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Lack of exposure to research
I am a senior computer science student and I am working on my senior graduation project. My supervisor said that I should implement a job search web portal as a graduation project. But I want to make some research oriented project rather than raw coding. My supervisor insists on this because he won't have to spend time with me.
So I have decided to get involved in research myself without his help because he is not helping me. I had to register for his project class because other slots were full. He does not want to deal with students but due to school constraints he had to open this class.
I have never done research or I don't know what exactly it means. How do I start this myself ?

This is no means an answer, but

Apply for research internships, perhaps at Microsoft/Google. Life doesn't end at your final project.

Participate in Kaggle.com competitions or collaborations. Look at online forums. Many online forums have special sections where people look for collaborators for projects.

Assuming CS to be your field, you can do research on your own. However, you would typically need a strong field of interest with a lot of reading in that field.

Look for interesting problems to solve. Think of a solution and contact Professors online requesting for collaboration.

Can you find a different supervisor?

@JeffE It seems he cannot since, all the other Professors have their slots full.
Typically this sort of a system implies that a Professor has 3-5 students working under him, with 5 being the maximum limit offered by the university. Probably due to delays in asking the other Professors, he was not allowed to take up official projects under them.
He now probably wants to do unofficial research work, either complimentary or different from his current basic work.

if you want to find a supervisor for a bioinformatics related project, please give me your email address

Firstly, note that, from my experience, your senior advisor isn't by any means a research advisor. What you're looking for, admirable as it may be, is a good deal more than he's signed up to provide to students. I wouldn't be too hard on him.
If you want to simple familiarize yourself with "what research entails", I recommend simply talking to people. Ask any graduate student if you can meet them for coffee and just ask them what they do all day (other than surf the web and drink coffee). Search through the faculty profiles on your department's website, find someone who looks interesting, and send an email asking to meet with them for 15-30 minutes to talk about research as a career.
If you're more interested in actually doing research, all of the above still apply, but there are two more steps. First, talk to the undergraduate coordinator for your department and try to set up a research internship over the next semester/summer. Secondly, when you're talking to faculty whose research interests you, ask whether they'd be willing to take undergraduate researchers in their lab. Doing research with them, even if just for a few hours a week, will give you the exposure you need to really understand what research entails.

Since you have never done research and do not know what exactly it means, I would suggest Attending Seminars and invited Talks in your school before anything else.
Try to understand how they are related to different subjects you have taken.
This is a good way to start thinking about research and identifying interests. You may not like it and directly pursue a career in the industry after graduation.

One way to fulfill your supervisor requirements and start being
researcher is to look for the researchy problems associated with
portal implementation. A good start in this direction is googling with "portal implementation site:.edu". Try to understand what are the problems in implementing portals and what are the current solutions to them.

This might seems difficult. But remember if you want to become researcher you have to read a lot others' work . Actually some master students they graduate by implementing some systems. At the end, doing implementation is part of many research projects in Computer Science.

Another better approach (specially if you are interested in theoretical Computer Science)  is to try to find another supervisor for your
project that has research projects for undergraduates.


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Can I ask professor to send me a copy of papers?
I'm a senior in college and working for my final year project. I am required to read more than 8 papers. However, 2 of them cannot be found online or in the library (Summon system). The library delivery service is inaccessible now, and I believe my advisor have that papers.
Can I ask professor to send me a copy of the papers? Is it impolite to ask such favor or illegal?

Yes, you can, and you should. It is not impolite (unless you actually have access), and it is not unethical. I don't think it is illegal, if you do not distribute it further, and it is certainly not uncommon.
First, make sure you really don't have access (otherwise, you risk looking a bit like a fool), then ask him. Don't make a big deal of it, just explain that you lack access and you believe he may have them, if so could he please send them.

IANAL, but this sort of thing would certainly qualify in the US under fair use.

One trick is to google the complete name of the paper in quotes.  This will very often pull up a pdf copy stashed somewhere; perhaps on the profs own web page. Sometimes you can get essentially the same paper from arxiv.  But I totally agree with the previous answer that you should make sure you don't otherwise have access to the paper before emailing.  If you can't get an email response, your library can almost certainly get you a free electronic copy by inter-library loan.

Thanks!I do not know there is a service inter-library loan.

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Is it ok to ask a potential PhD advisor for more information about their future grants?
Is there an etiquette when asking Potential Advisors about their future projects?
The reason I ask this is because a Potential Advisor informed me of a future grant that she is applying for, which would have research a topic I am fairly interested in. The advisor gave me a general outline, but she left out some important details that are important to me; my fear is that the advisor will think I am trying to steal the grant idea. Perhaps I am making too much of this?

Don't worry, your potential advisor's behavior is perfectly normal. Grant applications, especially not (yet) funded, are one of the most confidential documents in academia.

I think you can certainly ask (nicely) for some more details about her ideas and the research she proposed as part of the grant. Especially so if this is going to be something you end up working on, or close to your own projects. You are, after all, possibly going to work for her! I don't think she will think anything else than you having interest in her research, which is quite positive.
However, don't ask for the grant proposal (i.e. the written text) itself, as it could be seen as assuming. Ask the questions you have, and let her decide if she wants to reply or simply give you the document to read.

However, don't ask for the grant proposal (i.e. the written text) itself, as it could be seen as assuming — I disagree.  If you want to see the grant proposal, you should ask to see the grant proposal, rather than playing mind games.  Just ask politely, and be truly willing to take no for an answer.

@JeffE I'm not suggesting “mind games”, just saying ask for what you need, but not more… I know some people who would react badly if asked by someone they only recently met. You wouldn't, but that's only anecdotal evidence (and we have to take your word for it :)

If a potential advisor reacts badly (as opposed to simply answering "no") to a straightforward question, walk away.  You want another advisor.  (You want one of my proposals? Just send me email.)

I think one thing I failed to mention is that I am currently applying to these programs, I am not in these programs. In geosciences we tend to pick advisors before we enter the program, and that advisor chooses his/her student and advocates for you in front of the adcomm, so to speak.  Does this make a difference? I am sort of this random student from the internet to this person.

@Neo, yes, your relationship to the potential advisor makes a difference.  At this point you should focus on applying and getting admitted.  Once you have been admitted, you can start to ask more detailed questions about the research program -- at that point the potential advisor will hopefully be eager to recruit you and that is the natural time to have a detailed conversation about the science.

@D.W. I completely disagree. Neo just said that in the Geo Sciences you are effectively admitted to an advisor's lab and by proxi the program. You do not get to choose advisors when you enter without breaking up with the advisor that admitted you. This is unlike math or CS, but it is actually very common in the lab sciences where an advisor is committing to having you run their experiments (bigger commitment than in the mathematical sciences).

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Do Australian academic jobs have similar tenure track policies as USA?
Is the Australian academia following the same system as the US one? i.e., tenure track for a few years, and then tenured? Or it is more like the British one where there is 'probation' period?

I don't want to contradict Samuel too much, but his account of what can happen has definitely happened to some people. But it is extremely rare and I would argue a little over-simplified.
For starters, my paycheck from a major Australian university has the word "tenured" on it. So my first point is, yes, continuing positions are "tenured" - but lets not get bogged down in semantics because tenure def means something different in Australia. Indeed I believe the union considers this to be a f(ph)urfy so let's say there is some subjectivity there.
Having tenure does not guarantee that you cannot be fired though. You can be. But as one manager said to me once, it is more expensive to fire an under performing academic than to simply retain them as long as they keep doing their teaching etc. I work with lots of unproductive academics and many have been asked to leave. They simply said no thanks and stayed. The only time I have seen academics forced out, they left with large redundancies and, simply put, wanted to leave. When you read about retrenchments at Australian unis in the newspaper, often more want to leave than are given packages.
Gross incompetence or dangerous behaviour? Yes you can be sacked. But as far as I have seen you cannot be fired on a "whim" as someone suggested. A business case would be made (declining enrolments, lack of research activity, lack of administrative roles)
And yes, as Samuel said, management teams will go after departments at times. But redundancy packages are often generous and often people from an eliminated department will be shifted to another department (good academics stay, crap ones move to a lower ranked uni).
I also don't want to make this a peeing contest, but I have worked in the US system too and the Australian system is more protectionist of staff than the US system. But indeed tenure is probably harder to lose than in Australia.
I am tenured at a Australian uni. I say this to people regularly and no one corrects me. But yes, I know union types that tell me my tenure is not tenure. I heard this a lot 5 years ago, but not recently
In short, to answer the initial question, the Australian system, broadly speaking, is the British system. Tenure with probation (3 years, recently raised to 5 I think)

This is the best answer. Australian academics in continuing positions who underperform at research are usually just assigned more classes, as many as a prof at pure teaching University in the USA.

I think this answer is great on the “ordinary operation,” and mine on “worst case” for ongoing contract / permanents. Neither answer is great on the large proportion of casual and non-ongoing positions and their increasing proportion of teaching load. For the individual academic the answer is usually “get so good you get permanent,” but this often requires long instability and location agnostic applications (ie: 2 body, single parent issues).

