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How to ask for an academic agreement with a foreign faculty?
In my current place of work we would like to offer our students the possibility to follow courses and do research in foreign universities, but I am a little bit dubious how our faculty would manage to do that. I mean, what is the procedure to follow to make this kind of academic agreements? Should one write directly to the Dean of the objective faculty of which we want to make the academic agreement? What would be catchy for them to agree to have an academic cooperation with us (related to exchange of students and lecturers for short periods of time)?

For this to stand a chance of working it will require a lot of cooperation between your departments before it gets escalated up to get approved by the real high ranking people overseeing the departments. So yes I think your first step should be to sit down and have a discussion with your colleagues in the opposite department to see what kind of opportunities can be offered and whether it would be worth having a trial programme with a small number of eager students. Also discuss with the head of your studies committee.

Setting up a formal relationship between departments can be a lot of work, and requires strong motivation on both sides.
A possible lighter-weight option to consider would be a more unidirectional program like exists at the department of one of my colleagues in Europe.  In his institution's Ph.D. program, each student is required to do two terms abroad at another institution.  The university supports this by continuing to support the students financially while they are abroad, but it is up to each student and faculty member to arrange where they go and who they work with independently.
As I have observed it in practice (i.e., being on the other end hosting a visiting student), this it much easier for others to agree to than a formal arrangement between faculties, because it requires fairly little investment and are likely to be covered by normal "visiting scholar / visiting student" arrangements.  It's also a great way to bootstrap collaboration with a foreign colleague.


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What do these article submission dates really mean?
I want to submit a paper to a conference in the field of Computer Science, but I am a little bit doubtful of what information to submit. The dates are the following:

Abstract Submission Deadline: February 6, 2015
All Acceptance Communications: March 16, 2015
Preliminary Paper Submission Deadline: April 27, 2015
Peer Review Final Acceptance Communication: June 1, 2015
Final Camera-Ready Paper Submission & Copyright Deadline and Author Registration Deadline: July 10, 2015
Early Registration & Hotel Deadline: September 22, 2015

I am in the process of finishing the paper, but I think that I will not make it for the first deadline to complete it throughly. For what I know the Abstract Submission Deadline is only for submitting the abstract, am I right? I believe that is for the chair to have an overview of how many papers will they have.
The question that I have is: what does All Acceptance Communications means? Is it the submission of the full paper? Why just don't they call it Full paper submission instead of that other cryptic name?

This set of deadlines sounds like the conferences is doing two rounds of review for submissions.

First, you send in an abstract in February, and they decide if it's worth reviewing a full paper by mid-March.
If they invite a full paper, you send it in by late April, and they send a final accept/reject by the beginning of June.
Final versions of accepted papers have to be submitted by mid-July.

Their names could be a bit better, but it seems fairly clear to me that this is their intention.  If you're concerned it may be otherwise, it's always OK to write to the conference contact email to check your understanding.

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Why as the level of a college course goes up, is the course generally more specific and more specialized?
Why as the level of a college course goes up, is the course generally more specific and more specialized but not necessarily the easier one on the lower level, also you don't have to have the knowledge of the previous class, even if it served as a prerequisite?
For example, you study general biology first, then study anatomy or endocrinology, but you probably won't need to have the knowledge of general biology to study anatomy or endocrinology.
Is there any reason that every subject appears to be in that pattern?

You definitely need basic biology to understand endocrinology.

I strongly dispute your assertion that knowledge of the more general subject is not needed for the more specific subjects.  To use your own example, general biology will include general cell anatomy and metabolism and probably some basics of evolution.  More specialized courses like anatomy and endocrinology will make no sense without these basics.
Even when a direct subject material connection is not obvious, in a well-designed set of courses there is often an important dependence in skills.  For example, in the mathematics classes that I took, there was not much direct connection in material between Analysis and some the higher-level subjects like Abstract Algebra and Topology that had it as a required prerequisite.  However, Analysis was the subject where students were expected to learn how to properly approach and formulate mathematical proofs, and the higher-level subjects assumed these skills.  Likewise, many engineering departments have a required "general engineering" subject for freshmen, which drums in the general philosophy of engineering through hands-on applications in various areas: even if an electrical engineer never uses a machine-shop again, the "engineering way of thinking" that they have learned will be critical to their success later on.
Returning, then, to your basic question: there's an awful lot of knowledge in the world, and much of it simply is very specialized.  General classes give the foundation required by many different specialized subjects, and so a well-designed curriculum tends to naturally form a "tree" structure that starts general and becomes more specialized as one progresses deeper into a subject.

It's because of a combination of several reasons.

There is knowledge overlap between the general and the specific.
The general gives context, and thus meaning, to the specific.
Complex systems such as biological systems are rich in emergent phenomena: having an understanding of the system is crucial to understanding one of its components.
There is skills overlap: develop the skills in the general, and apply them to the specific.
It's economically efficient to teach it that way: general basic courses form the foundations for a whole host of later specialisms.
It's economically efficient to learn it that way: there are very few biology opportunities for someone who knows the rudiments of endocrinology and no other biology. If you want economically useful endocrinology, you're going to have to learn it to quite a deep level.

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Over a month and a half has gone since the status changed to "Decision in Process"
On June 7, 2024, I submitted my paper to a reputable journal. After a day, it was in the status "With Editor". The status was changed to "Under review" after a few days. The status was updated to "Decision in process" on August 6. Up until then, nothing has changed. How should I proceed?

Still now, my article is in "Decision in process" status. It is 133 days now. What should I do?

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How to respond to a student email demanding quick feedback?
My group of new masters students submitted their 1st essay. I explained in our 1st group meeting that I may take up to 2 weeks to return essay feedback to all of them. (I said this explicitly to manage expectations and as I've got a very heavy teaching workload for a few weeks). In the meantime, they have 2nd essay to work on - and they will be receiving feedback from me fortnightly throughout the academic year.
One of the students emailed me this, despite my explanation (one week after submission, so well within the 2 week feedback timeline I gave them):

Good morning [name],
I hope you had a restful weekend. Please let me know promptly about
the feedback on my first essay, as I am now gearing up to write the
second with only a few days - a narrow amount of time - to digest and
implement improvements. All the best, [name]

I was quite taken aback and upset by the email phrasing/tone, I find it (subtly) inappropriate and demeaning, treating me as if he's my boss, and I'm at his service (not even senior colleagues/Head of Department etc ever speak to me like this when making a work request). It's also patronising as I obviously know he won't have much time to integrate feedback, as I set the deadline.
Firstly, am I overreacting or is this an inappropriate way for a student to speak to a lecturer?
Secondly, any advice on how to respond would be very welcome!
I find myself unsure how to respond. A part of me really wants to explicitly call him out (I will be supervising him all year so I think it's important to set boundaries and expectations regarding behaviour/communication early on), but another part is worried that wouldn't be okay on my part.
I was thinking of responding something like:

Dear xxx,
As I very clearly already explained in our tutorial meeting, it might
take up to two weeks for you to receive feedback on this essay.
Also, please note that it's inappropriate to issue demands to academic
staff regarding how we conduct our teaching work.
Regards,  xxx

Finally, it dawned on me that this student is a man and as I'm a woman (and early career academic), there might be some unconscious (or conscious!) bias going on - I doubt he would speak to my 50 year old senior male colleagues in this way.
I know I'm overthinking this but I mainly have experience with students who email in a considerate and respectuful way so this really unsettled me. Thank you so much for all for your input!

Comments have been moved to chat; please do not continue the discussion here. Before posting a comment below this one, please review the purposes of comments. Comments that do not request clarification or suggest improvements usually belong as an answer, on [meta], or in [chat]. Comments continuing discussion may be removed.

Is the student a non-native speaker? Did you use the word "fortnight" that one might assume to mean "forthcoming night"?

I strongly suggest you leave off the second paragraph and don't express annoyance. I'd also avoid "very clearly" as it has a scolding tone. Students aren't perfect. Accept it.
And, a second paragraph should remind them that the time is getting late to work on the next essay. Suggest they get to work on it.
I'd think you would be more successful overall with students like this to take a somewhat tolerant attitude and laugh at their marginal/poor behavior.

I agree that there may be sexism in the student's note. But it could also be that they are just "full of themself" or are socially awkward. Even autistic people might respond like that having little natural sense of social norms. Take the high road so you don't get stuck on the low.

