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Overlapping post-doc positions
I have a 3 year post-doc position at University A and also have been offered a 3 month post-doc position at Research Institute B. To be precise, the invitation letter from B is worded as follows:

We would like to invite you to spend three months at Research Institute B. For your research work in collaboration with the mathematical community at our Institute, we will offer you a monthly research grant in the amount of XXXX. By accepting this grant you do not become an employee of Institute B.

The position has a flexible time so I can go for any continuous period I like. I would like to accept the invitation and go during the summer so that it doesn't conflict with my teaching duties at A. However there will be a period of about one month of overlap. My idea is to commute during this month, as I only have to teach one day a week at A, and no teaching at B; and it's about a 5 hour train ride. So I could spend about 3 days out of 5 at B and the other two at A, for the period of overlap.
My question is: is it ethical for me to do this? Would I get in trouble with University A or Institute B, if either found out?
I have heard of someone doing something similar, but I don't know the details of how that worked, so I want to be sure that I wouldn't get into trouble for this.

It depends on country and subject, but it is generally heavily implied that in a postdoctoral position you are 100% committed to that one position.

Why not ask Research Institute B to only spend 2 months there?

If A doesn't give you leave for the whole month, or A and B both agree on this, then this is not only unethical but will most probably land you in trouble. Possibly legal trouble, depending on your grants/employment contract at A (?), but very likely that will be last grant you get. Word of such behaviour has a tendency to go round.

The original source of the funding might matter in addition to the opinions of A and B. For example, if you are in the US and both positions are being funded through the US government, even if the institutions would be okay with it the federal rules likely prohibit the arrangement. If one of the positions is funded by a different source of funding, then the institutions might be able to decide.

As a department chair at a US university who has on various occasions negotiated these sorts of overlapping/adjacent postdoc arrangements with job candidates, I can tell you that at least in the US (and, I strongly suspect, in many other countries) it would be considered highly unethical to set up an arrangement of this sort without informing and getting the agreement of the directors/department chairs at both institutions A and B, and is very likely to get you into trouble if you are found out (an event which itself seems quite likely, although that is harder to estimate), with possibly very bad consequences for your career. You can be sure that the negative financial effects of those consequences (even assuming money is the only thing you care about, which probably is untrue) would be of a much greater order of magnitude than the extra money you are trying to squeeze out of your third month of stay at Institution B. And keep in mind that this is not just an ethical matter -- at my institution specifically you would certainly be violating some institutional policies, even if in a practical sense you would still manage to meet your teaching obligations. If you are somehow thinking that "it is better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission", please trust me -- this is not a situation where that saying applies.
In short, DON'T DO IT. Bring the department chairs and/or faculty mentors on board and see how they can help you achieve your goals. As I said, in my department we occasionally try to help postdocs combine their stay at my university with another short-term visit to another institution, and recognize that this can work to everyone's benefit, but it must be done honestly and with the full knowledge and cooperation of all involved parties.

Outside US it might not go up to board. For us it would be a fairly trivial matter of a professor agreeing that it is ok. The professor saying it is ok is enough for the chief of department to accept to pay for traveling which is actually handled by the secretary and the chief just signs it.

@user3644640 ok. As I said, if everything is done out in the open and with the agreement of the department, there is no ethical issue. That is also true in the US. There are some administrative issues involving limits on accepting reimbursement for travel/accommodations (some federal regulations put a cap on how much one can accept, for tax reasons, but otherwise it is okay) and the need for travel outside the home institution to be vetted, sometimes by administrators above the department level, but given the physical proximity between the two institutions that might not be an issue here.

You mean to ask for travel reimbursement out of your grant at place B, right? Because as your boss in A, I'd probably hang you.

@Karl the reimbursement can come from whoever is willing to pay it. Please don't hang anyone, it's unethical :-)

In my experience, this answer will appear in the postdoc's employment contract or in a university policy document.

@DanRomik Unethical maybe, but asking for three months leave and travel money to get there strikes me as a bit cheeky. Eight five-hour train rides, that sounds like a thousand euros at least. Not every prof has that kind of petty cash lying around, and taking it out of project funds could cause a few raised eyebrows in higher places.

@Karl academia is a big place. You may be surprised that there are places where people don't bat an eyelash about spending a thousand euros even on something that seems frivolous to you.

@Karl and Dan - I don't see where the OP said anything about seeking reimbursement for travel costs anywhere.

+1 Indeed. It may be ok to do what the OP requests, but only with clear - and written - permission of the institutions involved. Do not wing it.

Thanks for the answer, this is very helpful. I would certainly pay the travel costs myself. Any way I will have a look at the contracts to see if there is any violation. If not I will ask permission from my university A.

@doublepostdoc it's ironic that you say my answer was helpful and then say something that makes it clear you haven't actually understood it. Well, good luck - it looks like you might need it soon.

Grants are not like salary. It is completely unto the conditions of your grant. They can have a condition that makes overlapping grants impossible. But then, you could say no to grant from B and work there on grant A. It should be in your contract, and if not, then there should be no problem. Of course it is good to ask for a permission from your supervisor or such.

I don't see much problem here as position in B is flexible. Actually, your bosses/department at A might be even happy to know that you has an opportunity to visit B not on their funding (since it is good collaboration-wise and, most importantly, they pay nothing for that :) There is an issue with your teaching duties at A but there should be windows in your teaching schedule. Another possibility is to formally ask A (i.e. your boss or head of department/faculty) for 3-month research visit to B --your postdoc funding at A can be postponed for three months (typically such postponing is very easy thing if one has a good reason, and making a research visit is definitely a good reason).
Regarding your questions: your suggested one-month overlap scheme with A and B is unethical. I expect that if A finds out that then there would be consequences: imo, you don't lose your three year funding even in the worst case scenario but overall impression in A about you would shift towards 'weird guy'. Indeed, what's the point in hiding a good thing?!


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Touch screen for projecting results and mentoring PhD students: a good solution for a computer lab?
I just got an assistant professor position in the USA. I am negotiating the startup package. I am mainly doing computational staff (engineering deparment) therefore I am asking for computing nodes in the campus HPC facility and for a small local cluster to put in my relatively small computer lab, where initially 2 PhD students will work (and more in the future + post-docs). I would like to add a nice touch screen, probably around 40 inches or more in which I can project powerpoint presentations and simulation results, and which could be also used as a board by means of a pen or fingers. It would be nice to explain things to my group by drawing on the screen and then saving the notes directly on a file. Which one is the best solution for my needs? I see that there are:

LED Interactive Displays
Whiteboards
Interactive Projectors

Which are the differences? Which option is best? I was thinking of a LED display. What I am looking for is:

multiple finger touch
touch screen feature has to work also if projecting my laptop screen (and any other pc in the lab) to the big display by cable
possible to project screen of any other computer in the lab via wifi, and touch screen would still be available (optional)
the display has a little processor and hard drive, with windows installed (optional, maybe not really necessary?)

I guess here is not the right place to suggest brands, but it is possible please go ahead, otherwise general indications are fine.

In most of the places I've worked in, this thing will work for a week, then will be down most of the time because no one knows how to run the maintenance for unusual devices. Are you sure this will not happen at your office?

Have you considered a (good-quality) tablet pc with digitizer pen setup, connected to a beamer? It gives essentially the same results, but it seems vastly cheaper and easier to handle to me.

In Europe many university has ctouch, its 24000euros (very expensive), and its beautiful, they have on-site assistance for 7 years (https://ctouch.eu/classroom/ , in the video it is shown how students can throw the screen of their laptop to the big screen with a gesture). I saw it myself, very impressive. However they dont sell in USA. I was looking for something similar.

From the ctouch website "Every CTOUCH display ships with a single Smoothboard licence that
allows up to 40 wireless devices to be connected at any one time.
Smoothboard allows collaboration between iPads, Android tablets,
laptops and smartphones, across all platforms (Windows, Mac,
Linux). Teachers and presenters, classes and audiences can now
engage like never before."  Thats even too much for my small lab, I would say something cheaper that can connect fewer device would be enough

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Study on number of papers in math during the pandemic
I would like to know if there is a serious study about how the disruption caused by COVID-19 affected the publication figures of some mathematics journals during 2020 and 2021.
Was a downward trend documented somewhere? I mean, in comparison with the figures in 2018-2019 or another biennia prior to the ghastly 2020-2021.
Please, forgive me if you find the implicit premise in this post altogether wrong.

Given the notoriously long review times for (pure) math, I'm not sure the time is right yet to get hard data. Anecdotally, I knew a variety of (non-math) staff who took advantage of working from home to finish up papers, boosting their paper output in 2020-2021.

I don't know about math in particular, but the effects of the pandemic are almost certainly dwarfed by trends in publishing like the continued growth of OA publishers and  their special issues, as well as academic systems that encourage quantity of over quality as a "quantitative" measure of research output. Possibly submissions to certain journals would be more informative than numbers of papers published, but those data wouldn't be as accessible.

