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What are "Numerically Weighted Transcripts"?
I was reading about a postgraduate scholarship. As part of application for the scholarship, a "numerically weighted" transcript is required.
This is what my B.S. trancript looks like:
(A part of my transcript HERE)
It shows, on a single page, all the courses taken in all the semesters, Letter Grades (LG) and Grade Points (GP) secured in the courses, Credit Hours (CHr) of the courses, all my re-attempts, as well as GPA secured in the semesters, and final CGPA --- i.e. absolutely no information is hidden.
Now my question is:
Is this what a "numerically weighted academic transcript" is; as required for the scholarship?

An "official" transcript is very likely one which is sent to them directly from the school, and not from you.

Welcome to Academia SE! We don't usually include "thanks" in questions, so I've edited it out of yours.

@PeterShor I would think an official transcript is any original transcript or copy which includes a valid stamp and signature from the school. Because in some cases students can print out their transcript themselves through an online system as well (that wouldn't be official).

This seems to be explained in a FAQ from a previous year for this scholarship.

I do not have numerically weighted academic transcripts, can I still apply?
We require academic transcripts/official documentation showing specific subjects and how your overall grades were obtained. We require evidence of the progress of your studies in individual subjects, so that we can see, for example, whether your strongest subjects were in the areas in which you propose  your specific research inquiry, or whether your grades improved over the course of your  years  of  study.  We  require  evidence  of  the  subjects  you  completed  and  of  their  actual  value,  not  just  the  one  figure  for  their composite value. This  information  is  required  so  that  panel  members  can  make  appropriate  and  informed  recommendations  on  the  ‘academic achievement’ selection criteria. We would suggest you contact your University to obtain this information as your application would be deemed ineligible without this information.

So they want a transcript which has grades for every subject you took (and not just an overall rating, which is all that some very prestigious schools in England provide).
It sounds to me that what "numerically weighted academic transcript" actually means to them is one that has an overall GPA, as well as all the numbers that went into computing this value. Most schools provide this in their standard transcript; the most notable exceptions being the few U.K. schools noted above—I would guess that these schools are the ones that this criterion is directed towards.

Yes, I have read FAQs, but could not understand this point.
So in my case, if you have had a look at the transcript picture above, is it 'numerically weighted'? Or does it need to describe the marks obtained (out of 100, for example) in every subject, as well as the grade (GP or LG) in the subject?

@Asim my guess is when they say weighted they mean for each course you multiple the GP by CHr, sum all of those together, and divide by the total CHr (thus you weight the GPs by the CHr value). I believe your transcript already does that. But let's wait for an actual Australian to confirm.

@Asim Yes my understanding is the "GP" and "CHr" columns in that transcript clearly shows all of the grades and how they are weighted. You should be able to calculate your GPA directly from those two numbers: the weighted (by CHr) average of the GP.

@BryanKrause Thank you! That's what I wanted to be sure about.


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How to select a journal at the intersection of two domains?
My professor has asked me to select a journal to publish the paper I have been working on, which focuses on analysing the performance of NNs, SVMs etc. on existing datasets in the Network Security Domain.
I am a new researcher (just finished by Bachelors), and I'm unsure how to go about selecting a journal; I tried sending the paper to an AI journal, which rejected it suggesting I submit it to a journal closer to the application domain. I do believe the paper lies in the domain of AI/Machine Learning, as it's majorly a performance analysis of datasets and their properties. How would I go about selecting the correct journal, accounting for things like impact factor etc.?

There are many factors that aids to the selection of a journal or any other publication venue. You are asking us to search stuff for you and such a question is regarded as "shopping" question in academia.SE.

I'd suggest to rephrase this question so as to make it more broadly applicable beyond the particular intersection you're interested in.

@Coder I do have a list of journals I think might be suitable. But then again, I thought the first journal selected was suitable too, so I'm looking for advice on how to improve my journal-selection skills.

@henning I was thinking it might be an interesting topic to discuss, but wasn't sure. I've changed the title now.

Very odd for a professor to leave this entirely up to you.

It is the job of the professor to find a suitable journal.

@mystupid_acct. He's asked me to decide as he is unfamiliar with the one of the domains covered.

As a first year grad student, you are unfamiliar with BOTH domains.

@mystupid_acct I know, it's not ideal. Any and all advice would be helpful.

It is perfectly normal for a grad student to ask advice from professors about which journals might be a good fit for a particular paper. Obviously, the advisor should be the go-to person, but in this case it sounds like the advisor doesn't have any suggestions. In that case, it would be wise to reach out to another professor in your department who knows about one or both of the domains in question.
Here are some other approaches:

Look at the venues where the papers you build on got published.
Find individuals who seem to be doing similar work and see where their papers are getting published.
Look at editorial boards and identify editors who do work in this intersection of two domains.
Look for a journal that encourages submissions from (grad) students.

In terms of impact factor, I think first-year PhD students don't need to worry too much about this. There will be plenty of time later for high impact journals. Many authors in math publish first in lower journals and work their way up. Anyone reading your CV will be impressed that you published anything at all as a first-year grad student, and the venue won't matter much (as long as it's not predatory or vanity press). A less selective journal might be best, so you can learn the ropes of the publication process and still have a strong chance of being accepted.

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How to list on cv an article honored as national conference theme?
Apologies for the unwieldy question title.
Essentially, a journal article I just published in the flagship journal of the national disciplinary association was very well received by its members. The article's ideas are now being made the organizing themes of the following year's annual conference.
Does anyone have any suggestions for how/where I might list this on my CV?
Thanks in advance.
Edit: Yes, I've gotten confirmation from the organizers that this is the case. I'm also not asking about whether or not to list this, but how the best way to do so might be without incurring confusion. Thanks.

I think it's necessary to read the conference announcement to answer this question completely.

Will the conference announcement explicitly mention your paper? If so, then I think it's reasonable to mention that on your CV. But I wouldn't mention things that can't be objectively verified; in particular, I wouldn't say merely that the conference theme matches your article's ideas.

I think you have to convey this in few lines. The description can come after thet paper entry or in other section of your cv.

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Is it ethical to reject an article after acceptance?
I submitted a journal article to Forum: Qualitative Sozialforschung/ Forum: Qualitative Social Research back in September-October 2016. By February 2017, I received an R&R. April 2017, official acceptance. We were in the midst of the final edits, but I couldn't fully understand the editing requests of the editor. She threw the broad recommendations at me to "fix references" and to "improve readability". But even though I adhered and responded to all the specific queries/comments marked by reviewers throughout the paper and went through the paper multiple rounds after, the editor still wasn't satisfied. She snarked at me telling me she was "repeating herself now", and refused to read my paper in-depth until I'd made the appropriate changes. I apologized several times, but at this point, whatever responses/comments I'd written in the paper itself I now had to email directly to her or she wouldn't see them. I noticed in the edits she'd misunderstood some italicized words for a quote, so I kindly brought up that my italics were actually for emphasis and not quotation. I then asked her to simply identify which sections didn't look right or "readable", and I'd be most happy to edit it. Immediately after, she straight-out told me she decided not to publish my article, because she felt attacked by what I asked and because I had one reference that didn't conform to her guidelines (I wrote "trans." for translation rather than "transl by."). This happened this week in June 2017. I feel like I had a lot of my time wasted, and it feels unfair to have my article rejected AFTER acceptance. And even more so because the rejection wasn't for the quality of my paper nor the fit of my article, but because of a personal grievance of hers about something that I didn't even do, and a citation detail that doesn't really seem significant. Is recanting an acceptance this close to the finish line ethical? Can an editor decide this without consulting any of the reviewers or editorial board? I understand I made some mistakes, but they were just references and some issue with "readability" that I didn't understand, which is why I simply asked -- were these really so serious that an editor could justifiably do what she did? How should I respond?
Edit: I should add the readability issue is related to a language barrier, as the Editor was not a native English speaker. I've published a lot over my career in reputable journals, so I'm fairly confident my writing's fine.

I did not read your paper. Even I did, I won't be able to understand since I am not in your field. However, I am reviewing this question as this is the first post you write on this site and I am supposed to provide some comment and the comment I really want to give is "Please improve readability" because it's wall of texts.

February 2017, I received an R&R. April 2017, official acceptance. It's a bit dependent on the culture of one's field but R&R is not identical to acceptance and commitment to publish... / but some of the rest sounds like some pretty troubling standards for publication.

If your paper is written like your post here, I can sympathize a bit with the editor. Perhaps, some colleague with good written language skills can give you some help improving your text?

@scaaahu and Walter, if any article is that much of an issue for a journal to begin with, then it shouldn't have been accepted in the first place? My point isn't about writing, but the ethics of retracting an accept. Authors shouldn't simultaneously submit to multiple journals, because it'd waste reviewers' time editing for something that won't be published in their journal. Shouldn't editors be discouraged from retracting an accept months after the fact for the same reason?

Okay, rejecting after acceptance is unusual and perhaps unethical. But so is asking the authors for edits after acceptance. It appears this is a dodgy journal.