Australia does not have a US-like tenure system. Academics at all levels are occasionally
scrutinized, and advancement is not automatic.

So, in Australia, any academic can be kicked out of the university anytime with or without any serious reason?! That sounds bizarre!

@John How did you go from “occasionally scrutinized, and advancement is not automatic” to “kicked out anytime without any serious reason”? That's quite a leap…

I didn't go from 'occasionally scrutinized'. I took the general message that in Australia does not have a US-like tenure system. The question is simple: can the academics in Australia have a tenured position or not? Sure, there may be some differences between a US tenure and Australian tenure. But the over all idea of a tenured position is that the academics don't get fired unless there is some serious reason.

@john Tenure does not exist in Australia.  Academics can be dismissed at will.  The provisions governing "at will" dismissal generally require a six-month stitch up attacking a disciplinary area or sub-discipline; but, the substantive effect is managerial perogative over research and teaching.

@John There are many that would argue that it is the US system that is bizarre :)

Australian Academics do not have tenure.  They are either appointed on an on-going basis ("Permanent" staff) or on contract (year-to-year, three-year to three-year) or casual (hour to hour) bases.  All three categories of staff can effectively be dismissed at whim by management.
Appointment to permanent positions in Australia is on the basis of:

Merit selection to externally advertised positions (with a probationary period)
Corrupt selection to unadvertised strategic appointments (with a probationary period and the possibility of "non-conversion")
Absence of selection or merit selection to contract or casual positions followed by a lengthy union fought conversion process

While the conditions of appointment to ongoing positions vary from field to field, you should expect that the conditions of appointment for a Level B "Lecturer" are broadly similar to the requirements for either entry to a tenure-track position or achievement of tenure in a tenure track position.  (Varies by field and labour supply).  Appointment to Level C "Senior Lecturer" often occurs 3 to 6 years after first appointment on the basis of another unit of research output equivalent to the unit of research output required for initial appointment.
Academics may be dismissed at will by forced or "voluntary" redundancy processes covered by weak industrial provisions in Enterprise Bargaining Agreements (site specific industrial instruments).  These dismissals need a fig leaf of reduced student numbers or institutional renewal; but are effectively managerial dismissals.  Individual academics are constructively dismissed through bullying processes, change fatigue, and general managerialism.  Management has the power to entirely defund teaching streams and then claim that positions are no longer required due to the lack of teaching.  Australian University management is adept at manufacturing both immediate and long-term funding crises to achieve fundamentally political ends in terms of attacking specific work-cultures or disciplinary research programmes.  In addition, freedom of research has been significantly eroded by quantity and quality audits of research output which often involve politicised sub-disciplines indicating their preferences (Consider the Business Dean's journal quality list, for example).
The only defence Australian academics have against management is unity in the National Tertiary Education Union.
Sources: Industry experience, NTEU membership, 40 years of union journal back-issues.

"The only defence Australian academics have against management is unity in the National Tertiary Education Union." In the USA, many academics do not have any union protection.  Unions are usually local, which weakens them.  In the USA, tenure is not a defence against bullying or a lack of funding.  I would say the Australians have it pretty good.  They are paid more too.

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Is there any disadvantage to having PhD from a non-main campus?
What if one pursues a PhD from a university campus which is not the main campus, rather in a different city hundred miles away. The certificate is given by the main campus authority. Is there any discrimination towards the graduates?
As an example, say the campus is ADFA which is a sub campus of UNSW, Which is also known as UNSW Canberra (details). more on this is here.

ADFA is a military college and has a lower quality research output than UNSW proper, as their focus is quite different. In the end it may not matter, because ultimately it will be the quality of your publications that will matter.

@DAVE - As you've completed your PhD at UNSW, your comments are important. However, ADFA in these days promoting itself as a high quality research oriented campus with huge funding, also they got a student to teacher ratio of about 9. Perhaps other members of SE here, from that area can shed some thoughts on this matter?

I confess that my experience with ADFA is rather old and they may have improved. That said, the student-to-teacher ratio is irrelevant for research quality. Funding helps, though.

The quality of the department has much more influence on the degree than the "famousness" of the campus—whether it is a "main" campus or a "branch" campus.
For instance, in my field, Chemical Engineering, the University of California has two departments that are widely acknowledged to be top ten: Berkeley and Santa Barbara. A degree from either of these schools would be recognized as essentially equal; degrees from campuses like Davis or Los Angeles would be slightly less well received, but still be considered good.
So, to some extent, it's more the issue of the resources available at a given department, and its reputation within the community as a whole, that makes the difference. The campus as a whole is a distant second. (As a similar example, the University of Minnesota is recognized as a top-five program in my field; nobody would rank UMN as top five nationwide overall.)

For most university systems in the US, individual campuses are completely independent entities, except at an administrative level that most people (including the faculty) don't see and don't care about.  The systems themselves have no reputation to speak of; there's no such thing as a PhD from "The University of California"

Often a university will have many campuses, and some campuses will be much more prestigious than others.  (One well-known example is the University of California, Berkeley, versus UC Merced.)  In that case your degree will generally be more highly regarded if you go to the more prestigious campus.
However, I think the example you mentioned does not fall into this case.  (After reading the link you sent, I couldn't quite decide, but I got more information from the wikipedia page for UNSW.)  So in your case, I would ask about which resources, particularly classes and faculty members, you will have access to.  Elsewhere I've written about why you should go to the best grad school you can get into.  One big reason is networking and another is the culture and mindset you will absorb from your classmates and faculty.  Even if you have the same degree on paper, many people will know (or think they do) if there's a difference in the quality of your training.


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How to clearly lay out research ideas
A constant struggle for most graduate students is how to clearly lay out research ideas in a coherent manner. We are constantly in the "weeds" reading papers, move data around, running models, and researching tiny little details. When we decide to come up for air and begin to talk about our ideas they are unorganized and unclear. We assume people know what we are talking about and so we talk right past them.
So my question is, how do you clearly and coherently lay out research ideas?
Are there books to help with this, or other resources? Are there ways to overcome this challenge as a researcher?

Big ideas

Think about breaking your big ideas down into manuscript ideas--what would be the focus of each paper you could potentially write? This helps to break big-picture research topics down into both manageable and focused sub-topics, and will help you plan the even smaller research steps needed to achieve the bigger goals.

So for example, if my big grand research question is "Why are all my houseplants dying and how do I save them?" I could foresee breaking that into manuscripts:

Review of common houseplants with compiled statistics on hardiness, common stresses, etc. and development of new quantitative metric for normalized houseplant stress level
Experimental results of houseplant responses to induced stresses
Application of a new methodology for protecting houseplants from common stresses.

Similarly, break your smaller sub-projects down by what results you'd like to attain (e.g., figure comparing x and y as a function of z, calibrated equation describing x(z), etc.), then plan your work around reaching these goals.
Keep your notebooks organized according to these big ideas (e.g., Plants Notebook).
The front page of each of my notebooks is a running to-do list of things that are relevant right now, which I try to review and update at least once a week.

Smaller ideas

Make sure your smaller ideas fit in under your larger research goals/plans above, and record your ideas in the appropriate subject notebooks
Keep a "parking lot" notebook for your random thoughts and ideas that might not be tractable/relevant right now but might someday be useful.

General

I like to use a digital notebook app instead of a paper notebook to keep things organized since you can move text around as needed... my old paper notebooks are full of notes on different topics all mixed randomly so it's hard to find them again, and relevant notes are often in very different places. You can keep different notebooks for different topics, but I've found it's still hard to keep things organized and the topics themselves often evolve over time.
Go back occasionally and re-read/reorganize/rewrite your old notes. This is especially facilitated by using digital notebooks because it allows your notes to be more of an actively updated list of relevant things you're working on right now (for the most part), rather than a bunch of disjointed things you randomly wrote down way back.
In addition to (digital) notebooks for each subject I'm researching, I also keep notebooks for seminars/conferences/meetings/workshops (since they're often on random topics unrelated to my research), administrative/proposals, outreach, teaching, classes, and papers (notes on papers I've read). Any info in one of these that's also relevant to a research project, I'll copy over to that subject notebook (this is a little clunky and would be easier if I could find a notes app that lets you cross-reference or alias pages to multiple notebooks...).

Great answer! Organizing notes and ideas is certainly a struggle when using paper notebooks. What notebook app do you use to organize notes?

I use Goodnotes, but I've also heard good things about Notability and have considered switching over. I'm sure there are many other good ones out there though. Might be a whole other question topic...

@Dandan that app is the only thing that I miss my iPad for. I currently use a Windows 2 in 1 tablet and the applications are pretty bad compared to the ones that support Apple.

Once I had an informal discussion with my supervisor and few of my peers regarding this. Even I had this question looping over my head many a times. This is the experience from my side.

