Having colleagues sit in on your courses also helps separate "students did not like what I did" from "what I did was bad". Just because students did not like, does not mean that it is a poor method of instruction (see point #1 above).

You can ask co-teachers for their opinion on the feedback even if they didn't sit in the class and didn't see you teaching. Especially if they saw you giving seminars or so, they might give you some good ideas as what happened and how to prevent it next time.

There are several ways this can happen. scaaahu provides one good reason, that students found Calc II harder than Calc I and was not prepared for it. Another reason could be that some person or group of persons in the student group infect the others with a sentiment. I have seen this happen and it only takes one dominant person to get others on the train.
Your description of the evaluations and your digging into them, with no response form the students, should tell you that the problem primarily is not yours in terms of teaching etc. The only thing you may consider thinking about is how you introduced the class. Setting the tone at the beginning of the course (or earlier if that is possible in your system) and thereby preparing them for the course can be a powerful tool to reduce complaints. This is all about the expectations and if expectations are wrong, it may lead to discontent.
As I was writing this a good response from Ben Norris was posted so I can only agree with that reply and let my anwser add to his.

Good point about some students infecting others. Like Ben Webster says in his comment, little can make a big difference.

Not only have I taught engineering courses for 10+ years and had to have students (corporate students) fill out evals after every 2-4 day class but I also built/run the company's evaluation system.  In my opinion the following are things that heavily influence evaluations:

The student's view of the topic.  If students don't want to take your class because they hate math but yet have to fulfill a requirement then your evaluation will be lower - for sure.  This is the #1 factor.  You can easily see this if you add questions to your survey like "What is your interest in CLASS_FIELD?" (1-5) or "Why did you take this class?" (choices being part of major, liked topic, whatever, other).
Students want learning to be easy.  If you made them do a lot of nonsense work for little payoff they will not be happy.  I had a teacher make us write these essays once a week and the 15 essays were 10% of our grade.  Just a ton of work and it mattered very little to our grade.  "How would you rate the workload (I don't like that word but you get it) of the class taken?"
Be clear about your goals of the class.  Make sure you discuss at the beginning what you will cover and a brief outline of chapters in a book, other materials covered, and if there will be class discussion questions not found in those.  You do not have to tell them exactly what topics are on the test but there needs to be a happy medium between "Know Everything" and "Here are the exact topics".  Your survey should have a question that says something like "Were the tests and assignments reflective our your expectations from the syllabus?"
As a teacher you need to make sure that your goals are aligned with the school's goals.  Is your goals to have happy students after your class?  Seems like the easier classes would rise to the top then or the classes that are more topical at least.  The way to truly evaluate you as a teacher is to test their retention of the materials at 3-6 months.  Not a flat out test, but do they still understand the concepts of the class?  Even this can have a lot of noise because batches of students will fluctuate (but you could fix this with a pretest).
Culture and individualism.  Nothing you can do in an anonymous survey to get around this.  Basically there are certain cultures and groups that feel like a 3 out of 5 is really really good.  While others may think that is horrible.  You can label whatever but you cannot account for this noise in numbers.  However you can figure out if this is the issue with blank essay boxes - at least one that is mandatory.  If you really want a good mandatory feedback question (which is negative) "What about this class would you change?"
Knowledge of the instructor and comprehension level of topic.  You are teaching Calculus I and II right?  Moderate level of difficulty.  So you probably get some brownie points with students if you know your stuff well AND more importantly you can explain the difficult points in an easy to understand way.  I see instructors at my company get good scores because they are an expert (maybe the only expert) in a field.  Some of these people can barely form a coherent thought but still good scores.  But still that is the expectation of some students - they want the best/smartest teaching them.  So... "What was your instructor's skill level on the classroom topics?" (1-5) "How well did your instructor explain classroom topics?" (1-5)

Now how do you make students fill out an eval.  Well in my company (100 instructors) we tell them the eval is used to do attendance so they don't get credit without it.  If your school cares they would do the same.  If you want to know what range of questions get people to respond, I gave some hints but that is a different question.
Also we tend to call our evaluations the "happy forms".  This is because generally the instructors act all happy before giving the online surveys out (they are fully anonymous and they generally follow Kirkpatrick I).  I have witnessed instructors saying all kinds of positive things to their class and even some passing out treats during the eval/survey.  Of course students will give the instructor better scores.  Your variance from one class to another could have had just as much to do with your attitude and mood the 30 mins leading up to your survey than compared to the entire semester.

Don't wait for the end-of-semester evaluation. It does not give us a chance to improve the students' experience. And it usually causes the teachers a lot of remorse and confusion. Instead, incorporate a mid-term evaluation. Send online questionnaire to students and solicit their comments on aspects like i) if their expectations are met, ii) if the objectives are fulfilled in a regular base, iii) challenges they face, iv) and suggested improvements. Address their concerns and lay out your revision right after you have checked the results.
Use anonymous channels such as online questionnaires (Qualtrics or SurveyMonkey) or forum (TodaysMeet, which works like Twitter.) Compared to getting students' criticism from their e-mail, I think I will have better luck to talk a tiger into giving me its hide.