I thought the right of accept/reject is in the editor's hands. Referees make suggestions for the editor. If the editor finds the reference pesonal and inadequare, the referee can evem cast curses on you, the paper will be published.

My take is that you cannot really know what is going on at the journal. Your role is to try and produce the best possible content for your academic article and accept the decisions of the journal.
It does sound quite unusual - usually an acceptance means that it is accepted, period. You could try going down the official complaints route but I wouldn't recommend it. Editors have a lot of power.
I would suggest finding another journal for your paper. Yes it will take some time but ultimately it will end up in a better place. Perhaps the reviews from another journal will further improve the paper.

The process is unusual for sure, but without seeing the reviews and what exactly the editor and you wrote to each other, I can't say that it is unethical. The acceptance of the article may, for example, have been conditional on improving language issues. This may or may not also have been stated in the reviews that suggested acceptance "subject to improving the presentation" or similar wording.
In the end, what you describe is an editor deciding that this improvement in presentation or language is apparently not forthcoming, and so the conditional acceptance was turned into a rejection. I'll note that you state: "And even more so because the rejection wasn't for the quality of my paper nor the fit of my article...", but that is exactly what it sounds like: the quality of a paper is not only a function of its scientific contribution and originality, but also its organization and ability to convey its meaning accurately. I have certainly rejected papers that may have had sufficient content for publication but were written in a way that made it impossible to understand or follow the arguments.
Obviously, I cannot say whether that is what happened. We lack the information for this. But in the end, I do believe that it is upon the author to present the material in such a way that it is understandable. Papers that fail to do so, even if their content is good, should be rejected.

I don't see any question of ethics.
"Is it normal?";
"Is it polite?";
"Is it necessary?"
These and the like are all very good questions.  An appointed editor made an editorial decision based upon the revision process.  I don't see any ethical issues

It is one thing to reject after asking for changes and then not being satisfied with them.  Here, it was officially accepted, then rejected after edit.  I wouldn't call this an ethical issue, but neither would I say it's as simple as you make it out to be.

@FredDouglis  -- Hence "Is it normal?"

Scott, I agree with rephrasing as "Is it normal".  I disagree with the summary "An appointed editor made an editorial decision based upon the revision process".

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To what extent can advisors edit our writing?
When advisors edit our thesis work, what kind of changes can they make? Is there a limit to what they can do? There's proofreading and also editing for style and clarity. Is asking students to paraphrase what they wrote something that occurs commonly? If it's not, what can I do?
Does anyone know any resources where I can read more about this?
Thank you.

What kind of writing are you referring to? Your thesis? A publication? A discussion paper?

limit?  they can pretty much rewrite everything, or dump everything into the bin.

@henning--reinstateMonica it's for a thesis.

Are you the student or supervisor in this context? In my own experience, my supervisor made plenty of comments on my PhD thesis, some about style/wording and others about content. But he never physically edited the document. Whether and how I chose to implement his suggestions was up to me. It's the student's thesis after all, not the supervisor's.

Anyway, in general it completely depends on your supervisor and their style and preferences. There's no hard and fast rule. Why don't you talk to your own supervisor about this?

Will this be a paper to be published with multiple authors?  I would think that any of the authors could edit what the others write.

@GEdgar This is for my thesis. I think it would be ok if it was a paper, but for a thesis I wasn't sure what is the limit, if there is one.

@astronat In this context, I'm the student. Though I understand I don't really know how to write an academic thesis yet, I wasn't sure if this was how people learn to write theses. The amount of changes that were made made me question if it was still my thesis after. I did try talk to my advisor about this and they said it is ok but it just feels so strange having that much input from someone else for my writing.

@solid-rock it took me a long time to get used to other people editing/commenting on my writing too, but I've learned that at least 99% of the time it results in a better piece of work. Learn to live with that strange feeling!

@astronat Yes I do think the end result is much better after someone else has edited/commented on my work because they have a different view of things! Ok I shall try!

Do know that there are a lot of moving parts in this dynamic: your and your advisor's personality, interaction, language proficiency, etc. factor in as well.
In term of convention on how much and advisor edit the student's work, there is none. Some like to be more hands on, treating it as a collaboration; some like to be more hands off, treating it as a consultation. Some may render more help (justified or not) if the thesis language is not the student's primary language.
Instead of "how can I change the advisor," I'd suggest focusing on how to "get the most learning out of this situation." Not all good researchers are good language teachers, they could be writing well and yet unable to explain why they wrote that way. So, some active deciphering would be needed.
First, put all emotion aside (I know, having your writing mutilated does not feel good, but still put that aside) and try to figure out the motive of each edit. Usually, they fall into a few major categories:

Grammatical: tenses, plural/singular, etc.

Clarity: unaccounted pronouns, run-on sentences that detach the subject and the action, etc.

Contextual: the language was right, but the concept was wrong. Maybe due to misinterpretation of some results, derailing the discussion.

Stylistic: the work makes sense overall, but not on par with professional convention. For example, using future/present tense in Methods rather than past tense. Using APA format instead of Vancouver, etc.

Idiosyncratic: these are more like individual preferences that are either "my mentor's mentor's mentor did it that way, so I do it the same way," pet peeves, or habit stemming from misinformed grammatical rules.

Based on the prevalence of each type, you can decide what improvements may be called for. Grammar, clarity, and style are often well-documented in textbook and professional manuals.
For idiosyncratic types, I usually let those stay as I believe there are more than one way to say the right thing, just some people prefer their "righter" way. But of course, if the changes are harmful, feel free to discuss or edit it to avoid that issue.
If you found most of them are contextual. Then it may be better to change the writing submission protocol. For example, before sending in the full text, generate a writing outline. The outline should include bullets of your interpretation in short sentences, and the bullets should be grouped by paragraph. This would help the advisor spot any misunderstanding earlier, and the list would also prime the advisor about your layout. This could temper their surprise when they see the full text not laid out as how they envisioned.
If this analysis gets too difficult, prepare an original version and a clean edited version from your advisor, and consult a professional editor who is experienced in your field. Basically, ask for an analysis on the two piece and how can your version be improved.

Thank you @Penguin_Knight. "Mutilated" is a good word to describe what I feel has happened, but I know it's to make it a better piece of writing in the end. I feel like many of the the changes are contextual, stylistic and idiosyncratic and my advisor just wrote over my own writing to fix them in the main copy of the file.
That's a good idea about dealing with contextual edits. I will try that next time. And maybe a professional editor might help too.
Is writing blocks of text and asking the student to paraphrase it something that occurs commonly when advisors edit students' work?

Thank you @Penguin_Knight, I think your answer was the most complete and gave advice on what I can do about how I feel about the edits. Though I'm just still not sure about if advisors can ask us to paraphrase a block of text they wrote something that's commonly done?

@solid-rock, don't get too hanged up on "if this is something commonly done." Just because something is commonly done does not make them right or useful. If you feel that i) your advisor is contributing fairly to your advancement, and ii) you get to grow based on the experience, then take whatever you can learn and move on. From what I can see, your advisor chimed in and was aware that you should hold the ultimate decision on how the passage should look, I don't think the situation is as dark as you think.

Thank you, I think that's a good way to think about it. Yes, I am growing from this. I'll just take what I can learn and move on.

It's your advisor's job to prepare you for a professional career. That should include helping you learn to write in the style and up to the standards of your discipline.
Your thesis is a good place to learn to write better - even though it is "just a thesis". It is still yours.
Your advisor's writing critique improves this piece of work and future work of yours.

Yes. If you (the OP) believe that the edits are not an improvement, have a discussion with the advisor and, ask why, at least.

Yes, I think the changes do improve the writing but I'm not sure if we are allowed to have that many changes made by someone else for a piece of work that is supposed to be ours. For example, is writing blocks of text and asking the student to paraphrase that a way many advisors use to help students learn to write better?

@solid-rock You are "allowed" as much help as anyone wants to give you. The thesis is still yours.  If you end up using a lot of someones suggestions, or words, you acknowledge that in a preface. Literally "writing ... paraphrase" seems too strong, but that may just be your way of saying that your advisor found a paragraph too confusing to edit a word or two at a time and suggested a complete rewording. We don't know enough about the interaction or about you or your advisor to tell.

@EthanBolker Thank you, that seems like a good way to acknowledge their suggestions being included in my thesis. Yes, what I wrote about being asked to paraphrase blocks of text that they've written is literally what happened. It feels strange to do so, but also strange if I don't do what they've asked.

When I edit a student's thesis, my intention is to make suggestions, not demands, even when the editing was done by writing my comments in red all over a printed copy of the student's draft. Of course, some of my comments are corrections, which a student would obviously accept, but some are matters of judgment, and a student might well disagree. I'd discuss the disagreement with the student, and until now (28 Ph.D. students so far) we've always reached an agreement.  In at least one case, the final version of the thesis contained a proof which, though correct, was so far from optimal (in my opinion) that I wrote down a better proof for my own records.
In principle, there could be a real problem if the student absolutely insists on doing things one way (because it is, after all, the student's thesis) while the adviser absolutely insists on another way (and won't approve the thesis if it's done the student's way). Fortunately, I've never heard of such a situation in real life.