I agree with Buffy that you ought to remove “very clearly” from your proposed response.  These two words are both adverbs.  As a general rule, when answering students by email, I tried to do an ‘adverb-ectomy’ (excision of adverbs) on my response.  I tried to attend to removing adverbs especially if I was irritated by what the student wrote.  The student’s email might have seemed less an assault if he had left out the adverb “promptly.”  I’m not sure I would say that you are “overreacting” to what the student wrote.  But in academics, a VERY thick skin is something to strive to develop.

@DianaPetitti You can make your comment an answer.

"remind them that the time is getting late" - it seems the student already knows, they wrote that they "[are] now gearing up to write the second with only a few days [left]". Repeating that might be unnecessarily confrontational. The student just might have missed the info that they won't get the first evaluation before the second essay.

As an autistic person I don't really love "maybe he's autistic" being thrown in there as an excuse for being kinda rude

@deee, I didn't just throw it in. I know some prominent and excellent autistic academics who sometimes appear rude but it isn't their intention to do so. Just missing  cues.

Okay? I also know non-autistic academics who are accidentally rude, and autistic academics who are very polite. Nobody has a "natural" sense of social norms, they're learned. How would whether or not the student is autistic change your advice?

If I know someone is neurodivergent I'll cut them some slack. Not so if I know they are sexist.

The student sounds anxious, but this is a far cry from seriously rude, at least compared to the spectrum that I have seen (yes, I have also seen seriously polite and overpolite mails, so the spectrum I have seen is wide).
In general, I found the tolerance principle quite useful. Once, ignore. Twice, raise an eyebrow. Three times, crack down.
[Unless it is very seriously and unambiguously rude which this one doesn't seem for me to be, if interpreted through the lens of anxiety - but maybe you have an unbelievably well-mannered cohort to compare with]
As response to such mails, rather than being reactive to the misplaced tone of their letter, I prefer to dry them out and use a maximally impersonal tone. Here's what you could say if you decide to follow this route [added explanations in square brackets]:

As explained in our tutorial meeting, it might take up to two weeks for you to receive feedback on this essay.

In particular, the fact that the writing of your second essay overlaps with the period of marking, is factored in and intentional.

[this makes clear that you knew about that and it's supposed to be that way; it's not something they can hope to change]

The reason is ---give your reasons--- .

[Personally, I do not think that such an overlap of marking and work on the next essay is a good idea, but maybe you have specific reasons to do so, so it does not harm to specify them in a dry, factual manner - but choose reasons that cannot be easily overturned; if you cannot, just leave the reasons out, though I personally think it is good academic practice and example to give justification for decisions]

Hope that clarifies your questions,

Prof. Dr. Lovegood

[The Prof. Dr. is a bit of a distancing element to express your displeasure - but if that is not done at your institution, you can also use your first name, and the old-fashioned "Sincerely, Luna". The more old-fashioned, the more distancing you signal. So, "Respectfully, Luna" would actually be a very strong rebuffing, without saying so]

While I like your distinction in the greeting formula, I doubt the ignorant student will recognize it.

@usr1234567 Maybe not. But I have used it to surprisingly great effect myself and, yes, people who are insensitive to others are often quite more sensitive to the vibe of a response to themselves than we are tempted to give them credit (of course, to some extent, that's to some extent dependent on the culture of the place and recipient, and you may have to culturally adapt your response). That's also why I wouldn't lead with direct confrontation, unless it is absolutely necessary, as an indirect warning can often be enough. When not, you have a different-sized problem on your hand.

Prof Dr Name sounds like it's probably in Germany - in which case this would not be unusual, AIUI

One thing I do not see discussed is whether the student is a native speaker. Because if not, they a) will not recognize the delicate distinction, b) might have phrased their email this way due to the language barrier and not because of their attitude in the first place.

@Flyto Yes, it depends on context. Sometimes, abbreviating your name to the first letter is also considered dismissive, but, again, some people do it by default.

@AndreiSmolensky And that's precisely why mentioned the three occurrences rule, and I opt for a dry response round at first. If the student meant no harm due to language, they won't read anything into it. If they intended power play, they will read between the lines. And if they are insensitive, they have one more round to be warned off more clearly before they get their mind "opened a bit further than before" in the third.

To me, the student email does look unambiguously rude. Given the content of the rest of the email, opening with “I hope you had a restful weekend” seems like a deliberate implication that the professor had been slacking off and now should get back to work.

@Significance It's entitled, yes. But I have seen rude. I mean, really rude. On a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being the highest, this is probably 5-6 of what I have seen. And if someone makes implications, you always have the option to imply back. However, I found it useful to always put a damper on escalation. You are the person in power, you pretty much decide the rules of the game. You can afford to be non-reactive on minor blips.

There are many good answers here already, so I am not trying to provide a full answer, just to contribute small details which others may have missed.
I agree that the tone of student's email is far from perfect. I agree that the best course of action may be to stay your ground. However, I also suggest considering further actions to improve student experience for the next cohorts.
I think that the student is essentially right here:

getting feedback and acting on it is crucial for student learning
hence, timely feedback probably the most important part of the exchange between the University (academics) and student
feedback is timely if students have sufficient time to read it, understand it, and use it to improve their learning by the next (or final) assignment
delivering feedback on Assignment 1 after Assignment 2 is due would not allow students to act on the feedback they received and lead to frustration

I see the student request more as a complaint about the timeliness of feedback. You may not be able fix it for this cohort, but your Department can design a more robust assessment pattern for the following years. This may mean having fewer assessments and spread them along the term more evenly so that there is ample time between them to act on the feedback received from the previous assignment. Also, some assessments can be made formative, i.e. not contribute to the mark, but rather provide feed-forward advice. Such assignments may be shorter, faster to mark, and ultimately more beneficial for students learning.

"Delivering feedback on Assignment 1 after Assignment 2 would lead to frustration." - This. Especially with assignments of the "essay" type where often the requirements aren't 100% clear, having to write a second one without feedback on the first one would make me REALLY grind my teeth.

You may not be able fix it for this cohort, - other than by prioritizing grading / feedback for assignments like this one where there's a second similar assignment due before your planned feedback schedule would provide it.  If every assignment in every class has this problem, that would require doing more grading work sooner to catch up, rather than just scheduling differently.  That's worth considering if there's anything else they can put off.

From the phrase "up to 2 weeks," the student has (correctly) inferred possibly sooner; OP seems rather to have intended "no less than 2 weeks."

You could deliver some feedback quickly, e.g. a mass email to everyone giving general advice based on common things you've seen across multiple submissions. It might take 2 weeks to deliver individualised feedback to everyone, but you can probably get the most important points across after 2 days.

If you haven't already, consider (really should be required) giving your students in advance the rubrics you are using to grade these essays.

"Delivering feedback on Assignment 1 after Assignment 2 would lead to frustration."
This 100%, it is a terrible idea to ask students to start another assignment without feedback from the first to guide them.

@Gossar While it means they could receive a response earlier than 2 weeks, they have no reason to expect it, much less demand it. And writing after just half the expected time seems highly presumptuous. But perhaps the professor would be better off just saying "you'll receive feedback in 2 weeks"; if they get done earlier, the students can consider it a happy surprise.

@Barmar With a second essay due imminently, students have every reason to expect actionable feedback from the first (especially if it's the first).  OP has muddied the water by saying "up to 2 weeks" knowing that she intends "fortnightly"

What about:

Dear abc,
Your enthusiasm for starting the second essay is delightful!
As of now, we are still on track for a fortnightly feedback turnaround.
I assure you that if I can get them reviewed sooner then I will but do not delay due to the first essay.
Regards, xyz

Great answer. It doesn't buy in to the push for a super-fast response but it does this without being rude or punitive, it repeats the earlier advice about a two-week turnaround, and indicates, through the first sentence, that you did read the whole of the student's email.

This is a very good answer except that it encourages the idea that the student shouldn’t start the second essay before they have feedback from the first. I’d keep the rest but remove the first sentence and instead include the line, “please don’t wait before starting your second essay.”

@Significance It is ambiguous, to me at least, as to why the student's second essay hinges on feedback from the first. Does each essay build upon the previous? Is the student merely trying to gauge OP's grading style/expectations so they can cater an essay to OP? Telling the student to not wait seems about as effective as telling someone to "stop being mad". There seems to be something about the curriculum structure which makes it disadvantageous to wait a fortnight for feedback.

My reading was that the student was simply anxious and prefers to gauge the OP’s expectations before starting the next essay. I made the same mistake of waiting unnecessarily for feedback on a previous assessment before starting an assignment in primary school, and was set straight by my teacher then. (I remember it vividly because it felt unfair at the time, but I did learn the lesson).

