text:
Should I notify a med school about their student's cheating history?
I know this individual who has lied on their medical school application by not disclosing a disciplinary action that they received and is now about to matriculate. They explicitly told me this, in writing. Further, I know from being in the same classes that they cheated in many classes, including after the one in which they were caught.
There is a question on the application asking about past incidents of academic misconduct. The student must answer "yes" to the question if they've ever received disciplinary action, to which they lied and put "no". However, the misconduct isn't noted on the transcript; but if the uni was contacted it holds records that would prove the cheating incident.
This infuriates me and I feel like it's my ethical duty to notify their school of their status.
Is this the right thing to do?

Some new info has been edited into the post; the rest of this conversation has been moved to chat. Please avoid writing answers in comments.

Something you probably want to add to your question is who you are (relative to the individual).  Are you another student, a relative, a university employee, ...?  You might also describe what kind of honor code if any the school has.  Some universities have strict honor codes and the existence of something like that might change the nature of whatever the correct answer is.

Clarifying who and where you are is important. If you are in the US and an employee/agent of the current school, non-consensual disclosure of student records as you propose could be a violation of FERPA, a federal law.

Please do not vandalize your own post. Please see here for an explanation, and some alternatives. For what it's worth, I do not think anyone could possibly guess your identity from the question text; millions of people could be facing this dilemma.

The medical school should require that the student provide their transcripts from universities where they previously studied.  If misconduct should be disclosed, it should appear on the transcript.
You do not have a duty to do anything if you are not involved in providing transcripts.
If you do not have an official role in the enforcement of academic integrity and are not affiliated with the medical school, I suggest you do not get involved.
There is considerable variation in opinion about the appropriate response to cheating if you are not involved in the cheating.

"the misconduct isn't noted on the transcript."  Presumably there is a reason for that.

@afesafawf you should add this information to the body of the question.

You want this person to go on to cut people up and do a slipshod job because he or she is used to cheating?

"If misconduct should be disclosed, it should appear on the transcript"--I could just as well say that if they're asking you to disclose past incidents of misconduct, you should disclose! That this medical school isn't trying super hard to identify past academic misconduct doesn't really bear on what OP should do

"You do not have a duty to do anything if you are not involved" is about the worst ethical advice ever.

@Jeff It is certainly not a general ethical principle.  Do you have a reason why the asker should involve themselves?

@AnonymousPhysicist May be merely because transcripts are documentation of grades, not the behaviour?

Physicians belong to a special class of profession where misconduct can have seriously harmful consequences, especially for the most vulnerable people in society. The best defence we collectively have is to ensure that as many physicians as possible take their personal responsibility and duty of care seriously. If the med school investigates and isn't concerned, then no harm done.

I’m personally against lying, but let’s acknowledge a few uncomfortable truths here:

This individual’s lie was almost certainly motivated by fear that telling the truth would hurt their med school application.

Even many very honest people would lie if you put them in a position of having to choose between telling the truth and being allowed to pursue their dream career (a dream which may well be motivated by noble/altruistic reasons).

Most people in general tell lies, including some relatively consequential ones, over the course of their lives, and especially in early adult life at the age at which one would typically be applying to medical school.

This particular lie might not actually be so big if the disciplinary action the individual didn’t report was not significant enough to be reported on their transcript. (Considering this, one can even turn the question around and ask if it’s ethical for medical schools to ask questions that probe into unverifiable aspects of their applicants’ lives, creating an obvious temptation for lying.)

So, is reporting the dishonesty the right thing to do? That strikes me as a profoundly difficult ethics question. I don’t have an answer. [additional content from a previous version removed — see edit history for details]
Edit: the question has undergone some editing since I posted the answer, and my own update to the answer was also edited by well-meaning users who nonetheless modified my answer in a way I do not endorse.* I can’t keep up with this flurry of activity, so I’ve removed a part of my earlier answer. See the edit history.
Some content from an earlier edit (note: this references now-deleted comments so may not make complete sense): To OP: what I would say in view of the new information is that it’s still not an obvious decision, but I’ll grant that the argument in favor of reporting the dishonesty is stronger than I thought before.
At the same time, I noticed that in response to another answer you wrote a whole laundry list of misdeeds this person is supposedly guilty of, and that you “know” they will be dishonest as a physician. Well, I’m not in a position to argue, and you may well be right in this assessment. However, from an ethics perspective, it seems to me that whether you should report someone for the specific offense of lying on their med school application is quite a different ethics dilemma than whether you should try to sabotage their ambitions to become a doctor because of a whole list of other bad things you know about them, whose truth the medical school would likely be in no position to assess, and about which you might conceivably even be mistaken (quantitatively if not qualitatively).
Basically I’m saying, consider carefully your motivation here and whether it can ethically justify ruining this person’s career goals (assuming your actions will have that effect). There was another question on academia.se recently where someone asked if they should report their former roommate to the academic department that hired him for being generally a bad person, lying, cheating and whatnot. There was more or less a consensus that this would be quite inappropriate. I’m not saying it’s obvious that one should never warn schools about people with a bad character - again, what strikes me about your question is exactly how non-obvious it is what is the right thing to do in such a situation. But it’s something to think about very carefully at least.
* apparently this was done out of an objection to my use of the strikethrough formatting feature, which I find strange considering that this feature is offered by StackExchange, presumably implying that they approve of its use and believe some writers would find it useful.

@afesafawf well, the call is yours to make and you obviously have more information than you gave us. So yes, I can imagine situations where it would make sense to report the dishonesty. That’s why I said I don’t have the answer. Even with the new information you’ve given, it does not seem like a completely obvious choice.

@DanRomik What you say is very interesting - in fact, that ethics might have some analogy with the game-theoretical "common knowledge"-like infinite iteration of arguments. Nice idea.

While there are seeds of reasonable feedback here, I downvoted because I think it carries them way too far—essentially saying that 90% of practicing physicians have lied on application materials or something more serious, which in my opinion is far from accurate.

@GregMartin thanks. That was written before OP provided more information. With the current information I agree this looks like potentially worse behavior than that of the average doctor, so I edited to revise my assessment.

Here's another uncomfortable truth: a substantial fraction (order of magnitute: half) of falsely accused students in experiments on plea bargains were found to "admit" misconduct as part of a plea bargain if offered a known, slighter punishment on admission rather than holding on to truth and undergoing a misconduct "trial". See e.g. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2071397 or https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-020-09564-y

@cbeleitesunhappywithSX This is irrelevant to this case since the OP mentions that there are far too many accusations to call all of them as "false accusation".

@O_huck: OP says the student was caught once and that this incident did not make it into the transcript. Everything else is OP's accusation only - and thus irrelevant for what the student should disclose to the med school. I do think my point is relevant here: I gather from other questions here that getting the student to admit is the typical practice of establishing guilt. It may be tolerable at that level of evidence to risk false punishment of the order of magnitude of requiring a student to attend an ethics course. For more severe, including long-lasting, consequences, the misconduct...

... must be sufficiently severe and the requirements to procedure and evidence would also need to be far more strict than what is available in the everyday undergrad cheating incident. However, from what OP says, the old university did not see the need or a way to expel the student and/or put a public record of the misconduct on their transcript. I see a difference between "caught cheating" in everyday student language and having sufficient and proof of misconduct (suspension points towards severe) to warrant keeping this on record for many years and disclosing it to third parties.

You note in a comment that the violation doesn't show up on the student's transcript. What you've run into is the fact that most colleges and universities these days are completely unwilling and unable to deal appropriately with academic misconduct by undergrads. There are several reasons for this:

They're afraid of lawsuits, and unlike in a rape case, there is no identifiable victim who could also potentially sue them.

Cheating is extremely widespread (e.g., freshman physics students using Chegg on homework, or on online exams during covid). Therefore the relevant administrators would be overwhelmed if they tried to take every case seriously.

Most faculty don't want to go through the work of reporting cases of dishonesty.

There may be state laws prohibiting the school from doing anything on a first offense, or from taking action beyond minor stuff like giving an F on the assignment. With these "first time is free" rules, every time is effectively a first time, because violations never actually get recorded.

What you're proposing is to do an end run around this system and report the violation directly to the graduate program that the student is applying to. While I understand and share your frustration, such an action would be problematic:

The school being applied to probably will not accept such information, nor would they have the tools to verify your reliability or the strength of the evidence.

It creates a situation where the student doesn't know that they are being blackballed. This is sneaky and dishonest. If the student knew, and felt that you were wrong or your action was unfair, they could argue their side. Keeping it secret from them means that they don't even have these options.

Two wrong don't make a right. Your school has a system that has rules and checks and balances. It's frustrating that that system likely lets off almost all dishonest students with a slap on the wrist, but you can't fix it by sneaking around and playing vigilante.

This is my fault for not clarifying. The violation is documented and the student received disciplinary action. It is recorded on several documents that would be sent to the med school if they were honest and checked the box that says "yes" to previous disciplinary actions. The faculty that reported did go through the trouble to report and get them suspended.