In my experience, the noise in course evaluations is around 1 point out of 5.  My evidence for that is that I once taught the same course twice at the same time with the same book, the same syllabus, the same homework, and very similar exams.  Not only was the evaluation rating on my teaching different by almost one point out of 5, but the ratings of how appropriate the book/homework/exam was were also different by around 1 point out of 5.  I had another similar experience TAing two sections of the same course (where the quizzes and exams were set by the professor) and where the class got rated 6/7 in one and 5/7 in the other.  Students' expected grades have a huge impact on the ratings.  So although you should definitely pay attention to your student ratings, it's also very important to smooth out the noise.

Yes, this happens to me every semester as we have twinned-sessions for all courses. For the early morning session I get 10 to 15% dropouts, and negligi(ea?)ble dropouts for the afternoon sessions, with much better evals for afternoon classes: randomly assigned students, exact same content.

@PatrickT: Sometimes the "noise" can be identified as something other than noise though.  For instance, I would expect the time of day that class is held might have a huge impact on the scores.

@Mooing Duck, exactly what I meant yes.

"Answers were obscure"; "can sometimes be cryptic when answering
  questions"; "didn't really answer questions".

This makes it sound to me that students never really understood the core content of Calc II. It was a problem I personally struggled with and needed a tutor to solve. Often students will be able to complete homework and quizzes of Calc II content (especially tougher content of sequences and series), even though they don't fundamentally understand what is going on. Calc II is quite a course, as many students test out of Calc I and their first college math course is Calc II. With often a new way of thinking, and representations of problems that students have never seen, Calc II is extremely difficult. I'd suggest (especially with like Power, Maclaurin series, etc.) that you take extra time to explain to students at the most basic level what is going on and move forward. Relate it to real life scenarios if possible, and give a few examples of where such problems are used in real life. I think they're missing key connections which make understanding the course a lot easier.
While I don't think you're a bad teacher, I think there is a slight disconnect here between you and your students. Obviously your level of understanding at the content is much higher than theirs, and what you may think is an easy subject to understand, could be the complete opposite to your students. While your students probably understand how to complete many of the problems in Calc II, from what you've said I doubt they have a true understanding of the content.

+1 for "Calc II is extremly difficult". Tougher courses often tend to get worse feedback, simply because they're tougher.

@MooingDuck, from my understanding of the question he's comparing to his previous experience teaching Calc I. "got excellent teaching evaluations when I taught Calc I a year ago", "Clearly, I did something wrong with regard to this course in particular." Makes it sound a lot like this was his first time teaching Calc II

@AlexD: Don't I feel foolish, I completely overlooked that he was comparing Calc I to Calc II.

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text:
Should I mention a "math depression" I went through in my letter of motivation?
I am a master student in mathematics studying in Europe and I am applying to several graduate schools in the USA. They aren't all Top 10 in these dubious rankings, but I am applying to Harvard, Northwestern and Rutgers.
Currently, in the first paragraph of my letter of motivation (=letter of intent, statement of purpose, personal statement, ...) I explain how I overcame a big slump (=phase in which I had not much motivation to learn maths) which I went through after completing my bachelor, so roughly 1 year ago.
I mention it because this was an important experience to me, and as a result I feel like a more mature mathematician, and I am now confident that I want to do maths in my life.
However, I read that one should never put negative things about oneself in the letter of motivation, so right now I'm having doubts.
Could people on the admission committee consider having gone through a slump a negative point? Do they only want to hear how awesome I was my entire life?

How would you feel when you review someones SoP, and he writes he was sick of [subject he applies for] for a month.
think of how  they would read it, they could read that as very negative :)

@Dylan Yeah, that's what I fear. On the other hand, I get the impression that having a math burnout is actually relatively common. It may not be among the professors reading my application, though ;)
Also, I explain how having this burnout actually helped me in the end, which in my opinion really is  the case. Before that I had this rather unreflecting approach of doing maths because "what else is there? I've always done maths!", now I really know it is the right thing for me..
I guess in the end my question has no definite answer and it is left for me to decide it.

that's very true. After studying Software Engineering I got a "burn out" as well. I was so sick of it I studied physics. Then went back to SE afterwards, and know I'm in the right place :)

an overcome of a negative event is a big positive. Focus on that positive.