Yes, I think my advisor's edits do improve my writing and I would be happy to keep things they way they changed it to. But what I'm unsure of is if it is possible for an advisor to make so many edits that it's more the advisor's writing than the student's? For example, asking a student to paraphrase blocks of text that the advisor wrote? An analogy might be, you renovate a house, modifying every room internally and even adding another level on top. Can the original builder of the house still say that they built that house?


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Is it normal for good PhD advisors to micromanage early PhD students?
I am a first year PhD student in science. I have a good advisor, the kind that will spend time with you (he is busy not emeritus), read what you send him, reply emails, give good advice for future, good project management. I've googled for what are traits of good advisors and what to avoid in bad advisors (e.g. here) and he fits all of good advisors and none of bad advisors.
However the problem is I feel that he has micromanagement style. He is very detail oriented and tries to understand every step you do. I meet him twice a week, and it is basically a do this, show me this next time. He will tell me exactly what to do.
Granted however I am not a very strong student who is capable of independent research right away, but I still like to be able to do explore my own ideas, or at least be able to do things independently, as I think that is the point of the PhD. Hence my question is whether it is normal for advisors to micromanage early PhD students, and whether I should be concerned, because I definitely do not want to spend my whole PhD working like that. Maybe he will turn into a hands off advisor later?

Are you able to ask senior students whether he will be a hands off type supervisor in the future?  I do micro-manage at beginning.  Once a student is competent, i.e., he/she knows what I want or knows how to do things, then I no longer micro-manage.

"Granted however I am not a very strong student who is capable of independent research right away," What would then be the possible alternative to micromanagement? If you cannot work independently on your own right away (like many PhD students are, my earlier self included), how are you supposed to learn how to do it?

If you have your own ideas about what you want to work on, then rather than waiting for your advisor to give you the next steps, tell your advisor what research you are considering pursuing.  If they agree then not only do you get to work on what you want, but you have some confidence that you are not pursuing a dead-end, since your advisor didn't warn you against it.  Also if your advisor sees that you can come up with good ideas on your own, they might give you more freedom.

Some of it can be human (you and him). Some of it can be him being perfectionist. I would act naturally and let days shape the relationship (for little more time). --I don't hold or pursue a PhD

Professors stop micromanaging when they get the impression you're always one step ahead of them. You lead the discussion when you've got a meeting. You've got a plan for the next four weeks. Don't show and explain all the nitty-gritty details, but have them ready. Etc.

Some PhD students need micromanagement.  Some are harmed by it.
Some supervisors know how to customise things to the needs of the student.  Some supervisors do not know how to micromanage.  Some some do not know how to not micromanage.
Tell your supervisor what you want.  Listen to your supervisor's feedback - what you want might not be possible.  If you have tried this several times and the relationship is failing spectacularly, get a new supervisor.
What you are experiencing is within the range of "normal."  There's no way for us to know if it is "good."

A useful view on this is offered by the situational leadership model (Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard). The idea to match one's leadership style to the needs of the supervised person. People generally start out with low competence and high commitment levels (D1 in figure below) and, therefore, benefit the most from a directing leadership style, which could be perceived as micromanagement. As the competence and commitment levels change, the leadership style is adapted.

Interesting chart. However, why does commitment go from "high" to "low" and then back to "high" as the supervised person goes from D4 to D1? I would think for a PhD student commitment should start high and only decrease as the student either becomes involved in other projects or becomes disinterested.

@6005 There is some elaborate theory behind it, see my link. Some of it has not actually been confirmed by science, but I would still call it useful especially with regard to the D1 level.

A lot of this is going to depend on what your field and your time limit is. I'm a molecular biologist/bioinformatician in the UK. Students who come to me have 3.5 year to finish collecting data and another 6 months to submit their thesis. This means there is not a lot of time to lose, especially if you want to publish in that time as well. In my field an experiment can easily cost thousands of dollars, and every experiment a student does is an experiment that someone else in the can't do.
In these circumstances it is normal for a supervisor to micro-manage at the start. In the ideal world students are given more freedom and responsibility as they learn, and prove themselves trust-worthy. In practice only the best students reach full autonomy in 3.5 years, and some need micro-managing right till the end.

My own personal philosophy is this: if your advisor suggests that you should do something, you should probably do it. But if your advisor suggests that you shouldn't bother... consider doing it anyway.

He is very detail oriented and tries to understand every step you do. I meet him twice a week, and it is basically a do this, show me this next time.

This sounds good to me -- I would recommend explaining yourself to your advisor, and following his advice.

I still like to be able to do explore my own ideas

Great! Do it! As long as you're not using up laboratory resources, or something similar, then you don't need his permission.
Next meeting with your advisor, you should make some progress on what he's asked, as usual. But why not also bring in your own suggestions -- which you spent some time and energy exploring since the last meeting?
Odds are, you will end up exploring dead ends this way. This is fine -- it will give you a greater understanding of your subject as a whole. And who knows, you might figure out something your advisor overlooked.

As a first-year graduate student, your focus, besides classes, is on building your research skills. I would be elated to have an advisor who is obviously involved in your education, responsive to your questions, and interested in the details of your experiments, not just the production of data. Consider this a confidence-building and expectation-setting phase. I, as the PI, would want to make sure that the experiments are well planned, with the proper controls, and that the data are reproducible, with limited variables. Once I have confidence that my first-year graduate student does things properly, I can let go a little bit and go from biweekly meetings to weekly meetings, then on a normal lab meeting rotation schedule.

It depends
There is no single right answer to the question of how 'hands-on' a PhD supervisor should be.
In principle, it should be determined by the nature of the project, your existing skills/expertise, and the extent to which the supervisor's skills/expertise are actually conducive to 'micromanagement' (in my discipline, it is rare for any one supervisor to possess all the specialist knowledge needed to manage every aspect of a PhD project in detail; for that reason, a research student often works under 2 or even 3 supervisors, and he/she is expected to acquire a variety of skills/expertise independently, through a combination of reading, doing, and 'hands-on' guidance/training).
In practice, it is often determined by the personality of the supervisor, his/her other commitments, and his/her past experience. What you need to ascertain is why your supervisor is 'micromanaging' your work. Possible reasons may include:

the supervisor is imparting a skill/specialism that requires intensive instruction and oversight (you should start by assuming this reason);
the supervisor, when he/she did his/her PhD, may have lacked support from his/her own supervisor, and is 'overcompensating' by going to the opposite extreme in his/her own approach;
the supervisor may have a history of PhD students failing to complete projects, and is trying to ensure that you succeed;
the supervisor may think you lack motivation or capability; or
the supervisor may be a control freak.

It can be a delicate matter asking about this. You could start by asking your supervisor about how he/she thinks you are progressing. Then, you could ask him/her what he/she expects of you in the next few years, and what you need to do to fulfil those expectations. Ask your supervisor to comment on your weaknesses (everyone has weaknesses), and what you could do to improve. If, after asking about these issues, your supervisor does not bring up the issue of 'independence', you should then raise the point -- you could phrase it something like:

I understand that, to get a PhD, I have to make an independent and substantial contribution to knowledge; obviously, I appreciate that this does not happen overnight, but could you tell me what I need to be doing in the next few years to reach that threshold, as a researcher specialising in [insert name of field/discipline/specialism]?

The www is awash with lots of generic advice about this, some of which may be very useful. But keep in mind that the answer will be unique to the individual and the field in which he/she is specialising. In many arts and humanities disciplines, it is often expected that a PhD student should present at conferences and even publish as a sole presenter/author. In the natural sciences, conversely, multi-authored papers are more common.

One other thing to consider: Does your advisor have tenure? If he's coming up for tenure in a few years, it would be massively beneficial for him to manage you in the most optimum way possible to ramp up productivity.
What you perceive as "micromanagement" might be him putting you on a path that is very well planned and thought out to get quick and tangible results. I think at the very least, as a first year student, you need to curb your desire for independence and try to get on the same wavelength as your advisor. After you've objectively demonstrated competence, you can have a candid conversation about having more of a say in the projects you want to do.


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Should I email a professor during Christmas and New Year Holidays?
I got a project confirmation from a professor 2 days ago. The project would require me to travel abroad during the summer vacation period of May-July 2021. The formalities such as offer letter and visa forms are pending. The professor told me that he would be on vacation for a few weeks but would be in touch via mail. I sent him my academic records yesterday but I haven't received a reply from him.
Should I wait and send a mail after Christmas? Should I contact him in January?
He was enthusiastic about offering me the position and I'm sorta panicking. Would greatly appreciate some help.

Give it a rest.  If you mailed him yesterday, you don't need to mail-bomb him again today.  Wait for him to respond, perhaps after Christmas.


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Would it violate copyright to retype a classic mathematics book from the 1960s using modern notation and uploading it online?
I am reading a classic book in mathematics that was published in the 1960s. This book uses very old notation, which makes it impossible to read it. Suppose further that I want to read the whole book and, in the process, retype it using modern notation, without any addition. Can I do it freely?
Please do notice I do not aim to publish it. Would I be allowed to share it without any copyright violation? Obviously, writing the name of the original author as “the real author”.

