text:
Ethical implications of using scraped e-mail addresses for survey
I have an interesting (in my mind) experiment in mind: it entails e-mailing hundreds or thousands of corresponding authors, asking them to voluntarily fill out a short survey about their work.
I would obtain the e-mail addresses by scraping manuscript data from Web of Science and send automated e-mails to them. I believe this is within scope of the terms of use:

For Research Projects you may use the API:
(a) to view, use, download
and print such data fields for individual academic use;
(b) to perform
specific research or numerical or statistical analyses on such data to
produce reports in support of scientific endeavors (provided for
abstracts you must have the relevant rights by law or from the
copyright owner for such use); [...]

I'm not quite sure if this would be ethical though. This kind of bulk e-mail resembles SPAM and, even though the academic value of the survey would likely be tangible to the recipients, it feels like it is crossing a line.
How would this kind of research likely be perceived?
Clarifications:

I will be approaching my organisation's research ethics contact as well, but I expect them to err on the side of caution.
I am not concerned about the technicalities of sending such mails (e.g., I would not use the university's email servers).
I am aware that this paradigm may introduce a selection bias; such is not what I am asking about here.
I am not pondering just mass e-mailing thousands of people. I would carefully select my audience and send them individualized mails with individualized, specific questions.

Various discussion, advice, answers, and funny jokes have been moved to chat; a few clarifications have been edited into the post. The conversation can continue in chat, but comments below this one should request clarification or suggest improvements to the question.

I think it would be perceived as very shady and extremely irritating by all the people you are spamming. People spam legally all the time and it doesn't make anyone feel good about it that it's legal.
Don't forget that when you do human subjects research you need ethical approval, so it isn't just the terms and conditions of these websites that matter but also the opinion of your institution's ethics board.
As far as methodological issues, the problem with low response rates in a survey is not just having a small N, but also that when your response rate is low the risk of bias becomes very high.

In particular, in this case your sample set is extremely biased along the line of "folks who like spam".

... or, those who have time to answer spam and are not representative of the population of published authors.

And since WOS aims to be a complete scientific database, not only would this be legally and ethically problematic, it's also a quick way to personally piss off literally every single member of the global scientific community.

You also run the risk of people deliberately filing bad responses to mess with you because they're annoyed you spammed them

Spam (noun): 1. irrelevant or unsolicited messages sent over the internet, typically
to a large number of users, for the purposes of advertising, phishing,
spreading malware, etc.

(source: Google & Oxford Languages)
What you would be doing is effectively advertisement of your survey to people who never gave their consent.
So yes, this is very much spamming.
And besides the ethical issues, there are a ton of serious legal issues. For one, I'm very sure Web of Science TOS explicitly forbids such a scraping for any purposes*, and especially survey/advertising purposes. For two, I'm pretty sure most legal systems, especially EU for example, would have a lot of legal issues with sending en-masse advertisements to emails whose owners never gave consent for this. EU data/privacy protection laws are especially stringent and you could find yourself in huge legal trouble.
So just don't do it.
There are accepted, morally and legally safe ways of conducting such surveys. Follow those. Spamming around like this, you will a) expose yourself to huge legal liability; b) will surely put your e-mail into every spam filter ever; c) obtain data with questionable methods, which will be a strict base of refusal for any reputable publisher; and last but nonetheless, d) piss off literally every single scientist on the world at once.

* Important distinction: analyzing the data is not the same as using the information in it.

Also, take the point of view of the opposite side: the receivers. I'm pretty sure you're not the first one to conduct a survey involving scientists. A 100k dataset of researcher email address would be very tempting for any such research. Would these 100k scientists be happy to get daily "not-spam" en-masse survey requests, like the one you want to send? And do they get it? Nope: there are definitely strict measures to prevent this from happening.

@academic_burner "will surely put your e-mail into every spam filter ever" Not only may it put your individual email address into spam lists, if you use your university address it may result in your institution being blocked, to the annoyance of its authorities.

@GrahamNye Even if your university isn't explicitly blocked, you could end up being perceived as "that school that spams people" and harm your entire institution's reputation.

IANAL, but I think this kind of use should actually be ok in EU under the "legitimate interest" GDPR clause.

@FedericoPoloni: "Legitimate interest" is far too frequently abused. There is no existing relation between the OP and the proposed audience, no expectation of this email being sent, no benefit to the receiver, and the necessity test also looks rather iffy.

also not a lawyer - but I'd argue it definitely isn't covered legally under legitimate interest - it almost certainly doesn't meet the requirements from the "three tests", and there's no consent. I think you could possibly get away with the research exemption, but that includes organizational safeguards for the data, and proof your research is legitimate. I'd argue you'd have to go through an ethics review for this, and show excellent data security

From the UK Information Commisioner "If they would not reasonably expect the processing ... their interests are likely to override your legitimate interests."

Apart from varying ethical issues (and human-subject issues: yes, consult your IRB...), from a statistical viewpoint your sample will be biased by self-selection (or not). Also, despite their attempt to universality, "Web of Science" is not the universal repository for all references...

The ethical and effective way to do work like this is to work with various journals (or whatever Web of Science is, if you need to work with them specifically) directly, so that the email can come from them.  It's never going to not be an unsolicited email, but if the email comes from the journal or organization, it will have a better chance of being opened, and can limit contacts to a reasonable number of times and or methods - for example, they could include a link to the survey in certain correspondence that comes already.

This is always a tight line to walk along and, as the majority of other answers have clearly stated, there are plenty of reasons why spam is bad. I get a lot of spam every day -- from penis enlargement pills (which actually are quite rare for me to read nowadays) to "please publish in this journal" or "speak at this conference" -- which are far more common. They don't usually get read and I never see them unless checking my spam folder.
I would like to briefly posit an example of this sort of research that I think was done well.
I was invited to fill in a survey by a group of social scientists (not my area at all!) by email. They highlighted how they were asking me to take part in a survey because I met specific criteria that they were looking for -- which they then outlined.
They also outlined the research proposal -- briefly, but effectively -- which was looking at differences in attitudes to publishing over the duration of an academic career, attitudes to rejection, and a distribution of outcomes. Some of these criteria were things like "you appear to be an early-career researcher because your first publication was within x years of the date we collected the data", and they stated briefly what areas the full survey would explore.
The email was fairly long, very detailed, and specifically mentioned that it was part of their ethics approval. I read it and, as an academic, felt like I understood the motivations for their work and therefore I contributed to it (and filled out their survey).
Note that:

All of your concerns about self-selection and selection biases are not ameliorated by this approach. In particular, it is difficult to distinguish those who read the email and did not participate from those who did not read it.

The authors of the previous study I took part in highlighted that they knew this was a problem, and I was invited as part of a stratified sampling approach.

At the end of the day, emails like that are still spamming people, but I personally was not offended by the time I finished reading the specific, personal reasons why I was a useful data-point. They wrote it to their audience.

The fact that the email itself was specifically reviewed as part of an IRB (or equivalent) gave me confidence in its authenticity and that it served a useful purpose.

Very good point. It made me realise I've left out this specific detail: what doesn't sit well with most people is they assume I would send out a generic research volunteer recruitment e-mail. This is not the case. The e-mail would have a direct reference to the recipient's work and would specifically refer to it. I have updated the question.

I'm not a full-throated supporter of this idea, and I do think "spam" is a pretty accurate statement of how many recipients would receive it, but I can't help but bristle at the many other harsh, erroneous claims that other answers have made.

You don't need to contact institutional review boards to send people email messages. Contra Bryan Krause's answer, you don't need to obtain institutional approval to send people an email message.

Corresponding authors willingly take an obligation to receive queries about their work.  That's the purpose of having corresponding authors.  The idea that well, corresponding with these authors is automatically some kind of ethical violation seems suspect to me.
If your survey or message obviously relates to the authors' work, it is less likely to be perceived as "spam".  I think this is a tall bar for any mass survey, but I don't think the idea is obviously absurd.

The terms of use seem to say this is OK. You want to use the contact information in the Web of Science data for individual academic use.  That's explicitly allowed, at least by the excerpt you listed in your question.  So in my mind, as long as you invidually are the one who writes the survey and distributes it (n.b. this may be its own technical challenge), it seems like you are explicitly in the clear.

None of this is to say that your idea is good or worthwhile. It will be perceived as spam by many recipients. It's probably a scientifically poor way to design a survey that will not result in particularly strong data. But it is not inappropriate to send corresponding authors email messages , you don't need institutional approval to send people emails, and the terms of use you found do say that "individual academic" "use" of the data is OK.