Actually, I kind of disagree with @TheHiary... I don't think you should put negative statements about yourself in your cover letter.
While they do not want to only hear how awesome you would be, they do want to hear how, and why, you would be totally awesome working for/with them. You can look up some tips and guidelines about writing a cover letter here: A good motivation letter.
I also think that any half-page story has no place in your cover letter. It should be fairly short, clear and memorable/striking. I was suggested two pages maximum. One page is better.
But, if it was an important experience for you as a potential researcher, there's definitely place for it in your cover letter, just not directly.
What you should include, however, is:

what helped you get back your motivation
(you can say that e.g. a project made you "rediscover your love of science" without explicitly saying that you lost it for a while)

how your approach to research has changed in a positive manner
(e.g. working on the team project made me realize how important and helpful peer input, informal discussions and exchanging ideas was for my productivity)

how your vision of science/yourself changed after that
(e.g. working with Professor X. what made me secure in my opinion that I want a career as a researcher)

basically, any positive result of your experience is worth mentioning, but I would rather mention just what triggered the positive change of attitude instead of motivation-less period before

Thanks for your answer! Your first link ("[here]") seems to be empty.
I kind of agree that my half-page story is too long, but then again the biggest part is a description of what fun stuff I learned to regain fun at doing maths plus the conclusion that I feel more mature and ready for a PhD now. I will still try to cut out the more negative part as you suggest, and I think your second and third bullet points especially are very good advice that I can use. Merci!

I agree that you shoudn't put negative statements about yourself in your application, but recovering from depression is not negative!

There, I edited in the link. There was a question about cover letters here, but it referred to them as "motivation letters". The bullets are just examples, but basically, my personal preference would be: talk about all the good from the recovering part, and let the depression part be just implied. You can't deny it, but don't write "I was depressed and could not work for months". Even if the next sentence talks about how you got out of it, the first one might have already made too strong of an impression.

How about "I got out of depression I had for a few months." ?

@scaahu well, it wasn't really a depression and I wouldn't want to throw this term around lightly. Instead I write that I felt exhausted and briefly explain what lead to this. Then I go on to describe how I recovered, which is important in my case, and what I learned from this experience.
Thanks for your answer, penelope and thanks also for your input, @JeffE! I'm going to accept this answer very soon, but I just want to wait a bit longer to see if anyone else wants to take a shot.

@Parisien As this answer indicates, it's about the spin. Any big negative that became transformational to your life can be talked about, and arguably should. But do so positively. Leave the negativity implicit at best. Make sure it is clear that you have purpose and passion that can last a career. Avoid anything that suggests to the contrary.

First, having observed graduate education in mathematics for a long time, very many people encounter their own period(s) of extreme disheartenment _in_grad_school_, for the obvious reasons of the challenges, but also for having not thought through the level of commitment to the enterprise that's required to make it work, and how delayed the gratification may be.
(So to a large degree it's not whether one has an episode, but when, and what happens afterward...)
Thus, if portrayed well, acknowledging such an experience already weathered could be a big plus, if the net was that you have a clearer purpose and clearer interest in mathematics, etc.
Maybe this oughtn't be the first point you make, and not in the cover letter, just toward the end of the personal statement... so if anyone is interested to read that far, they may also be interested in your remarks. In fact, thinking it's worth reading statements of purpose may be well-correlated with sympathy and interest in your having worked-through a bad period.

Youll hear a lot of "rules" in presentation and writing. There are no real rules, only guidelines.
For this question specifically the guideline is:
If you take your audience to depths, definitely bring them back to end a higher point. Do not end in the depths. If you experienced hardship, it has to be the second act in your story arc. The story must include how you learned and grew and are now a different, better person.
Always leave the audience feeling better at the end. Your goal is not to inform, but to enhance the audience. (Informing is a good route to making the audience feel better but thats a different conversation)
This might be tricky in a short letter, but youre talented. Im sure it can be done. I personally would stick with a purely upward story arc in this specific scenario, but saying it cant be done is false.


text:
What is the status/reputation of the University of South Africa (UNISA)?
I would like to follow PhD studies in my field of Computer Science. The problem is that I have to work in my native country. I have read that this university, UNISA, is known because of their online Master and Doctoral studies.
The question that I have is because I see different comments from people from United States or Europe that wanted to enter into this online degrees. Does anybody have experiences or know if that university is worldwide recognized? Or would it be only a waste of money and time? In case of the latter, which institution of quality offers online PhD degrees in CS?
Consider that this question is not focused locally, because as I mentioned in the aforementioned paragraph; there are people from all over the world that want to take those UNISA degrees.

I have never heard of a reputable online PhD program in computer science (or any other field).

UNISA is a telematic (and massive) university, their masters and PhD programs (full dissertation type) are handled very similar to other masters and PhD programs.  I would suggest you get a list of supervisors and then check their backgrounds, to ensure they have the necessary skills. This university is very popular in the southern hemisphere, has huge physical locations in Pretoria and Johannesburg, and has various research related on-site workshops for masters and PhD students including everything from R to SPSS. (Disclaimer: completing my M here currently).

This university is very poorly ranked internationally and doesn't even feature on most ranking lists. Be very wary, as these "online" universities often aren't very active in research.