At least over the short term, and counting only reputable journals, the number of pages published is basically constant, because editors tend to accept enough papers to fulfill their quota of pages and no more.  So, if more research gets done, that doesn't result in more published papers, but rather in more research that ends up unpublished.

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/145583/has-the-rate-of-papers-uploaded-to-arxiv-changed-due-to-covid-19 Related, although the only answer there gives arXiv statistics as a whole.

Arxiv has some statistics: https://info.arxiv.org/about/reports/submission_category_by_year.html There is no way to deeplink this, but if you select only math and extend the timeline, it looks to me that there is stagnation after around 2020, compared to growth before that. But the data is very noisy.

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Does publishing medical case reports qualify you as a researcher or just as an author?
I started writing medical content in 2021. Before that, I had never published (or attempted to publish) anything related to medical content. Since then, I have published around 40-50 manuscripts, out of which, mostly are case reports. About 15 out of these are indexed in PubMed.
Still, I wonder, whether one is considered a researcher if they have not published any research per se, like me. Being a clinician who is not working in a university, opportunities to conduct research are minimal and it is out of your own interest that you continue academic writing.
Let me know your thoughts on this. Thank you!

Considered by who, for what purpose? Is your question distinct from "is a case study 'research'"?

There is no universal official definition of a researcher.  Some people will consider you a researcher; some people will not.

I am a clinician who worked at tertiary / small hospitals for the first three years of my residency before transitioning to a university hospital.
Out of curiosity, I wonder where did you get all those cases from? Even by actively looking and reaching out to colleagues on a constant basis in my first years, I wasn't able to gather more than 3 or 4 cases per year that would add to the case report landscape.
Where are you located if I may ask? Also, what kind of case reports do you refer to? Clinical images? Classical case reports following CARE structure?
I can tell you that this is important. It will shape you as a research-minded doctor and increase your differential skills as well as your ability to think across disciplines. 15 PubMed-indexed case reports is an achievement!

Dear Dr. M, I worked as an Anaesthetist with a three-bedded ITU in a District General Hospital in Sri Lanka. We had several interesting patients presented to ITU. Reading out of interest and with colloborations with my colleagues, I noticed they were quite unusual and sometimes rare presentations of certain diseases. The  collaborations continue even today and we discuss and write up important cases which include specialties of surgical, medical, anaesthetic and forensic medicine. We include images (with permission) if appropriate. Thank you for your valued feedback!

@ Malaka That is a superb achievement in my humble opinion - particularly in a world where many young residents argue that case reports "do not add to their habilitation" due to not counting as original work. My sincere congratulations!

We're sort of splitting hairs and atoms here, but yes, if I understand you well, you are a researcher. You actively, apparently, contribute to the peer reviewed academic literature, even if it's only in case reports. Just because you don't do pathbreaking work on medical statistics or whatever doesn't make you less of a researcher, it just makes you a different kind of researcher, and that's perfectly okay. If there were someone outside academia who just so happened to have my skills and expertise who was able to publish research, then yeah, they're a researcher all the same as I am.

It clears things up. Thank you Jared. Much appreciated.

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Did I screw myself out of graduate school?
I graduated from a state school in 2009 with a 2.77 overall GPA. I technically should have graduated in 2008, but was only going part time, so I stretched it out and became a "super senior." I'll be the first to admit...I struggled with undiagnosed mental health and alcohol abuse issues for the majority of my early-mid 20s, so I simply didn't apply myself as much as I could have.
After I graduated, I had a really tough time finding a job in my field, so I decided to start taking some courses at a community college to see if perhaps I should try for a post-baccalaureate degree in another field. Many of which I did well in, with the exception of one F. THEN I made the asinine decision to go full time at a school about 1.5 hours away that I had to drive to. That lasted all of 2 months and by the time the semester had ended, I bailed...I didn't even take the time to withdraw. I simply allowed myself to fail out.
A decade later, I'm a marketing professional with 10 very successful years under my belt. I've worked some odd jobs to make ends meet, but I ended up excelling at a small nonprofit...then I moved into working as a contractor at a well-known retail store corporate office, now I work at and volunteer for the local branch at a nationally recognized nonprofit.
I'm married, own my home, have an amazing child, and I go to therapy regularly and take medication daily. I finally have my life together, but I've grown bored in my field and need something more in my professional life. I decided to look into graduate school awhile back and really took an interest in instructional design. I feel like my background, which includes a lot of graphic design, could prove to be quite useful in the field...and I have a genuine interest in helping people learn. I could go into more detail as to why I feel I'd be a good fit in the profession, but I'll save you all the elevator pitch. haha
The trouble I'm afraid of running into is my past...While I didn't give my all academically in my 20s, I KNOW I would as a person who is now in her mid-30s. I want better for myself and of course I want to show my daughter that you can do whatever you set your mind to. A lot of the programs I am looking at will accept a 2.8, others (like my Alma mater's) program will accept a 2.4 if you've been out of college more than 5 years, with 2 letters of recommendation. I have co-workers/supervisors/etc. that would be happy to write these letters for me... However, I'm scared the grades I received while screwing around at different schools while trying to figure out my life AFTER I got my bachelor's degree are really going to negatively impact my chances to move forward.
I guess I'm just wondering if anyone has any insight on whether or not grad school could be in my future with the history I have or it's simply a pipe dream at this point. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!!

Very short version: the longer it has been, and the more you've done since, the less the grades matter. For professional focused master's, you may simply be able to get admission now, while some programs may want to see you've taken a few courses or some mini program and done will, to establish you can be successful in an academic setting now.

Just apply.  You have nothing to lose but the application fee, and if you're doing well financially, that should be a negligible expense.

You write a very eloquent explanation of the situation and your current motivation...write that in your letter of intent. The best thing to do is to take your record head on, own it, and make sure they hear the right message about it.

Thank you all very much for your input! I recently reached out to a few different schools admissions people to "plead my case"/for some more direction. I haven't heard back from any of them...which is disappointing and a little disheartening. However, I suppose if I really want this, I should just suck it up, write a killer statement of purpose, and make sure I have amazing letters of recommendation.
Wish me luck. :) And thank you all again!!

If you intend to pursue a professional career and not a career in research sector, I would say "apply with no hesitation". Do not let your doubts and cognitive biases prevent you from accomplishing all you deserve.
For someone in your age, grades do not matter anymore. Even for someone straight out of college, I would say that grades do not really matter. It's more about your experience, characteristics, and capabilities. Based on your post, I think you could easily prove those criteria to your future employers.
Regarding a career in research sector, grades might matter. Grades represents your academic discipline and how you methodologically attack problem statements. So, you need to do very well in the course of your graduate studies.


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My conference paper got rejected. Will it be bad for my PhD performance?
I'm a PhD student. A paper for a conference got rejected. I haven't met my professor yet to discuss about it. But is it bad for my PhD performance? I mean, probably the professor will not trust my manuscripts anymore.

I am willing to bet everyone here on this site had one of his papers rejected before.

Did you get feedback from the reviewers? What did they say?

two reviewers both said this is not something theoretical new.

Welcome to the club. We all have had rejected papers before. Talk to your supervisor, find with him the next venue to submit it, improve it and upload to arxiv (if the next venue regulations allow) to avoid scooping and being able to cite it in a follow up work and resubmit at the next deadline. Rinse, repeat.

My supervisor willingly avoided to aid me in my first paper knowing that it could be rejected. He did it so I would learn by myself how to write good papers and handle harsh reviews/rejection. Failing is the best way of learning! "sucking at something is the first step of becoming kind of good at something" -Jack the dog.

@AnderBiguri I think that's a terrible way to teach. Writing good academic papers is a skill that has to be learnt, and one of an advisor's jobs is teaching it. Papers by non-academics get rejected all the time, simply because they don't follow the conventions of whatever field so they don't look serious, they don't relate their work to what's gone before, and they tend to labour obvious points while skating over non-obvious details. Letting a PhD student do that kind of thing wastes everybody's time, including the reviewers.

I attended a presentation by Harold Kroto where he told us about how the paper that got him a Nobel price was rejected from the first journal he tried. Enough said.

@DavidRicherby it wasn't that bad as I picture it actually.  He didn't help me that much in the beginning,  but in the end my paper got published.  Just wanted to show that it's not a big deal

If failing were the best way to learn, why would we bother with textbooks?  Just fail everyone until they learn the material, don't even bother to lecture on it.  Heck, I'm not sure why we would even need instructors.

One of my iron-clad graduation requirements for my own PhD students is to have a paper rejected from a major conference. (If you don't get rejected occassionally, you're not taking enough risks.)  Congratulations, you're one step closer to finishing!

@user3327426 What is conference paper? Is it just the same your poster in conference? Also what is manuscript?

@scaaahu I am willing to bet not everyone on this site who has written a paper would be comfortable with the pronoun "his".

I upvoted @scaaahu's comment , because I think its upvotes should be a reassuring indication of how many readers have had at least one paper rejected, not just how many men.  See this meta.so answer for my views on pronouns.