We read a lot of papers, on an average at least a paper per day. Create a log in your machine or your research log book; that contains details about one line summary of the research paper that you read. This helps in concrete understanding on the paper. Yes of course, none can fully understand the paper, but that is how it is. You will see that you are getting better at it with time. -- This will help also in expressing ideas.
New ideas are often seem unclear the very first time. But get refined. Try to express ideas not with English sentences first, rather with demonstration. Then, try to summarise the demonstration in sentence.
Your idea should express the following: (1) What is the problem, (2) In which portion of the problem solution, your idea fits in, (3) Is it new or an improvement of earlier ideas, (4) Would it produce a good solution, (5) How to formalise it, (6) How to implement it, (7) What are the concrete set of tools to be utilised.
Most important is "Can you divide your idea into smaller ideas?" -- If yes, it solves all problems during laying out the big idea.

Hope, this helps!

Thinking about a one line summary for research papers is a great idea.

Whilst not being the exact answer you are looking for, properly defining research aims and objectives may help you in your endeavour.

Similar to about anything in life, practice makes perfect.
The lack of clarity while explaining an idea to others is mostly because you never do it before you do it. In my case, while reading papers and thinking to myself, the ideas become extremely clear. But then when I want to discuss it with my collegues, I just can't proceed. My descriptions are flawed, my arguments have no supporting arguments etc.
When we discuss frequently with my colleagues, after two or three sessions, at least one idea becomes more clear, and finally turns into a good research problem.
Also, my former supervisor used to tell me

We, scientists, frequently daydream. So many of us have a 200 page notebook filled with so called ideas. They are just wrong things on the way of finding the right research direction.

Overall,

Frequent discussions with your collegues, and keeping small notes about meetings.
Keeping a log of research ideas, and frequently discarding them.
Repeating the process untill a research topic is found.

might be the best way to go in my humble opinion.


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How to determine if the presenter will attend as a session chair
As a session chair, it’s important to maintain schedule.
As shown in SPIE’s responsibilities of session chairs:

If you find a presenter has failed to attend:

Note the no show on the Session Report form
DO NOT move to the next paper.
  Attendees plan for the talks they want to hear based on the published schedule.
Choose one of these options:
  […]

My question is how to determine if the presenter will attend? Maybe he will appear later.

If the presenter has not appeared at the beginning of the session, or at the very latest at the beginning of their presentation, it may be safe to assume they have failed to attend.

Should a session chair give the rest of time to other presenters? Or better suggestion?

It tells you what to do on the page you've linked. Read the bullet points immediately after the text you've quoted.

Actually, @Ian_Fin, it is only safe to assume they won't attend at the end of the allotted time. I have never seen it reasoned explicitly, but this may be why the chair is admonished to "NOT move to the next paper", however disruptive that may be to the flow of the session, and to attendance of the subsequent talks.

@user3697176 Read the sentence immediately after the one you've quoted: "Attendees plan for the talks they want to hear based on the published schedule." You're not meant to start the next talk because anybody planning to attend that talk, and not the one before, will miss the beginning.

I think you are misunderstanding the instructions.
Let's say a presenter is scheduled to begin their talk at 11:00.  If they are not there at 11:00, they have failed to attend, for the purposes of these instructions.  The instructions go on to say what you should do in that case.
It's not asking you to predict the future, or to guess at 11:00 whether they will show up at 11:15.  What happens at 11:15 is irrelevant.  If they weren't there at 11:00 they missed their talk.  Even if they show up later, it's too late.

Yes - additionally, the instructions are clearly stating that you should NOT continue with the next speaker, until it is that speaker's turn. Having been on the listener end of this, it is very frustrating to show up for a talk only to find it has already concluded because the previous speaker did not attend. The audience may not attend the entire session depending on their interests.


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Should I oppose reviewers whose results I show to be wrong?
I am submitting a mathematics paper to a journal. This paper contains a section where I claim that some results made by some authors in different published articles are false. I give a counterexample to support my claim and also show where their proofs are flawed.
Should I oppose these authors as reviewers when I submit the manuscript? In this case what should I write in the “reason” section?

Why do you want to oppose? Why not keep them as reviewers? Won't they be happy finding the mistake?

Well normally, I should keep them as reviewer. But I don't know how they will react when criticizing their works.

I would think the authors in question would belong to the set of ideal reviewers for your paper. Additionally, I assume that you criticized their work in a respectful manner. (You did respectfully critique their work, right?)

As @MadJack alludes to, as long as you were respectful in your critique, those authors would easily be the ideal reviewers for your paper, as they are intimately aware of the problem which you're working on.

In an ideal world, you would want these people as your referees. In this one, maybe ask around or google to see if they are known to be difficult or respond poorly to criticism. There are some people who are like this.

Your concern is that some potential reviewers have a conflict of interest.  In my opinion, it is the editor's responsibility to manage conflicts of interest.  You should inform the editor of the facts in your cover letter, and leave it at that.

You shouldn't oppose reviewers unless you have reasonable belief that they'll be biased against your paper. That might be because they're biased against you, your particular sub-field or the techniques you've used; or, in cases such as this one, if they're very sensitive to any kind of criticism. In this case, we can be pretty sure that they're not biased against your sub-field (they wrote papers in it themselves!) or really against your techniques (that doesn't seem to be a thing in mathematics, but more likely in experimental sciences).
Simply being proven objectively wrong shouldn't cause significant bias for most mathematicians. Of course, it's embarrassing to have published something wrong. However, it seems that the error wasn't central to the original paper, or they'd have tried to write an actual proof without the supposedly redundant assumption. It seems to have been more of an aside, so the level of embarrassment we're talking about is "Oops, I made a boo-boo" and nowhere near "Noooooo! My career is destroyed! I must bury this!"
The authors of the claim you showed to be wrong are likely to be particularly good reviewers, since they understand the topic very well. I'd expect the natural choice of reviewers would include one of those people and one outsider.


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Is it normal for PhD students to do much "non research" work?
Background: At my current institution I haven't even officially started my PhD yet, meaning I am not even enlisted as a PhD student. I have my bachelor’s and master’s already, and this is in Germany so “thesis only”. I also have worked here for a while now during my master’s so I know the institute well and they also know me well, which may be part of the problem as I am not “just a PhD student”.
The problem is that I get buried in all kinds of work like,

writing parts of grant proposals (many, not one or two like other questions mention)
giving popular science talks about our work on any given chance
presenting our work during lab tours for all kinds of guests (which happens often)
writing news articles and marketing material
supervising students and assistants
...

It’s not that I don’t like doing that stuff as much of it helps me to improve my writing, presentation and people skills.
My problem is that there is nearly no time left to actually do research. I just present old stuff or the work of colleagues that is to some degree build upon my old stuff. I feel like I do the work of a postdoc or professor and not the work of someone that hasn’t even started their PhD yet.
So to what degree/amount are the mentioned tasks normal for a student in my stage?

Looking on from afar (US), this sounds unusual and not good. Is it driven by your advisor? Can your advisor get you free of it?

It is behind a paywall, but, if you want, "Are You in a BS Job? In Academe, You’re Hardly Alone" by David Graeber could be a good read. https://www.chronicle.com/article/Are-You-in-a-BS-Job-In/243318 It only gets worse, unfortunately.

@Clément Although it's related to the issue of dwindling time for research, that article isn't much related to the things the OP is describing doing.

@buffy In Germany all of these activities are quite normal for PhD students (who are employees in Germany) and often their contract specifically states some of these activities. In this case in sounds like a little much in total.

@Dirk, right. I forgot about the "employee" part. Here, students are mostly just students, though some of those activities are good training for an academic life.

@Buffy On your first comment: My advisor could get me free of it but I think he would very much not like to because this stuff seems the be effective in getting us new projects, grants, partners, etc. So we´re having great success but I pay the price of not getting anywhere with my own research.

And yes, I am a employee which makes all this "part of my job". It´s the amount that bothers me as it leaves no time to do my "main job".

Start training other lab members so you can all share these tasks.

I'm in the US and as in my answer these activities don't sound unsual to me, I don't think it's just a Germany vs US difference.

I think your question is simply how to limit and manage time (e.g. set "office hours" for supervising students/RAs, and likewise for external visitors). Then make yourself unavailable outside those hours when you need to concentrate and get stuff done, e.g. go to the library/coffee shop/wherever people will not pester you, until they learn. Right? Also, keep an hourly timesheet of where your time went, esp. if you think you're doing more than your peers or they're dumping responsibilities on you.

You probably do not even get paid for the research. You do the research and writing your thesis for yourself. If you are not paid by a grant, you are often paid to do such things for the institute.

Is it normal for PhD staff scientists/professors to do much "non-research" work? Well, yes. Yes it is.

"I haven't officially started my PhD yet" - might that be the culprit? Do you have a starting date? What is your current job title, what does the contract say?

@Bergi From a job title or contract standpoint I am a regular scientific employee like every othe PhD student.