The "end run" point is key here.  In the criminal law, sometimes a court orders that someone's criminal record should be kept secret in perpetuity (usually when that person was convicted as a juvenile of an offence that caused considerable public revulsion, or when that person has testified against their vengefully-inclined accomplices).  Anyone who writes to that person's subsequent employer revealing the crime can expect to find themselves in very hot water indeed.  This situation seems quite closely analogous.

I think this is an overly harsh statement about universities. Many of them handle such cases appropriately, even severely, but, then, treat the matter as settled rather than force it into the student's future. It is possible, actually, to make mistakes and then figure out how to do better. Young people do a lot of that. A good system provides help rather than condemning the student to a lifetime of failure. Ease up.

@DanielHatton: where I am, criminal record entries are deleted after certain periods of time (stated in the law), and some convictions are not reported at all in the "normal" criminal record excerpt. Compared to this, academic misconduct (and in particular misconduct that is not in the student's transcript and thus was either judged not to be of sufficient severity or not sufficiently proven) carrying a perpetual penalty of being denied further studies seems completely out of proportion to me. (side note: AFAIK you need to provide a criminal record excerpt to get approbation as physician here)

This is the first answer that doesn't have the flavor of "cheating is no big deal" and that points out universities' complicity in the situation, so thank you. I agree it'd be good to let this person know that you reported the misconduct if you choose to do so.

@Buffy The "easy up" defense can be used for almost any crime. It just means "drop your morality to the level of the criminal". Also, if the crimes were that minor and insignificant, then there's no point in hiding them.

O_huck and @SheridanGrant: I beg to disagree - judging what punishment is proportionate for a given misconduct (or that the [to us: unknown] misconduct in question  is sufficiently severe for suspension but not for expelling nor for a public record on the transcript) neither means that morality is dropped to the level of some criminal nor that cheating is no big deal. On the contrary, keeping such proportionality is one of the main pillars of the rule of law - and in this case it is up to the university to make this judgment, which they apparently did.

"Two wrong don't make a right." --> and what do  two "rights" make?

Ultimately, you're just giving the medical school more information so that they can make a more informed decision. At that point, it will be up to them to weigh the situation. They will either choose to ignore your email (possibly suspecting that you were motivated by a personal vendetta), to contact the person to obtain a clarification from them, or to revoke their admission decision. That being the case, I see very little downside to presenting this info to the medical school.
This has possibly happened before, so that they have institutional experience and procedures for dealing with it. And if it's for the first time, it probably won't be the last, so they'll need to develop such procedures eventually.
The other answers and commenters seem to be placing themselves in the ethical position of the medical school: what to do after hearing an allegation. And that ethical position is very difficult. (So you should not be upset or morally indignant if they ignore you, or appear to ignore you.)
But I would argue that your ethical position is less complicated. It is not unethical to put a medical school in an ethically tricky situation: it should be used to facing ethical challenges. So long as you can do so without violating any privacy regulations, making an allegation is not unethical.

I think what @DanRomik wrote in his answer is a bit more tilted towards reality in the sense that providing this information to the medical school may likely lead to career sabotage, more so than causing the med school to carefully weigh the gravity of the misconduct. I would be very carefully in walking down this road, and rather accept the "unjustice" in a few people being let off.

No one is entitled to a career as a doctor, nor entitled to be admitted to any particular medical school. The career of doctor does not exist for the sake of creating careers in medicine, but for treating patients. If the medical school concludes that patients are best served by removing this potential doctor, their judgment should be trusted.

Very good analysis. I do think there is a dilemma for OP, since they are considering being a part of the chain of causality that might lead to the lying student being kicked out of medical school. You are of course correct that no matter what happens, a good share of the ethical responsibility for it would be shouldered by the school itself. I am not sure I agree with “your ethical position is less complicated” though. If OP were to act, knowing that institutions are fallible and can make mistakes, they are also going to have to live with their own decision and the consequences it led to.

@BetterthanKwora: I'm glad to see your straightforward stance in your comment, and completely agree that doctors are for treating patients, not pursuing careers in medicine in themselves, and that cheaters are not entitled to a doctor's career or admittance to medical school. That said, I have a slightly different perspective, as in my answer. =)

3 questions for you:

Are you motivated out of personal interest or morale obligation?

If you just want to see the person "punished", that is not your job.  If you feel the individual will be a detriment to the medical profession and possible cause harm, then you need to act.

Was his behavior an isolated incident or part of a pattern?

Many people been put into situations where they felt the "wrong" decision was the only one left to them. In my experience that is rare, and most people own up to it afterwards.  Unfortunately, several of the discipline cases I've dealt with were repeat offenders with a pattern of behavior that required action.

What is your expected outcome?

Are you out to punish the individual; protect the profession, open a seat for a more deserving applicant or make yourself feel better for "righting a wrong". There are many reasons to inform the medical school; make sure you are doing it for the right reason, or you regret it later.
You need to decide what is the right decision for you to live with. He will have to live with the consequences of his actions.  Make sure you can live with yours.

Perform a calm evidence-based evaluation of the risk that your inaction will allow such a person to go on to become a cheating, lying, 'doctor', who treats patients badly, potentially harming or killing them for the sake of his/her own career. Take into account that others' lives are not toys. If you believe the risk is high enough, then you have enough reason to do what you want to stop such a person from getting into a medical profession. Just for example, it would have been far better for thousands of people if this quack doctor never got his medical license.
If you choose to report this, you should provide upfront as much information as possible, emphasizing how to verify your main claims, because they may not reply to you to ask further (whether it is due to unwillingness to address the issue or something else). By providing all appropriate information, you minimize the excuse the school can potentially give for ignoring your report. Also be careful not to reveal your personal identity, for your own safety.
And of course you have to take responsibility for your actions. But this applies whether you act or do not act. So choose what you think is the best path.

Just report it. The potential damages caused by a doctor with criminal inclinations is just too much. They come across the most vulnerable people in this profession who blindly rely on them. If their past behaviour is excusable, it's up to the School to decide.
I will just mention a small story which may be (slightly) relevant. I have a friend who worked with me some time back. He was accused of inappropriate behaviour by a female coworker (stalking and eve-teasing).  When reported, he merely got a slap on the wrist and everyone else instead convinced (peer-presssured) the female to "forgive" him, claiming it was a one-time thing. I don't know if he did such things in future or not (he didn't tell me himself) but currently, that guy is the manager there (after gradual promotion), and I hear that such behaviours are rampant in the office (I have left the place but stay in touch with friends I made there, including that guy). In fact, recently a new recruits left the job due to such harassments. And the guy (manager) was once telling me about how he received a complaint about one of the employees from some other group working with them in temporary partnership. He just laughed and told me that he summoned the accussed and candidly told him that this is no big dea and that he had done similar things "back in his time" so he understands.
I will just say that I personally will never jump to convict someone, but hiding evidence is just promoting crime in future, in one way or another. Let the evidence be there, what the judge (School) decides is their job.

The system you describe where:

the suspension is on the student's record, but the record isn't sent to medical schools unless they specifically request it, and
the medical schools don't specifically request this method unless informed by the applicant that it contains something worth reading

seems bizarre and unlikely to me. I would first consider it a possibility that you've misunderstood how the system works.
Maybe the university's department of academic integrity makes a judgement call about whether an academic infraction is severe enough to send to medical schools? If this is the case, you shouldn't override the judgement call based what you've heard: you have much less information and context than they do!
Maybe some medical schools will in fact request these records no matter what the applicant says, and include the question as a sort of "gotcha". If this is the case, there is no point in contacting them.
Maybe some medical schools don't want to consider this information until necessary; maybe they want to extend their students some amount of trust, and won't request the records until something else comes up. If this is the case, they still don't want you to contact them.
Maybe there's something else I haven't thought of...

...or maybe the system really is broken. If this is the case, what's the point of going around the system in the case of one individual you've heard about? Their offense may not even be the worst offense. If the system is broken, maybe your report will mean that someone even less honest will get their spot.
If you're really convinced the system is broken, try fixing the system. Contact the medical schools and the university's department of academic integrity to verify that you've understood the facts as they really are. Then point out the problem to them. (I'm making this sound easy, but it probably involves making the same argument lots of times to different people and being both persuasive and stubborn.) If you do that, there's a chance they'll treat everyone more reasonably.

... or maybe the university decided that after suspension (and possibly some other punishment) the case should be considered settled and they reserve the possibility to put misconduct to the transcript to even more severe cases. Since OP claims they know the student cheated after that incident, the university obviously did not consider the misconduct sufficiently severe (or sufficiently proven) to expel the student. (At least where I am, "disciplinary action" covers a range from time out during university sports  to falsification of graduation documents which is a matter of criminal law)...