@Significance I guess it's up to OP to decide whether they wish to play "therapist" and delve into the root cause of the student's anxiety or if they wish to ignore it and expect steadfast obedience from the students. I don't have a master's degree so I have no idea about the norm at this level of academia. From what I can surmise, professors are "bending the knee" more often these days.

@Significance Additionally, "we are still on track for a fortnightly feedback turnaround" is a nod to nicely stating "don't wait on me, deal with it"

@Significance I edited my answer to reflect your sentiments. I felt that the student's efforts should still be recognized so I left the first sentence.

The student’s tone was unprofessional, but the message was actually correct: if you can’t get feedback to the students within 2 weeks*, then it’s not constructive (from a learning standpoint) or fair (from a grading standpoint) to give the students an assignment in the meantime that would depend on that feedback. In my view you have the following choices:
*Not a value judgement. As a former TA I know how hard and time-consuming grading is!

Reduce your time to feedback: Streamline your assignments to make them quicker to grade or streamline how you grade, possibly giving slightly less detailed feedback on each for quicker turnaround time.
Hold off on similar assignments during the waiting period: if you can’t streamline your grading process any further, then only give assignments that would not in general depend on the feedback your students are waiting to receive. This doesn’t mean don’t give homework, just try not to give assignments with a lot of overlap with the one you’re still grading.

Any other approach deprives your students of the full benefit of being able to incorporate your feedback in their practice and thus of learning opportunities, and honestly isn’t fair from a grading standpoint.
To answer the student, I recommend making the assignment in question either not for credit or extra credit, and announcing this to the whole class. Or you can give them an opportunity to correct it for a regrade after receiving the feedback in question, but that would be more work on your part. Either way you won’t have to address the student in question at all if you adopt my suggestions, as you will be addressing your announcement about this assignment to the entire class.
In the future if you get an unreasonable demand (this one wasn’t unreasonable), you should simply restate your policy each and every time a student asks a question about it. Simultaneously take longer and longer to respond to repeat queries made by email. The combination sends a message that the student is pursuing a fruitless quest and limits the burden on your time dealing with the problem student.
That said while the student was rude in this case, they weren’t wrong, and I do think you need to make some changes as indicated in my answer above.

Only 1 week has passed from the 2 weeks OP promised. They’re well within their own deadline, the student is being inappropriate.

@Neinstein See Dmitry's answer from 2 hours before this one; it makes the same point that this is a real problem the professor created with their choice of feedback schedule and assignment due dates.  It's not unreasonable for a student to hope the professor will exceed their standard (or worst case?) 2-week feedback timeline when that's necessary for it to inform their next essay.

"I recommend making the assignment in question either not for credit or extra credit, and announcing this to the whole class."
Surely changing assessment policy on the fly when the course has already started would not be considered fair: shouldn't the assessment procedures be laid down in the syllabus? Making this change now would disadvantage students who haven't left the second essay to the last minute and have already put a lot of effort into it in the expectation that it will be part of the assessment.

@Significance It would depend of course on institutional policy, but I would view it as correcting an error on the part of the professor in the class’ favor, but the key for me is less this one assignment and more a general change to ensure students have sufficient time to incorporate feedback in their practice (the homework) to maximize their learning, which ultimately is the point here.

@Neinstein From the phrase "up to 2 weeks," the student has (correctly) inferred possibly sooner; feedback cannot be effective or meaningful unless it is timely.  OP seems rather to have intended "no less than 2 weeks."

@Gossar 1 week is within “up to 2 weeks” and well before “no less than 2 weeks”, which is not what OP meant anyway. The student can respectfully ask whether it’s possible to get it sooner, but the disrespectfully demanding tone OP got is well over the limits.

@PeterCordes That’s a different problem altogether. If the student feels the deadline is unjust, they can very well raise the issue to OP. But that’s not what the student did. Instead, they requested the report halfway within the promised deadline in a rather demanding tone.

From my reading of the question, OP has no intention of responding with feedback until 2 weeks have passed; that is not the meaning of "up to 2 weeks".  It is normal for a student to expect actionable feedback before a second similar assignment is due.  I do not read the student's tone as demanding or disrespectful but rather anxious as a result of OP's unclear timetable.

My general advice is to put all rules you want to impose (judging from both your anticipations for the particular course you are about to start and your previous experience) into the written syllabus and respond with a single phrase: "Your situation/request has been addressed in Section X, part Y of the syllabus, please refer to it". Long and elaborate explanations of why you are doing the things the way you are doing them usually get nowhere. If you have just made an oral announcement in the beginning of the class, take a sheet of paper now, write "Class Rules" on the top, think of everything you have said already or want to say now, put it there, and distribute it during the next lesson.
I usually keep the syllabus simple and fairly generic and distribute "Exam rules" a couple of weeks before the first exam to avoid any misunderstanding about what is OK, what is not, what kind of grading to expect, etc. Half of it is common sense (of the kind "If you don't understand the conditions of the problem, then don't try to read my mind but ask a question instead") and the other half is of the kind "There will be no partial credit" or "You can check your solution with me before submitting the test; I'll either confirm that it is correct or indicate the first wrong step or unclear passage; this check can be done multiple times".
I guess you get the idea by now: never retract from what you have announced and be ready to put in writing whatever you think can be misinterpreted or disputed at any time. In case of a possible conflict arising from unjustified student demands, just act as an impartial finite automaton following the preset program on the input tape. Spare compassion, empathy, and granting privileges for the cases where they are really needed (illness, important family events, etc.) and spare the anger and frustration for self-control exercises in front of the mirror.
Of course, I presume here that you have thought about balancing the student convenience with your workload limitations before you entered the classroom for the first time, so the fortnight return policy you announced came from the necessity rather than from pure whim :-)
Just my two cents...

I've gotten these sorts of emails many times over my career, as I'm sure pretty much every teacher has. My solution -- with students, as with other things in life -- is to just not take them personal (even if they are personal, like this email): Nothing good can come off that.
The reason why the email annoys you so much (and would annoy me equally) is that the student is asking for something you simply can't provide, and is doing so in a demanding way. But the reason you can't provide what they're demanding is not personal, it's factual: You just don't have the time. So perhaps something like this is an accurate response without being personal:

Dear ...
I'm doing my best, managing this and my other classes, along with the other responsibilities to my job and my family. As a consequence, it sometimes takes a little bit for me to give everyone the feedback they deserve. But as mentioned in one of the earlier classes, I'm committed to giving all of you feedback within two weeks, and that includes you. In the meantime, it's probably useful for you to already get started on the second assignment.
Best, ...

I really don’t think that the main annoyance is coming from OP not being able to comply with the request. Rather, it’s the mere presence of the request, combined with the way it’s phrased as a demand, being indeed inappropriate from a student, and inappropriate even in itself as OP is only halfway within their announced deadline. Even if OP could immediately reply with the corrected essay, I’m quite sure they wouldn’t be any less annoyed. Also, this answer, to me, came off as if OP would have fell short of something, which I really don’t see. (Not -1’d.)

I don’t see a point in justifying anything, especially with family. Taking the time allotted isn’t due to exceptional time constraints, it’s sticking to what was promised - which goes both ways and that’s it.

Didn't downvote, but I agree with @MisterMiyagi that it is not good to apologize with "weaknesses" of one's own or justifications to a demanding and impositioning mail. Unwise move in general, only an option to be used if you already established firm authority, and then it should be in a more humorous than apologetic fashion.

@MisterMiyagi I think Wolfgang is recommending turning this into a teaching moment about taking the perspective of others. I disagree that this is just about "sticking to what was promised": the procedure and timeline are there for a reason, not to be arbitrary rules. Explaining the reasons for those rules may help a student understand and be more thoughtful about the purpose of rules like this in the future.

@BryanKrause I'm not trying to say the rule is arbitrary, just that the student doesn't need to be given any specific reason why the rule is being followed. In my experience, giving specific reasons to specific requests invites the student to argue against these reasons, not to ponder them. A reason can be given when the rule is introduced to everyone if one does so desire, there is no need to justify it every single time the rule is invoked.

@MisterMiyagi I don't see this answer giving any specific reason, it gives a general explanation that the instructor has other responsibilities.

@BryanKrause Having other responsibilities is a specific reason in my book. Especially since some specific responsibilities are listed. Surely course X is more important than the lecturers other courses Y and Z, and why are they worrying about their family when they should be working instead? I mean, it’s nice that they are doing their best, but is it really good enough when they expect their students to do even better every time? And so on.