Corresponding with one or more individual authors about the actual content of their work in a relevant context is completely different from spamming a huge set of authors trying to do research on them as authors with no actual legitimate interest connected to the content of their work. You're either missing this or being rather disingenuous. If you think you're being clever, you're not. The folks who wrote the norms/laws around this stuff already thought of this and made it clear it's not okay.

The terms of use of the site explicitly forbid scraping though. The site and API are two very different things, and have different TOS, and when scraping a site, it is the site's TOS that matters.

If you are doing research, then, yes, you may well need an IRB review prior to sending out a message.  In fact, many IRBs will be interested in the methods you use to solicit subjects.  Research has real definition in this context.  For example, the intention to publish what you find may well turn this into research.

Query about my work - yes; generic solicitation to do work for some guy who scraped my address - no.

At least in Canada, your work would be explicitly considered Spam:  https://fightspam.gc.ca/eic/site/030.nsf/eng/home
(that's a government web page)
Note that that page includes the following:

The legal definition of spam also encompasses:
...
the harvesting of addresses (collecting and/or using email or other electronic addresses without permission)
...

Canada's anti-spam legislation includes very large fines.

How would this kind of research likely be perceived?

Negatively. If I were a recipient I'd be annoyed and refuse to participate - and would consider complaining about you to your advisor or university - depending on how annoying your email is.

I will be approaching my organisation's research ethics contact as well, but I expect them to err on the side of caution.

Hopefully, they don't like getting spam either, so they'll tell you not to do it.

I am not pondering just mass e-mailing thousands of people.

Don't mass-email people who have not expressly indicated they are interested in such emails.
This is not about the academic merit of your work, it's about abusing the possibility of mass-mailing. Though shalt not mass-mail except by authorization, or in life-and-death situations. Period. Just don't do it.

Well, in addition to the fine reasons already listed, WoS limits maximum requests per second to 5, and email addresses don't appear to be in the fields supplied.
It's an idea with issues to start, but if you really want to do it, buy an email list.

Are e-mail lists any better? What kind of e-mail list exists for sale where people are voluntarily on it?

@DKNguyen, at least from the point of view of not violating a ToS, yes, much better.  For getting a targeted list with minimum hassle, also yes.  From the spam perspective, not so much.

It's worse in more than one way from a spam perspective. Not only are you sending out spam, you're funding the operations of the people selling e-mail addresses for spam.


text:
Does it make sense to "pause" an academic career so that I can pursue financial independence and self-fund my research?
I graduated with a bachelor’s in the humanities last year. I would have preferred to continue studying, but I don’t have the money, and I have found very few opportunities for full funding where I live (in the EU). I’m originally from the States.
I work in IT, and given how the wages are at present, if I buckle down and exclusively focus on work, I could probably save up enough in 5-6 years that I could live completely off of conservative investments (index funds). I would work at a US company (where wages are high) and live in central Europe (where costs are low).
My question is: from an academic point of view, does it seem reasonable that the benefits of self-funding my research would outweigh the disadvantages of delaying my career by at least 5 years?
For the purposes of this question, please assume that my financial assumptions are realistic. I realize I will need to do my due diligence there.
More details / clarifications:

The plan would be to attend graduate school in Europe after achieving financial independence, and then self-fund independent research after that. By "self-fund," I mostly mean paying my living expenses; my field does not require expensive equipment, travel, etc.
My concern is that at 30, my motivation and ability to re-enter academia will be much less than it is now, both because I’ll be older and because I will have spent all of my youthful energy on non-academic work. Obviously, 30 is young, but still, I’ve been warned that motivation and capacity to learn really decreases from one’s 20s.
I think one advantage of this idea is independence. I am in the humanities and have a far-left persuasion. I've heard that junior faculty have to research what their seniors want to see, rather than what they’re interested in. I recognize the need to consult senior colleagues., but having to censor myself would defeat the purpose of doing research in the first place, for me.
It seems to me that academics have to waste time and give up autonomy in order to get grants. I could avoid all of this by self-funding.
It's unfortunate that my IT work (which requires study and effort) has no overlap with my research interests. So, I would have to put research completely on hold until saving enough money, and then would never use my IT knowledge again.

How much are they paying IT people now to be able to retire at 30??

@Azor Ahai Well, I live in Central Europe, where a frugal single life costs around 12 000 USD. I'm also a U.S. citizen. In the U.S., the starting pay for my job is 70 000 USD on average, maybe around 100 000 in California. So, it's not so much that it's a massive amount of money, but rather 4% of 300 000 USD is my cost of living, and that much can be saved in a matter of years.

You are planning on working for a US company while living in Europe?

@cag51 I would probably study somewhere in Central Europe, either in the Czech Republic or Germany. Maybe somewhere else in the EU. In Central Europe, English-language master's programs are either free or inexpensive. I haven't given to much thought as to what my ideal university would be, but Humboldt, Charles University and LMU come to mind, for philosophy, history and social epidemiology, respectively.

@AzorAhai Yes. Or moving to a richer country in the EU to work. Since COVID-19, remote opportunities have opened up more, it's looking like. It's a bit complicated legally, but not completely prohibitive.

Also, I recommend making an additional post to Money.SE for a reality check on the financial side. Our advice will necessarily be limited to your questions about the academic side, but it seems like your decision will be heavily influenced by your financial assumptions.

The life of an independent researcher without advanced degrees or collaborative contacts can be pretty bleak, unless you want to be like Darwin and just do it for fun.

I would recommend asking a question specifically about your assumptions related to researching “left” topics in the social sciences. In general, “hard-hitting” research with a social purpose is not intrinsically difficult to fund.

@Buffy A lot has changed since the "gentleman scientist" days...

Suppose you proceed as planned, but when you turn 40 you no longer want to continue - maybe you are bored with your research, or your investments have collapsed, or living expenses have increased unexpectedly, or you want to support someone else, or you just want a nicer house and more vacations.  Now what?  Your IT skills are ten years out of date, and with no experience in teaching or any aspect of academic work beyond your specific research, you will not be well qualified for an academic job.

To me, your plan with retiring sounds unrealistic. Have you taken all into account (inflation, catstraophe, accident, sick parents, falling in love)? Have you talked over your plan with someone who understands finances better than you?

@user111388 I'm basing the plan on the 4% yearly withdrawal rate rule accepted in the "financial independence / retire early" communities online, which accounts for inflation. Definitely, having a child would complicate things. On the financial side, I would do more rigorous financial planning with an advisor or someone else, if I go down this path. The main roadblock for me, though, is whether it's sensible to pause an academic career until 30.

The discussion about on-topicness has been moved to chat; please use the chat for any further discussion. Comments after this one should seek to improve the question or request clarification only.

It seems implausible that your plan can work: You can't hope to draw more than 5% off an investment per year, so even a moderate income of $50k (or equivalent in your country) will require you to accumulate about a million dollars. It seems improbable that you will be able to sock away this much money in 5-6 years, post-taxes, unless you have a pre-tax salary on the order of half a million dollars.
So what that means for your current situation is then that you'll have to save for far more than just 5-6 years -- and that you'll miss some of the best years of your life where you can establish a career, a family. In other words, I think that the premise in the title of your question is flawed and that you'll miss out on some of the best parts of your life.
(As a side note: In your 30s, you probably will want to have a partner and family at some point. It's conceivable that you could live of less than $50k per year if you're living by yourself frugally. But you can't do that if you have a family and children: They have needs that may exceed your own, and what's acceptable as a living abode for you may no longer be for your family.)

My COL is 12 000 USD. 4% of 300 000 USD is 12 000 USD . With an income of 70 000 USD, which is entry-level in my field, I think I could realistically save at least 45 000 per year, which would be ~7 years. And I think that estimate is somewhat conservative. But I could be wrong.
If I have a family, it could complicate things. I guess the missing-out-on-life part is the main issue.

@JD_ Your calculation seems to be based on getting that salary without moving to the US, which seems implausible. Also, remember that 70k is before taxes.

The point I'm trying to make is that when you meet that partner of your dreams, is he/she willing to live in a studio apartment and eat ramen every day? Besides that, as @TobiasKildetoft mentions, saving $45k per year requires you to have an income of $45k to save + $12k to live off + taxes + health insurance. If you're single, you don't have a lot of deductions, so you're already not far from $100k even in low-tax US. If you're in Europe where taxes are generally substantially higher, you're quite easily beyond that.