That's what I was thinking of when I suggested "maybe the university's department of academic integrity makes a judgement call about whether an academic infraction is severe enough to send to medical schools". It might be that a case of cheating is severe enough to merit suspension, but not to merit a a record on the transcript.

Ah, OK - I read that as yet a separate point.

I would take a slightly different view. It is not your job (assuming you don't work at the university records department) you aren't the original accuser (or convector) and really have no duty to act here. and I have no opinion of wether this person would be a good physician or not (having worked admissions at my medical school it is an incredibly hard question to actually answer). But the correct person to approach is the original faculty member who brought him up on these charges at the university, to ask why these aren't on the transcript? A suspension would seem to rise to something on your transcript (since normally any break would be reported such as a leave of absence, etc). While you say you have written evidence of this, you presumably weren't the originator of the process at the university. Your doing an end-run of the university discipline process would likely be viewed as highly suspect by the medical school (given the huge competitive nature of medical school all sorts of sabotage during the pre-med process are highly common, which they would likely suspect this as)

Yeah, in any case one can present them with the concrete (verifiable) evidence. What the school does with it is their responsibility.


text:
pros and cons of accepting ORCID Reviewer Credit / Recognition
When submitting a review, some Publishers/Journals ask whether one would like to getting Reviewer Credit, by asking the following question
ORCiD Reviewer Recognition. Publisher xyz can send verification of this review directly to ORCiD. If you would like to take advantage of this service: 1. Please click on the “Yes” option below. 2. You will be asked to sign on/register with ORCiD. 3. The name of this journal and year of your submitted review will then be transmitted to ORCiD. 4. ORCiD will display this information as a verified item from Springer Nature on your unique ORCiD researcher profile
Please Select: Yes No
What are pros and cons of accepting (or refusing) this request?

This is a similar question: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/94541/publons-is-it-a-serious-thing

Currently, peer review work is not widely rewarded by academic employers or funding agencies.  Publicly identifying yourself as a peer reviewer is publicly identifying yourself as someone who works for free.  You might get more requests for you to peer review if you do it.  It is also possible nobody will notice.
Otherwise, accepting or refusing the request is unlikely to do much.
You might wish to carefully examine your ORCID privacy settings.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
What is the hardest part of transitioning from a PhD to a full-time career in academia?
Multiple users on this site have stated that only around 1 in 10 (or maybe an even smaller ratio) PhD students are able to successfully continue in academia, beginning with an Assistant Professor position and working their way up towards tenure. (I am unable to find links for this, but I have read it in at least 5 different answers/comments on this site.)
For the purposes of this question, I am ignoring those who actively want to pursue a career in industry, and am focusing on those PhD students who wish to go into an academic career and fail to successfully do so. I wish to know why students fail to make the transition, and what exactly is the hardest part of this.
For instance, is it:

The transition from a PhD position to a postdoctoral position: A postdoc has to work much more independently than a PhD student, and maybe people struggle with this.
The next transition, from a postdoctoral position to an assistant professor position, or,
Simply making a bigger impact on one's research field of interest, after securing a tenure-track position, and hence moving away from academia into industry.

In which part do newly graduated PhD students, who actually want to go into academia, "fall by the wayside"? Or, which of these transitions is the hardest to make, resulting in students not making the transition to a full academic career?

The title is unclear to me, PhD students are in academia

When I say academia, I mean a full-time career in academia, affiliated to a University, conducting research, handling classes, basically a professor position.

Are you saying that you didn't work full time while earning the PhD? Shame on you :-)

@JyrkiLahtonen Haha, I've not yet earned a PhD, I have only just finished my undergraduate degree :)

Highly suggest you read Lantsoght, The A-Z of the PhD Trajectory (available online), esp., Sec. 13.5.1: "Transitioning from PhD Student to Faculty Member".

@DanielR.Collins Thanks for the suggestion! Will definitely check it out.

"Hardest" is ill-defined. Maybe one could answer a question about transition rates.

This could do with an answer that looks at actual data:  How many PhD students are hired per year in a given field, how many postdocs (including re-hires), and how many faculty.  Preferably world wide.  I expect that would confirm my experience that it's relatively easy to go from PhD to postdoc if willing to move world wide, but that going from postdoc to faculty is hard.

@gerrit I think this thread provides a few statistics, but I am yet to read through it completely. It is also only for the transition from PhD's to tenured professors.

PhD students are (almost always) full-time academics.

Please note that the remaining 9 over 10 PhDs (in the STEM area) that did not find their way in Academia usually got  a good position in

research institution
public employee and similar etc
companies

@EarlGrey Absolutely, I do not mean that these people have "failed" in any manner, I just mean that they have not made the transition, and that among them, there will be people who originally intended to go into a full-time career in academia.

The hardest part? More candidates than available academic positions. And departments have politics of who to hire. It is not always the best candidate.

Most PhD students will not have academic careers.  This is not because the duties of academic careers are "hard."  Academic careers do involve hard duties.  But so do non-academic careers.
Most PhD students will not have academic careers for economic reasons.  There is simply not enough demand to employ more academics.  The economic factors have the biggest impact on those who seek so-called permanent positions.  Permanent jobs require a long-term financial commitment from the employer, and there is very little demand for making that sort of commitment.

Yes, exactly this.  The hardest part of transitioning from PhD to academia is simply finding a job in the first place.

Isn't there demand for new professors who can make an impact on the research output of a department/University? Is it really that hard to find a department with open, tenure-track positions?

@RamPadmanabhan It is easy to find one department with an open tenure-track position.  You might find tens of open positions.  But in most fields of research there will be hundreds to thousands of qualified applicants, and tens of thousands of qualified people who don't bother applying because there is so much competition.

The money has to come from somewhere.

@AnonymousPhysicist So, in a sense, it is the transition to a tenure-track position that is hardest, because there are so many applicants, all of whom are well-qualified?

I would not say that; there are plenty of other careers where there are many applicants.  It is the low demand that stands out.  Pick any professional sports league in the US.  The number of athletes one league hires in a year is greater than the number of tenure track physicists hired in one year.

Also, keep in mind that many advertised "open positions" are never filled; an open position is not necessarily a real job opportunity.

The competition is simply brutal. And it’s not clear, at least to me, that society would be better served otherwise.

It's easy to see what @AnonymousPhysicist is saying. Look at your department.  How many tenured or tenure track faculty are there.  How many PhD students, and how many graduate each year.  That ratio (faculty to students) represents a slice of the market realities in your domain.

Here's a particular datapoint: when I was applying, ~6 years ago, I got a polite and appreciated rejection email that stated, in part, "it was very difficult to pick among the 700+ qualified applicants". Mid-tier comprehensive (USA), not particularly specific (that I recall) subarea mathematics, tenure-track of course. For that one seat. From some sort of ID on their system, their numbers aren't fake (+ they have no reason to).

In addition to the point that @AnonymousPhysicist makes that there are far fewer postdocs positions available than there are PhD students, and far few faculty positions available that there are postdocs, there is also the up-or-out mentality: after a certain number of years as a postdoc, many people will start to think you are past it - that if you were any good, you'd already have a faculty position by now. This means there is really a limited amount of time you can spend as a postdoc looking for a faculty position, even if you were willing to stay as a postdoc.

"after a certain number of years as a postdoc"  That number of years varies a lot by field.

@AnonymousPhysicist but is absolutely true (rightly or not) -- especially if you're a postdoc at the same institution for a number of years. When I started postdocing, I remember a mate advising me not to stay longer than 2 years at any position, as "after 2 years, you will benefit as much as you can from them. They can still benefit from you working there, but the benefits of you start going down".

@AnonymousPhysicist Yes. This will vary by field (and by supervisor) - I have one colleague who is very much against hiring anyone who has already done a postdoc somewhere. In my part of biology that is somewhere between 2 and 3 postdocs.

Here, in Germany, there is a hard limit on the number of years (12) that you can work on temporary contracts in academia, so you literally cannot stay as a postdoc. I'm not sure whether similar arrangements exist in other countries?

@penelope That's not good advice if you work in a laboratory field where each position uses different, complex instruments.  When you move you must retrain.  It is even worse if you spent two years building an instrument and then move, leaving it behind.

@JackAidley I think the US DOE has a 3 year rule.  But that is another question.

"there are far fewer postdocs positions available than there are PhD students", citation needed.  My experience is the opposite, that there are more postdocs than PhD students.

@JackAidley In US, Canada, and UK, I've known people who spent more than 30 years on postdocs.  I've known postdocs to retire due to old age.  So such rules certainly do not exist everywhere.

@gerrit Numbers of postdocs is hard to find, but this: https://www.statista.com/statistics/185167/number-of-doctoral-degrees-by-gender-since-1950 says around 188,000 graduate every year in the US, so assuming it takes 5 years to complete a PhD, that around 940k PhD students. This link: https://www.postdocacademy.cam.ac.uk/aboutus/postdocs-in-the-uk-higher-education-landscape suggests 80-100k postdocs in the US.