@BryanKrause expresses what I meant to say. I find that rules on their own are meaningless to everyone unless you explain why you made the rule. All of you would probably agree that the rule would be inappropriate if you promised feedback "within two months" because that's half a semester. You would also agree that a rule "give feedback within 24 hours" is not practical. But the students might not understand the latter because they don't know the pressures on a professor's life. So let's explain those, to explain why 2 weeks is a reasonable timeline students have to live with.

@CaptainEmacs I absolutely don't see pointing out responsibilities to family as "weakness". (I did not apologize, just point out.) My family is important to me as a person, and that's true for nearly everyone. People who don't understand this concept are either inexperienced in life matters (which students may well be -- so let's help them understand) or psychopaths.

I think most of these comments stem from "I'm doing my best," which carries a bit of an apologetic tone ("You may have lost, but at least you tried your best!") and sounds like an admission of guilt; either an admission that two weeks is too long or that OP is behind (they're not). ("Why did I get a B? I tried my best!")

@WolfgangBangerth It is showing vulnerability. It is unwise to show this to a random student, especially a pushy one (and no, they do not have to be psychopaths to play power games). You say you did not apologize. Yet, if a student would say they did not finish homework because of family etc., it very much sounds like an apology, even if they do not use an explicitly apologetic word. Furthermore, it's none of the student's business what the lecturer's duties are. Finally, OP already clearly stated the marks are due in 2 weeks, so OP does not need to justify themselves.

@CaptainEmacs Then we have different perspectives about who we are as teachers. I think showing vulnerabilities is not wrong. I'm a human too, and I am ok with my students seeing that. They know that I do my best, and that that is good enough most of the time, but not always. This is not an apology, it is a statement of fact. I will add that if a student says that they have unexpected family obligations (say, funerals) I will give them extensions on homework 100% of the time.

@WolfgangBangerth To be honest, we do not seem that far away from each other in our general philosophy. Where we differ is this concrete case. OP's case is perceived by OP and quite a few others here as outright rude. We can't be sure, but it is distinctly possible. In such cases, I have found it regularly to be a capital mistake to show vulnerability. A mistake for which one pays big time and with interest. No need to be rude in turn, but definitively unwise to open up. If it never happened to you, you must have had a consistently nice environment or you are doing something else in addition.

@CaptainEmacs I try to be a human to my students. That tends to work pretty well for me. I honestly cannot remember a case where a student ever tried to take advantage of me over it. But then, admittedly, I'm a tall, athletic, self-confident, white male -- not the type of person people feel like they can generally run all over.

@WolfgangBangerth I knew there was something :-) It goes without saying that, I believe you need to treat students with respect and goodwill as as fellow, if apprentice, academics. I don't think we differ on that. The problem appears only with these very "special" 2%. If you never experienced that, congratulations, and may your luck continue! Those of us who encounter them, however, need ways to deal with it. As young academic I was invariably nice and open to my students (which 98% of the students did appreciate); I could have then done with some of the advice I am giving out now.

@CaptainEmacs I think my direction is the opposite. I was much more reserved earlier in my career than I am now. Mostly, however, I simply do not let those 2% ruin it for the remaining 98%. I just don't take those 2% personal.

I think this answer takes the wrong tone, akin to agreeing that you are not meeting expectations. I prefer the simpler responses with perhaps some reference to previously communicated assignment grading timelines as need. A simpler more streamlined response like MonkeyZeus suggested is best here, and will nudge the student into accepting those timelines as communicated in the future.

@WolfgangBangerth Maybe I wasn't clear: I have not changed my defaults for the 2%. But, boy, can the 2% create trouble. So one better knows to switch modes, fast, efficient and hard, when necessary, as soon as one gets the slightest inkling that something's afoot. And, when done right, the 2% shrinks to 1% or 0.5% or less and maybe at some point disappears in the noise.

Reading this e-mail, I suspect that they are a non-native speaker and were taught what polite words in English are but have never learned the cultural aspects of politeness in Anglosphere countries. The whole thing is overly formal in the way of someone who's studied business English but never used the language day to day nor spent time living in and interacting with an Anglosphere culture to pick up the indirectness that is central to good manners (the only rudeness is that they were too direct). If true, this also greatly increases the chances that they struggled to understand the words of your lecture, which would also explain why they didn't know feedback would be so late in coming.
If I'm correct that the student is from a non English speaking culture, I'd suggest that you first answer their question and then explain that it's more polite to phrase requests indirectly or as questions than as clear demands and suggest an alternate way to have phrased their e-mail that would have conveyed the same information more politely.

I am not a professor, never will be, and will never be in this position as an academic. I also cannot comment on the gender aspects, because, well, I am the 50 year old senior male colleague to people where I am.
I am, however, working in industry, and I've been in a lot of mentoring roles before and after my excursion to academia.  So my perspective is from that workplace angle:
That attitude is not going to fly in the workplace.
It's just not.  The inversion of authority and responsibility is glaring to my eye without needing to be pointed out.  I would be offended if I received that type of e-mail from a new hire, and I would be embarrassed if I witnessed that attitude directed at someone else.
I may be in the minority, but I do not think you are overreacting.
One approach I have seen my own professors take in situations superficially similar to this is to make a stern announcement, either through e-mail or at the beginning of a lecture, reinforcing the rules of the class.  In this case, something along the lines of, "As a reminder, you may not receive feedback for two weeks.  Please do not ask about it before that.  I will not respond."  (Or anything that matches your writing style.)
Note that I have never seen a professor call a student out by name in such an announcement, and I advise against that.  I find it hard to imagine a situation where I would willfully embarrass a student in public.  Or in private.  But this does serve the purpose of reinforcing the rules for everyone, and making sure that the offending party hears it directly as well.
As a side note, I do have some sympathy for the student, if they are in the position of having to finish a second essay before they get feedback from the first.
It might be both wise and kind to tell them (or reinforce the idea) that you understand the constraints they are under-- you set them up, after all!-- and will not penalize them for not incorporating feedback they have not had enough time to digest.

Not true. People are often quite demanding in industry, even towards people one or two levels higher up. They are pressured by their own bosses. It does not make their behavior better, but you can often experience it.

I don't think comparing the the relationship between a teacher and a student to that between an employer/manager and an employee,  they are different relationships.

That said,  reminding students of the rules in a whole class announcement is not a terrible idea.

This is Academia.SE, not Workplace.SE, so I don't find answers about how behaviors work in the workplace to be very useful.

Students are not new hires at a workplace. University does not pay them. Quite the opposite: students may pay tuition fees, either directly, or via loans. If you want to draw analogies, students are more like customers than like new hires. And customers have a right to demand particular standards of service, such as timeliness. This specific student is not doing it gracefully, sure, but this is a separate discussion.

My point with the perspective from industry is this:  Most students who enter academia do not remain there, but cycle out into the wider marketplace ("industry") with better skillsets, including soft skills.  In a large number of cases, this is their purpose for being there.  And so, without claiming that it is the direct responsibility of any one professor, I do claim that the sooner this student is disabused of their attitude, the better it will be for them.  Whether they remain in academia or, especially, if they don't.

The entire workplace point feels like an out of place tangent here. You can't really speak for The Workplace™ in general, and it just detracts from the good suggestion you are making here.

@DmitrySavostyanov Timeliness is not at discussion here, the OP is within their allotted marking period. Also, the comparison with customers is not precise either. If you absolutely want to compare it, the uni is a gym. You pay for the opportunities. Still, stations/coaches in the gym might be occupied and you may have to sort out your own procedure for progressing, even if you pay for them.

@CaptainEmacs I like the gym analogy. And although it is true that gym stations can be fully occupied sometimes, it should be a rare occasion, which a responsible gym management should minimise. As responsible academics, we care about the best experience for our students and do not dismiss their valid concerns.

@Anonymous  I personally dislike it when people see University as a preparation step for the marketplace. People are not commodities; they can choose what to do with their life, which values to uphold, etc. They can also choose to change the society norms, if they are systematically unfair or biased. Education gives you a freedom of choice, not just a nice badge on your CV to be sold to some faceless corporation.

@Anonymous It is true that in a few years many of the graduates will join workforce, and many will be subjected to "corporate norms". But does it really mean that students have to use their time at University to prepare for this? I am not sure. Consider this -- in a few years we will be dead. Does it mean we have to spend our time preparing for the graveyard? Or perhaps we should live our life as we choose, treasure each moment, and use it in the best possible way to celebrate our life and freedom?