What field are you in? In mine (theoretical computer science), conference papers get rejected all the time: the better conferences tend to have acceptance rates of around 25-35%, and acceptance or rejection is a lot more random than you probably think (thanks to ff524 for the link). It's easy to judge what the best papers are, and accept those; it's easy to judge what the worst papers are, and reject those. For everything in the middle, it very much comes down to how enthusiastic the referees were and whether or not at least one member of the programme committee was willing to stand up and argue for your paper being accepted.
Assuming your paper wasn't one of the obvious-rejects, there's a decent chance that, if you resubmitted it unaltered to a different conference of about the same standard, it would get accepted. Hopefully, the referee reports made some constructive comments so you can improve the paper before resubmitting it, and have an even better chance. (Note that I wouldn't recommend resubmitting unaltered, unless you got no useful advice at all from the referees.  As Paul Garrett points out in the comments, it's not unusual for at least one of the same referees to see the paper next time it's submitted and it's rather irksome to see one's advice ignored.)

Also, if by mischance one gets the same referee in a different conference/journal and one presents an unaltered paper, it often happens that the ref is irritated to some degree by the lack of changes or lack of conformity to their advice... So, best to make some (worthwhile) changes, if only to be able to visibly have done so, but hopefully constructively, too.

@paulgarrett I agree: I wouldn't recommend resubmitting unaltered, unless there were no useful comments from the referees (which, unfortunately, is relatively common). I was mostly making a point about the randomness of the process.

Oh, indeed, for all but the best and worst, it's pretty random. But/and some people do have long memories, and want even their most random "advice" to be taken as gospel, etc., ... was my little complement to your points.

acceptance or rejection is a lot more random than you probably think. - some interesting research cited in related answer

What is conference paper? Is it just the same as poster in conference?

@Elessarr it's not a poster conference. it's a talk.

@Elessarr To give a talk at most (almost all, I'd say) computer science conferences, you write a paper and submit that. The papers are (lightly) peer reviewed and then one author of each accepted paper gives a talk about it at the conference. The accepted papers are published in a volume of conference proceedings and count as publications.

@ff524 Thanks for the link -- I knew about such studies but didn't have the details of any of them to hand.

In short, no. In long, this is a normal stage of going through a PhD: nobody gets all of their work published all of the time.
The best case scenario is that the reviewers have given you some useful feedback to work with, in which case now you're in a better position than you were before. Worst case, you got a flat reject with no helpful feedback (which happens sometimes: I've seen reviews that say "Insert review here"), but at least you'll still have something to talk over with your professor. In the latter case, try and work out why your paper was rejected: was the idea not considered novel enough? Was the explanation not clear enough? Or does this particular piece of work need some more data, more evaluation or more analysis before its publication worthy?
In either case, once you've talked this over with your professor, you should now have some idea of what direction you can focus your efforts on. This will help you get your paper ready for submission to a new venue.
EDIT: You mention in your comments that the reviewers said there was nothing theoretically new with your approach. This gives you a few options (which you should talk about with your professor). Firstly, if you disagree, then you need to make your case for this stronger (by citing similar papers in the field and showing how your approach differs). This is often easier than you might think; there are enough niches in research that you can often find a way to show that your work can be applied to specific cases in a new way, or in such a way as to tackle new problems. Secondly, reframe the work: the approach itself may not be novel, but you can frame it in a new way by, for example, comparing it to other approaches or by using it to form a position paper on a certain issue. Thirdly, if you've been scooped, or you feel this ground has already been trodden, then talk to your supervisor about exploring other approaches in this area.

Another reason for rejection is that the editors don't feel that a paper is within the scope of their journal.

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Does a low page limit (3 pages) indicate anything about the quality of a conference?
I'm concerned about a scientific & tech. conference which has set the page limit to 3!
I'm wondering if that means the quality of submitted paper in this conference is considered low.
What do they expect from authors to put into 3 pages?

but the page limit is not discussed as one criterion.

Do not confuse quality and quantity: the two dimensions are orthogonal.
A 3-page limit means that the conference is really asking for extended abstracts, rather than full papers.  You can't say much in a 3-page extended abstract, even in the highly dense IEEE two-column format, so it can't be treated the same as a full paper, but that's not reason for it to be bad, just terse.  The conference might well attract very high quality 3-page extended abstracts.  One thing that some such conferences do is have an associated journal special issue, where full papers are later invited.

I liked your orthogonality!

Usually this is referred to as an "extended abstract"  which might not be peer reviewed. Based on this, you can't really tell the quality of the conference, though you can know that this is probably not a discipline where conferences are more important than journal articles. In my experience, conferences with extended abstracts can be very good (excellent talks to see and great side discussions), but the submitted materials are often not worth referring to as there will be existing or forthcoming journal articles that cover the presented material in better depth and detail.
You have to ask yourself whether you're submitting to the conference to get a high-quality article to use for your CV or if you're submitting so that you can go and participate in a great conference. If the former, that's probably not going to be the desired outcome, if the latter, evaluate the Program Committee and see if you think a lot of high-powered people will be there.
If you are trying to decide whether or not to cite a 3-page extended abstract from a conference, you might look to its references or other papers by its authors for a better treatment of the material by them.

"Usually this is referred to as an "extended abstract" and will not be peer reviewed.": There are conferences where extended abstracts limited to 2 pages are peer-reviewed.

You should edit that into your question. Also, it might be a more popular and higher-quality conference than I am experienced with. The papers still won't be able to cover very much, so they will be of less usefulness than full articles in other conferences/journals.

@MassimoOrtolano, which is why I said "usually". I don't deny that some conferences have peer reviewed extended abstracts. They tend to get used for very popular meetings where they don't want to produce a proceedings with full articles.

@BillBarth: Sorry, I misunderstood your sentence: I thought that "usually" referred only to the name "extended abstract".

@MassimoOrtolano, I didn't realize how misleading that was. Edited for clarity. Thanks!

It understand it may seem hard to write anything substantial under such restrictions. However, how much can be fit into four pages depends on the subject matter. For example, one of the most respected physics journals, Physical Review Letters, restricts its papers to 3500 words, which they generally manage to fit onto 4 pages (using a small font size and a very packed two-column layout). Part of the challenge of getting published in PRL is to figure out how to concisely say something relevant.


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What exactly does it mean to say that a conference is "peer reviewed"?
I think as a PhD student, you should publish only in high IF journals rather than conferences. But if it is conference, then it should be at least "peer reviewed" one!
Some conferences first ask for an abstract. After the selection based on only abstracts they ask for a limited page number paper (like 3-4 pages). After all, you receive no any comments from any Reviewers. At best case, some few typographical comments from the editor.
Is this called peer reviewed?

Check this: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38086/why-are-conference-papers-so-important-in-cs

Things vary a bit, depending on the field you are in.
Some fields only review and publish abstracts (e.g., medicine), in some fields conferences are more important than journal publications (e.g., computer science).
But as a rule of thumb: a conference is only considered to be peer-reviewed when the full paper is reviewed, and not an (extended) abstract.
Personally, I think that there are great conferences out there, where only an extended abstract is reviewed (e.g., SPIE), but many working in academia do not consider them to be peer-reviewed.
Be aware! There are also scam (or near-scam) conferences that pretend to have a peer-review process, but actually hardly perform any review at all (and have accepted computer generated nonsense papers in the past). Try to avoid these! They only cost (a lot of) money, and will actually degrade your CV.

I don't at all agree with your second paragraph. At least in what I do, you have conferences with extended abstracts (12 pages) that are considered peer-reviewed.

@yo', 12 pages is much more than an extended abstract!

@BillBarth Then it's a matter of terminology I think :)

In my field, 12 pages is above the maximum length of full papers for most conferences.

Some conferences in computer science confusingly call "extended abstract" the papers that are submitted and reviewed there (usually around 12 pages). I guess this is because they are supposed to be a shorter version of an upcoming journal paper. In my experience, if these are peer-reviewed, then this is a peer-reviewed conference presentation, the term "abstract" isn't important.

as @BillBarth said, I have submitted an "extended abstract" to ION GNSS+ consisting of 12 pages. However, not all accepted extended abstracts undergo a peer-review


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Is it appropriate to register a girlfriend with "companion registration" for an academic conference?
Maybe my question is rather weird, but actually it turned out it is also a question of my colleagues.
Usually when you register for an academic conference, there's an  option that you can register a companion. I'm wondering if it is appropriate to register my girlfriend as a companion? Does it sound so bad?

Registering a companion is really important for conferences where registration includes the accommodations and meals. If whoever is accompanying you is going to stay in your room and eat conference meals, then they need to be registered.

Are you worried about whether bringing a girlfriend (as opposed to wife) would look awkward or scandalous, or raise issues such as whether the conference hotel allows unmarried people to share a room?  This won't be an issue unless the conference is being held in an extremely conservative location.  (In the U.S., it would be completely fine.)  If you are concerned about the location of this conference, you could always ask the organizers whether it would be appropriate to bring your girlfriend as a companion.  They'll probably say "sure, why not?", but either way you'll know.

What else would a companion be?