These all sound to me like usual activities for a PhD student (the "news articles and marketing material" bit sounds a bit odd to me, but that might be more field-dependent).
PhD programs are not typically designed only to allow you to do research, they are designed to teach you to do research, and furthermore to train you to be an independent researcher. That can include learning about all the other baggage that comes with research, such as finding funding, disseminating the research to the academic and sometimes lay community, mentoring junior researchers, etc.
However, like most things, balance is important. It's hard to specify some number of hours per week or something like that for you to contribute to these "other" activities, but the most important thing is that you are able to make progress in your research.
Since your advisor will be the person judging your satisfactory progress as well as being the person assigning you all these tasks, you should have regular conversations with them as a student regarding this balance. Have these conversations early and as often as necessary. It would be appropriate to approach this question directly as you have asked it here, too: tell your advisor "I am worried too much of my time is being spent on X/Y/Z and it will be difficult for me to make progress towards my thesis."

@JafFromA: I agree with this, but in addition: Keep a time log.  At the end of every week, log (on a per day basis) how long you spent Teaching (/assisting), Researching, Writing grant proposals, etc.  Put it in an Excel (or comparable) spreadsheet, with a line for each week and a column for each activity.  Bring it up with your supervisor regularly.  For what it's worth, if you go into industry after you graduate, keeping track of your time like this is pretty common in many fields.

It is not that usual to do such accurate accounting, as it is expected (and allowed) to be flexible. You usually do not have fixed working hours (in germany), but may come late and stay late or arrange your time in another way. You often are much more time working/researching than you're paid for, because you work for yourself, after all. Doing such an accounting may even reflect negatively on you.

@allo: "You usually do not have fixed working hours (in germany), but may come late and stay late or arrange your time in another way." - well, the contract certainly defines very clear working hours, break times, and so on. Needless to say, the only people even remotely sticking to them are some of the people in administration.

From phds in Germany I heard that the first time, until you've got experience and get faster, “other stuff“ can take 4/5 days a week.

@allo I thought you come early and leave late when having flexible hours. Actually, not having to log hours is mostly synonym for working more hours and not leaving a paper trail of that

@DonQuiKong In theory, in academia it is neither. In fact you're more likely to stay longer, especially since there often is no clear separation between university work and research for many people. Is writing the grant work (as in non-research)? You probably read papers regarding the subject, maybe you secure your own funding. So this is probably something which would go into a in-between category of a log, when you try to count the work/non-work hours.

I agree with the considerations on scope and balance from Bryan's answer. With a CS background from Germany, I consider all of the activities you listed quite normal, as long as you are not downright swamped with the sheer amount of work. I would, however, like to point out another important aspect:
It is important to learn how find synergies in the additional tasks and your research.
This can mean executing some of the additional tasks in such a way that their results are in some way useful for your research. It can just as well mean guiding your research into a direction that aligns with the content of your additional tasks, even if it is not exactly the direction you would have picked otherwise.
Let's look at your examples (without taking into account whether the concrete amount or frequency of such tasks is adequate):

writing parts of grant proposals

Beside this being an "inter-generational contract" (PhD candidates are employed from the funding gathered by a grant obtained by one of their predecessors, and during their employment, the candidates write some grant proposals to secure funding for their successors), delving into the topic of grant proposals may give you a better overview of what questions and topics appear to be considered interesting by the community and by external entities.
Furthermore, it gives you a chance of spawning follow-up projects to what you are working on, which will, in the future, produce citations of your work. In the best case, it might even create one or two new positions in your lab with colleagues working on directly related topics, thus naturally paving the way for collaboration opportunities.

giving popular science talks about our work on any given chance
presenting our work during lab tours for all kinds of guests
writing news articles and marketing material

All of these are chances to practice how to present your work to members of an audience who are not experts in your field, maybe not even in your general subject area.
Depending on your research interests, this can be immediately helpful for paper-writing: While research papers typically assume some familiarity with the field, there often is a desire to keep at least the introduction and problem description sections comprehensible to a rather wide audience. After all, even readers who may be only marginally familiar with the particular research questions should be able to figure out what the paper is about by and large, so they can decide whether reading up on the topic in order to understand the paper in-depth is worthwhile.
At the same time, chances are your research interfaces with people outside of your field in one way or another. Maybe you will have to embed a theoretical framework in a context of application from another field, maybe your research results are meant to benefit non-experts (who will thus be a part of user studies or similar events). Either way, you will have to explain to people who are outside of the target audience of your actual papers what your research is about.

supervising students and assistants

This might be the proverbial elephant in the room when it comes to synergies between additional tasks and your research - at least if this supervision happens in the kind of arrangement I am thinking of: Projects of one or more students whose content is more or less individually agreed upon between the students and (officially) the examiner/(inofficially) the supervisor.
If that is the case, try to actively participate in the definition of the tasks. Bachelor and Master theses, as well as other student-based projects, can often be designed in such a way that they end up forming a sub-project for your own research (think a prototype with a small evaluation of a concept you describe, an alternative approach that you do not have time to explore yourself, an extension that forms the "missing link" between your concept and a concrete problem, ...). Motivated students may be willing to try and publish a paper about their work together with you after completing their project, not so motivated students will at least submit their work, which you can then mention in your thesis as a proof-of-concept developed by students.
If done well and with some good luck, this can be a self-reinforcing process, as satisfied students will recommend your supervision to (hopefully) equally capable friends of theirs who can carry on where the previous ones finished.

Excellent answer.

Let's get things sorted straight away: in Germany, most PhD students are Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter (scientific collaborators), with a part-time or full-time contract for the time of their PhD. The tasks of your job are:

writing parts of grant proposals (many, not one or two like other questions mention)
giving popular science talks about our work on any given chance
presenting our work during lab tours for all kinds of guests (which happens often)
writing news articles and marketing material
supervising students and assistants

Plus some degree of teaching responsibility and, of course, doing research.
Being able to get a PhD degree is, at least on paper, an extra perk. If you have a full-time contract (TV-L/TV-H 13 100%), as common in the "IT" part of MINT, you're supposed to do all those stuff during your normal work week, and then put extra effort towards your thesis. If you have a part-time contract (50%, 2/3, 75%), as common in the "MN" part of MINT, you're supposed to devote that portion of the work week to those tasks and work the rest of the time towards your degree.
That, at least, is the situation on paper. In practice, your degree is one of the main goals. As O.R.Mapper also said, your best bet is to make sure those other parts of your work also have relevance towards your degree. Try to be proactive in offering to supervise Bachelor and Master theses by proposing topics which are relevant to your research (data analysis, programming and evaluating some algorithms, etc.). The better those theses are, the further they will bring you, and the higher the chance a good paper may come out of them - which, depending on the advisor, may be a major part of your final thesis. Try not to see those tasks (especially the teaching and supervising ones) as a burden: they may be really useful, if played well.

Isn't Mitarbeiter just employee?

I'm not totally sure, but I think part of the paid hours are supposed to be used for PhD research, i.e. 'wissenschaftliche Qualifikation'. It's not purely something you do after work hours.

I guess formally, it is expected to do research in the paid time and write the thesis in the unpaid time. Of course, it is not easily possible to distinguish between the two, especially when the research leads to papers.

In Hamburg, by law, at least 30% of your paid time should be focused on your PhD. Track your time and if that isn't the case, speak up.
But as others have said, most of what you have to do, can help you as well. Find the synergies and maximize them. In the end you should be able to reach 50% or more and all the remaining tasks are necessary for your (academic) career anyway. You can't be a professor without teaching experience. If there is an opportunity, most people will hire someone who was able to generate funding, for a postdoc position.

The type of work you described definitely belongs to the work of PhD students. And sometimes it can even be less connected to research; from my own experience this can include organizing conferences or helping reorganization of offices.
The actual amount typically depends on the kind of contract. There are different types with different perks and requirements on your side. A typical full time university job ("Lehrstelle") includes a certain amount of teaching, typically measured by lecture hours. It is expected that you spend twice as much time for the teaching. I.e. if you have the obligation for 8 hours of teaching this will mean 16 hours per week. The additional time is required for preparation, correcting exams, supervising the lab, etc. Also supervising other (bachelor and master's) theses is expected, and also helping students in seminars.
Often these jobs are only part time, which means that the official teaching obligations are also only halved. This allows you to spend the other half of the time for doing research.
Additionally, there are research grants. They typically do not include teaching obligations, but supervising students for seminars and theses is often expected and also voluntarily giving a lecture. However, it is easier to select an interesting topic. With these contracts comes the most free time to actually do research work.
The other topics are normally not written down explicitly in contracts, but it is expected to be the kind of work. If you feel that you do more than is usually done in your group, speak to your supervisor. From my experience in research groups that work well together, the work is shared belong all members, with a trend that PhD students that are shortly before finishing their own thesis have to do less work to concentrate on the at that time more pressing topic.
However, with any kind of contract it is often the case to write most of the thesis in after office hours.

You need to concentrate on your research.  Hide out if needed or do your work at odd hours.  Often people won't tell you the dirty truth but I would urge you to at least consider a more stark and cynical view of grad school.
A fair amount of single-mindedness, even selfishness is needed.  It is possible to take this too far (not pulling your weight in the group, leaving lab dirty, breaking things) but you are the opposite.  Doing too much.  At the end of the day, the "score" will be based on how many papers you write and how good they are.  NOT on the other crap.
Buckle down and get some science done and papers written.  You can be more outgoing and do outreach, etc. after you are a tenured faculty.