I'd recommend something like...
Dear xx,
You may have missed it but the schedule was already described on day month.
If however you are aware of the schedule and are requesting preferential treatment over your peers, perhaps you could justify in writing why you deserve such treatment.
Kind Regards,
Yy
Definitely would not recommend getting caught up in the sexism stuff.  Someone like that would probably go after whoever they thought they could regardless of gender if they sniffed weakness.

I recommend you press the delete or archive button on the email and move on.  No response needed.

Responding to concerns of their own students segarding their own course is absolutely a responsibility OP as a professor has to fulfil. Regardless if they’re appropriate or not.

I always respond to students, whether or not I like what they say and how they say it. Students really appreciate fast responses, and are more likely to take even a negative response/reaction from a prof to heart if they know the prof takes them seriously. We are not talking about a crackpot sending OP an unsolicited text to review.

"No response needed." -- by whom?

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


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My manuscript was accepted 8 th of December and the Scholar One status showed accepted then awaiting to assignment to batch
My manuscript was accepted on 8th of December and the Scholar One status showed accepted then awaiting to assignment to batch since then without any change! Did I miss anything and how can I contact Sage production server to ensure that everything is ok?

It sound like, for that journal, papers are released in batches.  (In former times, they were released in issues and volumes.)  So it seems you do not need to do anything (except wait) unless they contact you.

It is a online first journal and i need to get publish to get my master degree i hope to get news soon .

Publishing is slow. You need to have more patience than 6 days.

You need to publish to get a masters degree? That is very unusual,  are you sure this is a real requirement?


text:
What can I do when a manuscript is Completed Reject after 5 months of the submission
I submitted a manuscript five months ago, today I received a rejection letter, completed reject. There are many comments from the reviewers and one sentence the reviewer said:

"It is a good idea to explore further the relationship between
interactivity and map interpretation in the context of thematic
mapping. The authors are right to say that these are commonly used
representations and that we need to know more about how, when, and why
they work. However,the article as presented has major issues in terms
of its formation, execution, and interpretation that I do not believe
can be resolved in a major revision".

I would like to know:

is there any possibility I could send it to another journal, when I
solve all the issues they have sent?
does completed reject mean I cannot send it to that same journal again?

Of course.  That's part of the publishing process.  I.e., you get reviews, you take on board reasonable comments, and resubmit it to another journal.  You are the expert (supposed to be) on the subject matter, and you judge whether you have made any contributions.  If a reviewer says no contribution, and they are correct, then the paper dies.

related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/157573/given-reviewer-comments-shall-i-resubmit-after-the-rejection

You can certainly submit to another journal. You don't even need to make any changes to address the reviewers' comments, though it would certainly be advisable (otherwise you're likely to get similar reviews again).
Whether or not you can re-submit a revised paper to the same journal will depend on the journal's policy. The journals I know tend to treat outright rejection (as opposed to 'revise & resubmit') to mean no resubmission will be accepted, but this may not be universal. Of course, there is a grey area: at what point does something become a new paper rather than a revised version of an old paper?


text:
What is considered a new submission and a resubmission?
I submitted a manuscript to a journal and it was completed reject after 5 months, but they said they have found contributions. The reviewers presented many issues to be resolved, one of the most challenging is refered to the number of participant excluded from the experiment. If I include more participants explaining the reasons, this will generate different results, maybe. Would it be considered a new submission after solving this and other issues? or it is completed reject?

You can make the required revisions, and then resubmit it with a cover letter that states why you think the paper should be considered as a new paper.   The editor will decide whether to accept your re-submission.

If your experimental paper is rejected, and you submit a paper describing the same experiment, that is a resubmission.  It is not a new submission.  Changes to the analysis such as selecting different participants are not sufficient to make your old paper a new paper.
Exceptions may apply for particle physics, other research based on huge databases, and observational research that does not have experiments.


text:
Our final exam has us work in pairs. I am struggling with personal issues and worried about being able to pull my weight. Should I ask to work alone?
I am an undergrad about to graduate this month. I've been dealing with post-traumatic stress and severe depression for almost two years now. This time of year is especially difficult for me due to when the trauma happened.
My professor would like us to work in pairs for our upcoming final exam (which is more like a take-home project - we have a week to complete it). I worked alone on the last exam, ended up having to turn it in late, and got a C. I'm in worse shape now than I was then, and now that I've just moved home (which is where everything with the trauma happened, so there's lots of triggers here), things are more likely to get worse before they get better.
So I'm scared I'm going to drag down whoever I get paired with. I am obviously going to try my best, and hopefully things will go better than I'm expecting! But I also want to be realistic since my ability to function will now impact someone else's (final!) grade as well as my own. If I crash and burn, I want to be the only one doing so!
I am planning to talk with my professor about this, but I'm not sure how to approach it. Would it be appropriate to ask to work alone? Since the exam is pretty involved they said working in pairs makes it both easier on us, and easier on them to grade. I don't want to cause more inconvenience for them, especially since they've already been super understanding about my situation.
tl;dr: My professor wants us to work in pairs for our final. I am struggling with major mental health issues and am worried about dragging my partner under with me if I can't pull my weight. How should I approach this when talking with my professor?

Do you have any say in who your partner will be?

Did you talk to the professor after the previous exam? You could frame it as “What accommodations or extensions might be possible for someone in my situation?”

First of all, my respects for a responsible and fair attitude to your future work partner. This is not at all self-understood. Now, many universities have mechanisms in place to protect people with problems of various kinds. Is there such a support at your place? Or is at least the culture conducive to discussing such things, at least with a person that has your confidence? In such an institution, it could be appropriate to ask the prof directly what to do, because they are sensitized to such issues.

It is possible that there are an odd number of people in the class and that someone might need to work alone. Put in a request to be considered for solo work, giving your reasons.
But, there is value in joint work and your professor may be depending on this being a valuable lesson for everyone.
And, to be honest, I'd much rather have a partner who was worried they wouldn't be able to do their part than one who wanted a free ride on my hard work.
If you can't make it happen, just do your best. It is all anyone can do, after all.

In some cases, the one might be grouped with another pair to make a group of 3.  This will, of course, depend on the class.


text:
Thesis Data Collection Mistake
I am currently undergoing my psychology thesis (4th year) in Australia, and have just finished data collection. I have just realised that between myself and my group, 2/3 of the questionnaires used have 1 question missing. Eg. can now only be scored out of 19, instead of 20 as data was not collected for that particular question. Does anyone know how to proceed with this or where to address this in the best way without losing marks? I cannot redo data collection, and I know this is a big mistake!
Any advice would be really appreciated as I'm feeling extremely overwhelmed and don't know where to begin.

Your supervisor(s) will be in the best position to advise on this.

@Theoretician: sounds like an answer, want to post as such?

How many total people? With enough imputation is probably feasible.

There is about 200 participants, however it is an entire item missing on two out of three of the questionnaires, so I'm not sure imputation is appropriate as it is missing that question entirely?

So consider removing that same question from the 1/3 where it did appear. Then process the results from that complete batch for the 19 questions.
You could then consider processing the results for all 20 questions for that 1/3 and see if there is an appreciable difference. That may then give another route of investigation or further work.
However, you should discuss this with your supervisor.

Sorry I have worded it wrong, I mean in two out of my three questionnaires used, they each have an item missing - so none of the participants answered this question at all. It is for a mediation analysis, so I am unsure how to proceed.


text:
What to do if my undergraduate thesis advisor is not an expert in the area?
Recently, I decided to do an undergraduate thesis (in computer science). Since I just took a course related to the topic I'm interested in, I contacted the course lecturer and asked if he would advise me on the thesis. He immediately agreed.
However, after some chats, I realized that he is not an expert in this area. He read some papers when preparing for the course, but never publish or advise students in this area. He definitely knows more than I do on this research topic, but probably not an expert. Meanwhile, I also found that another professor in our department understands more in this area, but I do not know that professor personally, and neither do I take any of his courses before.
Should I worry about that? The research has yet to start. Should I go for another advisor? Or is this so rude that I should never do it?
There are plenty of similar questions here, but most apply to masters and PhDs. As far as I know, the undergraduate thesis is more about learning how to do research and does not require novelty or publishable (I may be wrong on this, though), so the answer may be different.

What makes someone an expert? I advise people on things I don't publish on myself and, conversely, get advised by people who do not do research in a narrow sub-field, but have enough experience and breadth of knowledge to make valuable suggestions. Besides, advisor (especially for the undergrad) would mostly be teaching you more fundamental things about the research process, if they struggle with some technical details there's always an option to ask someone with more in-depth knowledge.