This tallies with my (mol biol) department - we have 84 PhD students and 25 Postdocs

@gerrit: Yeah, I'm from the UK so I knew it wasn't universal, but I'm not sure whether it's a quirk of Germany or quite common around the world. Sorry for being unclear.

@gerrit How could that be mathematically possible, unless the average time each PhD entrant spends in postdocs is longer than the time spent in PhD (wildly untrue, since many PhD students do not undertake any postdocs) or the number of PhD students overall has sharply decreased since the time the current population of postdocs was in school (not true, at least in fields I'm familiar with)?

@JackAidley on paper, yes, 12 yrs is the limit. In fact, however, there are a few exceptions to that rule, and I know people who's been on temporary contracts for longer.

@KevinArlin In my experience, the average time people spend in postdocs is much larger than the time they spend in PhDs.  Like I've said, I've seen people being in postdocs for more than 30 years.  Here I use "postdoc" loosely to include any time-limited research position, even if the job title is not "postdoc", because the role and job situation is essentially the same (just possibly a bit more senior and a bit better paid).

@gerrit - this is incredibly discipline and country specific. In mol biol in the UK, people are PhD students for 3.5-4 years, and postdocs for 6-10 years (after 10 years you are often deemed "past it", and the only way to stay in academia is to stick with one supervisor and hope they don't have a gap in funding before they retire), in the US thats different because PhDs take 5-6 years. But even then we have 3 times more PhD students than postdocs. In other subjects people do 2-3 years of postdocs, and in others most go direct from PhD to faculty.

@IanSudbery - If PhD students stay 5 years, that is ~16 students per year. If postdocs stay 2 years, that is  ~12 postdocs per year - not that far off in reasonable probability of a PhD student getting an academic postdoc. Then there are postdocs in other non-university settings.

@JonCuster Our PhD students stay 3.5 years, and our postdocs 3.

In my field (cond-mat physics), there are really two main reasons. First, a lot of people want a job in the industry, and they leave after a PhD. Then, if you want to find a postdoc job, chances are that you'll get it rather soon: there are many open postdoc positions (in Europe, at least) and it is usually a problem to find a candidate to fill it, not vice versa. Second, the main bottleneck is between the postdoc and the adjunct or Jun.-Prof. level. Those jobs are scarce.

Yes. This might be field dependent of course, but I would say that the majority of PhD students do not stay in academia mainly because they do not want to. They have seen academic research from the inside for long enough to decide that it is not the right fit for them. I've seen this realization with many people roughly half way through. Some of them stop right there, while others finish the PhD to improve their C.V., but none of them even try to apply to post-doc positions.

Also, there are quite a few research institutes in Europe. People have a third option besides academia (as in being employed by a university) and industry.

You have confused "adjunct" with "assistant."

No I haven't. But you could also include Asst. Prof. to that list.

+1 for mentioning that most are choosing to leave.

@mlk The fact that many do not want to stay in academia is not entirely unrelated to the fact that it's very hard to find a permanent job in academia.

@gerrit Certainly, and the two are hard to separate. But I know more than one person who was good enough to likely have made it in academia, but still decided against it. One classic recurring theme seems to be that many people begin to think about starting a family around the age where they finish their PhD. And suddenly a career that will likely involve several long distance moves, frequent travel and long hours doesn't sound so appealing anymore.

I doubt there is a common answer across all disciplines. I'd highlight a few challenging inflection points, whose relative painfulness will vary.
1a. Being genuinely self-driven (work ethic). During a Ph.D., one is meeting frequently with an advisor, who may themselves have deadlines. There is at least annual reporting of progress to stay enrolled (varies a bit). So while a lot of Ph.D. students struggle a bit to buckle down and get stuff done, there's still a fair amount of regular external pressure. A post-Ph.D. but pre-tenure academic faces that less frequently, so may not make enough progress to make the cut to the next stage.
1b. Burnout, the flip side of 1a. Many junior academics, rightly or wrongly, always feel time is breathing down their necks and just find the number of hours they feel they need to put in is not worth it. This is doubly so if their personal lives deserve time too!

Continuing to find interesting but answerable research questions. This is what - in many disciplines - the post-doc stage is supposed to help bridge, but regardless can be challenging. Aim too high and you don't get publishable results. Aim too low and your career becomes a yawn.

Building teams and getting funding. More relevant for high-capital disciplines like experimental science, but also others. Even conference travel takes $, and you need to learn how to ask for it and get it!

And then there are the more pragmatic ones:

More applicants than jobs. In many disciplines, the supply of Ph.D.s far exceeds demand, in terms of junior academic jobs. That can translate directly into no job, but also insidiously into getting tracked into not-so-good jobs, cut off from your community, with loads of service responsibilities, very temporary, etc. -- all of which impact your ability to do great research to land the next job.

Mobility issues - the best or only job available may be somewhere you can't go, for personal or family reasons.

Oversimplifying greatly, in my experience, 4 and 5 are problems universally, felt particularly keenly where 1 or more postdocs is the norm (and so more opportunities to be zinged by these factors). 1a tends to be the biggest problem where people go from postdoc to independent researcher, where that's applicable, or Ph.D. to junior faculty member, where there are no postdocs. 2 and 3 at the more senior pre-tenure stages.

The academic career after PhD starts with at least one postdoc position. In order to get a postdoc offer you need to show strong ability and talent to do research (in math it means good letters of recommendation, publications, good PhD granting department, well known and good advisor, etc.). To transition from a postdoc to a tenure track position you need more of the same. Usually only a few people with PhD can become postdocs and even fewer will get tenure track positions.

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat.

My two cents : I don't agree with your first premise:

The transition from a PhD position to a postdoctoral position: A postdoc has to work much more independently than a PhD student, and maybe people struggle with this.

My experience of supervision as a PhD student :

First 2 month : 30min / 1h talk with supervisor ~ once every two days during lunch.
Following 6 months : The same, once a week
The second year : A 2 hour talk, circa every month
The 3rd year: My supervisor left and was replaced with another one. A 1h talk circa every two weeks or so.

I would call this very independant work, as I was basically making all the calls, I just needed to justify them adequately with my supervisors. I did not go for a postdoc afterwards (I transitioned to industry), but I doubt a postdoc position would have left me "less independant".

If we leave aside financial reasons and difficulty of finding a job, it's simply difficult because most people aren't that good at doing research.
I have actually thought about this a lot: I'm curious as to why my friend who was a stellar student in his Mathematics degree and got a high First (obviously seems to know a fair amount of mathematics) has really failed to make it in academia.
One thing which I think people do wrong is that they don't seem to read many research papers.  This really seems like a big mistake.  You will have to read a lot to be able to zoom in on a section where you are able to make a contribution.  Similarly, it's hard to know how to write papers properly when you aren't reading them, then you become dependent on other people to help you, and if you are dependent on others, you will probably fail at postdoc level.
Another of my friends seemed to do well on his Engineering PhD and published two good papers (with several co-authors) but has struggled on his postdoc and not published anything (possibly because he now has to direct his research a bit more independently, as opposed to being told what to do).  It's definitely worth trying to reflect on this a bit, try to identify what others do wrong that they fail, and so on.

True, but I am more interested in the case of graduated PhD students who could not transition, though they were excellent researchers, published quality papers in highly ranked journals, etc. etc. I think the "demand" answer addresses this pretty well.

This is a bit surprising to me that this would happen: almost all PhD students are not cut out for research and there are enough academic positions to go round amongst the few people that remain.  I think probably independence of the researcher plays a role ie. they publish quality papers but they are essentially being told what to do by a supervisor.

almost all PhD students are not cut out for research I'm not so sure about this; particularly at top-20 programs in the US, I would say that most PhD students will be cut out for research. I do agree with the independence point, but this might vary from field to field.

@Tom True enough but the "alickers" often get the job over the claims of the self-directing researchers.

Yes I see your point.  For example, it took Einstein a surprisingly long time to land the job in academia which he wanted because he didn't get on with the relevant people or didn't hide that he thought they were stupid (hence he had to work at an office for quite a few years).  Is this the sort of thing you mean?

What I mean is more middle-of-the-road that Einstein. Typically, it would be some "Rob Jones (24) PhD" with his well-organized, elegantly phrased but specious research together with adroit diplomacy on Prof Honeywell's intellectual blindspots and mid-life apathy ahead of some "Tamer Karadeniz (28) MSc (METU), PhD" whose largely independent, unstinting experimental work and study has effectively made him an unacknowledged world authority. In hindsight, Einstein was always going to come through and his "exile" to the Swiss Patent Office gave him time to theorise. "Karadeniz" may end up unknown.