This does not address the fact that the OP is a salaried employee of the university. He/She is formally was hired to do exactly what he/she spends so much time on. Given that, the "Hide out if needed or do your work at odd hours." suggestion does not appear to be appropriate, as making yourself unavailable is against the working contract. It would however be appropriate to approach the supervisor about reducing the non-science workload.

I disagree.  One approach is to ask supervisor.  Other is avoidance.  They each have plus and minus.  I am not talk open rebellion, but avoidance.  This is very possible as an employee.  For example when asked to help, "sorry too busy".

Yes, avoidance is possible for employees. However, unless you are Wally, avoidance will come back and bite you. The person whose assignments you are avoiding is the one that supervises your Ph.D. and that will write recommendations for you later. Avoiding assignments is a good way to end up on that person's bad side.

You can take a stance of doing the minimum. It's actually prioritization. Your instructor gets more out of the publications anyhow. And certainly you do. I urge to at least consider this more contrarian view along with the other answers.

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


text:
How many research papers are downloaded by each major economic sectors?
I am interested in knowing who downloads academic papers.
In particular, ideally, I wonder if it is possible to have a kind of matrix with:

in row, research areas (e.g. computer science, epidemiology, economics, etc.);
in column, research paper consumers (health private sector, transportation
private sector, energy sector, public administration and international institutions, etc.)

Have you looked at the Open Data Stack Exchange? What does a Google search show?

TL;DR I think that it would be almost impossible to acquire the data you are interested in, because it will be very difficult to collect and there are a lot of inherent biases that you cannot get rid off.
First of all, you have to know that there are four general ways to obtain a paper:

Via a subscription to a journal.
Via individual purchase from the journal.
Via freely available preprints.
Via the author.

You only have a hope to collect any useful amount of data from the first two sources and preprint servers, such as the Arχiv.
The major paper consumer by far is academia itself. As most academians get access to papers via university-wide subscriptions via the universities’ internet connections, there is no easy way for publishers to say who actually downloads a paper, because the journal will only know, which university the downloader belonged to. Something similar holds for big research societies such as the Max Planck Society.
Now, going by your question, you are not interested in this consumer, but this is important to consider as to what other paper consumers do, when they want to obtain a particular paper. As the vast majority of non-academic paper consumers were once in academia, they are likely to have some ties to their alma mater, by which they can easily (though perhaps legally questionably) get them access to a desired paper. Apart from reducing the number of downloads by other ways (which could generate the data you desire), this introduces a strong bias, as the prevalence of such downloads is likely to depend on the sector and field.
Moreover, as academia towers other sectors in paper consumption, it may be a considerable source of noise, even if you are not interested in it. Though academia¹ only downloads only a very small relative amount of its papers via non-university subscription or direct purchase, the total number of such downloads may be relatively high in comparison to what other sectors download. For example it could be that the student who does some surveillance job it an institution (which allows him to study while working) downloads more papers via that institution’s subscription for academic purposes than the institution downloads for its own purposes.
Another problem is the field dependence in the availability of online preprints (and similar): Making papers freely available is much more common in physics than medicine. This will give you an inherent bias on downloads from preprint servers and thus render this potential data source useless. Moreover, this will cause a strong bias in data collected by other means. If the papers of some disciplines are much more likely to be available freely, they are much less likely to be downloaded on ways that allow for collecting data on the paper consumers. Combining the two sources might reduce this bias, but won’t eliminate it, as a large number of freely available preprints and similar is available via private hosting.
Moreover, the data available on the total number of individually purchased articles is already rather scarce (see this question) and difficult to come by and it seems to be rather low. Breaking down this data as to the source of the purchases certainly won’t be easier. Also, collecting or using this data may violate privacy agreements.
Due to the immense price of such subscriptions, I assume that most non-academic subscribers are rather large organisations and companies, which in turn may cover many sectors and thus won’t generate useful data.

¹ by which I mean people doing research and similar to further their academic career


text:
Indecision between PhD and industry
First a little bit of background.
I am a graduate student (Bachelor) who will finish the Master degree in June or July at most. I am working on my thesis at my university with a professor which I know quite well. I am getting a Master of Electronics Engineering, thus my thesis includes some practical work and I got to know a lot of people at the Information Engineering department. I think that the work they do here is great and valuable, and so is the people.
Meanwhile there's a friend of mine who works for a quite big company near my local university. They are hiring young graduates for open-ended positions and I am very likely to be hired if I do an interview. My friend was with me at the university for five years now, we did much work together and I'd love to work with him, plus he tells me that the work environment is great.
The problem is that I would love to teach. Some people think I am quite good at what I study and quite good at explaining things to people. I love the idea of spreading knowledge, helping students understand things and pretty much all what's involved in the teaching process. To achieve this I will need to apply (and hopefully win) for a PhD, that I thought I can do at my local university because of what stated in the first paragraph, and because my girlfriend is currently studying here too so moving is an option that I'd like to avoid for now.
What keeps me to just jump in the Academic world is the fact that in my country (Italy) things seems to be a little stagnant, there are great people in their forties that are still associate (or researchers!) while some old professors (very, very bad at teaching) hold more than one chair. And of course from the economic point of view there might be a gap as high as 10x between industry and academy, but happiness can't be bought of course.
My question then is: given the fact that I am sure I would love to become a professor but the road might be hard (too hard maybe) would you advise me to take a PhD (that's three years here) and at least try the academic path or leave it already and hit the job market head on? Are there many downsights in starting an industry career after a PhD?

A note: I hope the question is on topic here, if that's not the case please leave a comment and I'd gladly edit/remove it. Thanks.

I strongly recommend reconsidering moving out. Coming from Spain, I can assure you, the grass is greener on the other side. Plus, it is always good to get experience from different places. Your education has some flaws (no department is perfect), and moving out will give you a better chance of realising and correcting them.

PhD is a many-years commitment. If you can work for a company for some time, you can discover whether it is better or worse for (and typically you don't need to commit for many-years, so if you dislike it, you can go for PhD).

First, we have 26 questions tagged phd+industry. Nothing that is a direct duplicate, but I'd still recommend you browse through them. This question and this question appear especially relevant.
Second, it will be hard for us to really answer your question, because we simply are not in your position. Yes, staying in academia and getting tenure is hard, and most people drop out. Until you get tenure, you will work your backside off. If you really love it, you can take the risk, but be prepared for a long, hard slog.
Third, that said, a couple of specific comments. You write that you love to teach. On the one hand, that raises a bit of a red flag to me, because teaching is not necessarily the top responsibility for a professor. Publications are far more important. If you want to become a professor, you will spend a decade writing papers and doing your teaching "on the side"... because you won't be able to get tenure based on your teaching alone. You can relax the research part and concentrate on teaching after getting tenure.
I am not familiar with the system in Italy. Im Germany, there are universities of applied sciences (used to be called Fachhochschule, nowadays Hochschule). You'll apply for a professorship there if you have a Ph.D. and at least five years experience in industry. Then you will do a lot of teaching. Teaching load at Hochschulen is twice as high as at "regular" universities and very applied, and conversely, you are really not expected to do a lot of research. If something comparable exists in Italy, this may be a potential career route for you.
Then again, if you just like to teach, you could try to go into industry and get a job as a trainer. You won't need a Ph.D. for that (in fact, you'd probably be overqualified with a Ph.D.). However, note that trainers are often on the road a lot.

Thanks for your insight. I do know there are some related questions and I was planning to read them, I just wanted some specific advice. Thanks for pointing that out though. I am sorry I did not point out that I know research is (a big) part of the package and I like it, also if I prefer teaching.

Do note that there are many kinds of professor jobs, and it's not the case for all of them that publications are "far" more important than teaching. I am a tenure track assistant professor at a smaller public university in the US, and teaching is weighed more heavily in my duties than research (50 percent versus 30 percent).

There are many ways to teach besides being a university professor. You can teach in primary or secondary school, you can teach at trade schools or for associates/professional degrees, you can tutor, you can volunteer, you can get involved in educational NGOs, you can even just come hang out on Stack Exchange sites. If you aren't passionate about research, I would highly recommend one of these other routes rather than Ph.D.
Note also that industry does not preclude Ph.D.: I know many people who have done a PH.D. after some time in industry, and they often do quite well, since they usually know much better why they want one than a fresh graduate for whom it is just "the next step."

Thanks for your advice. Trying the industry world and then going for a PhD is definitely an option of course, thanks for suggesting it.

I have a bachelor's in computer engineering and I currently work in software (early in my career). When I was in college I was seriously considering doing a Ph.D. and I talked to students and professors about it. I also like teaching, and I believe I do it well; I've tutored high school students and classmates.
I can't speak for your situation exactly, but for myself the main thing that deterred me was the salary difference and job availability. I wanted to have the potential to make more money, and have more options regarding the location of my job, whereas a professor can only teach in a university. (I also thought I'd enjoy both industry and academia, if that were not the case it's possible my decision would have been different.)
I had also considered going for a PhD and going into industry, but from what people told me the job market for PhD's wasn't very good, since you'd be seen as overqualified for most positions. (Though that could be wrong, but that was the impression I got from people I spoke to.)
The other thing was that I was unwilling to make a longtime commitment (5 years) to something with an uncertain outcome.
I can also say that of my best professors, many were those with industry experience (though mostly they weren't full professors). So if you want to be the best teacher you can be (from a student's perspective), I'd say industry experience can help.
Good luck!