I would share my perspective, though I am not from humanities but from CS.
Though you have multiple questions, the answer to all of them is actually fundamentally common.
But before going into that, I do not know what index funds are and earning enough in IT in 5 years so that after proper investment, you can retire is an assumption, which with high probability is going to fail. So first you need to carefully rethink that. I do not believe there is any investment without risk and experts advise investments should be diversified. Anyways, that is not a topic I know much of.
To all your questions, at the crux, the answer is you need to match with the right supervisor and find the right topic of research. You seek autonomy and you could get that if you want, which comes with caveats. A PhD requires multiple kinds of skills and you should ensure that you have those skills to complete your work -- something which you will not learn if you work with someone who gives you a lot of autonomy.
You should do a PhD if you feel the need for research as you are excited by an area of study. You say you can wait for 5 years to do that. That raises the question, are you driven enough right now? If so, you should already commence your research while working.  Five years is a long time. If you are OK in not doing that for 5 years, you probably should never do it. Moreover, starting you research now could get you a funded PhD position. Though, I do not know how much fieldwork is required in your area as I have little idea about research in humanities. I am a CS guy and can do my research just with a good computer at home.
Other political factors and age are not something you should worry about. There are hundreds of studies and hundreds of opinions. We do not fully understand how our body and mind work. So why worry about something which comes from half-knowledge. You like something, you do it. If you are doing something which requires risk-taking and commitment, you need to ponder if you like it that much. There are hundreds of counter-examples for every study you will go through -- e.g. people finishing PhD in their 40s, 50s and so on.
So, imho, abandon this line of thought. The fundamental question is, are you driven by a research area and the research questions? Dig deeper and identify what motivates you. Only after finding an answer to that should one look for other things like money and age. And then should one consider which supervisor(s) and university you should make your place of research.
Best of luck!

It's possible - I know people who did similar things, and knowing that one is on a secure footing financially before going into a poorly-paid academic position is a great reassurance.
However, make sure you can actually bank $50k a year. There could be all sorts of unexpected expense, for example, taxes (this is probably the biggest one), partner/children, house/car, and so on.
A few more things worth pointing out:

Your expenses might be different once you're in graduate school - you might have to relocate away from central Europe, for example.
If you decide to go for graduate studies, there's a good chance you don't need to self-fund. After all, many programs (especially those in the US) offer their graduate students stipends. Your studies are effectively free in that case, and the $300k you save is simply a backup plan in case you drop out, funding expires, etc.
Nothing stops you from drawing down the principal on the $300k. That's a substantial amount of money, much more than you might need as a safety net.
Note that being able to self-fund might not be an advantage in graduate admissions.

The financial plan is possible
If you have not already done it, find some related blogs or communities online. "Early retirement extreme" by Jacob Lund Fisker was one of the early ones and the book is still excellent, but generally searching about financial independence and how to achieve it should give plenty of results. Other website are more appropriate for asking for details about this.
It might not be easy, but it is possible. Most people live a very wasteful life. You need not to.
If you want to do a PhD, try to do it
Apply to any funded study programmes you find and grants. I guess getting the master's degree might be the difficult part; PhD students are employed in a number of European countries and therefor paid. Contact possible advisors.
But if not, go get a job
You can also apply to the IT jobs. If you can't get the academic position you want, continue applying while working and saving. Maybe you can do something on your free time to improve your changes of being accepted? Courses via open university studies, some research. Or maybe you can find an IT job that teaches you skills that would be useful in research and that many others do not have.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
I've collected years of data using a defective piece of equipment. How to salvage my thesis and graduate?
I'm writing my thesis for an Engineering PhD. Our department has a tool for measuring trace metals (an ICP-OES) that I was supposed to use to collect my data.
Unfortunately this equipment proved to be unreliable, and at the time I did not know whether it was my experiment/hypothesis or the equipment that was at fault. I raised concerns about the equipment for years, but everyone brushed me off. It turns out that the equipment was defective after all.
I was awarded extra funding so that I could get samples analysed externally. These results were exactly what I had expected all along. My concern is that my thesis now seems pretty insignificant. If the equipment had worked from the beginning, I would have pursued several additional lines of inquiry.
At this point, there is no time/money to do more work; my advisor wants me to finish up. So: how should I address the rather modest scope of my research when writing and defending my thesis?

Are you the only one using the "faulty" equipment in your department? If not, anyone else had the same problem?

Hi Scaaahu. It was used by many people, and I was the only one to report a problem. For this reason I was dismissed for years until the technical team finally investigated and saw that all data collected over the time period was affected; I was the only one to notice that it was unreliable. So when I repeated my analysis and sent it externally, my results came back as expected.

Your advisor and/or committee are the best people to ask.

Maybe add a section on the consequences for research of trusting measuring equipment without regular checks?

@Patricia Shanahan thank you, yes I'm compiling a short chapter on method development, it will contain some of the data that determined that the equipment wasn't working correctly, along with preliminary results and detailing the checks required to ensure that the equipment is analysing samples consistently.

@Nate Eldredge my supervisory team are very hands off, I get on really well with them but they do let me get on with things myself! The Covid situation doesn't help as all three of us are stuck in different time zones at the moment and they're having to adapt all of their teaching materials for remote learning. I know they they will help when they can, but logistics of organising meetings are tricky at the moment, they have loads to think about while I only have my thesis. I just wondered whether others have had similar experiences while I wait for supervisor advice.

@ Roland, fingers crossed, I have a meeting with them later day. They always seem far more positive than myself!

I'm afraid there's no magic bullet here; all you can do is proceed as transparently and reasonably as possible.
First, present clearly the proof that the machine was broken. After years of debate about whether the machine was broken, your committee has probably stopped following the interminable discussion. So, you should explain very clearly and unambiguously that the debate is over and the machine really was broken.
After establishing that, I think the main question you should be prepared to address is: why did it take you years to notice that the equipment was broken? Naively, it seems like you should have done calibration runs in the first few days and identified/fixed the problem right at the beginning. Clearly that didn't happen here, so you should proactively and clearly explain why not. Hopefully there is a good technical reason (e.g., there is no way to calibrate this equipment) rather than just a mistake on your part.
Third, consider whether there is scientific value in the procedure you eventually followed to diagnose the faulty equipment. If identifying the problem was not trivial, it follows logically that your successful diagnosis is a significant step. You want to find the right balance: don't inflate your achievement or gloss over any mistakes, but at the same time, don't sell yourself short.
Finally, you should definitely discuss this with your committee in advance. If your professor wants you to graduate, you will probably pass your defense. Still, your defense is not good to surprise anyone. Since you have firm time/budget constraints, any potential issues or objections should be identified as early as possible.

I am upvoting and would upvote another dozen times, if it was possible, because of your second paragraph! As an analytical chemist, I am almost speechless at how the instrument did not get calibrated for years on end. Apparently, not even spot checked with a secondary standard of some sort. This is like the horror of the old days, when an instrument was installed by a field service engineer, a calibration was run, plotted, taped to the wall over the instrument and then used year after year!

Great answer! thank you for all of your help. My supervisory team and whole research group know about the issues, and how for years I was trying to demonstrate to the powers at be that the equipment was not working as intended. That'll be my answer when asked what I'd do differently if I had my time again; run calibrations and known samples at the very start to ensure I definitively know that my analytical equipment is working, and to ensure that I knew how to operate it correctly. That's my big regret looking back.

@user18483 Best of success going forward! Also, as a three time grad program director in my department, my prognosis is that everything will work out fine: the most  important thing, by far, is having your advisor actively on your side.

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


text:
In the EU, can I start an R&D company and apply for research grants?
I am from an EU country and hold a PhD degree in structural mechanics. I have two questions:

Is it possible to start a company dedicated to R&D only and apply for research grants for my own projects and ideas? I would be the one hiring research staff and I would be supervising their work.

Does anyone know any funding organization, body or foundation that is able to fund privately-held companies?

In the US, this is quite possible via SBIR and related programs.  I don't know if EU countries have an equivalent, however.

Sorry, but this isn't about academia, so off-topic.

Hi! Thank you for your reply. The outcomes of my research would all be industrial products. Of course, publications can be part of the projects, but they are not a priority. My field is Structural Mechanics (branch of Mechanical Engineering)

@Buffy Grant-funded R&D work at a company certainly falls within the greater scope of this site: "... anyone in or interested in research-related or research-adjacent fields."

@jakebeal. The pharma industry does that. Are they in scope?