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


text:
Do admissions committees look at any applicant information beyond submitted materials?
My question concerns PhD applications that are handled on a departmental level by graduate admissions committees, as is the case in the US, Canada and a few other places. Further, I am interested mainly in STEM fields, with a particular focus on engineering applications.
I wish to know if graduate admissions committees look at any information that may be available about the applicant, beyond what is provided in the application itself. For instance, if an applicant's CV lists a couple of papers (and maybe even provides arXiv links to those publications), would the committee go out of their way to take a brief look at the papers (if not otherwise submitted by the applicant)? How would this change if the paper has been peer-reviewed or not?
What about other materials that an applicant may have provided? If an applicant's webpage is listed on their CV, would the committee take a look at it? More generally, what about information that the applicant may not have even provided? Would a committee ever feel the need to independently go out of their way to obtain more information by, say, searching Google, or social media, or a LinkedIn profile? Is this even "ethical"?

Since committees are made up of individuals with their own ideas, there is no way to predict what will happen in an individual case. There are probably situations in which there are rules to prohibit looking elsewhere for information, but I don't know of any.
But, the members of such committees aren't bored and looking for additional work. They have enough to do to weigh each application as presented. But a look at items listed on a CV might be expected and peer reviewed articles are better than otherwise (and don't probably require a look).
Websites might get a peek, but likely not a deep dive. In fact anything you include on the application might get at least a peek. But mostly, I think, people are looking for positive things, not negative ones. "Is this a hardworking, dedicated, student with some insight and a good likelihood of success?"
But social media posts might be a special concern for students. If someone is notorious online for any reason, then it might come back to some committee member and it is impossible to say if that would influence a decision. It might influence the vote of that member, of course.
Since searching for non-famous people on Google is pretty frustrating, I doubt people would bother to do a general search unless something alerts them that it might be necessary. A look at LinkedIn might be different, as it is supposed to be a "professional" information site.
But, public information is, by definition, public. There are probably no ethical constraints beyond adhering to local rules. If a person thinks they have a problem, they would be wise to clean it up as much as possible.


text:
Is it ethical to hire someone to program for a study project?
There is a small study project at university Z if someone did it and wrote a report, will be award an extra certificate. The project can be done as group work. The project was started with 2 person X and Y. Student x wrote the required codes in one programming language. Due to many troubles, it had to be written in another language by Student Y.
However, Student Y hired someone to translate the codes to the new language. My question is:
Is it ethical? Especially, Student Y seems to not have any intention of acknowledging this in the report?
How it can affect the future of other students, if they decided to continue a career in academia?

Outside of a course context it would be ethical. People doing research can hire specialists for many tasks.
However, within a course context it depends on the rules in place and it should, at the least, be revealed to the professor who assigned the project. Done in secret, however, it is possibly problematic since the learning objective of such a project is the important thing, not the final result. And it could well be that getting the programming "right" was one of the key learning objectives of the project.
And not acknowledging it would seem to be a clear ethical lapse. It might be necessary for other students in the group to disassociate themselves from the "offender". But a joint discussion with the professor and everyone else might make it clear and provide an acceptable outcome for most or all of the students.
But, again, it is the learning that is important. Don't lose track of that. You weren't asked to do the project (in almost all cases) because the professor needed the results, but so that you would learn.

My question is: Is it ethical? Especially, Student Y seems to not have any intention of acknowledging this in the report?

It’s ethical precisely if the contribution of the hired party is acknowledged in the report. Otherwise it’s plagiarism, a form of academic misconduct. All students who signed their name to the work will be regarded as guilty of this offense, including the ones who didn’t actually hire the outside contributor (although their offense might be deemed more minor, and hypothetically speaking they can try to deny knowing about what their group member did; whether that defense would work, I can’t say).

How it can affect the future of other students, if they decided to continue a career in academia?

Being found guilty of plagiarism is not necessarily a career killer, but it can definitely result in some bad consequences including major setbacks to your academic career, and potentially expulsion from school. It’s also possible that you could get off with very minor consequences, but I wouldn’t recommend (to put it mildly) trying to find out.
Here are some suggestions for how you could handle this awkward situation:

ideally, convince your group member to report to the professor what happened (including the explanation of why it seemed necessary to hire someone, while acknowledging that that was a mistake to do it without getting the professor’s approval first, and apologizing for their display of poor judgment).

if the group member cannot be convinced, you can inform the professor of what happened yourself (i.e., be a “snitch” — in most places there is a stigma associated with doing this, and it’s true that you would be violating the other student’s trust, but since your own reputation is at risk, there is an argument to be made that that’s an appropriate thing to do).

A third, more diplomatic option is to go to the professor, explain that you encountered irreconcilable differences with one of your team members, without elaborating, and ask to be given an alternative assignment that does not involve working with that person.

Finally, there is the option of going along with the misconduct. I think that’s a terrible idea and significantly less preferable to each of the above three options.

IMHO, that depends on the exact scope of work done by the translator and whether the translator has been compensated for it by student Y. Indeed, if I need to read some mathematical paper in Chinese, I can send it to the translation services, pay standard fees, and then, if I use some ideas from that paper in my project, I am obliged to acknowledge the paper itself, but not the translator work because I have already compensated for the latter according to the standard agreement (though, of course, I can consider mentioning the latter as an option). If that is what has happened (i.e., the code was blindly translated from, say, pascal to C++ for a fee without any attempt to improve it or to make it work properly), then I see no ethical problem whatsoever.
The ethical problem will arise, however, if the translator took an active part in the correction or further development of the code. In that case he/she has effectively become a co-author of the final product with all consequences it implies.

I think even the later statement is a case-by-case situation. If I work on a supercomputer, administrators or support of a software team often helps in compilation, optimization of the software etc. I have never met anyone who considered this unethical or worthy for a co-authorship, assuming the main topic of the paper is not the development of the given software.

@Greg assuming the main topic of the paper is not the development of the given software If I understood the OP correctly, it was exactly the case here, but I completely agree otherwise. :-)


text:
Is it allowed/legal to do two PhDs at once in slightly different subjects?
I am doing a Ph.D. in a university in New Zealand. I started 3 months ago and am about two years away from finishing. Since they do not issue visas (due to the pandemic), I had to start online and paid one year of tuition. For the next year, it looks like I will have to do the same thing.
Now I got admission to a different PhD program in a slightly different subject in Europe with funding. Can I study for two PhDs at the same time? I am confident I can handle the workload (already finished much of the work for the NZ program). I am not asking whether this is a good idea, just whether it is allowed / legal.

Some places do not accept students who have a PhD. Not sure what happens if the PhD at location 2 is obtained during PhD at location 1. Presumably, you won't be fired from the program, but make sure not to get studentships or contracts from both sides at the same time without checking this does not violate the conditions of your PhD program.

I had a PhD student in my group who started and completed two PhDs simultaneously. I think it was a combined program that was approved on an individual basis. I'm not sure if the submitted theses were different or the same. In principle, I think what you are talking about is possible, even if the PhDs are in separate topics.

If you want to know their policy in details, contact both universities. Only they can help you know if they allow that. I guess you could call them or email them and ask. If you are afraid that contacting them can cause you problems do so with a different email than your usual or don't identify yourself over the phone. Also, if you have already finished your thesis, just submit it, get a PhD, and apply for postdoc positions. You get a better wage and some freedom to research your own projects.

I edited some information from the comment chain into the post itself -- Turkan, feel free to make further edits if I botched anything.

That said: I am not sure we can tell you whether this is "allowed or legal"; such things will be determined by your contracts, your universities' policies, and the laws of the relevant countries; we are not lawyers and cannot give you expert advice on interpreting these documents. I agree this should not have been closed as a duplicate, but it should probably be closed as "depends on individual factors." Though it looks like Ben's answer was helpful to you, so hopefully you got what you need in any case.

Yes sir I got...Thanks

It is unlikely that any law would restrict your earning two doctorates simultaneously. That doesn't seem like something any law would be concerned with.
However, the funding from the European institution might well come with restrictions about what sorts of outside activities you can pursue while accepting the funds. In particular they might regard the funding support as "full time" and thus disallow some other activities. You can explore that with them.

Yes sir the only rule about the scholarship in europe is that you should not hold phd.

And even here they could not prove someone has phd or not unless she tells them.

@Turkan Saying that "... they could not prove someone has phd or not unless she tells them" is hinting at unethical behavior at best. Eventually you will publish some papers right? One of the advisors might notice all that cross-hemisphere collaboration.

Yes I know. I did not do that

"the only rule about the scholarship in europe [...]", I'm fairly sure this isn't a European regulation as such and will vary across countries and even depend on the funding body within that country or specific institution.

@ Bruno The schoalrship  that I talked about is the university scholarship not project. Therefore, I think there is no problem. However, some project such as project scholarship they say that you should not have a phd before. BTW this situation is due to corona otherwise it is nearly impossible that someone study in two universities physically

Short answer: Read the PhD candidature rules for those two institutions; at best, they might allow you to go part-time at each institution.  A better option would be to apply for suspension of candidature in NZ.