Undergraduate research is unlikely to be cutting edge. In fact, it rarely amounts to publishable work. A good working relationship with the advisor is therefore more important than first class expertise. If the department trusts your lecturer with teaching a class, you should be able to trust him with supervising you. Also, the rewards for supervising undergraduate theses is usually quite slim, implying that people are not going out of their way to supervise undergraduate research. If someone is willing to supervise you, and has not expressed any doubts about their suitability, then in their judgment, they are capable of supervision.
However, as long as you did not ask the lecturer to supervise you formally, there is no obligation on you. Once the lecturer spends time on you by looking for a good research topic and maybe preparing a list of papers for you to read, then switching to the other professor would be rude. Depending on the circumstances, much thought and work can go in planning a research experience for an undergrad.

Let me suggest that you try to get the three of you together and decide on a plan. If you mention to the one who has already accepted you (say "John") that the third person (say "Mary) has expertise and you wonder if it would be possible to get them involved as well then something might be made to work out.
In particular, John might open a dialog on your behalf with Mary, and if everyone agrees, then everyone might benefit. John might welcome a learning experience. Mary might value expanding departmental expertise in the field of interest.
There is no need to be rude.

However, if that isn't possible and you decide to still work with the one who accepted you, then note that while they may not be experts in the specific sub field, they are probably fluent in the general research process in the overall field, so can still guide you appropriately. If they aren't too busy with other things, they might take this as an opportunity to expand into that topic area. They already had enough interest in the topic to teach the course.
See this question on another site about how some teachers go about things like this.

This sounds like a good idea. I'll discuss with the professor. Thanks!

You already found an answer to your own question. Get friends who are in that research area. The thing I do when I start with something I have no expertise in is set some initial research goal, and then start asking people I know questions related to what I want to do. When they don't know the answer, they can refer me to someone who does, which is something your adviser can help you with.
Sometimes I email someone I don't know and ask them questions related to their published work that are directly relevant to mine. Some are busy and don't answer, some do. Sometimes you meet people at conferences. Those are very good places to find collaborators.
Once your network of collaborators is made, your adviser's expertise is less important. In any case, even if they were an expert, your research could take you in a direction very unfamiliar to them.


text:
Is it legal for me to post previous exams I have taken in University
I want to create a database of notes and previous exams for classes at my university, however, I am not sure if this is legal. I just want to know if this is OK or would I get a cease and desist or something similar from my university? And does posting the exams with/without answers make a difference?
Edit: Sincerely I didn't expect such quick responses and so many of them so thank you guys and thanks to all that may answer in advance. But also, I think I need to clarify some things to get a more concrete answer. First, I want to make clear that I will not charge anything for this website or access to it, second of all, I would change all the numbers of the questions, from say 2 + 2 to 7 + 5, and I don't think mathematics in any way shape or form can be copyrighted, of course exact wording and scenarios like Alice went can, but not something like prove the sum from 1 to n is (n(n+1))/2 or if it indeed is please point me to a US copyright law that says that. Per my understanding, "known, rational facts" cannot be copyrighted, since then you wouldn't even be able to do math to begin with because you'd be using way too many formulas written for other people.

Did you write the exams? Do you own the copyright to them?

"I just want to know if this is OK or would I get a cease and desist or something similar from my university?" Asking whether this is OK or you would "get a cease and desist from your university" is rather like asking whether it is OK to cheat on exams or whether you will end up in jail if you cheat. In other words, the space between the two extreme options is rather large.

you might get a better legal answer from the legal forum.

Do you mean an own database or "contributing" them to Course Hero?

Don't waste your time, do some sport, travel or socialize rather being busy with this stuff. Let others do some fair amount of studying.

If the faculty who composed the exam, and/or the relevant departments, did not already put the stuff on the internet, that might be an indicator that they don't want it to be "public". Or, it could be that they simply didn't want to take the time. OR maybe they're trying to keep things secret. I'd think you should (politely) directly ask them ... (E.g., I put all my course stuff on-line, so there'd not be much reason for a student to separately archive it...)

@JonCuster Keep in mind that in British English, "writing an exam" refers to what in AmE is referred to as "taking an exam".

@Acccumulation - good point - so what is used to refer to authoring the exam? Always fun to learn these things...

Are these relatively unimaginative questions like "Given $f(x)= \sin x$, find $\frac{df}{dx}$."?

Surely the exams at your university are more complex than just a single question like „prove the sum from 1 to n is (n(n+1))/2“, no? Just because a small excerpt would not be protected by copyright does not mean an entire work is not protected by Copyright, nor that chopping it up but keeping all the pieces avoids Copyright.

"Legal" is a local question. Probably civic, not criminal, law. But it isn't appropriate. The questions were probably created by someone else and if there is any creative element in them, then they are likely covered by copyright, even if not explicitly stated. That could be a legal issue. Appropriateness, however, is a different, possibly more important, issue.
But, if they can be found, you are also subverting the educational process if you make cheating possible on reused questions. While professors probably should't reuse exam questions, the reality is that they do. Shortcuts taken for grades are seldom an educational/learning benefit for those who take them.
You could, of course, ask your professors for their position on this. They might agree or not. But it would be respectful to do so.

+1 for suggesting asking the instructors who composed the exams. (And if one is reluctant to hear the composers' wishes, that in itself is probably the answer.)

downvoting as both off topic and speculation.

@Roland, I agree that in a place with such a system it would be different and instructors would work differently. But that isn't the question at hand here.

“If you make cheating possible on reused questions”: sorry, correctly answering an exam question because it was reused absolutely does not count as “cheating”. And as for “subverting the educational process”, if anyone can be said to be subverting the educational process it is the professors who reuse exam questions. To put it differently, an educational process that depends on a large group of people collectively keeping a shared secret despite never agreeing to keep it secret or having any incentive to, frankly deserves to be subverted.

Is it really inappropriate? Perhaps I'm being naive. I come from the UK, and for every exam I've ever taken the only preparation ever recommended in the run-up to an exam is practicing past papers. Exam boards make them available online, and websites offering worked solutions to every past paper ever written are common. People make careers out of it, and students would be substantially worse off if this (copyright-violating, perhaps) practice were not common. Is that outweighed by the convenience for an exam setter?

I feel pretty strongly that it is appropriate to share old exams.  At large universities, fraternities and sororities keep records of old exams to benefit other members in the future who take those classes.  Often questions are reused.  I went to a large University where the print shop kept copies of old exams and made them available to all students, and I feel that went a long way to the meritocratization of grades.  Especially in large survey classes.

Assuming the education is worth anything cheating would be detrimental. Sure you pass a class but in the next class you're even more lost and probability is increasingly not in your favor since eventually exam questions will change.

@preferred_anon practicing past exams develops students' pattern matching skills, which is recognised as a shallow learning technique and hence discouraged.

@DmitrySavostyanov Recognised by who? I've never seen an institution that simultaneously uses written exams and does not encourage practising from past papers. If your past papers only test pattern matching, they aren't worth writing.

You can boost up your exam score by practising on past papers, but it will have a short-term effect and would not achieve long-term goals. Next term in the next course that relies on this skills you will struggle. This is widely understood in educational literature and practice. Students are encouraged to practise on past exams on top of systematic learning in class and revision, not as a substitution of them.

@DmitrySavostyanov: That will depend a lot on the type of question in the exam. Certainly in many topics I've studied, practising questions from past papers would have been (and indeed was) excellent preparation for future courses - I guess because the papers were well designed to be a good test of the skills that would be required, and hence mere "pattern matching" would not get you very far.

@preferred_anon I was trained in the UK system and I teach at a UK university and I agree with Dmitry S. here. As for "websites offering worked solutions to every past paper ever written are common", I don't see this as a desirable feature. Moreover, re "if your past papers only test pattern matching, they aren't worth writing" - please try working in UKHE to satisfy the demands of the politicians, the TEF, the KEF and the league tables before presuming to judge those who have to set exams in this system

@YemonChoi I have the utmost respect for people setting exams in UK universities, and at universities in general. I am not passing judgement on them - I just have more faith in the quality of their exams than you seem to. You say that available worked solutions are not a desirable feature. Do you have any justification for this? I have never set an exam, but I've sat them. Do you deny that studying worked solutions helps students to learn? (please do not mix this up with "reading solutions instead of trying", which is obviously not a good way to learn)

I have asked some professors however not everyone has the time to meet and talk about if they want their exams on a website. That said, I don't get 100s on every exam, even if I did it would be blatantly obvious they copied a proof word by word and more importantly how would someone have the ability to memorize all these questions and answers worst part is most exams have A and B versions and of course I only have one copy so I don't get how would that encourage cheating and if it did how is a website like chegg still up?