I offer the following evidence from credible and official sources against doing a PhD in Computer Science at UNISA:

Low graduation rates:  17 doctoral students graduated from the College of Science, Engineering, and Techonology (which includes the PhD in Computer Science degree) in 2010, 2011, and 2012 combined. Compare this to the 99 doctoral student enrollments five years earlier in 2005, 2006, and 2007 (combined). Graduation rates are expected to be somewhat low for distance learning students, but rates this low are a bad sign. (PDF source)
Inadequate supervisory capacity: The school admits that "many [research] areas in the School of Computing have reached supervisory capacity" and says that "long waiting lists started forming due to lack of supervisors," which is another worrying sign.  (Same source)
Very, very low research output: Research output is arguably the most important indicator of a reputable PhD program. On this page, 6 professors in the School of Computing (which offers the PhD in Computer Science degree) are listed as having openings for PhD students. I looked up the Google Scholar and/or DBLP profiles of these 6 (for those that had them) and consulted personal pages of the rest to get a sense of their research productivity.

Averages across two years (2012 and 2013), the number of publications per person per year was 0.58 on average (range of 0-1.5)
Of the 7 publications I found for these professors in 2012 and 2013, 3 were in conferences or journals with the name "Africa" in the title (i.e., not international venues). So the average publication rate per person per year in non-local venues was 0.33.

Good answer - but I'm unclear why having "Africa" in the title indicates it's not an international venue or journal. Is this a peculiarity of Computer Science, that it considers Africa to be a single country, or is something else going on?

@EnergyNumbers by "not international" I meant "not global," i.e. likely to be localized to a particular region.

I'm a postdoc at the Computer Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, and do collaborate with some researchers at UNISA. However, this is with the Department of Decision Sciences, rather than Computer Science - I don't know the latter.
When it comes to PhD studies, generally the advisor plays a large role, too, compared to the university. I'd recommend to look at what and where the potential advisors for you publish, where their co-authors are from etc to get a vague impression how connected and well-regarded they'll be in your chosen discipline.

I do not have a direct experience with UNISA, but this kind of universities (having massive number of students) does not have international reputation usually. They normally address the local needs for graduating professionals, but what pushes a university among top ones is interactive connection of the staff and students, which is almost impossible to be conducted in a university with 5,000 staff and 300,000 students (even in the digital world).
Thus, if you do care about your education and reputation of your PhD degree, it is more reasonable to choose a university with international standards.

UNISA is internationally recognized. The small numbers of students passing, shows by itself that it is not a piece of cake.
I did my Bsc Computer Science and believe me I had to work hard to pass and graduate.
Once you are there, the work load, assignments, deadlines etc, makes you forget that you are at a distance learning institution. It felt the same as when I was at a residential school.
I am currently doing my Msc Electronic Eng in the UK. It was the same UNISA credentials that took me there.
So no worries, please go with UNISA and you shall not regret.
Inacio Lote GIMO

This answer seems at best anecdotal. The statistics mentioned were for graduating PhD's, not bachelor students. There is a big difference. And being internationally recognized is not the same as being well-known or respected, it just means that the institution is not a scam.


text:
I have noticed GPA calculation "bug" in our University, what should I do?
University X offers course Y with Z credits. The course is mandatory, and very important. It lasts for more than one semester with heavy workload. The University awards Z credits for the course Y, but it only includes Z/2 credits in the GPA calculation.
This is where the story gets a bit personal. I assume the University includes only Z/2 credits in GPA calculation because the majority of the students do very bad in this course. But, that is not the case for me. If I have the Z amount of credits calculated for my GPA, it is increased for 0,3, which I believe can make the difference at some point.
I asked the officials at the examination regulation department about this situation, they said: "that was the case from the day when the program you study was established". Not convinced at all.
What should I do? Should I complain somewhere, should I ask for a specific GPA calculation for myself. In the end of the day it should be in the interest of the University to have students with good GPAs, hence I believe they do all this calculation "trick". And I believe I would not be asking for something "illegal".
What is the clever thing to do when one finds such regulations in own University which can be used on one's own good?!?

In case of need GPA calculation is done as follows:
(sum over all (number of credits for the given course x grade)) / number of credits used in calculation
example:
((course with 4 credits x grade) + (course with 6 credits x grade) + (course with 12 credits x grade)) / 22 (4 + 6 + 12 this case)
Note: From the comments it seems as my intention is to get in a battle of changing regulations at my University. That is not the case at all. I am just trying to find a nice way of using this situation on my benefit, by having some convincing discussions with the officials.
Additional Note: After digging through some documentation, I found an examinations regulations document which states clearly how the GPA is calculated, but does not give a reason for this type of calculation. I am also surprised to learn that minor subjects are not included in the GPA calculation. I also learned that the Final Thesis awards M credits, but in GPA calculations is weights ~2M credits. What bugs me at the moment is, why the University officials hide this information in all the other publicly available presentations. And their answers are not convincing to me.