I have a PhD and so feel that I can give you some pointed advice. Finishing your degree is all about your professor and publications to some extent. It is not a giving that you are going to finish. If you really love teaching, then doing a Phd and then teaching at a liberal arts college or non R1 universities might be a good option. Just know that the PhD road is not going to be easy if you don't like research, plus you are going to lose out on income. On the other hand, if you finish and are able to secure a teaching job, you get to be your own boss and not work during the summer if you choose to.

I can't speak for other countries, but at least here in the U.S., it's very unusual for a liberal arts college to have an engineering program.

@reirab Harvey Mudd is considered both a liberal arts college and has an excellent engineering program, and has for many years.  There are many others in the US.

You make assumptions about your choice where I see a danger of misjudgement of external peoples decision. You can get knowledge about if your judgement is true without doing a true decision. I talk about the assumption, that the industry interview is most likely a walk trough, while a potential project is more likely to be rejected. Get in closer contact instead with both sides, e.g. look actively for open research positions in your town and if not there make sharp first contact to good chairs at this university. Do the same with the company. You never get a immediate reply after you write an application, there is always time to write another one or two applications. You might meet a professor and might get invited for an interview in the company. It is your right in this case to go to both sides. See what they offer. In interviews you always learn so much anyway. It is also a good psychological effect that during an interview you have somehow present that there is a second option coming next days. Less pressure and you will perform better. I personally also do not consider it wise to assume you have a close to garateed positive feedback.
You might also be able to teach people in a company. You will start there as a youngster, but you will get experience in your company and start sharing it to other youngsters. Dont forget about this point.
You should not be afraid of negative side effects on your later life. If you join industry after a phd you should be able to ask for higher sallery. Phd first year sallery benefits are in general higher than master first year salleries. In your field though there might be not a plus over a fourth year master sallery, but it averages out somehow.
You might have better choices to enter RD company parts with a phd, here it is benefitial. If you prefer non "research" part of industry, you can still reason for it in future during interviews. A PHD does not open you every door, but it also does not block you every job opportunities at master level. Your CV has to look interesting, but that does not mean linear.
In the end you will have to decide on your own, here in forum you can only ask for missing point of views. I agree that going for the professorship is the harder choice. But there will still more than a decade time to leave science if you choose for other priorities in life expectedly. I assume a phd in your field will already be considered close as possible to industry work. one of the more practical phds.


text:
How strange is it (as an undergrad) to email a professor from another institution about possibly working in their lab?
I'm at a relatively small Liberal Arts College (top 25, so not "bad", just relatively small) and there are limited opportunities for research in the field I am interested in: behavioral science of resource consumption.
How strange would it be to email a professor from another undergrad institution, asking if I can work in their lab over the summer?

Also look for official, organized summer research programs you can apply to, including programs organized by your school involving doing research at other schools, and programs organized by other schools that are open to undergrads from any school (e.g. REU).

'LAC' = Liberal Arts College, I take it

Not strange at all, just don't expect a quick response!
A plan of attack can be summarised in the following way:
1) Be specific
Make sure your email is brief, polite and clearly outlines why you want to work in their lab in particular.
I would recommend searching for a few different labs that do the specific research you're interested in, which you can find out by looking for recent publications or on the websites of the relevant institutions. Perhaps someone in your current department can recommend a lab- they may have connections, or would be willing to write you a reference letter.
2) Be persistent
If you don't get a reply within a few weeks, follow up once and then let it lie. Try asking someone else.
Most importantly, don't give up- it took me nearly three months of emailing back and forth with ten different people when I was in a similar situation last year.
3) Be enthusiastic
Remember professors are generally happy when someone expresses an interest in their niche field and shouldn't just dismiss you offhand.
Good luck!

I agree with all this. You should also clearly point out whether you're asking for a paid or volunteer position.

When you approach someone who doesn't know you, make sure that the recipient of your mail understands that you are specifically addressing this person. I get about one email per week asking for supervision in "your institution" by someone who is interested in "your subject of research". For some time I asked back about which of my interests they are actually interested in, and never got a response, so now every email which looks as it was indiscriminately sent out to 100 professors is treated like an email that was indiscriminately sent out to 100 professors, i.e. spam.

To be clear, you should provide as much detail as you can about what you know of that person, their lab, and their work, and the reasons you are attracted to working with them.

I wonder who wants to waste their time to spam

This is common, so feel free to email to ask, but know there may be limitations. For example, the lab may typically hire students from their university at hourly positions or give credit for lab work, but may only be able to take volunteers from another institution.
Also, know that even if you are offering to volunteer your time, as an undergraduate with little to no experience, you will likely be more of a drain on the resources of the lab you join rather than an asset, so be gracious and expect rejection; you might need to try multiple options if your first choice doesn't work out. It will be crucial in your email to make clear your level of interest and a demonstration of your commitment (for example, by understanding something about the current research being done in the lab).
I would also consider getting advice from a professor at your current institution who may have contacts at nearby institutions.

Another suggestion if you are prepared to be a bit bold. Find a paper (preferably published as recent as possible) that especially interests you and is written (primarily) by a researchers about half-way in the hierarchy in the institution. Then try calling that researcher. You should say something along the lines of:
"Hi I am so-and-so, a student at stage X of my degree Y. I am very interested in your research on subject Z, especially your paper A. I was wondering if you have any positions for students like me for over the summer. Can I e-mail you about this or should I e-mail someone else?".
In my experience, almost always they will say: sent me/that person an e-mail on this e-mail address. Of course you have your e-mail ready to go, so you hit send as soon as you hang up.
This strategy has several advantages:

It humanizes you. An e-mail can be sent to dozens of people with
fairly little effort, a call takes more commitment. Or, it at least
feels like more focused. It also shows you are interested in the
actual research, instead of just the name of the top professor and
the institution.
Usually e-mails get read sporadically and e-mails from outside students get very low priority or at times forgotten. After this call the researchers knows to expect an e-mail at a specific e-mail address about this specific topic. If you are lucky the researchers gets curious and looks at it right away.
If there is no chance of getting a position over the summer or you need to approach a specific person to get a chance, you get to hear it right away.

Check their website first if they have any policy on it for students wanting a position like you are looking for. If they do, follow that protocol. If not, the above protocol is fair game.
If there is no published e-mail of the person you want to contact, contact the general e-mail of the institution and ask for the researcher you want to contact. You might get a secretary that ask you to mail, in that case just mail.
I expect academics to disagree with this advice. They don't want to be called by students and want to let requests like this linger in their inbox for days or weeks until they have a moment. However in my experience calling works anyway, and academics prioritize people who called over people who only mail.

This is why I don't answer my phone when I'm not expecting a call.

@MichaelHoffman fair policy, and if the person isn't picking up the phone, indeed the only good option is to e-mail anyway


text:
Is teaching calculus important for getting a job as a university professor in mathematics?
I am a master's student currently deciding between two different Ph. D. programs in mathematics.  The two programs have very different teaching opportunities as a grad student.  One of the two programs I'm applying to allows (and encourages) students to teach a first-year calculus course, and the other one does not.  However, I would be able to teach a college algebra or precalculus course at the other school.  Would it reflect badly on me as a job applicant if I have no experience teaching calculus?

What are the other differences between the two programs?

@cartonn:  Thank you for asking.  There are lots of other differences between the two programs.  One of the programs is the one where I am currently doing my master's, so it is more "familiar".  I already have professors here who have agreed to advise my Ph.D. if I remain.  The other program is comparable in how well-regarded it is in my general area (analysis), but the specific research going on there is closer to my current mathematical interests.  There are other differences too.  I guess the main thing is I think I'd be happy at either place, but I want to make the best possible decision.

You should also look at how the schools are regarded in mathematics as a whole, not just analysis. Hiring committees will be composed of a variety of mathematicians, and at teaching colleges your fate may be decided by one mathematician and several other STEM faculty who won't know the difference between a good Analysis school and a good Algebra school. For teaching colleges the general reputation of the University is important. Same goes for if you decide to end up in industry. But of course go where you think you will do the best research (if that is what you want to do in the future).

I would be truly shocked if any hiring committee cared at all about whether you taught calculus versus pre-calculus.  Doing well at either would show that you can adequately handle teaching service classes.

I'd second this. The math is easy, the extra-mathematical issues are the potential challenge. Indeed, I'd dare say that "service courses" are not really about mathematics itself at all, they are about teaching and testing certain habits and skills of the students in the more-objective-than-some-things venue of "calculus" or "pre-calculus" or "college algebra". Attention to detail, following instructions, being on time, being organized. Slightly disappointing that it's not about mathematics, but it's a good thing to help kids attend to these skills.

