Academia Stack Exchange
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1500 questions
65
votes
5 answers

Is it normal for professors to not have families or not spend time with their families over the holidays, due to pressure of work?

My sister is a professor. I was visiting her over Thanksgiving break and my father (who is also a professor) told me not to hang out with her because she had a grant proposal due. Is this normal for professors or is it just my family? This happens…
user45218
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5 answers

Should I include funny pictures in my slides?

I am preparing slides for a short (10min) talk at the group meeting. The talk is about a fairly serious piece of (pure) mathematics, and it so happens that there is a very relevant one-panel webcomic. A thought appeared to me, and got some support…
Jakub Konieczny
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65
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3 answers

Conversation between freshman from senior high school and retired professor who suffers from Alzheimer's disease

I live at a university town where I am freshman at a senior high school. Some years ago a car steered by an inebriated driver smashed me off my bicycle and run over me. Nowadays I am a paraplegic sitting in a wheelchair. I can keep my head upright…
Thomas
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65
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13 answers

Why do undergraduate admissions in the U.S take into account nonacademic criteria?

College admissions in the U.S. takes into account many factors that are rarely considered in other countries and seem unrelated to academics. For example, legacy status (children of alumni may be given preference), athletics, extracurricular…
Rajesh_Singh
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65
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2 answers

In what tense (present/past) should papers be written?

That is, should it be present tense or past tense? Should there be a difference between the abstract, main body and the conclusion? Does the field of publication have any impact?
User 17670
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65
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5 answers

What does a "major revision" mean?

I recently received the reviews/comments for an article submitted few months back to a journal. All the reviewers overall appreciated the content and the usefulness, but also suggested corrections (varying from minor to major) : typos, better title…
user1162
65
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3 answers

What is life like for Western-raised/trained academics who are faculty in countries with extremely tight governmental control?

There are a growing number of prominent universities in the world which are based in countries where the government exerts substantial control over its citizens in ways that are not typical in "Western" countries (Europe, US, Canada, etc.). Two…
Danny W.
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65
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5 answers

Should I cite all R packages I used?

Intro: R is a open-source software tool for statistical analyses and graphics, which is heavily used in different science disciplines and which is becoming more and more popular (although it is already quite popular in many areas). In addition to…
hplieninger
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65
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7 answers

Is there a name for the inverse of the impostor syndrome?

Question: The impostor syndrome seems to be common in academia and there are quite a few questions about it. I wonder if there is something like the inverse impostor syndrome. I'm not referring to the Dunning–Kruger effect, I don't feel particularly…
Trylks
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5 answers

Should I send a "cease-and-desist" letter to ResearchGate?

ResearchGate is pretty well placed on Google. But it does not have a lot of contents or active users, despite their constant invitation spam. So they spidered a lot of publications, and provide some metadata on publications and authors on their web…
Has QUIT--Anony-Mousse
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65
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16 answers

How should I admit a teaching mistake without losing authority?

I made a small mistake while teaching a very simple concept. It was mainly a numerical mistake, and the essential parts of the concept were well illustrated. I want to admit my mistake and even though most students will receive it well, I fear to…
Ted
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65
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11 answers

What do I do if I cannot give a good reference to my PhD student?

I've seen several questions from students about bad supervisor references but this is on the other side. I have a PhD student whose priority during their PhD was family (had two children in 3 years) and social life. They are smart but simply did the…
electrique
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65
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13 answers

Colleague blames me for not spotting typos when I only reviewed the structure and content

I am a graduate student (PhD) in a STEM program. A fellow lab mate of mine asked me to review a chapter (basically the background/history of their project) of their graduate thesis a couple months ago. It was during my finals, I had conference…
fractalflame
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5 answers

Students using the same flawed online solution sheet as the grading TA

I am in a small electricity and magnetism class, and I have recently become aware of other students using an online solution sheet (on slader.com). On the most recent homework, I (who didn't use the online solution sheet) got a significantly worse…
Murey Tasroc
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12 answers

Why is getting a PhD considered "financially irresponsible" by some people?

I've been reading this question, whose premise is that going directly into industry after (presumably) just a bachelor's will make you more money than doing a PhD and then going into industry. To my surprise, most people seemed to agree with the…
Blue
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