What is the relationship between this courses credits and a normal 1 semester course?

@StephenTierney 1 : ~4 ; basically the grade of this course ~4 times as much as a usual grade

From what you write, it sounds like there is an honest error in the calculation of the GPA (I wouldn't suggest that the university is trying boost its student's GPA by mis-calculating it). You can try to talk with the administration of your department, or even address this issue to the dean of students office. A student union (if you have one in your school) might wish to be involved as well.

Are you saying that you told the school already and they have confirmed that it is intentional and that they do not intend to change it? That's the sense I get from your writeup but the other comments suggest that might not be the case.

What do you mean by It lasts for more than one semester? Exactly how long it lasts? Please explain.

How far along are you in your degree?  I find it hard to comprehend how half weight on a single course, even if that course is weighted at 4 times, could make any appreciable difference to your GPA.  Arguing this doesn't seem worth your time.

@BenjaminMakoHill Well, they behaved "politically correctly" and just said what I have written in the question: that has been always the case, we don't know why

@scaaahu It lasts 2 semesters

Just to be sure: this is not a case of this 2-semester course being listed twice, each time with X/2 credits, is it?

@KlausDraeger I had that in mind as well; but not, that is not the case

@WolfgangKuehne - Is it possible that you're just misreading the documentation?  Are you willing to link it?  Your latest edit makes it sound very strange.

snapshot https://www.dropbox.com/s/fjwxkbcv806p9xi/snapshot.png

@Articuno I never doubted that they do the things based on some regulation. My question is stated above the horizontal line

"I have noticed GPA calculation “bug” in our University, what should I do?" Exploit it.

I'd hold off on your conspiracy theories as to why the GPA is computed the way it is.  You are entitled to a grade computed in an accurate and transparent manner, but if you go into this process assuming the university is out to get you, you're going to have a bad time.
(Note that from your terminology, I think that your university system may be different from the US ones I know, so take with a grain of salt.)
Credit for classes isn't assigned at someone's personal whim.  If the university does have a policy of computing the GPA based on Z/2 credits for this class, that's a decision that must have been made by some committee and approved by some administrators, and there will be a record of it.  Most likely, it would be published in the university's course catalog or official regulations, so my first suggestion would be to read through those carefully.  If it's mentioned there, then you are expected to have understood and agreed to it, and that's the end of it.  (If the policy was put in place after you entered the university, you may have the right to have the previous policy applied, but it doesn't sound like that is the case here.)
If you don't find it, it's reasonable to ask someone if they can show you where the policy is documented.  (If you have an advisor or someone else assigned to advise you about which courses to take and your progress in the program, they may be helpful too.)
If you still don't get a good answer (probably unlikely), you could talk to more people (e.g. a department chair).  Note that if you were told about it in advance, even informally, you'll probably be considered to have understood and agreed, and the best you can hope for is to get it more clearly documented for future students.
Throughout the process, I recommend keeping the tone of "I'm confused by the system and am trying to understand it better" rather than "you've cheated me out of my rightful grade".  And always keep track of what you actually hope to gain and whether your efforts are worth it - if you lock yourself in an epic battle with the university just over "the principle of the thing", it's not going to have good results for your academic career, your relationship with your professors and peers, or your own sanity.

Well, I did my research prior to this post. Officials and other students say that is the case, but we don't know why. I went through the University regulations and welcome presentations. Everybody emphasizes the importance of the course by pointing to the fact that is has ~4 time more credits than another course, but no one says that only half of the credits will be used in GPA calculation

It appears to me that the course is something like 4 credits but you only get 2 credits towards your GPA. Well if you are getting 2 credits then you should only pay for 2 credits and not 4... This is something your university should consider

What is the clever thing to do when one finds such regulations in own University which can be used on one's own good?!?

I'm so glad you asked.  The clever thing would be to realize that the best way to raise your GPA is to do excellent work in all your courses.  Aside from being the optimal strategy GPA-wise, this has the fringe benefit that it is the only strategy with inherent rewards beyond the GPA game.
Look, I don't know where you're enrolled, but your university has taken a step down a dark road by playing with weighting GPA's differently than the number of credits or course hours (which is the weighting which corresponds to the actual instructional time and, ideally, to the workload of the course).  You're contemplating a further step down this dark road by trying to play games with their game.  It is up to them how they compute the GPA.  I disapprove of their strange weighting system, but do you know what's even worse than a globally enforced strange weighting system?  A student who asks for "a specific GPA calculation for myself".
Just rise above.  See if you can recapture the quaint idea that your goal is to learn the course material rather than attain a certain number at the end.  Or, if you feel that the world has moved on and that number that you get at the end is too important to your future to so naively dismiss, then respond by GETTING BETTER GRADES.  Merciful Minerva, we live in strange days.