Is it still under copyright? If so, you sharing (copying) it would be a violations. Whether anybody cares is a different question.

If you don't represent it as your own work, but list the original author(s) it isn't a question of plagiarism. The answers address copyright, which is distinct.

If the book is still under copyright, on the long run, you are wasting your time. Even if the editor is okay with publishing your version, the book remains under copyright and will be soon once again forgot/unavailable for decades. Write your own book containing the sames ideas, publish it under a free license along with its LaTeX sources and your work will be available to everybody for centuries -- ideas are not under copyright.

WRT your most recent change: uploading online is publishing. If it is under copyright you can only do this with the copyright holder's permission.

If you want to do something that would infringe on the copyright if done without the copyright owner's permission, you might consider asking for permission.

If you were to go to so much trouble and the book really is of some interest, it might make further sense to attempt to work with the copyright holders (if any) to publish a newer edition - better still though would be to follow @LaurentClaessens's comment of creating your own work

I’m curious:  what’s the book?

@Randall, I will be back to you as soon as Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg grants me the permission :)

If it was written in the 1960's I guarantee no one is reading it as it is. The notation was horrific

@Некто and I can assure you this is one of the worst in terms of notation and difficulty of the material.

For your own use, you can type anything you like, modify it in any way that you like. There are no restrictions on that sort of thing, as long as it is strictly for personal use. Among other reasons, a copyright holder would have no knowledge on which to base a case and no particular incentive to make a legal case.
The problems would occur depending on what you mean by "share it". Within in a small research group there would likely be no copyright violations (likely "fair use"). Putting in on a website without the copyright holder's permission is almost certainly a violation.
The question of when "sharing" becomes "re-publication" can be a bit subtle, but the balance is probably more with the copyright holder. Translations and derivative works are protected under most copyright laws. One of the considerations in most copyright law is what is the effect on the value of the original. Things that reduce the value, which your ideas would seem to do, are normally violations.
It might be worth talking to the original publisher. They might be interested in what you want to do, and hold the rights to enable it. You could wind up with your name on the cover, along with the original author(s).

It's also possible that the book is in the public domain (in the US, at least).  Up until 1991, copyright holders had to explicitly renew their copyright after 28 years.  If the publishers failed to do that, it entered the public domain.  So some works with copyright dates of 1963 or earlier are now in the public domain.  (A change to the law in 1992 made the renewal automatic, so works published in 1964 or after are generally still under copyright.)

According to this answer on the Law Stack Exchange, in the United States "creating a derivative work without permission is still disallowed, even for private use." That said, your point that the copyright holder would have no knowledge or incentive to pursue a claim still applies.

Fair use does not relate to the number of people a copy is shared with. This would possibly qualify as fair use if it is clearly and solely for scholastic purposes, but the fair use section is so vague you often really only know for sure after adjudication.

@ToddWilcox I think the number of people shared with does relate to fair use, because of "(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work." The more people you share with, the more it affects the market and value.

united-states
In US law, this would be considered a derivative work.  If the book is still under copyright (which is pretty much certain for any book published in 1964 or later), then you would need permission from the copyright holder to distribute the work in any way.
There are certain exceptions in US law ("fair use") that would allow you to distribute the revised book without the permission of the copyright holder.  But these probably do not apply here, particularly since you are planning to distribute the entirety of the book (rather than a small section) and it would potentially impact the sales of the existing book (since people would use your version rather than the older one.)
Conversely, if the book has entered the public domain (which is possible if the book was published in 1963 or earlier), then you can create and distribute derivative works without any restrictions.

This would definitely be copyright infringement, as discussed in the other answers. BUT: if the book is a good work that’s still relevant today, you could be doing the world a huge favor by retyping it. The economics of textbook publishing are such that only a very small number of classic books from the pre-TeX era have been retypeset to modern standards of readability/searchability/accessibility. The Feynman Lectures on Physics volumes, which were converted into both LaTeX and HTML, are one example. But for books that don’t have the large reach of such a classic and popular work, there is no hope for this type of digital facelift without a passionate champion like you who is interested in putting in the time and work to make it happen.
What I’d suggest is that you contact the publisher and ask if they’d be interested in publishing a new edition of the book if you were to retypeset it yourself free of charge. They might say yes and authorize you to go ahead. This will be a win-win for you, them, and any readers interested in the book. If the publisher or copyright holder is not interested in profit (or if the book is in such a niche topic that they won’t expect to make any profit), they might conceivably even approve for you to share the new version online free of charge. (It doesn’t seem very likely, but it never hurts to ask…) So: good luck!

“ask if they’d be interested in publishing a new edition of the book if you were to retypeset it yourself free of charge”: I'm not sure I'd define “win-win” a situation when someone, albeit voluntarily, works for free for someone who has a for-profit model of business (as most publishers).

@DaG it benefits both parties. That’s literally the definition of a “win-win”, whether you approve of the situation or not.

Let's say then that one of the parties “wins” more than the other. :)

It only benefits the publisher if they sell enough copies to cover initial printing costs, which go beyond typesetting.

@DanRomik You win by getting the book; the "rich elite" win by getting you to give them free money, essentially.

@user253751 interesting theory. And how much is the StackExchange “rich elite” paying you in profit-sharing for the 1699 StackOverflow posts you’ve written for them?

@DanRomik Nothing - they make free money from me and you.

@user253751 I see, so you are not as opposed to working for free as your initial comment made it sound. Perhaps the same is true for DaG, who has also contributed hundreds of free posts to our StackExchange overlords.

This depends on your school's fair use policy as well as how you share it and the publisher's policy. In short, it's complicated and it depends on lots of stuff. Here are some rules from where I live, that will hopefully give you information to go looking for where you live:

Fair use: Some schools have "fair use" policies that explicitly allow you to copy parts of a text for teaching purposes. However, most of the time this does not cover the entire text. The specifics of how much is too much varies from school to school, so you'll need to understand it for your institution.

How it is shared: sharing for non-commercial purposes among a small group of people is sometimes, but not always, allowed, and will depend on your country and the country in which the book was copyrighted. Generally, if the copyright doesn't even apply in your country it's not illegal, but some countries have rules that state you can make copies for non-commercial use, often within some rules (like limits on the type of copies and how widely they are distributed)

The publisher's policy: Copyright extends 50 years beyond the death of the author in my country, but it may be different for you. This copyright can be extended by the publisher, or the book could be released into the public domain before any of this happens. You can always look into it. The publisher may also be out of business...

I think that if you are going to go to the trouble of re-writing the entire book you can probably just write your own at that point, but if you intend to just share it among your class and it is your own project you are unlikely to run into any issues.

"Fair use" is a general concept under US law;  it's a bit misleading to imply that it's something that only applies to schools.  However, different schools may provide different guidance on how to ensure that "fair use" applies because the concept is a big blurry grey area—there's no hard-and-fast line in the law that says exactly what fair use is, just a set of guidelines that have to be considered on a case-by-case basis.

The "school's" fair use policy (weird concept, actually) is immaterial. Fair use is a legal construct, not one of school policy. Why do you bring up the school at all, as the OP does not?


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An article not presented in conference but published in conference special issue
Although an article was not presented at the conference, this article published in the conference special issue of a journal after reviewing and editorial process. Considering whether the authors attended the conference or not, is there an ethical problem in this case?

Possibly field dependent. One of my most used conference proceedings on my bookshelves says in the Introduction on p. ix "Many mathematicians who did not present papers in that session have also contributed papers to this volume", and I don't recall ever seeing anyone anywhere making the distinction, in a citation to any of these papers, between whether or not the person attended the conference. In fact, the only way I know to determine this is from p. 257 of the April 1982 Notices AMS.

This sort of thing often happens. Authors of such articles might be people who were invited to speak at the conference but declined the invitation.   Or they might have planned to speak but were prevented from doing so because of health problems, coronavirus travel restrictions, visa issues, etc.  And there are probably other relevant situations that I'm not thinking of right now.


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Stating PhD scholarships that I turned down on my CV
This is probably only relevant to the UK, because in the USA, PhD funding usually come from the department/university through fellowships/TA/RA.
I applied for PhD at a UK university and got admission. The university also runs an extremely competitive named scholarship competition (for example, this one - not the one I got, just an example) that offer holders can compete in. I was fortunate enough to have won the scholarship. However, I am going to turn it down for a funded PhD at another school.
Is it alright to state that I won this scholarship on my academic CV but turned it down? If this was a typical USA PhD funding offer (fellowship/TA/RA), I would not consider stating it on my CV.
Edit: This is a similar but slight different question from the "duplicate" because I am not asking about the "typical" PhD fellowship/TA/RA that is awarded to candidates admitted to PhDs in the USA. I am talking about competitive/prestigious scholarships like Rhodes and Gates-Cambridge scholarships that one has to apply for outside of the regular admissions process.

I tried Googling about this but I think I am lacking the keywords needed to get the relevant results.

does mentioning that you won a competitive scholarship will make you stronger? I believe Yes..