Longer answer: Most PhD programs have a set of rules for students that set out rules/expectations for the amount of hours the student will commit to the program each week.  In cases where this is specified, usually the stipulated hours will be commensurate with a job ---i.e., a full-time candidature would be approx 36-40 hours per week and a part-time candidature less.  Usually there are specific rules for taking leave from the program, and you get about the same amount of leave as in a job.  In some cases, approval will be required for outside study or work that impacts on the student's ability to meet the required time commitment.  Even if specific approval is not required, it would usually be considered to be a breach of the rules if a student does not put in the stipulated hours when they are not on approved leave.
If such rules are present in one or both of these programs then it is difficult to see how you could do both programs full-time.  You might be able to apply for part-time candidature at one or both of the institutions in order to cut down the hours, but it would probably be difficult to get approval for this.
In view of your circumstances, let me offer an alternative.  Since you are prevented from attending the university in New Zealand, your best bet here would be to apply for a suspension of your candidature for one year, so that you don't have to pay tuition for that year.  Suspension of candidature means that you do not lose your place in the program, but you take a temporary break with the expectation that you will return to candidature afterwards.  In present circumstances, where the pandemic is preventing you entering the country, such an application would probably be viewed favourably, and I suspect it would be granted.  A one-year suspension of candidature would allow you to attend the other university for a year and see which you prefer.  If you decide you prefer the program in Europe you can then apply for withdrawal from your university in New Zealand.

Thank you so much sir. You know the corona changes the meaning of full time and part time. In normal situation of course I was in New Zealand and I did not think about an alternative but now...


text:
How not to ask for a reference letter "too many times"?
I am a Msc student planning to apply to a Phd program and need reference letters for that. But when I applied to Phd programmes and asked my supervisor to give me reference letters, after the 4th reference he told me (in front of my colleagues) that it is a shame that he gave me so many reference letters and I still wasn't able to go anywhere.
I am trying to avoid this situation. Apart from not asking this person again for a reference letter, what can I do? (I am now having another supervisor, so at least he can help me out.) How many reference letter is okay to ask? Should I also ask my teachers or a reference from a supervisor is the absolute best?
// edit: some people commented that my supervisor might not have a bad intention and he meant it a good way. English is my second language, so I couldn't translate it well. What he said was rather something like 'you weren't accepted despite my efforts, shame on you'

Are you by any chance not a native English speaker? Cause it seems like you've misinterpreted the comment. "It's a shame" doesn't mean that it's something shameful for you, it's more like "I wish there weren't all these obstacles in your way! Someone should have the good sense to take you in!". It's an expression of support. Your supervisor would probably be happy to write another reference for you. And another, and another, if need be.

Another piece of advice; you seem to be a bit self-conscious ("in front of my colleagues"). I used to be like that, and I know there are other people like that in intellectual fields as well - we tend to assume that other people observe us all the time, and remember things about us for a long time. I assure you, your colleagues don't give a damn what your supervisor said, and almost all of them will not remember it within a week - everyone's too preoccupied with their own lives and their own problems. I know you can't just stop worrying, but you can train yourself out of this over time.

@FilipMilovanović thanks for the comment, I see that others have this feeling too, that this wasn't that 'shaming'. It is true that I am not a native English speaker and in my mother language it was a more harsh comment. (and in that lab, the atmosphere is also a bit harsh/bullying type, but I don't want to go into details)
You might be right in that my colleagues won't remember it.

@FilipMilovanović, as a native English speaker (from Australia), I agree more with AN_ − the supervisor seemed to be sick of writing references and was casting some blame on AN_.

@kokociel OK, but based on AN_'s previous comment, it's not entirely clear to me if the original exchange was in English or not. @ AN_: In any case, I guess I could reexpress my point as: don't operate on unchecked assumptions, and don't let all of your future interactions be colored by this one experience.

@FilipMilovanović the original conversation was not in English.

It might be helpful to know what country this is (for the culture etc.)

Actually, I think you may have misinterpreted the comment. It might have just been a reflection on the sad state of the job market.
I wouldn't try to avoid the situation, but to talk it over with the supervisor, especially if they are supportive.
He may already well understand the situation and may be almost as frustrated with it as you are.
It doesn't hurt to have backups, of course, but four letters is essentially nothing. A hundred (more) might be needed in this market. He may need a way to manage that, potentially using staff, but don't give up.
However, if you aren't being accepted into doctoral programs, perhaps you have an ineffective search. The most common one seems to be applying to only the "top" institutions in the field, which makes admission hard (to impossible) since there are relatively few positions in those few places. Another would be applying to places or in fields for which you aren't really prepared. Widen the search. But a discussion with the supervisor can help here.

Yes.  I've submitted literally hundreds of job applications in the course of my career, most of them to institutions that take up references immediately on receiving an application.  There's one of my former line managers in particular who must have written at least fifty references for me, and he's always taken it with good cheer.

@Daniel Hatton (and Buffy): Hundreds of applications for job applications after one's Ph.D. is certainly not especially unusual (at least not in some fields where this many jobs exist), but the OP is describing applications to Ph.D. programs, which is an entirely different situation.

@DaveLRenfro, unlike the US, in some places a position in a PhD program is just like a job and obtained in the same way. Parts of EU, are like that.

I realize that (I never realized this until a few years ago, on this site by the way), but "hundreds of applications"?

I second this - "it is a shame that ..." does not mean that the professor is ashamed of the OP. I think this bears saying explicitly since the OP may have understood it that way.

@DaveLRenfro I agree, it sounds a bit too much, but the order of 100 applications (for an entry job) is not uncommon.

@DaveLRenfro and the UK is somewhere in between, where the references needed are comparable to those for jobs, places in STEM are usually funded with a stipend to live on, but the PhD student isn't technically an employee.  Part of taking on MSc (and indeed final year BSc) project students is the need to write references for them, often repeatedly.

@Buffy, and the others: thanks for your answers. I didn't misinterpret his comment (I wish I would), but maybe I translated it badly. I corrected my question.

Apart from not asking this person again for a reference letter

If you are worried about bothering people, then you should definitely ask references to people you have already asked them from. They already have a document ready with your information & life story to which minor changes need to be made as you have more experiences. It would more "bothering" for someone else to start from scratch with a reference letter for you.
I don't even ask my old referees if they are willing to provide a reference anymore. I used to for the first 3-4 applications. Now I just e-mail them saying that I put their name down. Just because I know they have a letter ready and it's just a matter of changing the date.
What you may want to start thinking about is the following though: the stuff your referee is saying about you - is that helpful to your applications? Have they known you when you did a piece of exceptional work that they can write about? Have they supervised a project that was brought to completion? Or are they just writing a "standard" letter with no personal touches and examples about your exceptional abilities?


text:
Where can I find "Correlation and Causation" by Wright 1921?
I've been looking for where I can read: Wright, S. (1921). "Correlation and causation". Journal of Agriculture Research. 20 (7): 557-585.
I've tried the following without success.

Going directly to the Journal
Google search engine
Google Scholar
Research Gate
Search tools at my university's library
Asking a research librarian for assistance

Articles by the same author in a similar time period are available, such as Systems of Mating. I. The Biometric Relations Between Parents and Offspring. It isn't clear to me why the particular article I wish to read is difficult to obtain.
Is this article available somewhere?

Did you ask a research librarian at your university's library?

This isn't really a question suited to this site, but... the Bodleian Library catalogue reveals that this is a US Department of Agriculture publication, and not obviously related to the current Journal of Agricultural Research (which appears to be a Pakistani outfit).  http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/f/89vilt/oxfaleph013202870

Here is your paper, via Google Books:
https://books.google.co.ao/books/about/Journal_of_Agricultural_Research.html?hl=pt-PT&id=lNNdIV_qpwIC&utm_source=gb-gplus-shareJournal
Check page 557 for the first page of the paper (if you download the pdf file, go directly to page 738).

People often neglect to ask for help from a research librarian at a local university. In fact, even a village library, such as that where I live, has a librarian with "contacts" at nearby libraries, including university libraries.
Research librarians are trained to find such things and also have a network that they can use to chase down things. They are a valued resource that every research should become familiar with.
They can not only uncover difficult to find books and papers, they are excellent at taking descriptions of research "needs" and translating them in to the papers that cover them.


text:
Listing my activity as a Chapter Editor in CV
I am a chapter editor for a particular book. How do I list that in my CV? I see no guidelines particularly stating how to go about stating this.
Please keep in mind that I am not the editor of the book, I am simply an editor for the introductory chapter alongside a few others. There is an author listed for the chapter.
Thanks in advance!

A section "Other Contributions" or "Service to the Academic Community" would be an appropriate place, provided that you don't have to follow a strict format.