@LightnessRacesinOrbit: You haven't watched Firefly, have you? (More seriously, though, I agree with your question.)

@O.R.Mapper Of course I have ;lp However, you should come to terms with the fact that that is a work of fiction! It is not real.

Propose? Definitely no problem with a fiancee.

In the conferences I am aware of, companions are people not attending the conference, but coming along with some of the participants for tourism or company. Depending on the venue, they may or may not offer some alternative activities for them (anything from visits to the city to a heap of maps and sort yourself out).
If this is the case, your girlfriend would fit right in, as long as she is not interested in the conference itself.

Davidmh's answer makes sense for conferences where registration is a "package deal" including lodging, meals, maybe travel, etc.  Here is another possibility.
At the annual Joint Mathematics Meetings, participants have the option to register a "nonmathematician guest" for a small additional fee.  The conference describes this as:

Any family member or friend, who is not a mathematician, and who is accompanied by a participant in the meetings is eligible for this category. Guests will receive a badge and may accompany a mathematician to a session or talk and may also enter the exhibit area.

(The "exhibit area" in this case has booths operated by publishers, software vendors, etc, often selling their products at a discount.)
For this conference, registration doesn't include any travel, lodging or meals (participants are supposed to arrange those separately), so the only benefit you get from registering a guest is that they get a badge to attend the conference.  If you are traveling with a companion but they don't want to get in to the conference, there would be no reason to register them at all.
Some possible reasons to do this:

You need someone's assistance to get around inside the conference (pushing a wheelchair, carrying books, etc)
Your guest is curious what a conference is like
Your guest wants to be able to meet you inside the conference venue during breaks, meals, etc.
You just want to be with your guest during talks, etc.

The "nonmathematician" requirement is to point out that this is not supposed to be used as a way for you to get a colleague into the conference for cheap (at this conference, registering a guest is $16 while regular registration was $250-$400).  Of course the only enforcement would be the honor system.
So a girlfriend would be just the sort of person for whom this category is intended, provided that she is not also a colleague.
I once made use of this option when the conference was held in the city where my parents live.  My father is not a mathematician but is interested in math, so I registered him as my guest.  He enjoyed attending some of the less technical talks, browsing the books in the exhibit hall, and generally just experiencing the atmosphere of a mathematics conference.

Actually, Davidmh's answer even makes sense for conferences for which registration is not a "package deal". I've seen conferences that arranged for city tours or other freetime activities in parallel to the technical sessions for companions. The package may or may not also include a ticket for the conference banquet. So the companion ticket may easily be for "parking" the companion at least some of the time while science is happening.

@DCTLib: Interesting.  For the conference I described, there were no such activities scheduled, and the conference banquet required separate registration and payment.

To contrast Scott Seidman's answer, I'll also add that the Joint Mathematics Meetings are held in large cities in the US, so that companions would not normally have trouble finding things to do.  Guest registration would only be required if the guest actually wants to enter the conference venue.

@DavidRicherby: Well, not necessarily.  I meant that as a possibility instead of an actual reality.  I rephrased.

Its interesting that they have to be a nonmathematician.  I wonder if they interview them to check that their knowledge of mathematics is low enough :).

@PaulRichards Perhaps they put them in a room with a smouldering waste paper basket and a view of one black sheep from the window.

The companion option provides a convenient package allowing someone to participate in the nonscientific aspects of the conference.  For example, I've been to some remote conferences where if your guest wasn't a conference attendee, meals had to be eaten at the very expensive facility restaurant, instead of at the conference buffets.
These kinds of things can be very convenient.  I've seen people who thought they'd be able to avoid the cost of companion registration, only to knuckle down and buy it at the "gate price" once they're on the ground at the conference, and this can be more expensive.
Sometimes, companion registration may be an option because it is anticipated that non-conference attendees may have a rough time without it.


text:
How to rephrase this statement in a paper? "Due to a limited number of pages, ..."
How do you say in your paper that "due to a limited number of pages allowed, I'm not going to discuss the details how and from where this equation is derived..."
It is a conference paper, and they "might" ask us in future to publish our papers in more details in a dedicated special issue of journal X. I need to skip some calculations as I'm limited by pages, and no reference I have to refer, just some derivations.

Would you consider to show the audience your proof on blackboard when presenting the paper?

We often write "due to page restrictions, we defer proofs of results marked with an asterisk to the full version" but this may be field dependent. Also, make sure the reviewer has access to the proofs, e.g. by placing them in an appendix or by linking to full version available online (if the conference allows this).

"I have discovered a truly marvellous proof of this, which this margin is too narrow to contain"

@PålGD What's the point of the asterisk? Isn't it obvious that the proof isn't in the conference version from the fact that, well, it's not there?

@DavidRicherby I just do what I see others in my fields do.  And also because I prefer it myself when reviewing since, you know, gasp sometimes proofs are omitted because the authors are lazy (or their concept of trivial differs from mine), and then I don't have to go look in the appendix for a proof which isn't there.  This happens more often than it should.

@PålGD OK. In my area, when people omit a proof by choice, they say so explicitly, and it's pretty rare to do so. And, in a typical conference paper in my field, all the theorems would be starred under the convention of your field. :-)

In many fields, you can just refer to SI or a place were you uploaded the full proof if these details are necessary to understand your derivation. If they are not necessary, because they are trivial, then you can just skip.

Details are omitted to conserve space.

Terse. Because you don't want your explanation to cause you to go over the page limit.

If the referees object, replace with "Details are given in Appendix X."

@IlmariKaronen In my field, the appendices of a page-limited conference paper are only available to the reviewer: they don't appear in the published version. So a referee would never tell you to replace "Details are omitted to conserve space" with "Details are given in the appendix". The readers will never see the appendix until the journal version of the paper comes out, at which point, it won't be an appendix but included in the main body of the paper.

@DavidRicherby: What field is that? I'm guessing some subfield of CS, but I'm pretty sure I've seen appendices in CS papers before, so I doubt it's universal. Do you have anything equivalent, like online supplementary material?

@IlmariKaronen Theoretical CS (algorithms, complexity, combinatorics). Sure, there are journal papers with appendices (typically used for boring proofs that would interrupt the flow and provide little insight) but conference papers are strictly page limited. Saying "You must write ten pages but we'll also publish an appendix of arbitrary length" is pointless: you'd just put the word "appendix" at the top of page 11 and the page limit disappears.

"See Appendix X for the proof."
"See the full version [1] for the proof."
There is no need to explain why the proof is in the appendix or in the full version; it is self-evident in the case of page-limited conference papers.

For details, see supplementary material.

Usually, the appendix length is unlimited (but it is noted that the conference reviewers might not read it) so what I always do is writing something like "straightforward calculations lead to ..., for details see Appendix [A]".

"An in-depth discussion of X is beyond the scope of this paper."

I think this is a bad approach. Telling the reader that there is something important, but that there is no space to say it, just seems rude. Either the statements for which there is no space need to be said or they do not. If they need to be said, then you need to publish the work some place else that will provide the needed space. If they do not need to be said, then you do not need to tell the reader about them.

I disagree, though I can emphasize. Some derivations are important but trivial (and vice versa). The tradeoff between conciseness and completeness is rarely clear-cut - there is always just one more helpful detail. My understanding is that CS conference papers more often have strict page limits than other disciplines' journals, so you need to pick and choose what you explain. And explicitly noting that indeed there are (omitted) details for something is more useful than just writing the result.

Related - sorry, couldn't resist ;-)

In CS it's very common to have a limited number of pages.  It's difficult to include a thorough proof when there might only be 6 or 8 pages allowed.  However, I do think that in this day and age, there's no reason to not have the appendix that can't be published because of space constraints available online somewhere.  E.g,. "due to space reasons, we omit proofs here, but see http://... for more details."

@JoshuaTaylor one reason against online appendices is the lack of peer review. I find it hard to believe that just because someone says they have the the critical proof that people believe it.

@StrongBad I mostly agree, although the editors and reviewers would have had the same access, and issues with versions, updates, etc., can be mostly assuaged with sites like arxiv.  If nothing else, it removes some of the "this feels rude" aspect, in my opinion.

Telling the reader that there is something important, but that there is no space to say it, just seems rude — On the other hand, not telling the reader that something important has been omitted is dishonest.  Far better to be "rude".

one reason against online appendices is the lack of peer review — The conferences I submit to explicitly encourage submitting appendices with full details that don't fit in the official page limit.  These appendices are often included in the peer review process, at the discretion of the program committee.  Generally, PCs don't just believe you if you say you have a proof but don't make it available in some form.

@Stephan. Do you mean empathize?

@TRiG: I did. That's the kind of thing that hits you half an hour later, when you can't edit a comment any more, and adding another comment just to clarify this seemed a bit pointless.

I agree that it's undesirable that there's a whole system of conference papers where details are omitted because of space but this still counts as a publication. However, the question isn't asking for a critique of that system; it's asking how somebody who cannot change the system should operate within it.