I stand by my previous answer: "If you turn down an award (or an acceptance to a univeristy, etc), you don't get to reap the benefits of that award." http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/368/is-it-a-good-or-bad-idea-to-list-declined-fellowships-for-a-phd-program-on-one

I agree that one should not list USA PhD fellowship or acceptance that were declined. But what about prestigious scholarship competitions like e.g. if you have won the Gates-Cambridge Scholarship and Rhodes Scholarship (Oxford), then decline Oxford for Cambridge. Won't it be very advantageous to state that you won the Rhodes Scholarship?

If you didn't accept the scholarship, you didn't "win" it. The person who accepted it "won" it. It's obvious what answer you want to hear, and you are free to ignore my opinion. But keep in mind that listing things that you turned down will rub some people the wrong way.

I very much disagree with the statement If you didn't accept the scholarship, you didn't "win" it.  Technically, this is perhaps correct, but it misses the point.  When you list an honor, you are listing that you were chosen for that honor; whether you accept or not seems of relatively little consequence.  For example, if someone is chosen for an all-star team in sports, but can't compete on it due to injury, it is still publicized that they were chosen.

@DanC - you may have been chosen for the honor, but you didn't choose to take it. This isn't like getting injured before an all-star game, this is like getting courted by the Yankees and the Red Sox and choosing the Sox, but telling everyone you were a Yankee too.

I turned down an NSF fellowship. However, NSF still considered me an awardee, and included my name in the official list of offered fellowships. So, by NSF's reckoning, I don't see what's the harm in calling attention to that fact. So long as you don't claim to have been a recipient of the award, you're not being dishonest. (And the better sports analogy here is being drafted into different leagues, and only being able to accept one.)

It might be worth mentioning this while you are applying for PhD positions. But after you have obtained a PhD position, it will be fairly meaningless, as what will matter is how you perform in your PhD studies (ie, number/quality of publications).

I disagree with the part it will be fairly meaningless. Yes performance is very important for PhDs. But the list of accomplishments (i.e. successfully won a scholarship) is another important thing.

International PhD scholarship competitions in the UK tend to be judged based on the strength of the candidate's research proposal. I thought it would be of some use to say I was able to produce a proposal that won competitive research funding. (also, international students in the UK are usually not funded by the university or department - we get in and then look for our own funding)

I agree with this answer. People will be interested in what you have actually accomplished, not what you could have done instead.

Having easy access to your complete funding application history is critical in the UK. It is not uncommon for funding agencies to ask if you have every applied before. Some of the research councils are now tracking the number of unfunded/triaged applications you have made. As part of my annual review, my university wants to know how many funding applications I make every year (both funded and unfunded). Since I need information about both my successful and unsuccessful applications, I need a place to keep it. For me, the obvious place is the long version of my CV where I keep every piece of information about my academic life. My feeling is if something doesn't make my "long" CV, it gets forgotten.
It is also important to remember that most people don't want to see an unedited version of your long CV. You haven't said which version of your CV (you have more than one right?) you are thinking about including this information on. If you are talking about a 1-page summary CV for promotion to full professor, hopefully you have many more relevant things to include. If you are applying for a research support job where your job might be to help students apply for PhD fellowships, then it is probably of critical importantance.

Those are good points, thanks. I suppose it is implied in your answer that that only the most competitive (e.g. national level) awards are worth stating, rather than the generic funding that comes with an admit - in both long/short versions. IMHO it looks very silly to list all the PhD programmes I got into with funding, but at the same time, its feels silly not to list Rhodes, Marshall or NSF.

@Legendre No, I am saying list EVERYTHING on your "long" CV and then edit down to tailor the CV for a particular purpose. But I am also saying in the vast majority of the cases the declined fellowships will be irrelevant and get edited out.

a 1-page summary CV for promotion to full professor — What the what?  The official biographical document I had to submit for promotion for full professor was about three times longer than my "full CV".

@JeffE in the UK when you are promoted to chair there is a celebratory lecture. They like to have a 1-page CV/bio to promote the lecture. The promotion itself is hopefully based on the full application and not the summary (although I wouldn't know).

If the award is sufficiently prestigious then you should list it, otherwise you should not.
If you declined a Rhodes scholarship you would be very foolish not to list it on your CV.  In the US you should list declined NSF or DoD graduate fellowships.  However, you do not want to look like you are padding your resume with extraneous information, so I would advise against listing more than one declined award, and would advise against listing any declined awards that are not well known.  In most circumstances the declined scholarship isn't going to give any important information that couldn't be gotten from just listing the scholarship you did accept.

This is exactly right, in my opinion. National-level awards should be listed, because it indicates a level of accomplishment. Awards at individual schools that are declined are not relevant.

Not quite.  You should only list national level awards if the awarding organization recognizes you as a winner even if you turn down the money.  If you actually turn down the award, you don't get to reap the benefits of the award.

I think that the information that you have won several competitive PhD scholarships is by itself meaningless: you have won one, this is enough information to ensure that you have a potential.
The real interesting information is why you chose one specific scholarship amongst the ones you won. If you state on your CV all the scholarships you won but didn't take, be prepared to answer to the "why this one" question. And be very careful on your answer if you don't know the profile of the asker.

In the UK, international funding for PhD is often not automatically given by the department. There are a few, very competitive, named scholarships which are won by the strength of our research proposal. I thought it would be advantageous to show that I can write proposals that can win competitive funding.


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Advice with finding and contacting participants for studying crime (interview-based research with ex-offenders)
I'd like to conduct a study on street gangs in the 1960s-1980s as part of my PG dissertation. Ideally, I'd like to conduct this as an interview-based study (like an oral history/criminology project) rather than desk/archival research. As such, I'd be looking to interview former members of street gangs about their experiences with gang activities and possibly with criminal justice interventions (e.g. experiences with the police, courts and/or prison).
I was wondering whether anyone has any guidance or advice on how to identify and contact potential participants for studies of crime (or human participant studies more broadly!). My initial thought was to start by establishing contact through online forums with alleged former members and then to use a snowball sampling method for identifying other participants, but I also wondered about establishing contact through prisons/rehabilitation services/charities for ex-offenders (although I'm unsure if this is appropriate conduct). I have asked my supervisor but unfortunately this is not the sort of study they have conducted before and they are therefore unable to advise.

This is an excellent question for your advisor. Doing this right is very important. You can do serious harm to people if you get it wrong. You could also easily end up breaking (privacy) laws or ethical standards. This is a minefield you should not enter alone, and random people on the internet are not the companions you need here.

Branching out in new directions is a good idea. However, if your advisor is unable to assist you in this very important area, then there is a major issue here. Ideally, try reaching out to other potential collaborators with expertise (can your advisor put you in touch?). If that is not possible, or the collaborators are not interested, then your best bet might be to shift your research direction. Better to do that now rather than three years down the road when an expert looks at your papers and finds flaws that are obvious to the expert you did not find now.

What is PG? ...

@AzorAhai-him- Probably "postgraduate".

I was wondering whether anyone has any guidance or advice on how to identify and contact potential participants for studies of crime (or human participant studies more broadly!)

You need institutional review board (IRB) approval to do anything of this sort. That is your first step. If your advisor is unfamiliar with submitting to an IRB, you need a different supervisor.
The IRB process will guide you through what you need to do to protect their data and identities (although your mileage may vary with IRBs).
Furthermore, under the US Common Rule, prisoners are treated a special, vulnerable population, due to a history of exploitative research on them. You seem to indicate you want to primarily interview people who are not currently in jail (given the crimes would have been 40+ years ago), but if you want to be able to talk to anyone who is in jail, you need specific permission.
I doubt a prison specifically would enable you to reach former incarcerated people, you would probably have a better bet scouring court records (but I have no specific expertise).


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Virtual Special Issues in Elsevier good or not?
From the information available online, I understand that Virtual Special Issues (VSIs) can be either curated (comprising previously published articles) or dedicated to new work.
As a PhD student, I need to publish an article in a journal with an impact factor for my PhD defense.
Is the credibility of a virtual special issue similar to a regular issue?
How long does the review process for a virtual special issue take?
Considering my time constraints, would the special issue be a viable option for submission?

Is your main concern about it being virtual/digital only? I think being digital-only or not doesn't say anything about the credibility of the journal, nowadays you have several good journals that don't print out physical magazines.

Given the second paragraph, the only people who can answer are your local professors or administrators. Our opinion does not matter.

By the way, you have several questions in your text, you should focus on only one at time.


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Ways to learn mathematics
I will be graduating with my bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering in a few months. I want to pursue a master's in mathematics after 2-3 years. To prepare, I am currently doing "Advanced Engineering Mathematics" by Kreyszig but wanted to do some additional stuff alongside. After thinking, I boiled down my options to the following two categories;

either I can do some mathematics project involving various mathematical topics intermixing

or

I can work on some open-ended problem in mathematics giving me an in depth understanding of the field.