Part of the answer depends on your prospective area of expertise. Usually math professors teach the undergraduate courses that are closer to their research area. So, if you work in analysis, you will likely be assigned a calculus course; if you study algebraic geometry, you will probably get an introductory abstract algebra course; if you do research in Riemannian geometry, linear algebra.
That said, I would not worry much about which course you teach at this point.
This distinction should not be your primary concern in deciding between two PhD programs. Any teaching experience will do for now, and you will have many opportunities to compensate in future. Moreover, most hiring committees will focus more on your research activity than on your teaching in any case.

Maybe this varies between countries, but in the U.S. the question of who teaches relatively low-level math courses (such as calculus or linear algebra) is entirely independent of research expertise.

"Most hiring committees will focus more on your research activity than on your teaching": This assumes you are looking for a job at a research-focused department.  These are the highest profile employers, but employ a relative minority of mathematicians; many more departments will be most interested in your teaching ability.  But I agree that calculus versus pre-calculus is a minor distinction.

@AnonymousMathematician, NateEldredge: you are right, I should have specified that this answer is based on experience in Europe. From what I read in many places, the US is a different thing.

In my experience, hiring committees focus on both research and teaching. If you have sufficiently good research, you can be certainly be hired at research-focused departments without being a great teacher (and not vice versa), but even at research-focused departments, teaching is one of the components in the hiring decisions.

For some reason I doubt that there are that many European algebraic geometers teaching college algebra.  Does "college algebra" even exist in Europe?

@PeteL.Clark You are right, I picked the wrong English word. I meant "abstract algebra", as a first course in modular arithmetic, group theory, rings and fields. Editing to fix.

Maybe you've misunderstood what "calculus" means in the US.  It is not a real analysis course and the people taking it are not usually math majors.

@NoahSnyder Hmm, ok, I'd better delete this answer outright then maybe, it seems that I have lots of misunderstandings on how the American system works and the OP seems to be focusing on it.


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Do old preprints actually exist?
It is quite common (in some areas) to see the reference to the paper, which is cited as "to appear" or "in prepapation" but never actually appeared. Such citations are treated in the same way as references to unpublished results, conference talks, etc.
However, this approach doesn`t really work for references to preprints. The results are published. The problem is that old preprints (say, from 1985) are now inaccessible, they are often not digitized.
So, it is not clear how to treat such old preprints and papers based on results from them: should I believe the authors citing it or consider it as non-existent?

You ask "should I believe the authors citing [a preprint] or consider it as non-existent?"  Consider the question "should I believe the authors citing [a published paper] or consider it as non-existent?"  If you didn't have a copy of this supposed published paper, would you still say it existed?

Consider my comment above a request for clarification on your question.  Are you proposing to cite a preprint without having a copy of it?  Are you saying that it is okay to cite a published paper without having a copy of it?

it depends. I know a case of an obscure publication (but reviewed in Zentralblatt Math., so sort of known) basically announced results in the PhD thesis of the author, progress. The author left academia meanwhile. The PhD supervisor was easily computable, and he told us that the thesis was never completed and the only copy of it lost. And the paper was actually total nonsense as we found out...

You should try to track down the preprint.  Having to track it down is annoying, but it's usually not hard to do by asking around.  If your friends don't have a copy, and the author can no longer be contacted, then you should feel free to write to someone who has cited the preprint to ask if they know where to find a copy.  (You can also try the author's collaborators, thesis advisor, students, etc.)  When I've done this, it has generally led pretty quickly to a copy, and I've always found one eventually, even for unpublished work from 40+ years ago.  If necessary, you can also do things like post online requesting a copy from anyone who has one, but this is typically not necessary.
If you can't find a copy, I would suggest giving the citations you have seen the benefit of the doubt and mentioning the preprint in your paper; it's possible that the citations are mistaken, but not likely.  If you can't verify the claims, you can note that you have not been able to track down a copy, but it is cited in X, Y, and Z.  (You should only say this if you have seriously tried to locate one but failed.)
For some purposes, seeing the preprint doesn't really matter.  For example, you may be citing it merely to assign credit, in a situation where all the factual content can be obtained from elsewhere in the literature.  In that case, it's perfectly reasonable to follow the consensus in the field about credit, without worrying about investigating it yourself.
On the other hand, if your work depends on the actual content of the preprint in a way that cannot be verified without a copy, then you really need to track one down.  Some people may be lazy about this, but that's not a responsible scholarly approach.
The most frustrating situation is when you're told that something you've discovered may be previously known, but you are unable to access the paper that might contain it.  In this case you need to try especially hard to find a copy, to counteract your natural incentive to give up and decide the paper doesn't exist or isn't relevant.

While I completely agree with Anonymous Mathematicial, it is generally acceptable in my field to say "Jones found x (1945, cited in Smith 1985)." This makes it clear that you did not verify the information (from Jones) yourself but someone else (Smith) did claim it to be true.


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Preprint on CV - should I include journal I submitted to?
I'm in a discipline where it is common to make preprints publicly available on arXiv as soon as they're ready to be submitted to a journal, so naturally I list them on my CV. Before the review comes in I would just list the paper as "Preprint" and after it's been officially accepted I would list it as "To appear in XYZ". I wonder what is the best course of action between those two states, that is, after the paper has received positive reviews but there are still corrections to be applied and it has not been officially accepted (but I'm willing to bet that it will be). Is it reasonable mention that the paper is "Submitted to XYZ" in such a case? That has the benefit of providing more complete information, and is definitely a statement that I can justify if pressed. Or is it always preferable to stick with "Preprint" until officially accepted?

See a related answer here


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Is it bad practice to cite MSc dissertations?
While searching for references on a certain class of problems I came across a well-written master's dissertation. It did not contain much in terms of new results, but  it did a good job of explaining what happens in the important papers in the field (or so I believe). This was helpful - my interest in that class of problems is that it's adjecent to the problem I'm writting about, so it's important for me for context and historical reasons, but it's not a subject I want to research in much depth; having read the dissertation and a introductions to some of the relevant papers, I feel I know as much as I need to know. I should also mention that some of the relevant papers are in French, so I was very grateful that someone explained in English what their gist is. I also feel that what I read in the published papers is enough to reasonably write all that I need to write in the introduction, but having looked through the dissertaition certainly helped me orient myself.
Now, my dillema is: Should I cite the dissertation? It is not generally seen as a requirement to cite expository materials on a subject, so I don't think I have to. But I also feel that it would perhaps be nice to cite it: it acknowledges that I benefited from reading it, and it helps potential readers who might become interested in the subject. If it was a published survey article, I would definitely cite it. On the other hand, this is a piece of writting that didn't go through the usual peer review process, and that was almost by definiton written by a rather inexperienced mathematician. I'm worried including the citation could annoy some readers, and possibly the dissertaion's authour.
What is the best course of action in a case like this?

No, it is not bad practice. (And no, "might annoy the author" does not count as a reason for skipping a reference, unless perhaps the author explicitly told you to not cite their work and gave a good reason.)

Cite it. It's a source you used, so you need to cite.
In addition, good explanations are also good for readers who are looking for an introduction.

didn't go through the usual peer review process

Where I am, a Master thesis is reviewed (+ graded) by two professors, and that can include a list of required corrections/clarification for the final version. A paper is possibly reviewed by 2 PhD students who have barely published their first paper...

was almost by definiton written by a rather inexperienced mathematician

so is everyones first paper. Including possibly reviews: I know PhD students who were put to the task of writing a review paper right with their literature study to familiarize them with their thesis subject.

There are things in my Diplom thesis that I wouldn't write or do like that any more (now, 15 years later: science and my personal knowledge have advanced, after all - which is as it should be), though the downright mistakes I've found are mostly typos or otherwise the correct expression is clear. So it's rather that I have different expressions/sentences/wording now that I think are more clear/better or explain things I could only observe back then.
But then, the same is true for some of my (peer-reviewed) papers.


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Are there major obstacles to completing a thesis Masters program if I'm not funded/working in a lab?
I will be entering an MS program in engineering this fall. I was not offered any assistantships or fellowships/funding. I was accepted to other graduate programs with some funding but chose to go to my top choice of school.
I spoke to my academic advisor and they told me something very similar to 'most MS students here take out loans, complete a non-thesis program, and then go out into the real world and make a ton of money and pay them off.'
Given that I would also like to apply for PhD programs and external funding upon completion of the MS program: what obstacles, if any, will be associated with me choosing to complete the thesis program if I will not be working in a lab? Could this cause issues when I go to apply for fellowships/PhD programs?

Make sure they have enough supervisory capacity for you to do a thesis. If most students do a coursework-based masters, the department may not be equipped to supervise as many MS theses as there are students who want to take that option.

I've added the tag "united-states", correct me if I'm wrong.

You could do a theoretical thesis.

It strongly depends on your school, your department and your topic. Ask your advisor and/or PhD student what is the policy of the department.
There are theses where student work for a lab or factory and the thesis is part of this work (optimisation tasks, design of custom experimental apparatus), there are also, mostly theoretical, theses that can be succesfully defended and continued in PhD without strong bond with the department.
There are also topics, ususaly narrow-focused, where student is not skilled enough to work for the lab. Or there may be legal issues.