Not everyone is interested in the proofs... Supplementary material/appendix is there for exactly for that, so you can provide the proofs without mixing it with the text...
Of course, if the proofs are your results, that wouldn't work... :)


text:
Authoring unverified common-knowledge statements in papers about quality software-engineering?
Writing a software-engineering paper where I'm saying things like:

Quality software-engineering/software-design means developing modularised, tested, documented, maintainable, extensible and understandable source-code.

But that sounds a little grandiose especially without multiple references. I can find many textbooks & articles which say similar, but I can't find the first reference (have gone through Google Scholar as far back as the 1940s).
Is there some special way of referencing, e.g.: do I just take the most popular relevant textbook and quote that?

check the accepted answer for this question : http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/2192/on-citing-common-knowledge-statements?rq=1

This doesn't sound like the sort of thing for which it is meaningful to have a "first guy that said this" reference for, unless you are writing specifically about the history and development of modern coding standards.  And even then it's difficult or impossible to find a single, definitive source.  More than likely the ideas emerged dynamically from a whole host of forces and in multiple people/locations, rather than any one person who "said it first" and everyone else followed the lead of.  What is "good" and "quality" is largely a matter of convention and opinion, after all.
Having hundreds of textbooks and thousands of research articles that support it is more than sufficient to establish it as a common mantra, or whatever you want to call it.  If you can find a respectable book that is specifically about modern coding practice and its (historical) development, you could reference that as your support for the claim.  Otherwise referencing a few major, influential texts that make the same claims would be good, though you may want to be careful with your phrasing.  Citing them as proof this is the one "right" or "universal" way to do coding is arguably misleading and circular; saying that you take the same approach as those authors, however, makes no claims to objective truth and simply makes clear an assumption to the reader.


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Is it possible to get admitted to a MS program with funding if I have a poor GPA but good GRE scores?
Many university in North America or in Europe offer fundings for masters program .  But it only for those students who have a good CGPA in undergraduate examination .I  have completed my bachelor degree in computer science and engineering . I have a very poor cgpa  . Is there any possibility that I can get myself admitted in those institution for masters program with fundings . I have heard that a good GRE score will help a lot . Is it true ? Can I get funding if I have a good GRE score  once again I repeat I have a very poor cgpa .

What is your CGPA?  In my experience, by "very poor", students can mean wildly different things.

Unfortunately, the GRE subject test for computer science was discontinued several years ago, so you will need some other way, such as letters of recommendation, to show your computing knowledge.

@PeteL.Clark  2.5

Before I begin to answer your question, let me elaborate that US and European universities typically do not have much funding available to students participating in a masters degree. Most funding options (in some universities all of them) are reserved for PhD students and for the universities that do offer funding for master students, it is usually awarded to a selected few. Furthermore, it is less common for European universities to offer funding (when compared to the US) but study cost in Europe can be much cheaper.
A poor undergraduate GPA alone does not prevent you from being accepted to a masters program. One can even hope to receive full funding if he can satisfy the admission committee that he is a fully capable student and his grades do not reflect his potential for being a graduate student.
However to be applicable for a fully funded masters program you will most likely need more than a good GRE score. Having the following can significantly increase your chances:

Good letters of recommendation from professors whom you've worked with and can vouch for you
Having related research experience (preferably with published results in a peer-reviewed journal)
Finding a professor (for your graduate supervisor) who has a highly matched research interest as you
Having related industry work experience
Preparing a compelling statement of purpose, providing convincing reasons for your poor undergraduate performance
Having a high TOEFL/IELTS score (for international applicants)

In computer science, having valuable achievements in an internationally recognizable contest like the "ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest" can tremendously boost your chances of getting accepted (and funded) at even the top schools. However, even qualifying to participate in such a contest requires a strong background in programming and algorithms.
Final note. From my understanding, European universities are more sensitive to bad undergraduate GPAs and many have hard cut-offs which will eliminate you from the admission process without considering your application as a whole. Therefore, it is my personal recommendation to apply to US and Canadian universities alone as it will improve your chances and save you time and money.
Unfortunately even by having exact and complete knowledge of your GPA (which I don't), there is no way to be sure what your chances will be and parts of what is said above can be deemed opinion-based. The graduate admission process, from what I understand, is a complicated and nonlinear process with many different factors playing their part.

@ShuvroShuvro: By working towards what I mentioned, especially research experience, you can eventually overcome and remedy this, but it will take time and commitment. Wish you the best!

I agree with the existing answer.  In the US (I will restrict to that), funding is scarce for master's students under the best of circumstances, in large part because in many fields one does not need a master's degree to enroll in a PhD program, and thus master's students are often characterized by a limitation of their interest, commitment, ability and achievements relative to PhD students.
I suppose every department must have its own philosophy on which master's students to fund.  In my department (mathematics, UGA), we are likely to fund master's students  we think will (in particular, can) become PhD students: in fact, in many instances the student applied for both programs and we decided to start them in the master's program to give them more time and funding overall.
I don't know what you consider a "very poor" GPA to be and I'd like to.  I will assume that you mean that your GPA in your major is under 3.0.  In my opinion that will make it extremely difficult for you to get funding in a master's program in the US: as above, such funding is scarce and competitive, and your undergraduate performance is really not. The other answer gives a lot of things that would mitigate/amelioriate a poor GPA, but in my opinion most of these are not really enough to get you serious consideration.  I think that to have a real chance at getting funding in this situation you should have (i) some exceptional research-related achievement -- in my field, a paper that you wrote on your own and got published in a reputable journal would count -- and (ii) a convincing explanation for your poor GPA.
Let me discuss the second point.  After some years of undergraduate teaching, I will cheerfully admit that student grades are not perfectly correlated to student understanding and ability: a large percentage of students are simply not committed / serious / mature enough to get the grades that their command of the material should warrant.  Presumably any plausible candidate for master's funding with a poor GPA is in this situation.  But there is an inherent awkwardness there: what you'd like us to believe is that you're very strong and talented and just couldn't get it together to get the coursework done as well as lots of other students who didn't want to go on to graduate study.  So you haven't committed to your undergraduate studies...and now you want us to commit our money to your graduate studies.  Well, there's no logical contradiction there, but it's a pretty tough sell.  I would indeed concentrate on making a convincing argument for this (in your personal statement and/or cover letter).

I agree with what you said about a convincing reason for your unsatisfactory GPA and that is what I meant by "preparing a strong SOP".
Nonetheless, I think if the OP must enroll in a funded program, he best prepare for a PhD as it is more conventional to acquire funding for PhD (although the admission process is much more competitive).

@Abbas: Sure, I agree completely.


text:
Do some German universities never provide anyone with summa cum laude
So I had my defense recently, and I successfully passed it, so congratulations to me!
I have some questions regarding the grading though, I received a 1.0 in both my thesis and my presentation, which I was told was the 'highest distinction' and that is the best I could get (or so I thought).
But I was also told that I'd be receiving a magna cum laude, and I thought this was the second highest honors, after summa cum laude.
So what am I missing here? Do some universities never provide anyone with summa cum laude? Or what grade do you need to receive this honor?

What do the examination regulations of your faculty have to say on the matter?

The exam regulations say that summa cum laude is <0.7 and magna cum laude is 0.7-1.5. But the examiners did say that they gave the best grade possible and they unanimously decided the grade, so that leaves me a bit confused because exam regulations seem a bit different from actual practice. The regulations also mention that summa cum laude is awarded only in exceptional cases, so I guess it makes sense to receive magna cum laude, but the grades still don't.

Then clearly the examiners were mistaken. You could ask them.

I think summa cum laude etc. are undergraduate distinctions.  In the US they are rarely (if ever) offered for masters or doctorates.  I do not know about Germany, however.

@GEdgar Indeed, you don't. Traditionally, in Germany PhDs are graded on a scale from 1 (best) to 4 (worst), named "summa cum laude", "magna cum laude", "cum laude", and "rite".

The "0.7" grading only works in places which have that grade (which is a "raised" 1, just as 1.7 is a raised 2). Some place do this, some don't and the best grade for the latter is 1.0. The exam regulations suggest, however, that 0.7 exists in your place. (Most likely, however, "summa" is =0.7, and >0.7 is "magna" -- i.e., you need the best grade in all sub-categories to get a "summa", which makes sense.)

At my Alma Mater, the mentor had to announce that he had summa candidate to the comittee in advance, and then the thesis needed an en additional referee, and the examination took not 1h but 1.5h. This special distinction was not supposed for everybody who's just very good, but for the rare exceptional genius. ~One in ten years for every prof.

Ph.D. regulations in Germany differ widely between different universities, and examiners do not always read them in detail (which is not surprising). In principle, it should be your supervisor's job to gently acquaint them with what is possible and what not - but then again, Ph.D. supervisors also do not always read the Promotionsordnung in depth.
I would ideally first read your university's Promotionsordnung in depth, then talk to the supervisor - and do this quickly, because the longer you wait, the harder it will be to change the grade.
And: congratulations!

Fully agree with the "it's the supervisor's job". The point that the supervisor does not know about this, however, only applies (hopefully!) for a supervisor who is new to the place -- after a while, they should know.