In addition, my area of interest in mathematics is primarily probability & statistics and numerical analysis but I am open to other fields in mathematics having weak correlation to the above mentioned areas too. I need help in deciding which approach will be best for learning mathematics alongside helping me to prepare for my master's in mathematics with some solid work.

Related / possible duplicate: Graduate school admission with a degree in a different field. You might also search our archives; a common theme is that self-study doesn't count for much when it comes to getting admitted; formal credentials are usually necessary.

What country do you want to study in? Requirements differ.

Consider auditing a math class. Select a class that is taken by most new graduate students in a department. If this is a large department the preparation of the students will be highly variable and the instructor knows this.
Be a good auditor. Do not skip class because you are busy or because you have scheduled a ski week in the mountains. Take the exams if required and skip them if the instructor doesn't want you there. Do not quit after a few weeks without telling the instructor.
If you are not ready for the class, ask the instructor to steer you to appropriate preparation.

It seems to me that your question contains two questions.

How should I learn math?

How should I prepare for admissions or master's studies?

Everyone has to find the best way of studying for themselves. Therefore, I recommend you devote yourself to a certain method for a few weeks and then evaluate how you were taught and how much you learned. You may also try courses provided by others.
However, scientific studies show that a person learns a subject best if they teach it to others. The point is that you have to put a lot of effort into teaching. It's not just about retelling something to others; it's about realizing that others don't have to think the same way you do. It is, therefore, necessary to find ways to explain it to them in different ways. So, you can try making a series of videos, writing a textbook, or developing your online course.
Regarding the second question, I would recommend you to look at the website of the institution where you want to apply to see what the requirements are, or to ask current students how it is in reality and what they would recommend.


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Are R1s preferred over R2s in funding applications?
I have two tenure track assistant professor offers from two US schools, close in university ranking to each other (US news) but one is R1 and the other is R2.
I’m more inclined to the R2 offer. I am wondering if the status of the university (R1/R2) makes any difference to the funding agencies, national and private, IOW, if my (future) proposals will be viewed differently.
For context: department CS, area AI. The departmental ranking (again from USnews) is significantly higher in the R1 than the R2 one.

Note that the difference between R1 and R2 schools isn't quality. It is scope and scale. R1's have strong research requirements in many fields, R2's in fewer. An R2 can have an excellent research reputation in some field, even a single field, and not others.

R1s are not preferred over R2s (unless you propose something that your institution does not have the facilities to support). The trade-off will likely be the difference in grad students you can recruit and expectations for tenure. I've been on multiple federal grant review panels and the institution ranking or classification has never been discussed, and panels are in fact explicitly told to be aware of and avoid implicit bias towards institutions (positive or negative).

Research admin here who has supported AI folks in CS at an R1 institution for 8 years.  There will never be a straight up preference from the government.  Their "preference" is for well-scoped, well-run projects, with a thoughtful budget.  There are specifically calls geared towards PUIs (Primarily Undergraduate Institutions).  Does your institution have the resources to support you in this way?  Only you will know.  You should consider what "well-supported" means.  For some that is a facilities deal.  They might broker an amazing lab remodel at an R2 and a nice startup package also.  I worked at an R2 that provided all gases for the Chemistry dept.  That is unheard of at the R1 I work at now--simply crazy talk.  When liquid helium was $1,500 a pop, that meant a lot to the PIs I worked for.  On the other hand, there were other resources that they lacked, like more focused research admin and faculty support staff.
If anything was going to sway you on the status of your organization, I would look up its FDP status.  FDP institutions have easier grant terms because they subject themselves to rigorous auditing.  I would also look to see if they have a generative AI policy.  Institutions that already have a policy are forward-thinking and organized.  You may feel "restricted" by policies, but as an administrator, I find them freeing.  It means someone has looked at all the laws and set boundaries for the community.  You don't have to know the law to obey the law... if you follow the policies.
If you are serious about digging into the differences between institutions and funding, there are a few public data sources to look at.  Specifically consider:
HERD Survey
NSF By The Numbers

I'd include that there are a few NSF opportunities which have support of PI's at R2's amongst their (positive) criteria.


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Any natural way to split grade transition ( AA vs AB etc) thresholds for a large class?
Our University follows a letter grading system with discrete A through D ( including half grades like AB, BC etc) I have a relatively large class ( around 100 students).
No matter where I select my grade transitions ( eg A vs AB), there's always some student(s) who "just" lost an A and thay creates a barrage of emails requesting me to consider a better grade. That's the inherent problem of converting a continuous distribution of marks to a discrete set of grades. In other words, if I just had to report a continuous score I don't think the 79 student would agonize about not having recieved an 80. On the other hand, when 79 leads to a BC but 80 leads to a BB, the student does have a greater incentive to complain.
The situation is worse for large classes since the distribution is so dense that there are no natural breaks where say there are no students in a 5 mark interval and that can serve as a grade break. A student does not mind losing an A by 5 marks than "just" 1 mark.
Of course, I kind of see the students point of view as well. On one hand we do tell them not to fight for each small mark but on the other hand a 79 could mean a BC vs a 80 a BB.  So I guess the subjectiveness gets amplified.
Is there any workaround that anyone has? How do I make the grading "fair". Or at least give it some semblance of fairness so that I avoid this annual headache.
Would pre annuancing thresholds make a 79-vs-80 penalty seem more fair? I don't see a way out.
Ps. Personally I've started thinking this mapping of continuous to discrete ( at individual course level)  to then continuous again ( at a degree level) while calculating a CPI ( which can be a 9.1 and not just an A) does not make much sense. I would rather the university just had us report a continuous score and summed it up over all the courses. But that's beyond me to change!

If you need to make a distinction, well, there really is no way around it. Like many other times in life…

@JonCuster so basically go with the scores, ignore the complaints and not try to second guess myself?

I use linear interpolation, picking what I think is an A and what I think is a C such that I get the median I want, and then interpolate in between.  It's easy and fair and completely avoids the question of what to do about students who are right on the border:  They get what the formula says and that's that.  It tends to discourage students begging to be bumped because they were "so close".


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Tips for moderating a panel discussion: Optimum number of panelists?
I will be moderating a panel discussion (60 min event) later this Semester. Was wondering if there are any tips that people may have?
I have read some of the relevant questions on Academia SE. e.g. This and this  but would love more insights.
e.g. What's an optimum number of speakers? Typically in the past I've moderated panels with two or three panelists but this time it seems we might have four.
Is four too many? i.e. I worry each speaker gets too little time or the discussion becomes too disjoint.
Would love comments about what others feel. Even if you have not moderated a panel I am sure most of us have listened to one.
What are things that you love and hate?
e.g. Personally I feel panels almost always give too little time for audience questions and that's usually where the most interesting part lies.

4-6 sounds right, but you have to have a good moderator.
Don't let them ramble for 10 minutes, or you will burn all time on the intro.
Prepare good questions, slightly controversial or provocative is ok, but don't force them to become defensive, that's no fun, this is not "The Weakest Link" (a show where more and more  "weak" candidates are dismissed, usually condescendingly, from the selection)
You may want to try out the topic with your organizers and see how it works. Practice the moderation and the transitions and how you will handle the audience. Ramblers are not exclusively on the panel.

Excellent comments! Thanks. That's the sort of feedback I wanted!


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Replicating the classroom experience in zoom during covid: Powerpoint slides + annotation + whiteboard to sketch on
I teach an engineering class and pre-covid used to use Powerpoint slides projected on to a whiteboard so I could easily annotate on slides.
Plus the class had spare whiteboards where I could draw additional concepts.
Post-covid I am using zoom for my courses via my laptop (non touch screen). Now I can still share the slides but then come several problems.  Annotating via zoom on the laptop is clunky since the mouse / trackpad isn't too good for this. A workaround is that  to sign in from my Android tablet (Samsung S6 lite) as a second (dummy) user and then annotate using the stylus.
This works somewhat but has it's flaws again. First, the palm rejection doesn't work within zoom so one has to hold the stylus clunkily. Second every time I change to a new slide I've to manually "clear" the annotations since zoom seems to assume those should stick to all slides.
Furthermore, the annotations are lost and then don't make it to anything permanent that I can share with the students.
I could use the inking feature within power-point but then I would need a touchscreen laptop or to buy something like the Wacom bamboo. Not sure how steep the learning curve would be for that.
Finally, if I just need to sketch something in "parallel" to the ppt (which I would have done in a normal class using the 2nd whiteboard) there's no good way to do that.
Just curious how others are handling this? The tablet annotate screen real estate seems too small while writing with a stylus (due to a resolution mismatch). One can barely write 3 or 4 lines whereas a physical whiteboard would easily allow 10. It's difficult to keep as many concepts / equations / diagrams in the visual window to make a clear point.
Just wondering if any tips regarding the technology setup others are using? Any better tooling that would handle this multiple task set of powerpoint + annotation + multiple whiteboards?

I described what I use with pdfs here (the linked Q&A may be a possible duplicate of your question). I work with a Wacom Intuos Pro. I might also decide to use PDF annotator instead of OpenBoard, but I haven't yet tried for a lecture.