In all jurisdictions I know, professors (or in some cases their employers) retain copyrights over their exams, so unless the copyright holder themselves post the exams and you link to their site, it is illegal for you to repost unless you have permission.
The same holds for lecture notes or any other material, including third party material that may have been used by instructors (v.g. images, slides, audio contents etc.), especially as such material may be updated to remove obsolete material or correct errors.

In countries where universities are publicly owned, and where works created by the government are not protected by copyright, this doesn't seem like it should be a given.

@kaya3 Imagine trying to write a research paper at a university where you didn't have copyright protection. The instant you send a draft to a colleague, a publisher, etc, you would lose all control over it and they could just take your work, remove your name, and publish it without your permission.

@anjama No, that would be plagiarism by the colleague.  Plagiarism and copyright are two different issues.

@kaya3 I work at a publicly funded university and I still own copyrights to all my exams and course notes.  Students cannot reproduce or distribute said exams or course notes without my consent or in some cases the contents of the university (v.g. for final exams available to students via a university website.)

My point is: simply because the government is the source of university funding does not imply in any way that the government automatically owns the rights to my work, or that I forfeited copyrights to my work.  The university or government certainly do not own copyrights to my papers, which are creative works produced under employment: in fact when I publish something I transfer the copyright to the journal without government or university involvement.

When I started my post-graduate study in Australia, one of the documents I signed clearly laid out where ownership of intellectual property lies. This is quite different to industry where my employment contract specifically claims all related work I do in employment as the property of my emploter.

@anjama This already happens for US federal employees, e.g. those employed by NASA, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Naval Research Lab, etc. Papers written solely by federal employees have copyright disclaimers. (Example, see the very bottom)

@kaya3 Which country are you referring to? In the U.S., for example, works created by the federal government or its agencies are public domain, but that does not mean that works created by public universities funded by federal funds are automatically public domain. Besides, I believe most American public universities are state-funded anyway, and I believe the public domain rule doesn't apply to state governments anyway. In any case, universities are not considered government institutions at any level. However, your comment may be interesting if we're talking about a U.S. military academy.

@Brandin I didn't have any particular country in mind, rather I am not sure that it is definitely true in all countries that a lecturer working for a government-owned university (or the university itself) would necessarily retain copyright of exams they write within their employed role. Perhaps that is indeed the case in every country, it just doesn't seems that easy to say that it is; so I'm not saying it's wrong, just that it doesn't seem like a given.

At my university, sharing course material without authorization is a fairly direct violation of our academic honesty policy.

Academic honesty policy? This sounds like it would apply to sharing an exam with other students who would be taking that exam. I would not expect it to apply to an exam taken in the past. Is this what you mean?

@kaya3 - any material given to a student as part of a course.  I suppose sanction options go down after a student graduates, but anything short of that, we'll find an appropriate sanction for.

poster didnt ask what the university thinks. its pretty clear from the question the poster doesnt care what the uni thinks. i certainly dont care what a university thinks. poster is asking about legality.

legal system consists of many layers. The relations between a student and a University are covered by the educational agreement (contract), which stipulates the honesty code.

@user156207, I would put this in the "something similar from my university" category, which was asked for.  In other words, replace "Cease and Desist" with "finding of academic dishonesty", which can be a ton more significant to students in certain situations (like those with a previous dishonesty record can get a suspension or permanent separation -- as opposed to taking stuff down in response to a take-down order).

It violates your academic honesty policy to share resources to help learning the material?!

@user156207  "What the Uni thinks" is certainly a factor towards legality - if they have policies that specifically allow this, then it is highly unlikely that any jurisdiction will find it to be illegal.  On the other hand, a clear policy against sharing, may well draw a "line in the sand" that does make it illegal.

@preferred_anon sharing course materials with people not on the course may violate copyright held by lecturers or University

@MikeB then the answer should be produced through that perspective. Violating university policy or academic integrity in no way equals illegal. i see no evidence the poster cares one bit what the uni thinks. all i see on this thread is speculation and references to academic policy. i stand by my referral to the legal forum.

@preferred_anon -- That's not quite what this says.  The verbatim policy is "Students may not publish, distribute, or sell--electronically or otherwise--any course materials that the instructor has developed in any course of instruction in the University (e.g., presentation slides, lecture aids, video or audio recordings of lectures, and exams) without the explicit permission of the instructor"

@ScottSeidman I could understand that policy (particularly "sell") if it was intended for distribution outside the university. But it sounds like it applies e.g. to students giving providing notes from previous courses to other students, which would be an unethical restriction. It also seems totally unrelated to academic honesty.

@DmitrySavostyanov It might, but enforcement of those rights might still be unethical. Many papers are available online, but rarely with licensing information. Distribution is (strictly speaking) infringement, but lots of people do it anyway, and it doesn't make them academically dishonest.

@preferred_anon -- they're perfectly free to share their own artifacts.  They are not free to share mine.  I simply disagree about this not being related to academic honesty.

There are cultural differences, obviously, but I'm seeing similar statements in the policies of quite a few Unis, and can't believe it popped up in ours without appropriate benchmarking exercises.

From uga: "Stealing any information related to academic work (such as past exams, grade records, forms used in grading, books, papers, computer equipment and data, or laboratory equipment and data)."; from cmu: "Supplying or communicating unauthorized information or materials, including graded work and answer keys from previous course offerings, in any way to another student."  I could certainly go on.

@preferred_anon if you have to quickly jump between "what's legal" and "what's ethical" to maintain your argument, it often indicates a weakness of your position.

@ScottSeidman You probably could - and I'm taking us off topic so we should probably agree to disagree. But I disagree strongly: the whole point of education is to share knowledge, and a policy that forbids that seems unethical. Nobody objects to free access of their research papers (I hope?) and I don't see how teaching materials are any different. The regulation sounds like it's to do with cheating, but merely sharing resources does not imply that.

@DmitrySavostyanov That doesn't make any sense. The legal question is clear - I just think the law is wrong (or, rather, that the law fails to protect things that I would like to happen).

The legality of "creating a database" differ from country to country, and without knowing the details it is impossible to give an exact answer to your question.
It may also depend on the purpose. Keeping info for personal use is probably fine; sharing it with others may violate the copyright.
Your University may have its own rules on what is permitted for you as a student. For example, you may be granted free unrestricted access to a book, software license or electronic service, but you lose these rights when you complete your course and are no longer a student. If in doubt, ask your University first.

While I agree with most other answers regarding the copyright issue, I want to give a different perspective on "subverting the educational process" or "academic dishonesty": in my country and field of study, the student government had an offline repository of written accounts of oral exams and written exams. This is in fact one of the primary functions of that institution for most students. Some of the written exams were provided by the instructors, though typically without answers, to the student government. Other written exams would be handed to the students after grading, and the most successful ones were retained in the repository. In some cases, learning from these old exams was about the only way to understand the questions, unfortunately. In all cases, they were valuable tools for checking the study progress and useful practice. Note that all students were well aware of the material, which was provided either free of charge (written exams, you pay only for the copies) or for a "bottle return" fee (oral exam accounts, you get your money back after writing up your own).
Of course, if your institution handles this differently, then things are different. All of this to say: besides the copyright issue, there is also an issue of findability/accessibility. If only some students know about your repository, an unfair advantage may arise.

Publishing them yourself isn't the same as a governmental repository. The expectations of professors will be different.

FWIW, as a former student and currently lecturer at a German university (which I assume you refer to) I feel there is a huge difference between the Fachschaft ("student association/government") and individuals. The Fachschaft is associated with the university, has an actual policy for handing out materials fairly, and is usually a diverse group of people. In contrast an individual student will leave university sooner or later, may try to act for personal gain or even just get bored, and may be biased against lecturers/lectures. It's much easier to come to an agreement with the former.

Good to see a matter modeler here!

Although there are already answers that are on the mark, I have to add that, in the United States at least, every fraternity and sorority known to mankind has filing cabinets full of old exams. In fact, it would not surprise me in the least if they haven't scanned at least the newer ones and established a database just such as you are asking about.
What they have not done is published that database.  My non-lawyer mind says that scanning might be fair use and so might not be a copyright violation but publication of such a database absolutely would be.  Since you've included a "publication" tag on your question, I presume you intend to publish this database, possibly on the Internet.
In that case, the answer to your question is No, it's not legal, whether you get  away with it or not.  Someone else owns the copyright on those exams, and you have no right to publish them.  It isn't even necessary to debate who owns that copyright, whether professor, university, book publisher, or someone else.  To address an addition to your question, it also doesn't make any difference that you do not plan to charge for access.  It is the act of publication that creates the copyright violation.
I'm retired, but I used to put copyright notices on my exams to try to frustrate outfits like Chegg and Course Hero who collect such material (that they haven't created) and charge for access to it.  It doesn't stop them, but if I win the lottery I'll sue them into oblivion!