If I understand this answer correctly, you are suggesting that there are grades (like "0.7", based on the comment thread on the question) that are possible in some places whereas in others the best grade is "1", so the examiners could have intended to give the highest possible grade available to them and marked a "1", not realizing that "0.7" was an available option. If the examiners have said "We've given you the highest possible grade, a 1", yet the Promotionsordnung states that the highest possible  grade is a 0.7, then OP should talk to their supervisor because there may be an error.

@BryanKrause I can definitely confirm that the first part of your comment is the case -- there are definitely places in Germany with either standard for the best grade (1.0 or 0.7).

@BryanKrause: yes, that is precisely what I am saying. German universities have a lot of leeway in how they set up their Promotionsordnungen. AFAIK, they need to be approved by the state ministry, but that's it - and such differences in possible grades definitely do occur.

Not universities have Promotionsordnungen. Every Fakultät has its own. And the final grade is agreed on and voted for in the Promotionsausschuss, and they know what they're doing, or they'd have a lawsuit on them five times a year.


text:
How can there be a a department with no full professors? Should I be wary of it when applying for tenure-track?
A certain mathematics department of a Canadian university has assistant professors, associate professors, but no (full) professors.  I find this odd.
The university was founded in 1980 as a "university college" and it only became a university about 15 years ago. I am guessing that this history and its teaching-oriented nature may have something to do with the lack of full professors.
How can this happen?  More importantly, what should I watch out for when I am applying to for a tenure-track job in such a department?
Addendum: As some have correctly guessed, it's a rather small department: it has ~15 assistant & associate professors combined.

How big is the department? At my university some of the humanities departments have fewer than 10 faculty members. I encountered at least one such department that had no full professors at one point. While unusual, it did not strike me as particularly strange or problematic given the department’s small size.

FYI, for the first position (1993-1996) I had after my Ph.D., the mathematics department (perhaps 20-25 faculty members) had no full professors. The university began in 1931 (wasn't a "university" until 1969) and the mathematics department also had a masters program (mathematics, not mathematics education) for a couple of decades (I think) during roughly the 1970s and 1980s.

You should look at the CVs of the associate professors and see whether they have served long enough to be full professors, and if they have, why (as much as you can tell from the CV) they haven't been promoted.

@AlexanderWoo How should I use the result of such an investigation?

Depends very much on the organisation of the university. In my university a lot of strategic information is only shared with full professors, making a group without vulnerable to miss out on opportunities or be last in budget decisions.

I don't think it's a big deal provided there's not too many "lifetime associate profs". To explain: I expect people to take 8-15 years to go from Assistant to Full. 8 would be someone with prior experience as assistant elsewhere, 15 is someone who is struggling a bit or has had leaves of some kind (mat/pat/health). Anyone past 15 is likely never to get to full. Most research active faculty will take 10-12 years.
So when you look up people there, check the proportion of "older" associates. It might just be that the complement is renewing and nobody has made full yet but this will happen soon.
At the same time, from what you say, this is a small department that has, like the rest of the institution, changed purpose relatively recently. So I would expect the mean time to full to be slightly longer than usual, because there are changes of mentality that take some time.
In any event, there is no harm in bringing up the topic, if you do get an interview. You can also "shop around": identify one or two people who seem to be quite active in research and ask to speak to them while on site, that's completely okay.
In my view, it is in that department's best interest that the person they hire comes in with a good understanding of the situation, whatever that situation is. Otherwise, they risk losing the person quickly and in particular for a smaller department, that has consequences: running another search one or two years down the line is not necessarily always feasible.

I would doubt that. If just that, the difference in salary is usually well worth the extra bother.

There are a number of ways this can happen.  It can occur in small departments/schools and it can also arise sometimes as a result of staff losses of full professors.  It is not ideal to have a department with no full professors, but the negatives can be ameliorated if there are full professors in related departments that can still mentor the associate professors, etc.  The associate professors in the department must be supervised by someone so somewhere above them is a full professor (outside the department) who they report to.
As to what to watch out for, the main thing is to be aware that the absence of full professors means less academic experience in the department and this will make it harder to get mentoring and direction by really experienced people in your field.  This can be a double-negative because: (a) you miss out on direct mentoring/advice from a full professor in your field; and (b) if you are supervised by an associate professor in your field then that person might also miss out on soome mentoring/advice from full professors in their field, which may negatively impact their mentoring/advice to you.
This is something that it would be reasonable to raise in the question period in the event that you are given an interview for a position.  Ask them how they manage without any full professors in the department and whether they see this as a negative --- and do they plan to hire any in the future?

"The associate professors in the department must be supervised by someone so somewhere above them is a full professor (outside the department) who they report to."  Yeah, no.  That's not how academics work in North America.

@Buzz: Mind elaborating on how it works there?  Seems weird to me that an Assoc Prof would not have a supervisor/manager at a higher level.

@Ben: The higher level supervisor/manager would most likely be a college dean, the head of the college that the math department belongs to. Typically in U.S. universities, the university is divided into several "colleges" or "schools" -- not to be confused with separate post-secondary institutions called "colleges", which are usually what 4-year and undergraduate-only post-secondary institutions are called. For example, at University of Minnesota mathematics belongs to the College of Science and Engineering.

@DaveLRenfro: Okay, but wouldn't that Dean be a Full Prof?

@Ben: Probably such a Dean would be a Full Professor (there might be exceptions for especially small 4-year institutions, but I suspect any exceptions would be very rare), and this was true for the case I described in my other earlier comment, but a Dean (or other such direct supervisor to the department Chair) would be 2 levels up from the non-Chair Associate Professors in the department, and thus these Associate Professors would not have a Full Professor as their direct report (as one would say in non-academic settings).

@Ben Historically, deans have been promoted from within, i.e. deans are professors who have moved up into administration.  However, there is a growing trend of people with degrees in "educational leadership" who fill these roles.  While these folk with EL degrees are typically found at higher levels than deans (provosts, presidents, etc), it is no longer uncommon for a dean to not be a professor.

@Ben, In Canada assistant->associate->full prof is progress through the ranks, not a hierarchical relationship. Assoc and full profs report to their dept chair/Dean, but (as assistant profs) are independent as academics.
The Q "do you plan to hire full profs" is also unusual. Full prof is usually a promotion from associate. Senior hires come in as assoc or full based on qualifications at time of hire.
Finally, chairs tend to be more senior and so more likely full profs. However, there are assoc prof chairs. They tend to have less time for research, and so end up being slower promoted.

All that sounds right to me, but again, all these academics have a supervisor and if you are already Assoc Prof then I would think that your supervisor is going to be someone senior (e.g., a Head of School, Dept Head, Dean, etc.).  I would think that these supervisors are almost always going to be Full Profs, so I don't think I'm wrong to point out that it is typically the case that somewhere there is a Full Prof who supervises the Assoc Prof (though Xander does give another possible arrangement).

Same in the US - the reporting chain is really independent of faculty rank.  It's entirely possible for an associate professor to be the chair of a department, and thus the supervisor of all the department faculty, which may include full professors.

@XanderHenderson: Though even when a dean comes from outside, I've found they're usually granted a professor title and tenure privileges, sort of as an expected part of the benefits. And they tend to have the right to step down as dean and take on a normal tenured faculty role, even if it's rarely exercised.


text:
Invitation for science outreach - any downsides?
A few days ago, I got an invitation to write an article in layman's terms about my recently published research.
The "small outreach journal" is called The Science Breaker. They are a "non-profit publisher that highlights lay-summaries of scientific papers authored by the very same scientists who did the original research".
They are associated with the University of Geneva in Switzerland and are diamond open access.
They don't charge any fees etc. I was wondering if there are any downsides to accepting the invitation or if someone has some experience with them? I cannot find anything negative so far and at least it would be some good practice.

One downside is of course that writing that article will cost you time, time you could be spending doing research, writing "real" papers, or having fun. (Then again, some outreach may look better on your CV than yet another "real" paper, so the trade-off may be worthwhile.)

You might read a few articles to see what they are like. If you enjoy them, consider how much work would go into writing a similar quality article.

I'm getting these invitations all the time. Most are by "non-profit publishers", but really their business model is to charge money for creating glossy articles.

I think that this sort of thing feels exploitative. You, a subject matter expert, provide a free, high-quality article for a publisher. In return you get... nothing really. The opportunity cost is high since this takes time away from doing research or writing a proper manuscript. And the payoff is suspect. You may get some exposure (though doing things for "the exposure" is literally a joke). But even that depends on the journal/website that the article is going on -  is it exposure that you care about? There are easier ways to do outreach.
I'm not familiar with The Science Breaker though - it looks interesting and there is nothing that suggests it is predatory. But something feels off. They are piggybacking off of the traditionally one-sided academic publication industry and hoping that no-one questions the free labor they are asking for.
If it's something you are personally interested in and you have some free time on your hands, I don't think there is any risk in writing an article for them. There is probably something more productive for you to be doing though.

Great answer. As a researcher, time is one of your most valuable resources; treasure it.

Figuratively a joke?