THanks! How is your experience with the Wacom? How long does it take to get comfortable writing on a surface that does not provide visual feedback?

It didn't take long to get comfortable, just a few hours of usage and I'm having a very positive experience, and take into account that I'm very bad at writing and drawing (well, you can see this directly from the slide in the post :-) ). Actually, now I'd probably buy the largest model instead of the medium one, but it's not a big deal. I had also the opportunity to test the Wacom One with the built-in display, but at the end I preferred mine. FWIW, I know a professional comic artist who uses such a tablet without display, even with the smallest size, and produces wonderful drawings.

A stupid but functional workaround I used regarding palm rejection is to put a small towel under my hand. Basically anything thick enough to stop the touchscreen from detecting it as input. With regards to screen real estate keep the other side in mind though. For a student watching on a smaller screen, more than a few lines at once can be close to illegible.

@MassimoOrtolano Compared to my handwriting your annotations look professional. :):)

Why are you writing in "real time"? Is it in response to questions from students, or just a lecture style?

@Buffy A bit of both. Sometimes in response to student questions. e.g. "Professor can you mark where's the inlet port on the heat exchanger you show on this slide" At other times just part of the lecture style. e.g. Show two designs on the ppt and ask students pros and cons and then list those as the responses come over chat live. Just makes for a better and more natural lecture style I feel.

Post-covid is a term that threw me off to describe the teaching during the pandemic.

@user2705196 Corrected! :)

Not an answer, but... First, I don't think it is possible to replicate the in-face experience. You need to make some changes. The technology you are asking about may help, but isn't a complete solution. More important, don't confuse lecturing with teaching. I could probably provide a few suggestions for that, but it wouldn't be very zoom related.

@Buffy please go ahead. I am curious to hear your suggestions even if not zoom related!

@Massimo if money isn't an issue would you recommend the wagons with a display? Or is the non display wacom still better and more accurate you think?

With the display, I tested the Wacom One (it was the one offered by my department), which is actually cheaper (and it would have been free for me) than the non-display one, but I've found the latter more accurate. Probably a top one with display is as accurate as the non-display one. Disclaimer: I haven't tested tablets from other brands, and there could be valid alternatives.

@Buffy FWIW, I can tell you that many of my students thanked me because they said I was the only one able to almost replicate the real experience. Indeed, it depends on how much effort you put into it. Beware also that many students want to have something that resembles the standard teaching experience, and complain about inverted classrooms and the like because they find them too burdensome, in already too difficult times.


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Were there changes in approaches to undergraduate education in the 1970s or 1980s?
I was recently reading some papers regarding bridging the gap between academia and industry, specifically in undergraduate computer science and software engineering programs. The papers I read were published between the late 1970s and the mid 2010s. I noticed a stark contrast in papers published in the 1990s as compared to the 1970s with regards to education, often in reference to mathematics and science.
A small passage from Essential Elements of Software Engineering Education, published in 1976:

It is clear from the above discussion that the education of a software
  engineer will involve the study of a variety of subjects combined with
  a considerable amount of practical experience which must be
  accumulated over a number of years. From a university standpoint, the
  subject matter not only cuts across a number of traditional
  disciplines and boundaries, but also covers topics that historically
  have not been part of academic curricula.

This passage follows a discussion of problems that arise from teaching software engineering, specifically the difficulties in mapping certain aspects of industry into the classroom. This discussion is a significant portion of the paper, and similar discussions are prevalent in other papers written around the same period of time. Generally, there's an understanding that a wide knowledge base is needed in the fields of computer science and software engineering, but the trend is to focus on maximizing the skills and knowledge needed in industry.
Throughout everything published in the mid-to-late 1970s, I get the idea that the people designing the computer science and software engineering curricula understand the industry. This includes technical and non-technical topics, but always serving the needs of the profession. It's well summarized in this statement, also from Essential Elements of Software Engineering Education:

A curriculum in software engineering must be multi-form and in fact be
  a collection of curricula to meet the diverse needs of existing
  professional groups.

Fast-forward to the 1990s. A passage from the The SEI undergraduate curriculum in software engineering reads:

The mathematics and science content of the curriculum should help
  achieve two fundamental objectives. First, it should prepare students
  to participate competently in an increasingly technological society.
  This includes the ability to understand science and technology issues
  well enough to make informed political decisions. Second, the science
  and mathematics content should provide the students with an
  appropriate foundation for subsequent software engineering courses.
...
While the physical and life sciences are fundamental to traditional
  engineering disciplines, they provide virtually no basis for software
  engineering. The only significant exception is that electricity and
  magnetism, common topics in introductory physics courses, support the
  study of the computer itself, and software engineers need a basic
  understanding of the machine for which they are developing software.
  To achieve the first objective stated above, however, it is probably
  the case that basic knowledge of physics, chemistry, and biology are
  essential in almost any undergraduate curriculum. Chemistry and
  biology, in particular, are likely to be increasingly important in
  understanding society’s health care, environmental, and genetic
  engineering issues in the next century.

This is really the first time that I saw society come up in a discussion about the content of a curriculum. There were mentions of law and legal topics being relevant for software engineers and computer scientists in previous papers, but always from a professional standpoint. In the above quoted passage, the first objective (and I'm assuming the most important in the eyes of the author) of mathematics and science education is not to prepare the students for future course work or their first job in industry or for future research, but for functioning fully in modern society.
Beyond that, the authors even identify that these topics have limited utility in many industrial settings for software engineers. However, they continue to encourage that basic knowledge should be part of the curriculum for society's benefit.
My questions:

What happened in the late 1970s into the 1990s that caused a shift from focusing on the profession and entering the workforce (both industrial and academia/research) to the general needs of the society in computer science and software engineering education?
Was this phenomenon localized to computer science and software engineering education or was it a widespread event?
What were the triggering events?

This is totally unfounded speculation on my part, but I wonder if the gradual penetration of the web (and the internet) into the public consciousness led to an increased sense that training in computing was important for participation in society itself. This is certainly the view of computing today.

I agree with your point, but I'm interested in the view of mathematics and science education from computing professionals, not the study of computing being important for society. As an example, in the 1970s, the study of the natural sciences (with the exception of electricity and magnetism to understand the inner workings of computer hardware or a domain-specific topic) was called non-essential by at least two authors because it wasn't relevant to the workforce. In the 1990s, the stance was that sciences should be included to make the student a better participant in society.

"The web" was called first "ftp" and then "gopher" in the time period under discussion, was known to nearly nobody, and linked only a few large and wealthy institution together. It didn't support social interaction in the way the modern network does.

This question is perfect for this SE new site: undergraduates if you find it useful you can follow it and help us in spreading the word about it.

In the late 1970s when Freeman, Wasserman and Fairley wrote about software engineering curricula they were talking about graduate education. They assumed that most students would be working professionals returning to school to learn those things that they should have learned earlier, but which were not being taught when they had been in college. Those ideas were implemented in the early MSE programs at places like Wang Institute (where Dick Fairley and I met). We felt at the time that undergraduates could not appreciate some of the problems and techniques we taught, so it was not worth trying. I remember having arguments with Gary Ford at the SEI about exactly this point.
By the 1990s people were beginning to believe that software engineering should be taught to undergraduates, so that they wouldn't have to unlearn bad habits when they went to work. There was also an increasing interest in professional licensing of software engineering. Licensing would require ABET-accredited undergraduate programs, among other things. The focus on society is related to the interest in developing a discipline of software engineering aligned with ABET accreditation and professional boards of engineers.
This is not to say that we weren't interested in serving the needs of society in the 1970s and 1980s. We even had a version of a code of ethics that we taught Wang Institute students during orientation. But we assumed that students already knew their role in society. They had come back to school primarily to learn new methods and tools.
By the way, SWEBOK was actually started in 1998 as part of an effort to professionalize software engineering. The software engineering code of ethics was published at about the same time. Both of these projects were meant (by some of us) to support the eventual licensing of software engineering.

Since I asked this question, I studied a number of factors. I believe that the two primary factors are the age of the disciplines and the education reform in the United States in the 1980s. I also believe that the growth of multi-disciplinary education and the prevalance of computers have spurred these changes more drastically in the computing related fields (although I don't have sufficient knowledge at this time to be as confident in this assessment).

The first thing to consider is the age of the disciplines. At the time of the publication of the first articles, in the 1970s, the fields of computer science and software engineering were relatively new on the scene.
The first computer science degree program was started in 1953 at the University of Cambridge. In the US, the first computer science program wasn't founded until 1962. However, some of the papers noted that computer science education didn't made significant advances until 1969, with the publication of the ACM Curriculum 68 and ACM Information Systems Curriculum, which established the central topics to computer science. That's over 15 years between the first CS program and significant advances in CS education.
Software engineering as a separate discipline wasn't even a thought until the NATO conferences in 1968 (Garmisch, Germany) and 1969 (Brussels), and it took another 10 years (1979) before the first graduate program and it wasn't until 1996 that an undergraduate software engineering program existed. If SE as a discipline follows similar trends as computer science, I wouldn't expect significant advances in the education techniques before the late 1980s or early 1990s, after the central topics have been identified and disseminated. As a point of reference, the IEEE's Guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge (SWEBOK), which outlines the core knowledge areas and related disciplines of software engineering, wasn't even started until 1993, which puts it at roughly the same time-to-development as computer science.
I'm not an academic, but I would suspect that it's rather difficult to design a curriculum that's relevant to students seeking careers in industry without a solid framework, especially when the goals are to produce a solid, reliable curriculum that stands up to the rigor of engineering. In addition, there is the additional work related to validation and accreditation of the programs. The papers from the 1970s were typically laying the groundwork for the work to come over the next 15-20 years by proposing the key topics and content. Upon further examination, nearly all of the topics presented in the papers were identified as essential knowledge areas of software engineering or as a related discipline in the Guide to the SWEBOK.