@Buffy I'd say that if you're talking about the research, grant-writing, and publications aspects, absolutely --- there's a massive commonality between industry and university activities there.  If you're talking about the manufacture, distribution, and marketing aspects, then no.  But academia involves much besides universities, and this site has long recognized that fact (see, for example: https://academia.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/60/expand-scope-of-site-to-include-academics-searching-for-info-on-industry-jobs)

If your priority is to deliver industrial products, not papers, there are specific grants to do so (sorry, not familiar with the specific EU schemes). However, in most countries grants themselves are not enough to cover salary, office etc.

You can start an R&D-only company in many countries (including EU countries), but, such a company will surely be doomed, since there's no revenue.

Doomed unless it builds a portfolio of patents that becomes quite valuable.

@RodrigodeAzevedo Then it isn't R&D-only. Admittedly the term isn't defined, but I took it to mean not commercialising outputs.

A significant part of the EU's research framework program (current Horizon 2020) funding is for industrial and technology research, so companies (or consortia which also contain companies) are eligible for funding.  However, the idea here would be to ultimately aim for developing a product - thus, a pure R&D company like what you mention might not be the right target.  (Of course, you can always aim for having a company whose product is intellectual property.)

Hi! Thank you very much for your answer. Could you please send me the link to the documents of the EU research framework program that you are referring to? I would like to read it. Your reply was very helpful. thank you once again!

https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en

Note that "am I eligible to apply for a grant" and "am I likely to be awarded a grant" are two very different questions. A newly-formed company with no track record of success seems unlikely to be competitive for funding.

@avid Sure, but this was not a question, and should not come as a suprise.

@user151413 If your answer can't be applied, surely it doesn't meaningfully answer the question? (That said, my answer focused on practicalities and was deleted by a mod.)

@user2768 There was no mention of "how high are the chances if it is a newly founded company" in the question.  --  Moreover, it is not uncommon that newly founded start-ups are part of EU project consortia, so there is no reason why a newly founded company should have no chances if they have competent staff and a strong proposal.

@user2768 Also, answers on SE should be generally applicable answers which are helpful to others, and not restricted to solely apply to the specific case of the OP.

When asking a question there's a general expectation that answers are applicable. @user151413 You've asserted yours is unlikely to be applicable, seemingly falling into the category of not being a useful answer. Perhaps you can edit to clarify when your answer is relevant?

@user2768 I think it is relevant. As stated above, if you have a start-up with a convincing concept, I don't see why the EU FP wouldn't fund you.  On the contrary, the point of this funding is precisely to fund research which is not funded otherwise (as it could done e.g. in a big, established company).

-1 @user151413 In response to, "A newly-formed company with no track record of success seems unlikely to be competitive for funding," you acknowledged, "Sure, but this was not a question, and should not come as a suprise." Your above comment seemingly contradicts that and doesn't offer guidance, so a -1 from me: Your answer doesn't seem applicable.

@user2768 Are you upset because your answer got deleted?

@user151413 Those that downvote out of spite should disconnect from the Internet; I downvoted because your answer is not useful: You yourself acknowledged it cannot help the OP. (I see no value in commenting further.)

@user2768 I didn't acknowledge that. This is only your reading.


text:
Leaving Ph.D due to stipend
I am a direct PhD student in Turkey, currently in my third year (of five). Because of the pandemic and the associated sky rocketed inflation in country, I am unable to manage my life with the stipend I get from my PhD. My work is experimental, so going part-time is not really an option. Similarly, transferring to another institution in my country would probably not solve my stipend problem. I asked my supervisor about more funding 1.5 months ago, and he said something would look into it, but no good news yet.
I want to quit PhD and graduate as a Masters student while applying for a PhD position at some place better in terms of stipend. I would need my supervisor's letter of recommendation to secure a new position, so I would need to discuss this with my supervisor before I can begin applying. I am the only one in my group who is facing this decision since the other students are only a year away from graduation (rather than two).
However, I fear that maybe I am doing something wrong and I just need to finish the remaining 2 years time and just obtain my PhD. Is it normal to change universities due to funding issues?

Yes, it happens. I did the same, submitted what would have been my PhD thesis as a Master's thesis, was admitted to another PhD program with a better stipend (albeit more expensive city) and finished. I had no problems gettting postdocs (2) and I'm now a tenured full professor. In my view, switching universities because of funding issues is a much more 'cleaner' way/reason for switching than issues with advisors, labmates, etc. The latter could label you as a problematic student, while (again, in my opinion) funding issues are universal and everybody can understand them.
About your advisor, I can only tell you about my experience. My old advisor was not happy at all with the situation, but also did nothing to help with funding in a meaningful way. I thought he would give me a bad letter of reference, but I guess he must have written a good letter, or that the letters from the other committee members outweighed his letter. I'll never know, but I did get admitted to the other program, which was at a much better university.


text:
How much time to hear back after a UK academic interview?
From your experience, how soon did you hear back from an academic interview in the UK? The Department with which I had an interview for a lecturer role said that they needed to appoint someone asap but it has been three days I haven't heard back so I just wanted to hear about others' experiences.
Update: I have heard back from the department and sadly I wasn't successful. Thanks all for your helpful comments.

Likely they are interviewing a few people. Three days seems short.

@Buffy > Likely they are interviewing a few people. --- no, this is unlikely. In the UK, the final interviews for all candidates are normally scheduled in one day or two consecutive days.

One time, 1 day. Another time, 2 months that ended up being 9 months. It kinda depends. I'd say a week wait until you send them an email is reasonable.

You wrote lecturer role. Is this a permanent position of the academic rank lecturer or some temporary teaching contract? In any case you can always email your academic contact and ask for a timeline.

@user2705196, I believe they meant  Lecturer Role = Assistant Professor in the UK.

In the UK, the HR Departments at most (all?) Universities are notoriously slow. They would want to see all the paperwork post-interview before they approve the new hire, and they do take their time for it.
From my personal experience in the UK:

1 time the Chair of the hiring committee contacted me directly and informally in 2-3 days after the interview. The decision was not yet confirmed by the HRs, and the Chair contacted me on their own risk because they knew time was of the essence for me (due to my visa situation) and they cared.
2 times I received a call after a week or two. I was the first candidate and the decision was pre-approved by HRs but they still wanted Chairs to contact me informally first to make sure I am going to accept before they would issue me a formal offer (if not, why bother?)
10+ times I was not the first candidate. The rejection letter came by email sometimes a month, sometimes 6 months after the interview.
In a few very extreme cases, I had to chase the Department for feedback and reimbursement of my travel fees 6+ months after the interview. It was really a shame.

To summarise - in the UK, the academic hiring process for postdocs and lecturers is slow, disorganised, formalistic,  and not really friendly towards the candidate. Waiting 3+ days for the response after the interview is very common.
I have no experience and no idea how things stand for the Professors. YMMV

Thank you so much for sharing your experience! Their teaching starts next week so I feel like it's unlikely that I get the job.

@Maisie The teaching assignments would have been decided months ago. So even if you did get the job it's unlikely you would be teaching this semester. I don't think you can draw any conclusions from this.

@atom44 It is not unusual to reserve a module or two for the new hire in the Department's timetable, particularly if the new post was justified by the demand in teaching.

@atom44 do you think it’s worth contacting HR to ask about the result? I’m under time pressure and need to know…

@Maisie If you need to know for a genuine time-sensitive reason, I would email your point of contact and explain the situation; at the very least they should be able to give you more clarity as to their expected timetable.

@DmitrySavostyanov, they may do this. But if this was the case I would hope they would interview people more than a week before the beginning of the semester! For example, hiring over the summer so they have time to prepare. But there could be semester 2 teaching already planned for the new hire.

@Maisie, I wouldn't recommend contacting HR. In fact, I don't believe that HR has relevance to your situation. The academic committee (possibly through the head of department secretary) is the one who'd contact you about your interview. These are you contact points. HR is still not even involved, because my estimation you have not yet been appointment or recommended. Even if recommended to be appointed you'd first here from the head of department, not HR.

My estimation is somewhat different from Dmitry's answer.
In my opinion, the committee has selected another candidate, and is now waiting for his/her acceptance. As long as the candidate doesn't accept you are still in a waiting list, and have the chance to be contacted later (though this is unlikely in most cases).
Comment: in the UK, unlike the US, interviews are conducted in one or two days, to all the candidates at once.
Comment 2: In some rare cases interviews can be conducted like the US, and in this case you shouldn't be waiting for an answer soon.


text:
Attending grad school in US or Canada with a dependent spouse
I am finishing up my undergraduate degree in mathematics in my home country and expect to apply for PhD studies in statistics in the US (I am also willing to consider Canadian options but more on this later). My wife will also have finished her bachelor's degree in statistics by then and we intend to travel together. It seems to me that we have the following options:

Spouse does not work or study in the US.