Literally a joke (at least in art/creative circles) https://theoatmeal.com/comics/exposure.

My field is not in the hard sciences, so this will be somewhat different. It is, I think, helpful as a recommendation since The Science Break seems to present themselves as a new ideal cooperation of science and society. That kind of idealism and outreach is, of course, debatable. However, it is common in my field. I would consider contributing to them. They seem to be an interesting and interested venue. If you are ever interested in working in teaching-orientated institutions or if your work is the kind that is inherently of more interest to public engagement, then this sort of outreach may even be of benefit on your CV. This does not mean, however, that you should take the time to write if you are fully booked for your own research--so that you would be sacrificing your main object in working with Science Break. If you can teach people, have the time to teach people, and have a non-predatory opportunity to teach people, why not teach people? Good luck with either decision and your work!

I get two or three of those emails a week, and they all sound suspiciously similar. Neither I nor my work are significant enough to merit one press release a week; I don't really want to know what their business model aims to be, but I can't imagine it's anything good and I don't want to be a part of it.
The true significance of my work will be in whether other scientists adopt it. In turn, my work will only be adopted by other scientists if it is consistent enough to handle their varied use cases, simple enough that they are confident of using it correctly, and useful enough in giving new results that they are willing to spend the time using it. The only real shortcuts in this process are presenting your work in the usual forums: conferences, to supervisors' collaborators, and then sometimes using well-targeted social networks (like ResearchGate, LinkedIn, Mastodon, and various deep pockets of $\mathbb{X}$).
Outreach to other audiences, who have their own specialties, about the specifics of your research, isn't really that useful in comparison. It will come naturally once your work is scientifically significant. (Of course, if your work directly leads to policy recommendations -- such as in climate science, public health, or ecology -- then public engagement is highly valuable.)

It is actually the latter. My research is highly relevant for society and policymakers.

Then you should work with your university or institute's press department. They will have plenty of locally relevant experience.


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Would a (temporary) industry position before starting a tenure-track position have a negative effect on academic career?
I have obtained a tenure-track offer (computer science) starting in 1 year that I'm planning to accept. I'm currently a postdoc in theoretical computer science and I'm facing the situation where I could either extend my current postdoc for another year or, somewhat by coincidence, I have also the option of going into industry with the knowledge that my appointment there would have a fixed ending date (when my tenure track position starts). The potential industry employer does not have any knowledge of my tenure track offer, so in a sense I would be "abusing" my position there as an industry postdoc. (Considering that the company is a big player in the financial world, I'm sure they wouldn't be too heartbroken over me leaving after a year...)
I feel somewhat more inclined to go for the industry position just for the sake of "trying something different" before going the full academic route.

Would taking up a temporary appointment in industry be perceived as lack of commitment to research once my tenure clock is up and/or could there be other negative repercussions for my future (academic) career?

Edit: to add more detail, I'm planning to continue to work on research problems during my industry appointment as time permits. I'm reasonably well connected to avoid suffering from the fact that I'm not going to be physically located at a research institution (considering it's a short term absence).

I can't answer this question, but I'm curious what harm you imagine it could have, given that you've already secured a tenure-track position? It's my understanding that most places stop caring about your past once you advance past the applicant phase.

Be aware that there may be issues with your industrial employer if you leave within the first year of employment.  For example, if they reimburse you for moving expenses there would often be a clause that you must repay this if you leave within the first year.  You're also going to lose out on annual bonuses and stock options (if there are any.)  At another level, if you resign your position so soon after starting, then it's unlikely that you'll be able to maintain good relationships with the folks that hired you.

The potential industry employer does not have any knowledge of my tenure track offer — You need to change that, before the department that made the offer does.

I think that taking a lucrative industry job will lower the expected value of your academic career: if you were sure you wanted an academic career, you wouldn't be motivated to try something different.  Isn't there a non-negligible chance that you'll learn that you prefer the industry job?  That would end your academic career.  However, taking you at your word the most likely outcome is that you will return to your academic job with increased confidence that you're doing the right thing, which will be valuable to both you and your employer.

Note:  I'm not addressing the ethics of taking the industry job in bad faith.  That's addressed above.
Regarding future negative impact on tenure:
No, it shouldn't have negative impact.  At least, not at a reasonable school.  But I don't know if the school you will be working at is reasonable.  I wouldn't expect this to be a negative at Georgia Tech.
The only reason it could possibly hurt is if you had zero publications during that time, and even then that shouldn't matter if it's a non-research industry job.  But even then, if you are getting interesting experience you can talk about later, that might help your research or make connections for future collaboration or funding, it's still good.
Remember, when you come up for tenure, you write your research and teaching statements, do you can contextualize this year any way you want!
Regardless, I would hope it's viewed positively. When you come up for mid-tenure review and tenure review, the committee should look at your impact (in all ways), your publications, teaching evaluations, and so on.  Generally, they want to look at the trajectory of your work since you started as a professor at this job.  Will you appear to be someone who will continue to be successful?
What you do during this gap year shouldn't impact that.  So, I would expect it wouldn't hurt in any way.
That said, I would ask the opinion of a few senior faculty at the school, and I would explain to them that you think the experience would be a good one (perhaps for informing your future work, and teaching).  That will both give you a chance to find out how senior faculty feel about this (they are the ones judging your tenure case later on) and put into their minds a positive reason for you doing this.  Looking deliberate and thoughtful about your career choices is a good thing.

This is an excellent answer.  A reasonable institution would understand that if they want to have a say about what you do next year, they need to hire you then.  Assuming the year gap is their doing, you can go backpacking through Nepal if you want (and who's to say that would be such a bad way to spend your time?  only you and your close associates).  If on the other hand the OP negotiated for a one-year gap under the pretext of a postdoc, then spending it in an industry job instead seems deceptive.


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Should professors with Chinese names be addressed with surname only or both names?
How would I address a professor with a Chinese name?
I am unsure whether I should use only the surname, or both forename and surname, because the order of mentioning forename and surname is reversed.
When my professor's name is forename: Yi, surname: Zhang, should I then address him with

Dear Professor Zhang,

or with

Dear Professor Zhang Yi,

"Dear Prof. Zhang", surname: zhang, pronounced: John source: life in china, aside that in china as with anywhere people have family name and given name

"zhang, pronounced: John" - maybe that claim should be restricted to something like "the pronunciation of 'John' is less different from 'Zhang' than from most other common Chinese surnames". "in china as with anywhere people have family name and given name" - what is meant by "as with anywhere"? In some cultures, mononyms are not unusual.. Also, while in this context I second your conclusion, having a family name and a given name does not automatically mean only one is used at a time in any given situation.

Whenever I am unsure, I look for how the professor is addressed in department/university news postings, usually by doing a search on the university's website.

@AustinHenley: I am not sure that is so helpful, as news articles generally do not normally emulate direct discourse toward the professor in question. For example, based on your procedure, this news article would suggest to address a Professor Reed as either Stephen F. Reed or Mr. Reed, and this one provides a choice between Jeffery F. Miller, Professor Jeffrey Miller, and just Miller.

@O.R.Mapper Precisely why I said in department/university news postings. The Wall Street Journal is not a university.

@AustinHenley: But UCLA Newsroom is from a university. As are news from MIT, or UChicago.

@O.R.Mapper As with all advice in the entire world, there will be exceptions. It has definitely helped me time and time again. All of your examples are definitely not something I would look at for this, although I am exactly sure how to classify them differently than a department's news page.

I think the "John" analogy depends very much on your English accent/pronunciation :-)

I've sometimes had related trouble with Japanese academics - again, in Japan the family name is usually spoken first, but often they reverse it for the English version of their business cards, so it's hard to know whether to reverse it again! I haven't yet caused offense, though, by politely asking which their family name is, or how to address them.

Knowing that this comment is quite distant from the question, but if the name is Vietnamese, always call the given name, in any context. You will get that name from the question "what's your name?".

In the United States, at least, one would typically use the same structure of address as with any other name, e.g., "Prof. Zhang."  To do otherwise marks the person as different in a way that may be inappropriate, particularly if (as with many Americans of Chinese heritage) they use a European name order.  If the professor wishes to be addressed otherwise, it is up to them to make this clear.  From my experiences with European colleagues, I would expect it is similar there as well.  I cannot speak for proper courtesy in East Asia...

Being an Asian myself, I'd use 'Dear Prof. Zhang.'
In Chinese culture, it can be considered rude for a junior to address their senior by the full name, that's just the way we're brought up to address our seniors, well at least for me...

Just as a point of interest, would you (both personally and, if I may, generalized to others you know) still consider it rude from a student, or would you expect them to be unaware and would therefore make allowances for it?