I believe that educational reform also plays a role in the changes. According to Wikipedia, education reform was occurring around the world, starting in the early 1900s. Considering that the majority (all but one or two) of the papers that I read were written by someone in the United States, I focused my research on the educational reform that started in the 1980s and still continues.
In 1983, a report titled A Nation at Risk: The Imperative For Educational Reform (PDF) was published. Although the bulk of the paper is centered on primary and secondary education (in the US, kindergarten through 12th grade), it also mentions a decline in SAT scores, a decline in College Board (AP) test scores, an increase in the teaching of remedial mathematics courses in public 4 year universities, and millions of dollars being spent by businesses and the military for remedial education and training programs. The report found that the average graduate (of secondary schools as well as higher education) is not as well-educated as the average graduate of the previous generation and smaller proportions are completing high school and college.
This report presents the "Learning Society". A learning society has "a basic foundation the idea that education is important not only because of what it contributes to one's career goals but also because of the value it adds to the general quality of one's life." The focus become on life-long learning, well beyond the end of schooling. In contrast to this "learning society", they find that the American education system is expressing standards in "minimum requirements" and students who do the minimum amount of work to get by.
To report also finds problems:

Students are taking "general track" courses instead of vocational or college preparation courses in secondary education, but only small percentages complete courses like Algebra II, French I, and Calculus
Large numbers of credits are gained in physical/health education, remedial courses, and courses for training for adulthood
Grades rose as amount of required effort to complete work rose
Science-oriented students (4 years of science/math in secondary school) in the US are spending significantly (1/3) less time than any counterpart in many other industrialized nations
A significant number of public colleges must accept all high school graduates from their state
Textbooks aren't being written by experienced teachers or scholars
Many textbooks don't challenge their readers.
School years are significantly shorter (in length and total days) than many other industrialized countries.
Teacher preparation curricula are focused on "educational methods" instead of subject matter
Shortages of teachers, especially in mathematics and science, leading to under-qualified teachers teaching these subjects.

Although many of the recommendations point to changes in secondary education, it only makes sense that ripples flow throughout higher education. Vocational schools, colleges, and universities most likely adjusted their curricula in two directions. The first would be to meet the needs of the students who might have been underprepared by their secondary education by adding courses for subject matter that might have previously been expected by a high school graduate. The second direction would be to create the environment of the Learning Society by creating courses to expand the mind and enable students to "learn to learn" in the future.

I believe that scaaahu might be onto something in his answer, as well. As mentioned in several of the papers in the 1970s, industry can drive academia. This is even evident today with things such as Industrial Advisory Boards, which allow representatives from industry to meet with departments at universities and provide feedback on the quality of the graduates and suggest curricula improvements to allow graduates to ensure they have the skills needed in the workplace.
Specifically, I'm looking at domain knowledge. After reading some work regarding how in the early days of the computing profession, computing professionals were expected to know computing. However, the modern workplace is often cross-functional. Having domain knowledge seems to be more important in these cross-functional teams to facilitate communication.
However, going back to the idea of a Learning Society, even if the education isn't necessarily in the domain of work, the ability to learn to learn along with critical thinking, problem solving, and collaboration (themes that are cross-cutting across nearly every discipline and things that are difficult to teach outside of practice) is critically important to success.

I believe I found valid answers to two of the three questions that I presented in the original question. However, due to a lack of experience, I don't believe I can answer if the problem is localized to computing fields. However, I think I can draw the assumption that it's most likely not.

This answer is from a retired software engineer’s point of view. In 60’s and 70’s, not too many people had a close look at real computers. I wrote my first few FORTRAN programs on punched cards without actually seeing what a computer looked like.To me, a computer was like a black box. There was a magician living in the computer room, could understand the DO loop instructions in my program and do the job for me. There were a lot of students thinking the same way like me.  The professors in CS department were facing tough choices. There was limited time for the students to take the courses. You teach them math and science first, or programming first? What would the industry think if your computer science graduates could not even write programs? Naturally, the curriculum had to be focused on computer science itself.
In late 70’s, micro computers came out. In 90’s, PC became house furniture. A lot of software packages were available. Programming became everybody’s skill like driving a car. In the mean time, the industry found out CS graduates are hard to use because they don’t have enough application domain knowledge. I, for example, had to borrow books from the library to learn how radar operates. In the last few years before I retired, I didn’t need the programming language manual because I knew them. But I had to get on Wikipedia web site many times everyday because I was not familiar with the application I was working on. And I know I was not an exception. Many of my colleagues were doing the same thing.  Naturally, the industry and academia have to train the undergraduate student math and science so that they would be more useful.
The above is my observation and my experience. I would not say who is wrong or right. The OP was wondering what happened. I believe it was a gradual process and a basic economics rule, demand and supply.

The idea of application domain knowledge is something that was recognized in the 1970s, evidenced by the quote about meeting "diverse needs of existing professional groups" and discussed in depth in some other papers. However, I'm more concerned with the transition from including material in a curriculum from needing to know a particular topic in order to do your job (the application domain knowledge you mention) to including material because it benefits society but is known to have little impact on the profession.

However, you might be onto something with the tough choices and supply/demand idea. Computer science wasn't an academic discipline until the 1950s, and even then didn't mature until the mid 1960s. There wasn't a software engineering graduate program until 1979 or an undergraduate program until 1996. So this specific condition that I'm describing might be unique to computing professions, but it requires the expertise of an academic to determine that. However, if it's not unique to the computing disciplines, then something must have triggered this change, and I would like to know what it is.

@ThomasOwens, I would like to point out that the society in U.S. in 60's and 70's is very different from the society in 90's and thereafter. So, people might have changed their thinkings because the society changed?

Hence my third question in the body of the post: What triggered these changes? Was it a societal change? If it was, it is rather drastic over a span of a decade, especially since the sentiments of the 1990s are still being echoed in the 2000s and 2010s. Was it a reaction to (or part of) the reform movements in secondary education of the 1980s? Was it the immaturity of the academic disciplines in the computing field? Answering those questions is the only acceptable answer to my question.

@ThomasOwens, of course it's your call to accept the answer. I am not here for the reps. I submitted my answer because I was a computing professional and also used to be in academia. I myself am interested in this question. But, I am not too sure there was a (quick)trigger. I'll leave it to the others to answer it.

This question is perfect for this SE new site: undergraduates if you find it useful you can follow it and help us in spreading the word about it.


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What are the differences between the Statements of Purpose for Terminal Masters and Ph.Ds?
When applying graduate schools, what is the difference in the elements that go into writing a SoP for a Masters program vs. writing a SoP for a Ph.D. program.
As background, I'm looking into Computer Science graduate programs.

Does the terminal Masters program require a thesis or some final project? If not, the SoP for terminal Masters could be quite different that that for a PhD.

It depends on the differences between the MS and the PhD.
PhD programs are always research programs, so your statement of purpose is going to testify to your preparation for undertaking scholarship, your research interests, and your fit with the program in a research context. You'll name specific professors whose research interests align with yours; you might list some resources (like labs, archives, libraries, etc.) that the university has that make it a good fit for your work. Some students choose to say a little about their career goals and how the program will help you towards them, but there's really no need - if you're applying for a PhD program, professors will assume you want a research career (probably in academia).
If you are applying to a research-based MS that is designed to prepare scholars for further PhD student or for research-oriented careers, your statement probably won't be much different than a PhD statement. It may be advantageous to state that you want a research career and a PhD eventually for MS programs that explicitly state that they exist primarily to prepare students for the PhD.
However, if you are applying for a professional MS program, your statement will be a bit different. You still want to talk about experiences you've had that have prepared you for graduate study, but in addition to talking about research and some coursework, you also may want to mention professional non-academic prep (like work experience, internships, maybe even extracurriculars if they are highly relevant). You can still mention professors and research interests if you want, but it's not necessary. Instead, in the tailoring paragraph, you'll focus more on other resources that the university has - like close ties with employers, a co-op program, a specialization in your area, etc. And you'll want to close with a short statement about your career goals and how you think the program can help you reach those.
When I applied for graduate school, I applied to both PhD programs and master's programs in my field that were mostly for professional preparation. I used essentially the same template for both kinds of programs, but I put a little more emphasis on non-research resources at the prospective program and career preparation in the master's statements.