"If I win the lottery I'll sue" is a refreshingly realistic counterpoint to the the typical "It's easy to get rich with a lawsuit" advice encountered from non-lawyers (or unethical lawyers) on the internet.

Yes, the idea was basically put it in a Google sites. However, then the question arises, can math questions be copyrighted? since indeed all of my courses are math or math based, would changing the numbers then in the questions which could be reduced from "Alice buys apples and she pays 5 dollars for each denoted by the formula 5x" to something like graph 5x would that be a copyright violation? I mean that is just not something you can't copyright or at least I'd hope a math equation cannot be copyrighted, the idea again is to mostly help students for free, not to provide answers like chegg

@BryanKrause I also observe that buying lottery tickets does not significantly increase one's odds of winning the lottery.  So, Chegg and Course Hero are probably safe from me.  Maybe Elsevier will sue them into oblivion.

@MiguelRodriguez The web site librarycopyright.net says, "Numbers and basic math problems with only numbers and symbols probably aren't protected by copyright. Word problems would be, as would any descriptive text. However, the selection and arrangement of even numerical math problems could be protected by copyright." (Emphasis added.)  As people keep telling you, this might be country-specific, but in general what you propose would not be legal.  You mention Google.  I can almost guarantee that someone would send Google a DMCA notice and Google would remove your site.

It would definitely help if you state which country you are in.
As a (former) professor from Canada, yes it is extremely common for professors to re-use exams due to time constraints. In some cases, the professor may have never taught the course before (everyone has a first time) and has no material of their own.
In some universities, midterms are often returned to the student and used for study purposes, but publishing the midterm by the student would be a copyright violation of the professors intellectual property. At least in Canada, the professor OWNS the copyright to any material they produce, otherwise free and open research could never happen.
At my institution, final exams were never returned.
Unless you're in Germany (apparently), providing a copy of a past test to students currently taking the same course where it is likely known the questions will be re-used, can be seen as the same thing as looking at the exam before hand to know what questions will be on it. That may come down to a personal choice.
For-profit sites that contain previous tests are great for students, and terrible for professors. There are (I believe) professors who seek to  have their material taken down from such sites because their permission was not given to publish it there. Is is more of a intellectual property stance and not specifically because they plan on re-using the questions.
If you go ahead and publish it, and you DO get a cease and desist letter from your university, wouldn't you stop publishing it? If so, then nothing else would happen.
Is it legal? Probably.
Should you? Probably not.
Your best course of action would be to simply post questions on the topic that you wrote. Then provide the answers if that is what you want to do.
And then you'll find out how hard it is to write different questions every 4 months to check for the same knowledge (varies by discipline of course).
It could also lead to a future money generator for you when you create a course on the topic (that you wrote) like all those bloggers out there. :)

"At least in Canada, the professor OWNS the copyright to any material they produce, otherwise free and open research could never happen." - what do you mean by this? People share research papers all the time.

I am in the US in case that changes your response in any way

@preferred_anon: People share research papers all the time, but without intellectual property people would take credit for other people's work. Research is tied to funding, awards, and prestige, so ownership of research and "discoveries" is very important. To some people anyway.

@MiguelRodriguez Nope, my answer would still be ask your prof. If I was teaching in the States, I wouldn't want my students studying from things I didn't specifically design to be studied from. If a professor gives back midterms, of course you should study from them, not publish them. The answers are yours to study, the questions are not yours to publish.

@RickHenderson I don't think that's true. Copyright protects expressions of ideas, not the ideas themselves. If I read your paper, understand your idea & express it in a novel way without crediting you, I have not infringed your copyright (but I have plagiarised). Copyright primarily prevents distributing copies, which for most research is a good thing (maybe for books people disagree, but that's essentially about making money, not plagiarism).

@preferred_anon  What you describe is fine - learn the material then write a book. What the OP is asking is more like taking the "Reader Exercises" appendix of a text book and publishing that on its own. Yes, it is beneficial to students, no, its not legal

@MikeB I don't understand your comment. I'm disputing the claim that copyright is a requirement for free and open research. I think I have other comments on this page that express opinions on what the OP is doing (I support it, and I agree it's probably illegal) but they aren't in this thread.


text:
Can I use \textit in the title of my arXiv submission?
I need to italicize a word in the title of my submission. In the final preview page before submission on arXiv, the word is not being italicized rather I see:

\textit{word}

This is the case for both title and abstract. Screenshot:
arXiv submission page
Is there a solution for this?
For reference, https://arxiv.org/abs/1902.01521 has some LaTex text in the title.

You don't have full TeX support in the title field, https://arxiv.org/help/prep#title I've seen some people leave the \textit{} command in the title and let readers parse it, some just use math mode instead, and some just leave the fancy formatting out of the listing on the abstract page.

@Anyon Seems like an answer.

You can do it with MathJax:
$\textit{word}$

Unless it's absolutely unavoidable to use LaTeX in the title or abstract, don't. Lots of people use RSS feeds or other non-MathJax-enabled methods to browse the arXiv.


text:
faculty position: personal statement in the cover letter of a job application
I am applying for a position in a state where my spouse is. Would it be a good idea to mention this fact in the cover letter so that they know that I am really interested in the position? I just want to make sure that it doesn't go against me.
Thanks.

Living in the same state may not help much if the distance between the two jobs is large- are you talking about two job locations that are both within a reasonable commuting distance of a place where you might live?

The answer probably depends on both the state and the type of university. If you are applying for a job at a small college somewhere in rural America, a college which has seen a regular exodus of junior faculty to bigger and better opportunities, then a connection to the state in question might help. If you are applying to MIT, the fact that your spouse is in Massachusetts would illicit a big yawn.

"I just want to make sure that it doesn't go against me."  The cover letter is exactly the right place to put this. If you introduce it without a big fanfare, the best outcome from this would be to show that you would stick around and that you'd give your all for the department in exchange for the privilege of solving your two-body problem.

If your field is actually math, I wouldn't assume that your cover letter is actually read.  Maybe it will be, but I wouldn't count on it.  It's better to personally contact someone in the department.

Failed searches waste everyone's time. Anything that suggests you may not accept an offer might be a warning sign for the department. This could be your spouse, because 1) people turn down jobs if their spouse doesn't want to live in that location (or can't find a job), and 2) two-academic households, they might only accept if offered two positions.
Your situation probably makes the department think you are more likely to accept. It doesn't sound likely to hurt your chances. However, there could also be some old-school sexism, etc., ("oh, your spouse works?") depending on the people and genders involved. I don't know the odds of this being a problem, but worth thinking about before disclosing.
Will this matter a lot? Probably depends on the type of school and how attractive the location is. If you are applying to a less prestigious university in a smaller city, departments might really appreciate the evidence that you want to be there (and won't move at the first chance). When I interviewed at a less-fancy school in my home state, I'm pretty sure that came up as a plus. If it's Harvard, I wouldn't expect it to matter at all.

Yes.  Search committees are very sensitive to what are called "two-body problems".

Yes, ideally these ctes are so-sensitive, but there are some dinosaurs who still believe that two-body conflicts are a "test of commitment", etc. Indeed, I continue to be surprised at the survival of the "monastic" model of academe (but, I suppose, some parts of "business", too), wherein nothing in planning allows for the possibility that a person might have a partner, kids, friends, family.

Keep in mind that the committee can't normally ask about your family situation- if you don't volunteer this information, it's not going to come out.  Putting it in the cover letter means that the committee will know about it early in the process.  It certainly shouldn't hurt your chances.

To elaborate a bit on why committees are sensitive to "two-body problems", it's often the case that a department makes an offer to someone only to be told, "Oh, my spouse needs a job too."  At many smaller institutions, it is simply not practical to hire the spouse and the search committee has to move on to another candidate.

In every department I've ever been in, a candidate having a spouse already employed somewhere within commuting distance (or any family connection to the area) would have been regarded as a big plus.  Of course, "big" has to be viewed in context here, since obviously, it's quite small compared to the quality of someone's research and teaching.  It will only make a difference if the department was seriously considering you already.  But every department is worried about whether candidates will accept and retention after someone comes (Harvard included! the sort of people Harvard would hire have lots of other institutions falling all over themselves to make them offers), and the way humans make decisions is complicated.