Interesting article in a recent NY Times about "internal motivation", a generalization of your excellent answer:  http://nyti.ms/1qG0jiO

@pete I agree with the overall idea of your answer. But I don't see why asking for my credits being computed appropriately would be a continuation of the dark game. Moreover, how "a (correct) specific GPA calculation for myself" is worse than institutional misbehavior.

@Wolfgang Kuehne I used to be a pretty much extreme version of what Pete seems to describe (too GPA conscious). The good things about it are: [1] You have a clear goal you can set and track each semester [2] It makes you look good indisputably. Later I learn to realize that [2] is minor, many people at high places don't really care. I still think I got the material quite well that is I got from each course more than just a (good) number, but the GPA conscious mentality set up the habit and tendency of being too .. 'calculative'. Most people don't see that as a good human characteristic.

@Wolfgang: If you actually find out that your GPA is being computed incorrrectly, then sure, you should get it fixed.  But there is no evidence of that whatsoever: rather it is being computed in a way that turns out to be less than advantageous to you.

It doesn't seem particularly remarkable or "dark" to me that a course exists that's a lot of work (hence 4x credits), but which is slow going and so whose content is less inherently valuable per hour (hence only 2x grade). I guess the "darkness" in trying to make the GPA reflect success-at-valuable-things instead of success-per-hour, is that it dispels the very useful administrative fiction that all courses have equal inherent value per hour, by admitting that at least one course does not. Once you try to measure something that subjective, it will never end ;-)

@WolfgangKuehne: it's playing a game because all of the students who benefit from the flat calculation would ask for one, whereas all the students who benefit from the existing weighted calculation will stick with what they have. What are you saying: because you didn't know the weighting, you worked harder in this class than the university itself values it, leaving less time for others? But (a) that ignorance might be "your fault" for not reading the system ahead of time, if you cared so much, and (b) it is difficult to complain with a straight face that you worked too hard at a course.

I can't agree with the "your fault" part. All the introductory presentations prior to the start of that course strictly emphasized its importance by pointing to the fact that it has 4x as much credits. Due to that I skipped some other courses & lectures; This, today has time/financial/learning consequences on me. As you point out, its true that I worked much harder on that course, got the best grade, and now am disappointed that the hard word "does not pay off"

When I was an undergraduate I was instructed to read the examination regulations document. In fact, since this was a long time ago, I was given a physical copy. If this document is secret at your university, or even if it's public but you weren't informed of its existence at any point in your induction or directed to read anything that informs you of it, then personally I'd hold you blameless for not knowing the weightings.

If your university uses a method to calculate GPA that is transparent, publicly documented, and reproducible; you will have to live with it (or transfer to another school). If GPA calculations are opaque and at the whim of some school official, that's cause for legal action (being patently unfair). Your first task is to find out which camp your GPA calculation falls into. It may seem to be a stupid formula, but if it's evenly and fairly applied (and anyone can accurately calculate their own GPA), what's your recourse?
As for "that is the case, but we don't know why", that is an unacceptable answer from the school. Someone should be able to officially tell you the reasoning behind it. It's possible that it dates back to a cheating scandal 200 years ago, or that they don't want to change it so that they can compare GPAs from year to year, but somewhere there must be a clear reason behind it. Go through the proper channels before raising a public stink about it, and don't be confrontational about it. There may be a perfectly good reason (in their minds, anyway), for calculating your GPA that way, but it should be publicly known.
The school does owe you an explanation for exactly how (and why) your GPA is calculated. They don't owe you a change in the calculations to match your expectations, or even to match "industry standards".

+1.  Ultimately you may never be "convinced" of the reasonableness of many practices and requirements you encounter in life.  You unfortunately can't force people to explain things to your satisfaction.  The only thing you can (usually) do is hold them to what they said they would do.

If the University understands the issue and does not want to change, one solution might involve listing both GPAs (e.g., on a CV). I think this might be OK as long as this is completely transparent and you (a) include your official GPA (b) make it clear that your recomputed GPA is not your official GPA and (c) that you explain how both are computed and why you have two. This might be hard to do concisely but you might say:

3.9 [Official GPA] / 3.95 [Self-computed GPA: Sum(Grade * Credits)/Credits]

That said, doing this seems likely to be a distraction and pointing out two different GPAs is likely raise some red flags. If you're doing good work, how we choose to count really shouldn't matter. And if how we count does matter, you can't be doing that well. The other answers make this point very well and I won't try to reiterate it here.
You mention that this class is mandatory and most mandatory classes are taken early on. Is that the case here? Some graduate schools do not consider grades in the first year or two and most give much more weight to later years. StrongBad's comment makes it clear that some schools even try to incorporate this into the official GPA calculation itself!

This is a great idea if you want to present yourself to employers as the sort of person who will haggle, nitpick and complain about everything. Not many employers are looking for people like that, but OP might be happiest with one of the few who are.