In this case, I am aware that we would have to subsist on my PhD stipend since F-2 visa holders (my wife) are not offered employment. I am unsure whether this could be sustained for an indefinite amount of time (we will get some financial support from our families at home though).

Spouse works in the US right away.

This would be ideal but I do not know whether US employers would be willing to sponsor a work visa for someone who has a bachelor's degree from a relatively unknown university from outside the US. She will have very good grades though and some professional experience in auditing.

Spouse pursues a MSc program (in statistics or a related field) with the intention of finding work immediately afterwards.

In this case, we thought of two issues. One is that the MSc would have to be at my own university or somewhere preferably in the same city. Would it be possible for such an arrangement to be made after we arrive in the US and how could funding be secured? The other is related to 2) in the sense of whether she could land a job a short time after her US MSc.

Spouse pursues a PhD program (in statistics or a related field).

In this case, financial concerns would be minimal since we both would get independent stipends. However, she does not have a genuine academic interest in doing a PhD and would be mainly doing it to chip in with the finances. Another concern is whether we would have time to take care of a baby as PhD students (we are not currently expecting a child, but this could happen before we finish grad school).
As for options outside the US, I am aware that Canada provides an open work permit for international student spouses but have no information on how easy it would be for a foreign graduate to actually land a job in preferably a tech company.
Is this list comprehensive? We would be very grateful for any advice you could provide on any of the above. Personal anecdotes would also be most welcome since they are absent in most generic information pages on this topic. On a more positive note, my wife is considerate and super supportive so we are both willing to bear with any tough times for a better future :)
UPDATE: Thank you for all your suggestions! Would love to hear from an international student who has been in similar circumstances. Any advice on the above career prospects from a Canadian perspective would be welcome too

With #2, there might be a possibility of unofficial work, say in the home country or in the US. I am thinking here about tutoring, although I have also seen a spouse work remotely in a more highly skilled job in the home country — although I am not sure of the legalities.

@Dawn Thanks for the suggestion. A friend of mine's spouse works remotely for her job in her home country while in the US. This is certainly within legal bounds in my home country and will be an option we look into.

Note that we do not have "PMs"; just answers, comments, and chat.

@Dawn: I'm fairly certain that paid tutoring in the U.S. would put the spouse into violation of her F-2 status. I'm not saying that it doesn't happen, but F-2 means "you're allowed to be here; that's all."

In my current experience, the (median) PhD stipends in the US would certainly make it challenging for you to support yourself, your spouse and your baby without outside financial help.
Of course this varies with the cost-of-living in the area you intend to reside in, but usually the programs will anyway adjust stipend amounts accordingly. I would recommend getting this information — cost-of-living and the expected stipend amounts — as you are beginning to apply to various programs.
Now, it appears that your most ideal situation would be #2, but aside from that, I think #3 and #4 are your next most plausible options.
In fact, there may be a way to combine the two. It is not entirely uncommon for students to enroll in a PhD program and drop-out after receiving a Master's degree, people do this for a variety of reasons. The ethics of this are debatable, since in your particular instance, the intention is known in advance; nevertheless, I would try to see it as an opportunity — if your spouse ends up enjoying being in the academia, she has the option of staying. Since PhD programs are funded, this may be a good option. In this case, your spouse would also need to check if the programs she applies to have the option of getting a Master's "along the way". Note that some may charge a fee for doing this. This is likely to pose some challenges to her visa status later, but being a graduate degree holder in the US would certainly give her a better shot at landing a job locally; and with a degree in hand, she would still be eligible for OPT + STEM extension.
It is not my intention to suggest that your spouse misrepresent her academic interests. Transparency is important in the academia, and if she can genuinely not see herself possibly working towards a PhD, then I would strongly advise against applying to a PhD program. In that case (again, barring #2), perhaps option #3 with some combination of financial-aid, loans and scholarships is the better choice. There are several one-year programs in Statistics and Statistics-adjacent areas that are worth considering. Here again, I believe she has the option of an OPT + STEM extension after graduating.
I should add that it is not certain that you will both be accepted into the same program. Few things are ever certain. You have been presented with a tricky situation, hopefully it works out favourably. Wishing your family the best!

You mention "loans" and financial aid for masters programs. Are loans generally available for students from outside the US? Also, since I will be applying for a PhD program in statistics, would it be possible to make an arrangement with the professor/coordinator of the corresponding masters program to accept a spouse as a candidate? I understand that this seems informal/irregular but heard from forums, etc. that such arrangements are not uncommon if the slots of a program are not filled. Again, I have no reliable information on this. Thanks for your wishes!

As you may be aware that an essential part of the F1 visa process is to provide a proof of funds to your graduate program -- in which you list your dependents, and list sources of your funding up to the required amount -- it is only after evaluating this that they will issue an I-20. All of this happens only after you have accepted the offer, of course. So in any event, you will need to have your financial situation figured out by then. Now [...]

[...] when I say loans, I mean both informal loans from family member(s) and bank loans such as an education loan. As far as I know, education loans also cover your cost-of-living expenses. With that said, taking on debt is a major financial (and indeed, life-) decision, and a one that only you and your spouse can make.
Unfortunately, I can not answer your second question with any certainty. How and if one should approach such a subject with a potential research advisor is, perhaps, a separate question entirely.

@Krupiy: Education loans for international students are, in most cases, de facto impossible. With a few exceptions, they require a resident cosigner; so if you don't happen to have a U.S. uncle willing to guarantee your loan, you're unfortunately out of luck. The exceptions are programs at highly ranked schools which are considered to have high income potential; typically Law Schools and Business Schools. My information is dated, but I think this hasn't changed much.

It is still possible to obtain an education loan in one's home country to fund their studies abroad. Many have done it before.

If I understand your post correctly your family has a small baby or is expecting one soon, congratulations. Unfortunately this means option one is the only feasible one for the near future. Taking care of a newborn is not compatible with both parents having full time jobs and external child care in the US is expensive. You would both need a well paying job to be financially better off compared to one of you staying at home and a PhD stipend is not well paying and your wife is highly unlikely to get such a job.
If you have an offer at a fairly high ranking university money is going to be quite tight but should be managable. Note that the cost of living in the greater Boston, NY and San Francisco Bay area is very high, so ideally you would want a university not in one of these three places. Financial support from your home country will be very welcome.
Otherwise I'm sorry to say but it seems to me the combination of a) moving to a new country b) studying for degree and c) taking care of a newborn all at the same time does not seem feasible to me with any consideration of work-life-balance and general happyness for all three involved.

Might I suggest you expand this to include that all costs in the US are often much more than new folks expect, as well as financial support much less.  Food, transportation, housing, and the US health system are very expensive, the last one shockingly so.  Financial support from the university often does not cover all your living expenses, even for one person, and it is vital to ask exactly what it includes.  In addition to "tuition", US universities have "fees" as well as health insurance costs which can be thousands of dollars and often not paid for you.

In the past, many universities provided inexpensive housing for families and also inexpensive health insurance, making it attractive for foreign students who could get good stipends in a highly funded field of study.  But today cheap insurance is very hard to find and inexpensive university housing also fading.

Thanks for the advice. I apologize for any misunderstanding caused by the wording of my question; we are not expecting a baby yet. I included the possibility of having a baby in grad school since we would both be relatively old by the time grad studies finish.

@Krupiy 25 isn't too old to have a baby. 30 still isn't, unless you're planning on having 3+ eventually. Some people push it all the way to 35-40, although it is far from ideal. It is a very valid thing to consider of course, but the whole situation about the child support is very different depending on whether you (and/or your spouse) are still studying, have job security, savings etc. And yes, everything to do with health is extremely expensive in the US, part of the motivation about higher salaries compared to say Canada might not apply to your situation unless you're on the track to 100k+.

This is a US only response due to the differences in visa requirements.
Of the four, the last is probably best if you can both get accepted and either or, preferably, both can get a Teaching Assistantship. The same university is probably best, though there are places in the US with a lot of nearby universities and some (NYC) have good public transportation. But housing in such places is expensive. And, some enthusiasm for the program is necessary to achieve both success and satisfaction.
Note, however, that you are unlikely to get a "stipend" (scholarship), but rather a teaching assistantship which comes with a modest income and no tuition charges. Some places deal with medical insurance as well. And, there are duties attached in assisting in a course, usually undergraduate.
The third is probably financial infeasible unless you are already wealthy, as masters level students pay tuition (could be very high) and don't get funding. Switching to a work visa later will also be an issue.
Most people do the first option and live frugally on a teaching assistantship. I'd think that the visa issue would be minimal. Doctoral students with a TA don't, normally, pay tuition, which is otherwise expensive.
The second option might also be infeasible for reasons of visa. Not necessarily impossible, but it requires a sponsoring employer IIRC and you will need to worry about co-location and transportation issues.
I'm going to guess that TAs in math departments are readily available and somewhat less so in statistics. So, a combined department might be the best option.
You will need advice from someone else about Canada, though.