As a formality, I address any senior by their 'title/ surname' on first contact and will continue doing so unless they insist otherwise. Personally, I don't take offense if someone calls me by my full name (unless deliberate) as I would assume they're just unfamiliar with the culture. However, I would be slightly taken aback if that is coming from a Chinese student addressing his/her Chinese senior (eg. professor) by the full name (on 1st contact) as I'd assume they know. Exception made when they know each other relatively well and can thus dispense with formalities. Keypoint: ask to be sure

Rule #1, ask the professor if you are unsure. Ask him what name he prefers to be called. I am a Chinese and a native Chinese speaker. I myself always like Westerners to ask me this question before they call my name.
In the example you provided, both Zhang and Yi can be used as English translation of Chinese surnames. Zhang is a popular Chinese surname and Yi happens to be one of my relative's surname. As you can see in this example, it's easy to make a mistake when calling Chinese names. Not to mention that the Chinese name convention is Surname first and Forename last (or Last name first and First name last).
If you cannot ask him for whatever reason and you have strong reason to believe that his surname is Zhang, you should call him Dr. Zhang. This would be the most appropriate way.

From my experience (could be wrong, I do not speak Chinese -- I'd be happy to get a confirmation) a simple rule of thumb to tell Chinese first names from surnames is "if it has two syllables, it's a surname". There are also one-syllable surnames, but this simple rule gets a majority of cases right.

@FedericoPoloni: you got it wrong. Most Chinese surnames have only one syllable. The "two syllable" part would in fact more likely be the given name. What can cause more confusion is that some people choose to render each character/syllable as an individual word. In this case even the (corrected) version of your rubric will not work.

@FedericoPoloni I don't know how you got this experience. It's wrong. I've put my real Chinese name in my user profile. My surname is one-syllable. My first name is also one-syllable. Most Chinese have one-syllable for surname, two-syllables for first name. Some Chinese have two-syllable for surname. Some Chinese have one-syllable for first name. There is not really one single rule for Chinese names.

@WillieWong an scaahu: thanks, I appreciate the corrections.

If you are sure that his surname is Zhang, I would address him as Prof. Zhang. Beware that some Chinese use Last name First name convention rather than the First name Last name convention common in the Western world.

For what it's worth, Zhang is far more common as a surname than is Yi, although the latter is not unheard of.

Being a Chinese professor isn't the real issue. I guess the cultural context is more important here.
Is the professor in China? Then you probably should refer to him/her as Prof X, because that's what Chinese customs expect. On the contrary, is the professor in some other non-Asian country? Then ask for what he/she prefers.


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Which department does a professor in a joint appointment get his/her graduate students from
If someone is a professor of department A, however, s/he also affiliates with department B in a joint appointment. Which department does the professor in a joint appointment get his/her graduate students from? Department A or B? The original or affiliated department? Also, does he/she evaluates the admission of A or B? Or both? Thank you. I did a web search on this site with the keyword joint appointment, but I can not find any similar discuss.

Both.
In general, a faculty member with an appointment in a given department normally has full rights to having graduate students from that department. Typically, though, the relative ratio of recruiting tracks well with the relative "weight" of the two appointments. A professor with a true joint appointment (50% funding, etc., from each department) is much more likely to recruit from both departments than a professor with a merely "courtesy" appointment.

Most professors with joint appoints that I know seem to eventually end up "weighting" very heavily to one of the two departments.


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How much do math professors get paid in the United States?
I have been researching professorship (full tenure) and I have been wondering what these full time professors make?
I am not talking about professors are Harvard, but middle-good universities?
In the United States.

Country/location?

USA, I just edited @scaahu

What has your research shown so far? Which state in the US? With what experience? What is a "middle-good" university - 100th in the world or 500th? What are the other benefits in the package? What sort of professorship - i.e. with what responsibilities? Private or public? Named chair? And what's your underlying question - what difference would the answer here make to you?

This answer http://academia.stackexchange.com/a/32458/546 should be helpful to you.

There are several sources for this data. There are general salary surveys, such as the one done by the Chronicle of Higher Education.  These often classify only by rank and type of institution, not by discipline.
There is a more informative discipline-specific survey done by the American Mathematical Society: their Faculty Salary Report. This lags behind by a year or two while they process the data; the most recently released report when I write this is from 2013. The AMS divides mathematics departments into several groups depending on specialty and whether the department offers a doctorate, master's, or bachelors degree as its highest degree.
For future reference, here are the mean (average) reported salaries for new hire Assistant Professors in the 2013 AMS report. The meaning of each category is described in the report, which has much more detailed information.

Public, PhD-granting Large: $83,242
Public, PhD-granting Medium: $72,284
Public, PhD-granting Small: $67,043
Private, PhD-granting Large: $88,080
Private, PhD-granting Small: $75,722
Applied Math Department, PhD-granting: $81,234
Statistics Department, PhD-granting: $77,759
Biostatistics Department, PhD-granting: $88,362
Master's degree granting: $60,355
Bachelor's only: $56,217

There is also data available from CUPA-HR (e.g. 2014 Executive Summary). This organization has much more detailed data, but most of the data is not publicly released (university administrations pay for the data, so they can compare themselves to peers). They do release a summary by field, including mathematics, applied mathematics, and statistics.


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Teaching load in New Zealand research universities
What is the average teaching load in research universities in New Zealand? I mean how many courses per academic year does a research active faculty member have to teach? Say, in Math or Science disciplines?

The standard load will generally be around 3 courses per year or equivalent, with 2-3 hours of delivered lectures per week per course. It is common to teach only subparts of courses and distribute the load over the year in that way. Usually there is a notional "student workload" by university policy for a course worth a given number of points, and working backwards from there determines the notional staff workload, but there can be some flexibility in structuring a course within that. The number of points per course can differ between departments.
Terms are generally twelve weeks long for the two main semesters, with the summer programmes and often summer courses themselves having idiosyncratic layouts (particularly because "summer" in New Zealand includes Christmas & New Year's). Many departments do not offer summer courses at all. The main semesters run approximately March-June and July-October.
There are generally tutors hired to run tutorials or labs and grade assignments and tests for all but very small or specialised courses. Those may be undergraduate students, graduate students, or full-time employees, depending on the department and course. In general exams are marked by the course lecturers themselves.
All of this can vary between institutions. In addition, there are certain parts of some universities that operate on a different model of courses, often with a larger number of shorter terms, and those will be different in numeric terms but likely broadly similar in actual workload.

Could you clarify what you mean by 3 courses? Are these 3 hours in class per week? 4? 5? Are these for 10 weeks? 16? 32?

In addition to earthling's questions, could you also please let us know if any help for tutorials/homework-gradings/exam-gradings from the department (via grad students) is usually provided by the departments? Or everything is on the professors?

@earthling: I have edited in more detail on these points. Some of it falls within the variation between institutions, so I've tried not to be too specific about those points.


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Will working after bachelors reduce my chances of getting into a PhD program?
I am an 'overseas' student in a university, currently pursuing a bachelor's degree. Although I am really interested in signing up for graduate school, I am bonded to work for at least three years as soon as I get my bachelors degree. I am afraid that this might weaken my application and my chances of getting into a good university after I fulfill my bond obligations. Are my fears unfounded? Do professors really care about how long it has been since someone finished school when they review applications?

Lot's of people work before going back to grad school. It can even be an advantage. You'll be fine.

In some countries it's common to have required military service- I've seen lots of students from these countries apply to graduate school after their military service and it hasn't seemed to cause them any problems.

The more likely scenario is that your job/income/life will push you to forego the PhD program.

Related: Returning to academia after a year in industry and Getting into gradschool from a “real job” and Is it hard to start a PhD programme after leaving to work in industry?. And some of the other questions that are tagged both "industry" and "phd".

I'm an undergrad at a highly ranked institution for mathematics, and I know of at least three PhD students in the department who have worked for a number of years after a bachelors. One time one of them even participated in a panel for aspiring graduate applicants and provided advice for this scenario. Find one and talk to him/her!

As a professor, I often prefer students who have had a two or three years life experience after their undergraduate degree. These students tend to be more mature, more focused, and more successful in our program.

When I started my PhD the majority of my fellow students had spent time working before they started. Some of them had been in full time employment for years (I believe the most was 7 years). As someone who went straight from BSc to PhD I was definitely the exception and not the rule. It shouldn't be something to worry about.
My supervisor's take on the subject of how he chose candidates was: "Whoever seems right at the interview."
From my experience of interviews having relevant experience and showing a good work ethic is as important in academia as working for any other employer. Working outside of academia for a spell is no limitation and can in some case be a boon.
Passion for the subject area and proof of regular hard work will get you a very long way with most academics.

It won't count against you except in rare cases (maybe music performance or something?).  For the most part, having worked a little means you are more mature and possibly have some extra skills.  Those are good things.
In some fields it's a huge bonus.  If you want to go to business school, for example, having worked is a huge advantage regardless of whether you want an MBA or Ph.D.
The only hard thing about going back to school (this is my experience) is that it is hard to get used to being an impoverished and ill-respected student after having spent some time in the working world, where hopefully you were more respected and better paid.

Your fears are unfounded.
Instead of worrying, you should instead focus on growing and learning as much as you can in these three years.  Above all, learn about yourself -- what are you good at?  What do you care most about??  In what circumstances are you most productive and most alive??  If you can answer any of these question in this three-year period, then you will have used your time very productively.