@jwg, I think the downvote and saracastic comment is unjustified. I spend a third of my reply making the exact point you make and suggest that I do not go into even more depth because the other answers do so already. I agree with you and said as much but I was also trying to answer the question as asked.

What's the point of spending half the answer putting forward a really bad idea and another third explaining why it's a bad idea? Doesn't that make it a bad answer overall?

@jwg, Wolfgang suggested that it might make a "big difference." It's up to Wolfgang to decide if the risk of being seen nitpicking (IMHO, small but real) and the benefit of presenting a second/higher GPA is worth it. Wolfgang suggests it could change the GPA by 0.3. If the official GPA is tweaked and massaged by the university so that it really was that different, I would want to know this as part of evaluating a student's undergraduate work. Of course, I'm sure students wouldn't tell me in the situations that I really wanted to know.

I think the answer to this depends if you are an undergraduate or graduate student. If you are a PhD student (and possible a Master's student) your reputation with your future colleagues is much more important than you final GPA and I would suggest you just go with the flow. As an undergraduate student (and possible a Master's student) your GPA is really important and assuming the recalculated GPA is noticeably better, it is worth the fight.
For example, my UK department calculates an unofficial GPA that is then used to determine the degree classification (first, upper second, lower second, ...). The formula we use gives zero weight to first year marks, single weight to second year marks, and double weight to final year marks (it is a 3 year program). If the resulting degree classification were to improve by using a uniform weighting (either of all 3 years or just the final 2 years) and the student filed a formal complaint with the University, it would not surprise me if the University would not cave and change the degree classification. In fact, this year the University demanded that we change our policy and look at students who are one percentage point below the degree classification cutoff boundary and see if they would have done better with a uniform weighting.


text:
In single-blind peer-review, can you reveal your identity without the editor's consent?
In my field (chemistry), review is always done in a single blind process, i.e. the author does not know who the referees were, but the referees do know who the authors are. In ten years, I have never seen a referee breaching this anonymity, e.g. by signing their review, unless they got prior approval by the editor (in order to continue discuss things further with the authors, once the manuscript was accepted for publication).
So, it seemed logical to assume that in single blind peer-review, the reviewer should not disclose his identity without the editor's consent. Yet, some people have told me (here and there; also IRL a friend from human sciences) that they have seen people sign their reviews, or write emails to them after the review but before the paper is published.
So, in single-blind peer-review, can you reveal your identity without the editor's consent? Does it depends on the customs of each field, or is there a hard rule? (in which case, the few anecdotes I heard were outliers)

I would think that it's a bad idea to open the possibility of referees communicating with authors, since this opens the possibility of authors' influencing referees, compromising the process. Of course, this is not to say that there aren't some positive possibilities, but the conflict-of-interest criterion seems to me in this case to be clearly manifest.
That is, it should be understood, implicitly or explicitly, that referees will remain anonymous "in perpetuity", so that there is no hint or possibility that authors could communicate with them or influence them. E.g., either overt or subtle invitations from authors to a referee to communicate (and get some credit for the paper, maybe co-authorship, etc., as discussed around here some time back...) would be understood in advance to fail absolutely.
Thus, editors who discover referees willing to engage in such would probably regretfully stop asking them to referee, since if such activity became known it would seriously damage the reputation of the journal... if only in principle, but "principle" would seem to be the point...

Thus, editors who discover referees willing to engage in such would probably regretfully stop asking them to referee - aha ! :)

@Suresh, Ha! "Regretfully", because it's not so easy to find referees. But, srsly, if I were to take the trouble to be "An Editor", I'd be dis-serving myself and others by giving people a reason to wonder about the legitimacy of the review process, eh?

referees will remain anonymous "in perpetuity" ... I think that this is practical until the paper's been published, but I don't think it's a convention that you're supposed to leave it a secret "forever and ever". I've told people "I reviewed your paper" before and had people say the same to me.

@Irwin, I know that reality may not conform to either the pluses or minuses of the ideal, but I think that anticipation of disclosure even after acceptance could easily be viewed as a potentially fatal compromise of the system. Of course, this is relevant only under the assumption that anyone's trying to "game" the system, but presumably some weak form of that assumption is what motivates single-blind or double-blind review in the first place.

It is overwhelmingly clear from the answers at https://mathoverflow.net/questions/98308/when-if-ever-disclose-your-identity-as-a-reviewer that in the mathematical research community it is perfectly acceptable to sign one's reviews.  I know people who do so, and their purpose in doing so is to ensure that they keep the tone and content of their reviews such that they are not embarrassed to be acknowledged as the author of the review.  I think that other mathematicians largely consider this a courageous and responsible action.  Some may think it is unwise, but I don't know of any who think it is unethical.

@MaoWao I agree!  But check the Mathoverflow link and you will see a much larger number of upvotes there for what I am saying.  Of course, this is not a scientifically valid survey.