If you aren't yet expecting a baby, it might be wise to wait. Dealing with a newborn can be pretty intense. Even the first two years require a lot of care and attention. If one parent can dedicate themself to childcare it can work out (my history), but very hard otherwise. And, if you are in the same program, then you will probably be taking some of the same courses at the same time. That might even be true if one was in a masters program and the other in a doctoral program.

I was under the impression that no US grad program (in stat or math) would accept a student if there wasn't a TA/RA position to offer them. You mention that switching to a work visa would be an issue after a masters. Would this be different if she pursued a PhD instead?

There are a few (very) students who pay their own way and don't have a TA/RA. But it is very expensive to do so. Some might not be eligible for some reason (a 14 year old, say - yes, it happens). Others might be very wealthy. The work visa issue is independent of the degree. There is nothing automatic about getting a work visa even if you hold a US degree. It is an issue, but not necessarily disqualifying.

Pursuing a Master degree causes an extra financial burden regarding tuition fees if your spouse does not get a scholarship. If they do get a scholarship, however, finding a job after graduation might be easier than without a degree from a US institution.
I would strongly advice against your spouse pursuing a PhD for 2 reasons: 1) if you are not completely passionate about the idea of doing a PhD, gradschool will be extremely tough and your chances of succeeding will be significantly low. 2) you would be taking away a spot in gradschool from someone who might be more passionate about this career path.
There is, however, another route you can take if your institution supports it, which is that of going for a J1 VISA instead of F1. With a J1 VISA, your spouse will get a J2. On a J2 VISA you can actually apply for a work permit. However, this process can take long and it does not guarantee that your spouse will actually find a job (in their field). Another downside is that there is a 5 year limit on your J1 VISA, meaning you will need to graduate within that time period.
In short, I would take the following approach: while you finish up your gradschool application, let your spouse apply directly for jobs in the US, and ask whether the company wants to sponsor her a VISA. If so, great! Your problem seems to be solved.
If that does not work, your spouse can go for a Master degree, provided she is interested in that and will get a scholarship to cover the costs. After graduation, finding a job should be easier.
If none of those options work, ask your institution whether you can go for a J1 VISA instead of a F1, but then commit to finishing your degree within 5 years.
In general, I would advice against raising a child in gradschool.
Best of luck to you and your family!

Scholarships are very rare for graduate study in the US and funding seldom available at the masters level. Probably worse for international students unless the funding is from the home country in some way. There are too many students and too few funds.

Very true, not to mention how competitive they are. But, OP might want to look at scholarships from their homecountry. I know that for example in Europe, many countries provide full scholarships for pursuing a degree abroad (though, again, competition will be high).

Thank you for the succinct advice!

It's extremely difficult for someone with only a bachelor's degree to apply for a work visa in the US.  Normally a graduate degree is required.

@BrianBorchers Yes. However, the J2 VISA is just a dependent VISA of the J1, and through the J2 you can apply for a work permit, which has lesser requirements than a work VISA :) The permit is called Employment Authorization Document, or EAD for short. This should not be meant for financially supporting the J1 VISA holder though.


text:
When and how should I choose universities which will get my exam scores?
I'm going to apply for a graduate programs (PhD) that require TOEFL, GRE General and GRE Subject tests. Since deadlines for most programs in USA or Europe are somewhere in December-January and two available test dates for Subject test in my location are September and October, I thought that I will be able to choose schools where I will apply after passing exams. But a couple of days ago I realised that it is necessary to match 4 target schools as a part of registration process for TOEFL or GRE.
My questions are:

Will I be able to change universities after registration for TOEFL and GRE? Are there any deadlines?
How and when can I match additional universities if I want to apply more than four places?

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because the question can best be answered by ETS, the source of both exams.

Yes, you need to choose 4 universities at the test. Don't worry, you can still choose other universities to get your score with fees (universities other than the chosen 4). You can choose the additional universities from your account on GRE or TEOFL websites (after the test). The score will arrive at the additional university  after 4 weeks of choosing them on website (maybe 6 weeks I am not sure).
You can ask about the details of the fees on gre or TOEFL page on facebook. they are very helpful.
Best of luck

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
Should I provide TOEFL/IELTS results for a PhD admission?
So I'm a citizen of non-English speaking country, but my master's program in STEM field is fully conducted in English. Should I provide TOEFL/IELTS results when applying for a PhD program in USA or Europe? I accept that it may vary and depend on a university and country, but what should I expect in common?

What country was your masters in? Specifically, was it an English-speaking country?

@StellaBiderman, my masters is in Russia. If it is important I may even give a link to it: https://www.hse.ru/en/ma/math/

It is common for a degree from an English-speaking country to exempt you from taking the TOEFL. However, it is much rarer for an English masters in a non-English speaking country to. In the US, the general rule is that they want the degree to be from an English speaking country, although exceptions can be made. It's best to consult the admissions departments of the particular schools you are interested in.
To quote a few websites:
Princeton (emphasis original):

The ONLY exemption for this requirement is if your native language is not English, but you earned (or will have earned before enrollment) your bachelor's degree or a Ph.D. in its entirety in the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, or Anglophone Canada.

Harvard:

A strong knowledge of English is essential for successful study at Harvard, including the ability to understand and express thoughts quickly and clearly. Although you are not required to take the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or other proficiency exams, you may submit your scores if you have done so.

MIT

Students who have received instruction in English in their primary and secondary schools and students who have been in the United States for four years or longer and have received a degree from an American institution may be eligible for a waiver of the English proficiency exam requirement by sending a written request to the department or program to which they are applying.

Berkeley:

To qualify for a TOEFL exemption you must:

Have a basic degree from a recognized institution in a country where the official language is English.
Have completed a basic or advanced degree at an institution, in the United States or abroad, where the language of instruction is English and the institution is accredited by one of the United States’ regional accrediting* agencies. (United States universities only)
Have completed at least one year of full-time academic course work with a grade B or better at a regionally accredited* institution within the United States.

UChicago (emphasis added):

The English language requirement may be waived if the applicant is a native of or studied in full-time status for at least one academic year within the last five years in the U.S., the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand or English medium universities in Canada or South Africa. Students who studied in English in other countries, for example, India, Pakistan, the Philippines, Hong Kong, Singapore, etc., are not exempt from the English language requirement.

Oxford:

... been educated full-time in the medium of the English language throughout the two most recent years before the 15 October application deadline, and who remain in full-time education conducted in the English language until the end of the school year in their home country.

Cambridge:

If you don't have one of these formal qualifications but are currently being taught in English, please contact one of the College admissions offices for advice.

King's College of London:

Nationals of the following [all English-speaking] countries, or applicants who have successfully completed an undergraduate degree (of at least three years duration), a postgraduate taught degree (of at least one year) or a PhD in one of the following countries are not required to complete an additional English language test:

In the UK, you need to provide IELTS results as an evidence of your knowledge of English in order to make a successful Tier 4 visa application. So, even if a University admits you on their PhD program based on your MSc taught in English, the Home Office will still need IELTS results to issue you a visa.

If it is not clear from the advert whether there is an a TOEFL/IELTS requirement, they are unlikely to reject your application for failing to include it - at worst, I expect they would ask for it separately or make an offer conditional upon proof of a certain standard (We have an IELTS requirement and this is what we would do).
Then again, if you already have certification and you believe it accurately reflects your language ability, I don't see any harm in including it as part of your CV.

It is pretty common in academic CVs to include spoken/written languages with a vague notion of level (bilingual / fluent / professional competence / notions /...) , you can make that notion less vague by mentioning your TOEFL/IELTS and scores.

@Kerkyra oh, I agree. The only risk from including it is if you think your test result isn't a fair reflection of your (current) ability. If you include a test result of 6.5 on your CV and it turns out they require an IELTS score of 7.0 you might not even get to interview, but if they interview you and then make an offer conditional on a 7.0 you at least have a chance to retake the test.

If your school/program doesn't ask for it, then you don't need to. If it is specified in the admissions requirements, then you can provide it. Generally, it has been my observation that if you are an international student, you will need to provide TOEFL results.