Is there a particular citation style for chapter editors? I can only find one for chapter authors & book editors.


text:
How to add link to "Linked Data" in researchgate for a published paper?
It seemed to have been possible to add a tab called "Linked data" to the profile page of a paper published in a journal in researchgate. This data is essentially a zipped file containing problem instances or code that I would like share.
See a snapshot of one such instance from my profile from some time ago:

However, I seem to have either forgotten how to do that or else that provision has been removed from researchgate. I have been trying to add such a tab titled "Linked data" to a recent paper of mine but the option does not seem to be available. Please see below:

Online google search and email to researchgate support have not yielded any result.
Is there a way to do this?

Not sure if this is what you mean, since I have not used it, but in that page, there is a dropdown menu beside the "Save" above, that has an option "Add supplementary resources". Is that what you were looking for?

@GoodDeeds I have tried that. Unfortunately, that path explicitly disallows addition of a zipped file. Earlier, in the first snapshot I linked to, the linked data led to a page where people could download the zipped file.

@GoodDeeds Indeed your answer turned out to be correct. I think the system in researchgate is setup to disallow addition of such files to preprints but allows such addition only to final published version. Thanks!

Great, I think you should make that an answer.


text:
How to discourage constant queries for re-evaluation of answer scripts
I do not know if this is one of the unpleasant consequences of online classes. Here is a typical scenario that plays out:

Students take an exam.

They complain if it is a multiple choice question or fill in the blank questions that they are not being provided partial credit for thinking through the problem and are being awarded only for the final answer which could be wrong even though the various steps leading to the answer were partially correct. Also, cheating in the exams are much higher than usual due to lack of easy proctoring mechanisms despite usage of latest online proctoring tools that seem easy to game.

If they are asked to scan and upload their answers as a pdf file along with their working, there is never ending stream of requests after grading to have their answer re-evaluated because they made some different assumption or that their answers are "partially right". I teach a math-oriented course where there is mostly only one right answer and questions are usually not susceptible to being misinterpreted. Yet, after sharing the grading key, students put the burden on the teaching assistant to consider their answers again and if possible award partial credit. Many times these turn out to be frivolous requests. Yet, it seems impossible to stop these frivolous requests to regrade and re-evaluate their entire answer scripts. Everyone involved in the grading process (the TA and me, the instructor) have limited time at our disposal especially for a large class. The fact that I am not physically meeting my students seems to have somehow encouraged students to keep pushing in pursuit of a better grade.

What are some techniques to stop this unhealthy habit? The TA and I spend sufficient time and effort to ensure that we are consistent in our grading across the entire class, but beyond a stage it is impossible to fine tune our grading to differentiate between different shades of wrong answers.

Related, possible duplicate: What to do about “grade grubbers?”

Why do these requests lead to you having to re-evaluate the entire script? Surely, these requests must come with a description of which part they believe they deserve partial credit for, and why? (If not, requiring that may be sufficient of an answer.)

@mmeent They do come with a description but still these tend to be on every question where the student has not gotten full credit. Multiply this with the number of students in the class and you can get the picture. Essentially, there seems to be no cost or price to pay for a frivolous query. That is the fundamental issue imo.

@Tryer Why are you even entertaining these queries? At most, I'd issue a copy-pasted response of the form "if you have identified a clear factual error in marking, please raise it through the official means".

My suspicion is that most of these are problems with your exam design rather than having anything inherently to do with "online teaching".

You can have multiple-choice in an online exam or in a normal hall exam. In both cases you will get the (justified) complaint that partial solutions aren't worth anything. This complaint is inherent to having MC questions, and the only way to address it is to not use MC questions. Conversely, an online exam can have regular open questions just like a normal hall exam. If you choose to have MC questions instead because of the obvious grading-related advantages you'll need to live with the consequences.
You say that open questions lead to "a constant stream" of requests for re-evaluation (because the students claim they misunderstood the question). Again, I don't see how this is specific to online exams - if the same questions would be clear to the students in a hall exam, why are they not sufficiently clear in an online exam? And if they are not clear, why did the students not ask for clarifications during the exam (I am assuming there is a low-barrier way to ask for clarifications from the teachers in real-time, right?)?
I do agree from my experience that the online setting somehow increases the amount of frivolous requests one receives, but there really is no mandate for a teacher to react much to them. If students keep sending you updates of their exam after the examination period is over, stop accepting such updates (you presumably also wouldn't accept late updates to a hall exam). If you would normally not let "but I misunderstood the question" stand as a valid argument, then use the same reasoning also in an online exam. And if you get substantially more such requests than normally, I would take a good hard look at the exam and wonder if they are just less clear than the exams you normally do (and then the obvious fix is to improve the clarity of your exams).

Ultimately, my impression is that you (maybe subconsciously) may have used the transition to online exams to make detrimental changes to your exam design (e.g., adopting MC questions rather than open questions, potentially providing less support to students during the exam, etc.), and your problems stem from this rather than from the medium. Doing exams online should not be an excuse to reduce the time that you and the grading team invests, otherwise you will run into issues (that aren't inherently the fault of the online setting).

If anything my exams have gotten easier in the online mode. My previous exams used to be closed book / closed notes. Now, it is open book, open notes, and I have not made the questions any tougher.

@Tryer Same. And let's not kid ourselves - if students want to, cheating (of different types) is much more readily available.

It is perfectly legitimate to give multiple-choice questions in an exam, and the standard marking approach for these has always been a strict right/wrong outcome where there is no partial credit for working.  Usually the strictness of this approach is ameliorated by the fact that there are several multiple-choice questions and they are usually low-mark questions, allowing student marks to average out well in the long-run (i.e., students who have good partial knowledge tend to get more right answers over the long run than students who have no idea what they are doing).
I agree with the other commentators here that there is nothing inherently important about this being an online exam as opposed to an in-person exam.  In both cases you should simply hold the line and tell students that there is no partial credit for multiple-choice questions.  This is something that has applied to generations of students and we have all learned to live with the occasional frustration of getting no marks on a question where we had a partially understanding of the material.
There are a couple of practices that can be useful in reducing marking challanges.  One useful practice is to give a general feedback session on the exam outcome prior to accepting any specific queries/challanges from students.  You can then set out a general explanation of marking and expectations about what kinds of queries are reasonable.  (I do this in a lot of my courses, and I have not had problems with excessive challanges to marking after these sessions.)  Another possibility here is that your grading key might be too specific, and this might lead students to believe that they can evaluate the appropriate mark for an answer better than the TA.  Sometimes less specific information on grading can be a benefit here, since there is an element of professional judgment in awarding partial marks for questions.
When I have a TA marking assessments in my courses, the main thing I am concerned about is that they are consistent in their grading standards for all students.  If the TA turns out to be overly lenient or overly demanding across the board (relative to how I would have marked it) that is not a big problem for me.  Students should be made to understand that there is variation in professional discretion in the awarding of partial marks, and that you have confidence in the TA to do this in a reasonable way.  In the rare case where the TA's marking is beyond the bounds of what is reasonable (e.g., much too harsh for the year level), or if there is some other problem where all students were dealt with unreasonably harshly, you can usually compensate this by scaling the marks for the assessment item for the whole class; a better approach than trying to re-grade for individual complainants.

I agree with xLeitix that exam design is the first thing to consider. You need to be justifiedly confident that your exam questions are appropriate, sufficiently clear, etc. If your instituion doesn't have a systematic process for others to provide feedback on your exam design, you may want informally approach colleagues to get their opinions on your exams.
Making an exam completely multiple choice can easily lead to a student with good overall understanding of the topic to fail. A mix of multiple choice and open questions can be a decent balance between marking load and fair assessment. In any case, if you are certain that multiple choice is the appropriate format for some questions, then students may grumble a bit but this should cause any additional workload for you.
When it comes to marking open questions, it is again a matter of being justifiedly confident in your decisions. You should consider appeals based on the ground that you have made a mistake, but not on the grounds that you made a judgement call that could have gone another way. If your questions are clear to anyone knowlegable on the topic, then "I interpreted it differently" isnt a cause for reconsidering marks either.
Be very clear about your new appeals policy to the students. Let them know that you will only revisit an exam script if they explain how exactly they think the original mark was based on a mistake by the marker, and why. Stick to the new rules. Students will quickly see that they need to put in some effort now to get their exams looked at again, and that it only pays off in the rare cases where there actually is a mistake by the marker.


text:
Being a reserch student of some professor that I am not officially a student at their university
I am very much interested in some specific subject in mathematics that there is no professor in the whole country of my residency working or knowing about that subject.
I am a first year masters student and there is some professor in my university that is willing to 'supervise' me on this subject for my thesis but he said that because he is not an expert in that area, he won't be able to do research with me so to yield a publishable result.
It would be very helpful or maybe vital to have a published (or at least submitted) paper in that subject to help me getting an admission for PhD abroad (Canada or Europe) that I would like to apply. Nevertheless, I myself am very eager to do research in this subject regardless of its helpfulness for PhD admission.
The only way to do a good research is to do it under the supervision of some professor who (unfortunately is not living in my country of residence but he) is a highly expert in this area. He also used to work with other people in this subject so he likes very much collaboration.
My question : I am a student of masters program not an expert in this area so maybe I can't ask for being a colleague and because I am not a student in that university of the professor, I can't ask for being a student of his. So how can I start a communication with this professor (through email) and ask him to do research with/under him?
PS In my area of interest I mentioned only a few professors in the world are doing research.