It's possible to sign peer reviews. It's not common, but also not unheard of. You should check if you're unsure, though I don't think it's usually possible to do so without the editor's consent, as all the reviews typically go through them, not directly to the authors. If the editor truly found it unacceptable, I believe they would have the option of redacting the review or refusing to accept the review until it was amended.
A rising sentiment in my field (biological sciences) is that anonymity in peer-review is increasingly abused to make disingenuous, unreasonable, or inflammatory comments without having to stand by them, or to get away with sloppy or ignorant reviews. Signing reviews is seen as a step towards greater transparency. This pair of blog posts by Jeremy Yoder (1, 2) has some further pros and cons from people who sign or don't sign their reviews, respectively.
Personally I think open reviews, where they're actually published along with the manuscript, are a more effective remedy. But that's a separate discussion, probably.

You can sign peer reviews

This is not necessarily true and worth at least checking with the editor before doing so if you're unsure.

Yes, it's always good to check since norms vary so much by field. I've updated my answer.

In my opinion, informing anyone that you was their referee is a serious betrayal of the system. The fact that the reviews are (at least) single-blind by default has a good reason, which is that you don't feel unsafe writing a very negative review to a paper if it deserves it. As such, it works only if it's standard that this information stays secret.
Imagine a situation when 15 people vote for something in secret vote, but vast majority of them plan to reveal publically their vote. It stresses the minority to state their opinion as they feel it. And the uttermost reason for reviews is that reviewers state their opinion as they feel it.
There are some exceptions when it is acceptable, like:

When you reject to review the paper for whatever reason, you can of course tell them that you saw the paper.
Another exception is when the paper is really excellent and contains some breaking results (so that it is really really far from giving a negative review), but even then I would be quite careful.

AFAIK, in some countries, even a randomly-chosen portion of PhD theses get single-blind reviewed after they are published, to ensure that the thesis oponents take it more seriously in general.
The fact that others do it doesn't mean that it's correct.

Please notice that when you down-vote my answer with no further comments, I ignore that down-vote. Maybe if you commented why you down-voted the answer, I could make a better answer next time. Thanks.

"a good reason [...] is that you don't feel unsafe writing a very negative review to a paper if it deserves it."
Why would you feel unsafe? Will the author come after you with a bazooka if you point out factual mistakes in their paper? Just imagine what that would do to their scientific reputation. Nah, I don't think it's likely they'll do it. (And why do you want to know who downvoted your answer? Do you have a bazooka hidden nearby? Is that what you do?)

@rgrig Well, you don't imply that asking for commenting a downvote here is similar to asking to know who reviewed my paper, do you?

no, it's not similar at all

in any case, I didn't downvote your answer, so please don't hate me. (I'm saying this just in case we actually meet at some point and you do have a bazooka. That, and it's true.)

@rgrig Don't worry, I don't plan to do anything like that. I just really thought you compare the two things...

I do also agree with this answer... not that people will "come after you" in an obvious way: these are not stupid people. But (in my experience) even smart people can develop (irrational?) grudges, and be subliminally influenced, and come up with rationalizations, ... Better to avoid that.

Just one more data point: I recently submitted a paper to a physical science journal that uses double-blind review. One of my reviewers suggested that I add in a more detailed discussion of a relevant previous paper that I had cited - but then he revealed for the sake of transparency that he had somewhat of a conflict of interest, because he was the author of that paper. The journal editor chose to pass the review along to me even though it revealed the reviewer's identity.
I don't think that this reviewer's course of action is very common - and I acknowledge that many editors probably wouldn't like it - but personally, I really appreciated having the additional context behind the review.
In my personal opinion, I think that by default you should avoid revealing your identity in reviews, but in situations where there is a potential conflict of interets (e.g. a request to add citations to your own papers), it's ethically acceptable - although not mandatory - to reveal your identity.

In those cases it's often possible for the author to guess the reviewer's identity by the nature of their feedback. In those situations, it seems preferable to acknowledge that the reviewer is no longer anonymous, and get on with managing that situation accordingly, than to keep on pretending the author doesn't know.

For me (EE PhD in USA in 1990's) one would not reveal one's identity as a reviewer.  This would seem to violate ethics, even though I suppose 'double-blind' would be a stronger system than 'single-blind'.
However, if certain reviewers made certain comments, it is likely my advisor could finger them by their concerns, and determine that it was a certain researcher (or one of their associates).  Of course, this is just using likelihood.
We were able to revise a paper to get it published after it was initially rejected.  This is certainly possible.  However, the reviewers should remain anonymous at all times.
I suppose someone could reveal this years later, when it no longer 'matters' except as a curiosity.
As pointed out elsewhere, this would vary by field, publication-outlet, geographic-region and other concerns.
However, the default assumption would be for the reviewer(s) to remain anonymous.