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How the US Dept of Education define a school year for purposes of Pell Grant eligibility?
I applied for a pell grant for the 2016/2017 school year.  My question is, what is a school year to the US Dept of Ed?  Is it Fall 2016 - Spring 2017 or is it literally any day in 2016 or 2017, so long as school is in session?
I would love to attend the summer 2016 semester, but if a school year begins in fall, then I guess I will have to wait.

Yes and no.
You can only use your Pell grant money for summer classes if you've already been enrolled in classes  the previous year:
To be eligible for using this federal aid for their summer courses, students must have completed 24 credit hours toward their degree programs during the prior fall and spring semesters and have received passing grades, and they must enroll in at least 6 hours of courses during the summer.
So if you want to attend summer classes in 2016, you had to have 24 credit hours of schoolwork done at the same institution during the 2015-2016 academic year.
Campus Explorer, Pell grant can be Used for summer college courses, starting in summer 2010.


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qualitative research participants name
Basically, I am trying to find out the technical term for the participant in qualitative research, when the person giving the information is not the person experiencing the phenomena talked about first hand. So for example, I might ask a lawyer to talk about psychological impacts of the asylum seeking process, instead of asking people that have gone through the asylum seeking process themselves. This is done for reasons due to ethical concerns and also because the secondary source might be useful due to their vast amount of accumulated knowledge.
I know that the term exists, but I cannot find it anywhere.

Sounds like you'll be doing interviews. If this is the case I would call them respondents


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Seeking out guidance from a Professor at another institute during PhD
I'm interested in the research of a particular professor at University 1 (top 5 in my field), which recently rejected my PhD application. I do have an offer from another place, (University 2, top 20) which I now plan on attending.

Can I go to University 2, complete the requirements for a masters, and reapply to University 1?
Would it be possible for me to seek out guidance from (or maybe even collaborate with) the professor at University 1 during these two years who might then want me as a PhD student?

This is all in the US.

Okay, I've reworded but I think the relative ranks of the places do matter to the question.

Are you planning to go into the PhD program at U2 and apply to U1 after the Masters or are you going to U2 for a Masters?

Of course you can, and this is probably your best chance to make it into U1 (without any guarantee, clearly), but this involves a risk of straining relationships to your supervisor at U2.
This is a question you should discuss with your supervisor at U2 (after all he/she should give you guidance as well and careful argumentation is needed to explain why extra guidance might be appropriate), but don't be surprised if the professor at U1 would not be seeing a collaboration with you as a priority -- he/she might be busy enough with all the commitments towards his own institution.

Doing what you suggest is all within your legal rights, but I personally think when you have entered an agreement at U2 (possibly involving funding) then you should focus on that and not give the impression that you want to run away at the earliest opportunity.

It is not uncommon for PhD students to spent a couple of months in another institute as guest/apprentice. Sometimes this is a required part of the program, sometimes it is just encouraged, and sometimes it is discouraged. That depends on the department and discipline. But if possible, then that would be a more constructive way of getting experience with U1, which won't lead to a conflict with your advisor in U2.

It might be worthwhile to reach out to U1 even if you don't intend on leaving U2. As a PhD student I won a grant to visit another institution for a summer. A few years later I got a post-doc at the same institution, so perhaps that's a viable route for you as well.
In my situation, I visited someone who collaborated with my advisor frequently, and I had no aspirations to transfer (or to apply for a post-doc at that point). Still, I went on my own initiative and eventually collaborated with the professor I visited.
(Again, your ability to do this depends on the field; this was in mathematics, so I wasn't tied to a lab. You also need a decent reason to reach out, in my case, I wanted to learn topics related to my research area, but not commonly used at my university. Another common reason to visit another university is to use some equipment that you can't access at your university.)
Also, it's not uncommon to change universities after a few years to change research topics. If you're not tied to an advisor at U2, then leaving with a masters because you decided your interests are better represented at U1 is reasonable. I don't have any personal experience with this though.

After re-reading Maarten's answer, I realize my answer is essentially the same. Anyway, take it as evidence that his advice is good :)


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Is it common for PhD programs to require students to have a minimum number of papers to be eligible for the defense?
In some countries like mine (Iran), you are asked to have at least two papers printed or accepted in an ISI journal before you can claim for your PhD thesis defense.

Is it like that in other countries?
Is there any world record for the number of papers extracted from a single PhD thesis?

In mine, you are expected to have four (two published, one submitted, one manuscript), but there is no hard rule. John Nash would have gotten his PhD.

Publishing papers is not a requirement in many places, but it usually depends on the specific university and graduate program. In the U.S. these things tend to vary from school to school. Sometimes research projects funded by industry prohibit the people involved from directly publishing results.
As for a world record, I'm pretty sure nobody keeps track of that. It is pretty subjective. How would you determine whether or not the paper is from your thesis rather than just being in the same field? There shouldn't be that much value in the number of papers either.

there is no 0-1 meter to determine if a paper is extracted from your thesis or it is only in the same field, but I think it is distinguishable for your prof. because he/she is with your thesis growth from its birth. so he/she qualifies it as extracted or not.

Even if there is no formal requirement, here in The Netherlands several Universities/Department in my field require 4 papers to be submitted before Ph.D. defense. Yet, the limit is somehow soft and depends on adviser and impact factor of the journals where the papers are published.

In Sweden the doctoral theses may be in the form of a monograph or in the form of a series of papers presented together with a summary to bind and tie them all ("compilation thesis").
Regarding the compilation theses, it seems, at LTH at least, that it is not strictly required that the papers be published already:

The articles should be of the quality required for publication in international journals.

Nevertheless, I remember distinctly that supervisors expected that, by the time you made your Licentiate dissertation (i.e., about half-way to the doctorate), at least two or three papers be submitted or ready to be submitted to a journal. By the time you are ready to defend the PhD thesis, the submitted papers might be already published or at least accepted, plus maybe two other papers at varying stages.
This, of course, varies and depends on the thesis subject, the study plan, the supervisor criteria, the common practice in your academic Department, even on what's common in the discipline or field of study.
Generally, as stated in the first link, many consider that

there should be more emphasis on the content of what is published than on the number of articles.

The department of Computer Science of the university I attended in Italy had a requirement of at least 1 journal paper and 1 conference paper published (or accepted) by the end of the PhD. At the time, it was a pretty unique requirement and considered strict, but in recent years more and more Italian universities have implemented a similar policy.

In my dept. (civil engineering), a minimum of 1 published journal article is required for defense. However, my adviser won't schedule any student of his for a defense unless they have published 4-5 journal articles. Keep in mind that other professors in the same dept. go with the 1 paper rule. It varies from a professor to another and from field to field.

At my university, it is expected that there will be at least one publication-worth of work by the submission time, but there is no strict requirement for the paper(s) to be accepted.
For example - I am in my third (hopefully final) year, and I have a joint paper out for conference review and a couple being re-worked after rejection (one journal, one conference).
It may be a little different as I find that computer science tends to weigh conference papers quite highly.

At IIT Bombay (India) it is up to the department and the supervisor to have a certain number of publications. Otherwise, before a year or so even here it was the same scenario of a publication and conference paper.
It is not mandatory, but to have up to date knowledge on current trends in the field of interest is very much needed and that it possible through this medium.


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Using a time budget for a class
I teach at a school where the department has a strong expectation that a graduate or undergraduate course should require 45 hours of work per credit hour. For example, a 3-hour course should take 135 hours; say, 45 hours of lecture and the rest for readings and assignments. (The formal requirement is that 75% of students should be able to complete the work in that amount of time.)
At another school, the expectation for a class was 60 hours of work per credit hour. Furthermore, some professors took that requirement very seriously (including a time budget in the syllabus), whereas others took quite a cavalier attitude (“Do you want to be in graduate school or don't you?”). Of course, some classes take less than the allotted time.
At another school, I don't think I ever heard about a particular expectation, except perhaps an estimate of two hours of homework for one hour of lecture.
Given the range of variation, I wondered if there was any consistency of expectations across universities (say, in the United States, at the graduate and undergraduate level). Alternately, is there any pedagogical research that would inform either an instructor's or a department's policy about such matters?

There is no consistency of anything across universities in the United States.

The numbers you reported are exceedingly common in US higher Ed. What is strange is that you reported semester totals rather than weekly totals.
It is common in US higher ed that for every hour of class time a student will spend 2-3 hours studying and completing assignments outside of class. Therefore, if there is 45 hours of  lecture in a course there would be anywhere of 45*2=90 to 45*3 = 135 hours of individual study time for the same course.
The first example in your question requires 2 hours of study for every hour of lecture (45 lecture hours + (45 * 2 individual study)  = 135 total hours). The second example requires 180 hours of total time (45 lecture hours + (45 * 3 individual study)  = 180 total)

Yeah, I put it in semester totals because the course load will never be evenly distributed across the semester. So, IMO better to keep things manageable in the course as a whole.