I did exactly this. I cold emailed people, explaining my situation and asking if they would supervise me remotely. Each one that said no gave me the names of a couple of other people to ask. Eventually I was lucky enough that someone said yes. You have nothing to lose by asking.

There is nothing wrong with such an arrangement provided your own advisor agrees to it (and stays in the loop over time). But it it very difficult to arrange. A cold email from you may well be ignored and isn't very likely to be answered.
However, if your advisor makes the request to the other professor  it is much more likely to result in something. Even if they don't know one another now, a note from one professor to another will get read and considered. Let your professor introduce you to the other person and vouch for the quality and seriousness of your work.
Alternatively, you might have to consider changing topics to something that can be supported locally. Good luck.

At the very least, make sure when you email folks to CC your local professor.


text:
Effects of altitude on academic/research performance?
Research suggests that high-altitude training can have a positive impact on athletic (especially aerobic) performance. It is also known that high altitude (beyond a certain threshold value) is associated with a decrease in athletic ability and cognitive function. However, is there any evidence suggesting that doing research (or training to do research) at a high altitude could positively impact one's performance after a descend to a lower altitude? Has anyone tried to quantify the effects of the altitude on one's academic/research performance, especially in the range below what is normally considered a high altitude (~5000 ft or 1500 m)?
I am asking this question out of mere curiosity.

The trouble with this is that research often takes year of work, years of thinking.  In contrast, the boost from coming down from altitude lasts perhaps days.  Now a chess match might be an interesting thing to contemplate.

@TerryLoring https://en.chessbase.com/post/rogers-and-ajith-kumar-on-anand-in-sportstar :-)

Unless you are breathing heavily during your research, it is quite unlikely. The altitude effect is still quite noticeable even at my advanced age when I go down to swim meets. Thinking, not so much.

I added another closely related question, which may be more interesting and significant.

I can't imagine how this would be useful information. People don't go to Denver (Nepal?) to "train" for research and then move to San Diego (Death Valley?) to actually do it. What is the point? Will you become brilliant by studying for 3 years at Everest Base camp and have it affect your future output when you then move to London? Moreover, the effect, even for pro athletes in pretty much at the margins. In fact, the opposite can be true. The world record one hour distance on a bike was once set (Merckx 1972-1984) at a high altitude (Mexico City). Less wind resistance probably contributed.

@Buffy I agree. However, I edited the body of the question since I asked it.

Pagani et al. (1998), Cortex 34(2):243-251 might be a good starting point.

As the comments already indicate, you're not likely to get any useful answers to your question, in particular and also because there is no practical way of making use of the effect if it exists: Unlike sports where you can focus on one event, research is a year-round thing. You can't go to high altitude for a month and then come back for 2 weeks of intense research.
Empirically, however, Colorado hosts two very good research universities, both of which are located at around 5000 ft (1500 m). At least, it seems, the altitude does not negatively affect the cognitive abilities of those who work there. In fact, and that includes myself, many of us find happiness and relaxation at the much greater elevations of the 54 mountains in the state that exceed 14,000 ft (4267 m), where thin air is most definitely a thing. If you asked these people, they will probably say that their research productivity is far more affected by the happiness that comes from living in a beautiful part of the country than by whatever thin air we breathe.

Don’t forget about Sandia and Los Alamos, at similar (Sandia) or higher (Los Alamos) elevations…

Boulder, CO, also hosts some of the labs of NIST, which is one of the major research institutes in the US.

The effects of being at a high altitude can be simulated at low elevations using an altitude tent. I believe this is used for training purposes by athletes. I once saw an interview with David Blaine, who explained that he slept in such a tent every night for six months as part of his preparation for his (at the time) world-record-breaking stunt of holding his breath for around 17 minutes.
The effects on the brain of doing research at a low elevation can also be very easily reproduced by breathing a mixture of gases with a higher concentration of oxygen, eg, nitrox, or even pure oxygen, which would be the atmospheric air equivalent of a (hypothetical) elevation of many thousands of feet under sea level. During a sports event this is impossible to do, but for research, who would stop you if you wanted to do it?
From this I conclude that if breathing more/less oxygen was known to be “performance enhancing” for research and other mental activities, we would actually be hearing people talking about obtaining some oxygen for regular home/office use, and/or buying altitude tents. I have not heard such talk, but maybe that means that I just mingle with the wrong crowd and need to get out more. Related ideas do seem to exist, though they are pretty fringe and seem to appeal mostly to “alternative facts”-oriented people.
Note: I do not endorse the breathing of exotic gas mixtures without the necessary technical and medical knowledge. Breathing pure oxygen for extended periods will cause oxygen toxicity and is extremely harmful, and there are some safety issues with storing the oxygen and handling it safely.


text:
My advisor wants me to put his name as the first author but he didn't have math contribution
I am in a masters program (mathematics) and I have written a paper with my supervisor. My supervisor taught me the whole general procedure of finding papers to start with, methods of research and writing papers etc. I have learned so much from him but what I have learned has all been about how to do research. In contrast, the mathematics content of the paper is not within his area of expertise, and he has done almost nothing! Now he wants me to put his name as a the first author on our joint paper.
1- If I reject his demand, I will get a low grade for my thesis because he is a jerk, and thus my chance of being accepted for a good university will be reduced dramatically. I live a country where no one can object to their teacher's grading!
2- If I comply with his demand I will be a second author, and again, my chances of being accepted at a good university will be reduced dramatically.
Added after @Allure's comment: There are similar questions asked on this site but they discuss such things as whether the advisor's demands are right or not, and what actions should be taken. As I stated, I live in country where there can't be a powerful objection against a bullying professor, so my question "What should I do?" still remains because of my special situation.

Do any of these answer your question? https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/21132/adviser-wants-to-be-joint-first-author-even-though-i-did-most-of-the-research, https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/89070/advisor-wants-to-be-the-first-author, https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/147969/advisor-wants-first-author-do-i-have-any-leverage

Why does being second author reduce your chance of being accepted to a good university, especially as you are still on an MSc?

@Allure I edited my post. thank you

@CaptainEmacs, In the subject that I am working on there aren't many professors in the world. One of them is a faculty in some university that 1- is very prestigious so the admission rate is low , 2- is in Europe so PhD is considered a job so again the admission rate is low. So for those 2 reasons I will be competing with a over 100 applicant when they accept one or two.

For most areas of mathematics, authors are typically listed alphabetically... So being first or second is irrelevant, if the order is the standard one in the field.

What is his reasoning for asking to be the first author?

What kind of graduate program are you trying to get into? In pure mathematics and many parts of applied mathematics and theoretical computer science, no one cares about author order, and the convention is that authors are listed alphabetically. So, I’m not entirely sure, but I think you may have some misconceptions about the reasons for your advisor’s request to be listed first, and/or the effects that your being listed second would have on your academic career.

There could be many reasons as to why your advisor wants to be listed as the first author, i.e. for reasons of funding. There may also be certain conventions to consider here, e.g. that a prof. is expected to be listed as the main author, or that alphabetical order is used generally. The bottom line of what I am trying to say is that there may be very good reasons for him to want to be listed as the first author that you don't know about or haven't even considered yet.
If it really is such a big problem for you, you should in any case talk openly about it with your supervisor so that he can give you his reasoning. If it would be common in your field, you could also try to negotiate a shared authorship with him. If you tell him your reasons, he might be open to that as well.


text:
Research on gender and academic misconduct
In professor David Shanks' talk "Does social science tell the truth? (2016)" at 15:14 he claims that there is an apparent gender bias among his examples of people that have committed academic fraud in the form making up or fudging data. This list includes Lawrence Sanna, Dirk Smeesters, Diedrich Stapel, Jens Forster, Michael LaCour, Marc Hauser, and Adam Savine.
David Shanks follows this observation about his collated list of examples with a claim that this gender bias has been confirmed in the literature, but doesn't provide a reference. What literature is he alluding to? Is there serious research on the matter?

As this is now a clear reference request, all the comments discussing the methodology of this hypothetical study have been moved to chat. Please read this FAQ before posting another comment.

If you have an interest in scientific fraud, I recommend the retractionwatch.com blog. E.g., they covered the study "Males Are Overrepresented among Life Science Researchers Committing Scientific Misconduct" by Fang, Bennett & Casadevall (2013):

Of the 72 faculty members found to have committed misconduct, only 9 were female, or one-third of the number that would have been predicted from their overall representation among life sciences faculty.

So, yes, there is serious research on scientific fraud. You should be able to find more recent studies if you spend more time on a literature search than the 60 seconds I've invested.