Since you are applying in Europe as well: I haven't seen any university requiring the TOEFL, but they usually require some proof of English skills. Depending on the country, this can be as lax as your current thesis, a professor from your institution certifying that you can effectively communicate in English, all the way to an official certificate of C2*.
From what I remember, no one asked me for a certified copy when applying, it was enough for me to say that I had it, but some asked you to be ready to submit official proof if accepted. I may be missremembering the frequency, though. Cambridge has a self-verification system: my certificate has a link where anybody can see that I indeed have passed it.
If you have taken the exam, you can definitely add it to your application. Unless they say otherwise, you won't need to pay IELTS to send your scores just for applying.

*To my knowledge, there is no centralised organism in charge of this, so usually any reputable school's certificate is valid.

Can I just ask what is meant by an official C2 certificate here?

@DmitrySavostyanov See here: http://www.examenglish.com/CEFR/cefr.php

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
Can my advisor change the ordering of authors in a paper already under review?
When I was a student, I wrote a paper and submitted it to a journal. Having graduated, I am working for a company and am very busy. Recently, we got a revision for the paper and my prof asked me to do it. Unfortunately, I don't have time for it right now. Then, I got another email from him that if I cannot, he will ask another person to do it and change the name of the authors. He put my name as the third author, while I was responsible for everything for the paper and it has been published in my thesis and I was the first author. Now, I have a few questions:

Can he change the author's name while in my thesis I am the first author?
Suppose that he changes the name without my agreement, how can I stop him from publishing my paper in his name?

If you are not in academia anymore, is this worth fighting over?

I am fighting for my rights and future students.

Well, it really depends on what the "revisions" are, then.

One reviewer said that it needs minor modification and the other reviewer has a few concerns and question which can be justified.

Yes, your prof can make a change to the list of authors, but it would be un-unethical to do so unless the amount of contributions changes.  I note also that the paper has passed the first round of reviews.  Most (or all) publishers do not allowed new authors to be added or the order of authors to change after submission.   This means your prof may fail to make any changes, unless he/she withdraws the paper and submits it as a new paper.
You only need to inform your prof that you will not sign off on transferring the copyright of your article to a publisher.  Hopefully, this will dissuade your prof from any un-ethical actions.

Thanks for your reply. He didn't do anything. Idea, building and running models, writing paper, all was mine. He only gave me funds from his grant during my Ph.D. and nothing more.

If he changes the name of the authors, I will receive an email from the editor?

@8Simon8 You will receive an email from a journal once a paper is submitted.  However, your Prof may delete your name from the paper.  In that case, you will find out after your article is published, and you will then need to follow a journal's policy regarding authorship dispute.  Hopefully, by informing your Prof that you will not sign off on the copyright, and thus creating a dispute, your prof will not act un-ethically.    I've also updated my answer.

"Most (or all) publishers do not allowed new authors to be added or the order of authors to change after submission." Do you have evidence that "most" is really true? "All" certainly is not.

@ vitaminE @Anyon - Thank you so much for your reply. It is very helpful.

I would imagine your professor is trying to put some pressure on you. Maybe (likely!) you did not discuss the authorship details in enough detail in advance. Unilaterally changing the authorship is unethical, however, walking away from a group project in the worst possible moment without facilitating the transition in any way also leaves a bad taste. If the paper was rejected and due to resubmission, the renegotiation would be more straightforward.
A case could be made for the professor's perspective, if the revisions are a substantial amount of work: they would require someone else to do what you did almost from scratch, relying on the description in the first version on the manuscript alone. This could be similar to abandoning the paper altogether and starting it anew, where your contributions to the lab would be recognized but the claim to the first authorship would not be as rock solid. Walk a mile in their shoes, this scenario is fairly bad for both sides. You are not obliged to keep working for them, but they are not obliged to see this paper to completion, either, and hardlining the "not my problem" approach well may tarnish your professional reputation. Especially if you knew in advance you would be taking up that job demanding pretty much all of your time and energy and did nothing to mitigate the issues you are facing now (admittedly, this is not exclusively on you though, the professor should have raise these concerns before).
Having said that, I would advise you to focus on what you are and are not willing to do for this work. If you could make yourself available to someone taking this project over and help them with some questions, it would be reasonable to demand no changes in authorship. Otherwise, I would probably give it up if I were you: even if you have played the leading role in the paper, not cooperating with the rest of the team just enough to see the paper to completion is a bad move. As is usual in negotiations, a good strategy is offering the other side choices instead of shutting down their propositions.
Find something that works for all the parties involved. You can take a hard stance on authorship, but it is then on you to describe what will your responsibilities be and how are you planning to get this paper published. You could ask for an extension of resubmission deadlines, offer consultations or try to find time to work on it yourself, anything really as long as you do not just walk off. See the other side of the story, too.
The rest is as easy as stating "sorry, I do not think the change of authorship is appropriate".

Thank you so much for your comprehensive response.


text:
I do not want to invite my PhD advisor to my commencement ceremony
I really do not want to invite PhD advisor to my commencement ceremony and would like to invite another senior professor from my committee. How to go about doing this? In the future, I plan to block him from everywhere and will have no contact with him at all.

Welcome to Academia.SE. Note that we generally require a professional tone, so I removed your last sentence. Please check out our [help] for more info.

By "invite" are you asking about inviting their attendance only, or are you asking about inviting their participation, as in "hooding" or such. If the latter, I'll need to radically revise my answer.

I was talking about hooding ceremony @Buffy

When I first answered this, my assumption was that the invitation was only for attendance, not for an essential part of the ceremony. I'd guess that you don't have a lot of choice in who will do the hooding and inviting someone else to do it could easily be considered an insult.
You might have to just "grin and bear it" knowing that the future will be freer. I once had to literally kiss the ring of someone I despised. I lived through the experience.
On the other hand, it might be possible to avoid the situation by not attending the ceremony at all. I didn't attend mine, making my mother very unhappy. But rules differ and it isn't possible to do this everywhere.
But given the change in meaning, look carefully at the answer of StephenG - Help Ukraine who makes some good points.
Actually, there is no reason to invite him. He may go for other reasons, perhaps, but there is no need for an invitation.
Some faculty go to commencement and it can be quite a show, but others avoid it entirely when possible.
This may be a very local cultural thing, but I've never actually heard of it before, especially in the US.

Does your university not have the tradition of hooding PhD recipients??

@Dawn, it needn't be by the advisor. Chairs and Deans can do that. And it might just be an aide. The Dean, perhaps, delivers a diploma.

In many cases, the advisor will be asked, by default, to do the hooding.

The hooding needn’t be by the advisor, but it often is by default, so I was surprised to see you say in the answer that you had never heard of such a thing.

@Buffy I am considering not going to the ceremony as well. My mother will be super mad as well. :-)

I'm going to suggest a couple of reasons to consider a more constructive approach.  PhDs are stressful and maybe the anger you feel now will, in time, seem less of an issue.  Keep an open mind.
Could be an opportunity to heal things.
As you cannot control whether the person comes to the ceremony or not, you may as well try and make the most of it.  Academia, like any other career, tends to go smoother when you make friends and if you can't make friends, at least don't leave a lot of enemies in your wake.
This is just one more step and you may never have to have direct dealings with them again.  Instead of parting on bad terms I'd suggest just going with the flow (at worst) or (at best) trying to offer an olive branch - a skill it's useful to learn and practice in a career.
I would certainly not try blocking them in the future - that's unprofessional and unproductive.  Unless you are being abused by them there's no reason to do this and it looks bad.  I'd suggest the opposite approach if you can bring yourself to do it - inviting them to the ceremony.  Maybe things are too bitter between you to do that, but consider making a small effort to heal a rift.  Careers are worth investing in and this is a useful skill to develop.
Remember you really have no way of knowing if this person may yet prove a useful contact in the future.  It's just business.
Potentially creating a problem for someone else.

would like to invite another senior professor from my committee

Do you have a particular reason for doing this ?  It may actually create problems for the other professor as they still have to co-exist with your disliked advisor.  You're putting the liked professor in an awkward position in terms of internal politics.  Maybe don't do this unless they made a critical contribution to your success or you're very friendly with them.

How to go about doing this?

If you feel you really need to do this I'd suggest asking the disliked advisor if they would object to you inviting the other person.   Have a reason for this - e.g. you became friendly and would like to keep it going, or maybe the liked professor was especially helpful and you want to acknowledge it in some small way.
At the end of the day maybe even say thank you to your advisor.  You did, after all, survive the gruelling process and will be getting that covetted PhD - not everyone does.

Thanks @StephenG - Help Ukraine, needed to hear some positive outlook towards this.


text:
My PhD fellowship for spring semester has already been paid to me. If I drop out mid-semester, what is the likelihood that I'll have to pay it back?
I understand this question has been asked before, but my question is unique in that I am paid a lump sum stipend at the beginning of each semester for that semester. In other words, my tuition is fully-funded, and I'm also awarded a 22k stipend which is deposited in the first week of each semester (11k at the beginning of the fall semester, 11k at the beginning of spring).
My question:
If I were to drop out in the spring semester, would it be likely that I be required to pay that 10k back for the incomplete semester?
I know this varies by state law (I'm in the US) and by specific fellowship, and I will try to find a discreet way of asking someone in the university administration, but I am wondering what the probability is of having to pay this back. The paperwork I signed had no specific information on it.

I don't see how we can answer this question without knowing the contents of your contract. Is there something like a "student handbook" with policies that apply to you? Does your paperwork reference other specific documents that contain additional terms?

@AnonymousM That one is a bit different, because it addresses money from previous semesters.

@AnonymousM Except the dupe suggests that it's pretty much unheard of that previous semester fellowships will need to be repaid. That advice does not apply generally to leaving mid-semester.

The reason for dropping out might have a bearing.

I updated the title to make it clearer what the difference from the linked question is. That said, I am not sure whether this question should be left open; seems like the only answer we can give is that it depends on individual factors.

For students in a similar situation, this is the guidance that my institution provides:

If a student received financial aid from the university, they should consult the Office of Student Financial Aid to determine repayment responsibilities. If students withdraw and are receiving remission of tuition, they are responsible for their entire tuition assessment.

That last point is particularly important, because your fellowship is not just covering the stipend but also your tuition, so even if you are not required to give the stipend back, you may owe previously forgiven tuition for the semester which could even exceed that stipend.
No one here can give you a probability or guess that applies to your specific situation, you need to get specific information for your specific situation, and there is likely an office at your institution responsible for figuring these things out. If you can't find a written policy for your institution, talk to them. You may be able to do so without that information getting back to your supervisor, or to get general information from them without saying who you are.


text:
How to concisely describe your field when your work is very interdisciplinary?
I am a PhD student struggling to identify myself as belonging to a specific discipline. I am always having to introduce myself but never know what to say or write. Any ideas??
The context is often in social situations, where we go around the table and briefly describe our backgrounds.  The particular issue at the moment is writing a bio where we are asked to use the style: 'Julia, Human Geographer.'
I am studying epistemic justice in the context of climate change. I look at historical injustices as well as present day knowledge / power dynamics, considering also cultural and linguistic context. I look at the ways in which climate policies and interventions affect local communities. I work using critical theory, decolonial, feminist and post qualitative theories and methodologies that combine ethnographic and creative methods.
The work seems to sit within science and technology studies, environmental social science, sociology, human geography...but I don't know how to introduce myself when everyone else says 'I'm a biologist, I'm a geomorphologist, I'm an anthropologist' etc. I technically work for a department of international development, but my work has nothing to do with international development, and my home country's nomenclature probably does not map to the rest of the world.
Can anyone help me find a title fit??

Welcome to Academia.SE. I moved some info from the comments to the main post (feel free to make further edits if I botched anything). Also, we try to phrase questions in such a way that future readers who have the same problem could potentially benefit from this post, so I rephrased things a bit along those lines as well.

Thank you - will do my best on the next post : )

Here are some general principles for choosing a title for your subject:

The title should have at most three words (one word or two words is even better).

The words in the title should be common words whose meaning is understood by anyone.

The title should not seek to give a full description, or even a completely correct description, of what you study.

In view of these principles, I would say that “environmental social scientist” and “international development researcher” both seem to me to be pretty good titles to use. You can also look at journal titles for journals people who work in your area publish in for inspiration.
If asked for a longer description of what you do, avoid highly abstract formulations that may be very meaningful to you but come across as word salad when interpreted by the average listener. For example, I (a reasonable proxy for an average listener) have no idea what to make of “I am studying epistemic justice in the context of climate change.” Try to ground the description in concrete things, e.g., “I am studying the effects of [some policy] on [some group of people].”

THanks a lot Dan, that's really helpful!


text:
What is "arrêté de nomination" in ATER application for the French universities?
I'm applying for a French university for an ATER (temporary research + teaching) position, and they're asking for a document called "arrêté de nomination". I emailed the HR but no reply yet. If you're familiar with the French education system, could you please let me know what that is?
P.S. I've applied to other ATER positions recently, but have never been asked for this document before!
Thanks in advance!

From my understanding, this document should only be asked for persons who have already a permanent goverment employee position in France. For applications for ATER positions, this would for instance be the case for an academic that would have succeeded at the agrégation, which is one of the recruitment level for high school teachers. A number of persons in academia in France start by getting the agrégation or a lower-level CAPES guarenteed high school employment before starting their PhD. They could then apply for an ATER temporary position, but the administration will need to be told about it beforehand.
This document mentions that it is only required in such situations (I - POUR LES FONCTIONNAIRES DE CATEGORIE A which means for A-level public servants.)
If you are not familiar with the French system, it is quite likely that you do not need this document.

Thanks a lot - that sums it up!


text:
Is there a site where I can look for potential collaborators on an academic project that I'm pursuing all by myself?
I'm working on an academic project, and after getting a few results by myself, I'm a bit stuck. Currently, I'm not affiliated to any university or company, and also since I switched from my PhD topic to postdoc topic to topics in which I worked in companies, I don't have a known network whom I can connect with for a discussion.
So I'm looking for a website(s), where I can post a question/request like: "I'm working on project XYZ, and if someone with an expertise is interested, I'd be glad to share my draft and initiate a collaboration." I'll of course either take them as collaborators or acknowledge their contribution. Any ideas?

Unfortunately this is a "shopping question" and so is off-topic here. If you have a local university, you could start there rather than online.

What field are you working in?

@NathanS. High dimensional statistics/machine learning, specially something called "distance concentration."  This is also used in the mathematical theory of database systems/database theory. It's related to this paper: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jonathan_Goldstein4/publication/2845566_When_Is_Nearest_Neighbor_Meaningful/links/09e4150b3eb298bf21000000/When-Is-Nearest-Neighbor-Meaningful.pdf

@Buffy Are you sure it is a shopping question? Looking for a place where the poster can find help surely is, but asking about general sites where anyone can find collaborators may be an interesting question for many people and could yield a useful list of sites and communities.

I know you're looking for a web site, but I think you're unlikely to find one. With typical web anonymity it's hard to build trust and have open conversations. The number of people qualified and interested in working on a certain problems is often quite small, and the chance of them all being on the same web site is then even smaller.
So, this is typically one role of conferences and workshops, although this can really depend on the field. Luckily, these days (this may change back in two years) most of these are happening online in very accessible formats, so it might be much easier than normal to participate.
Workshops tend to be a slightly less formal presentations of work - if you can find a workshop where you can present you might find others who are interested. Similarly, if you find others presenting at a workshop or conference, you might be able to discuss collaboration opportunities.
A few weeks ago ICML included online socials where people could meet up and talk about proposed topics. This sort of thing could have worked really well for your purposes, and I'm sure future ML conferences will continue to have these types of meetups.
Of course, typical social interaction rules apply - not everyone will be willing and/or interested in collaborating.


text:
My professor has left the university and his official email ID is no longer active
I will be applying for MS in Computer Science in the United States and I want to ask for a letter of recommendation from one of my professors, with whom I share a strong relationship. He has left the university and won't be able to write the letter with the university's letterhead. He will have to send it from his personal email ID, since his official email ID has been deactivated. Will this put a dent on the authenticity of the letter? Are the admission committee members willing to contact my professor in case of any doubt or discrepancy?

He may actually have access to university letterhead for this. In particular, he might be able to get a staff member to type it, assuming he left on good terms, or retired. But the answer of Solar Mike is fine.

I'm afraid he won't have access to his previous university's letterhead.

If he is still prepared to write you a reference then he will.
He can state that you were a student when he was teaching at X institution and that will be accepted.
If the admission committee feels it is necessary to contact him then they will do so.
I have sent reference letters to the Academic secretary and she printed them on letter headed paper - this was while I was on holiday in a different country and the student needed the reference quickly (comes down to planning ie 5 p's: proper planning prevents poor performance...)

Do I need to mention this in my SOP as well, that my professor had left the university and was unable to write it on the letterhead and had to send it through his personal email ID?