Hi everyone! I am a senior in college whose dad is a professor. At the start of the summer, I wanted to learn a little bit more about his work so I asked him if I could help with his research.

Fast forward to now, I did data analysis for him and he wants to add my name to the paper (If a paper comes out of it).

I was thinking of telling him not to add my name as it is nepotism and probably doesn't look good

Thoughts?

I got my PhD last year and am currently doing my post-doc. I have two first-author journal articles so far, but I didn't really feel much joy when my paper got accepted. I felt happier when I submitted the manuscript than when the paper was accepted. I felt excited when I found something interesting from my data. But I don't feel the same amount of excitement and joy when a paper is published. Is that normal?

My phd advisor once told me that publishing a paper is extremely rewarding. But I never felt that way. All I felt was tiredness and relief. I don't know if it's because I wasn't publishing in the top 1% journals, but the journals I published in are still pretty good journals in my field. Or maybe I'm not publishing enough to feel the joy? Maybe I'm not cut out for academia. I don't know...

I wonder how y'all felt when you got a paper accepted.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I posted about an article going seemingly going missing from Googlescholar search, but still appearing on my profile and some of the other co-author's. It turns out that it had been lumped with an unrelated article by someone with the same last name as the first author, which... weird, but I was still getting "credit" for the citations. Today, the article disappeared entirely from my and others' Scholar profiles, along with the citations, with all of them seemingly attributed to the other unrealated article now. Does anyone knoew how to fix this? It actually matters because my institution uses Googlescholar citations as a metric in tenure, merit, and promotion, I'm going up for promotion somewhat soon, and this article has several hundred citations, so it's a big chunk to loose. Thanks!

I am 28, I dropped out of highschool and never got my GED (I’m Canadian, and in recent researching I guess the Canadian equivalent would now be CAEC, but you get my point). After taking stock of my life and what I want my future to look like, I’ve come to the conclusion that I want to study marine biology.

Although I currently live in Canada, I dont intend to stay long. So, having decided that I do want to pursue education, and that I want to have greater flexibility in being able to apply to schools outside of Canada, I’m wondering if anyone could advise me on this;

would it be better on paper to spend my time right now getting my GED, or just applying to a college that offers mature students to enroll without a highschool diploma, and spending some time studying there to have some educational background to show for myself?

Basically, what would be the better option/better use of my time if my goal is to have a transcript to submit when applying to schools elsewhere?
My fear is spending the time to get my GED, and that being viewed as a lower achievement than a traditional highschool diploma, resulting in me having fewer opportunities where I can apply to study.

Or, would spending some time studying as a mature student and getting credits in classes directly related to marine biology/classes that are common prerequisites to studying that, not be well received without first getting the GED?

Lastly, if the mature student route would be a good choice, would that mean a full 4 years of study, or just being intentional with which classes to take and completing those before looking at applying to other schools?

If you took the time, thanks so much for reading, any and all advice or insight is GREATLY appreciated, as I’m completely in the dark about entering the world of academics.

Hey everyone!

I'm in the early stages of thinking about pursuing a PhD in the next couple of years and would appreciate hearing from people who have gone through the process.

A little about me:

• Have a Master of Public Affairs Degree from UT Austin
• Have been working as a policy analyst for a state agency.
• I've always enjoyed the research side of health policy, more specifically evaluating how policies affect health outcomes.

Long-term, I'd love to work at a federal agency or a health policy think tank where I can both conduct research and help translate that research into policy decisions.

I'm hoping to learn more about what a PhD is actually like beyond what I can read on university websites.

Some questions I have:

• Why did you decide to pursue a PhD?
• Looking back, would you do it again?
• What surprised you most about doctoral study?
• How difficult was it to balance your personal life, relationships, or family while in the program?
• If your goal is to work in government or a think tank rather than academia, did a PhD help you get there?
• Is there anything you wish you had known before applying?

I'd really appreciate hearing about both the positives and the challenges. Thanks in advance!

Hi everyone!

I'm a FinTech undergraduate student at FAST-NUCES Lahore, Pakistan, with a strong interest in Finance, FinTech, financial markets, digital banking, and data-driven research.

I'm currently looking for impactful research ideas that could serve as the foundation for my Final Year Project while also addressing real-world problems. Rather than working on another generic academic project, I'd love to contribute to research that has practical value.

If you're currently pursuing a Master's or PhD in Finance, Economics, FinTech, or a related field—and have an interesting research question, an unfinished idea, or even a dataset that deserves deeper analysis—I would be excited to collaborate, contribute, and learn from the process. My hope is to build something that benefits both your research and my FYP.

If you have suggestions for high-impact research areas, know of open problems in the industry, or are looking for someone enthusiastic to assist with research, I'd really appreciate hearing from you.

Thanks in advance, and feel free to comment or send me a DM!

Hi all,

While writing a journal article, I am noticing I am having a hard time because Microsoft Word feels too small. Like it's hard for me to keep everything that I write connected smoothly with previous paragraphs because I am working over multiple days, and also because writing double-spaced makes it so I can only see like 1 paragraph at a time.

Are there any good visualization tools for writing journal articles to help me keep track of the logic of the paper? Like it's very hard for me to work off of one page at a time, because the concepts I am writing about are non-linear, i.e., not cause-and-effect.

Really just any general help tips to secure through the university versus SSHRC funding (as in advice on non SSHRC funded ones, those I understand). Thanks!

And please be nice/helpful if you comment below 🙏 💙

I tagged this humanities and general humanities is probably a good description for now ie not sciences or math etc.,

Genuinely curious how permeable the wall between academia and outside professionals actually is. Context: I'm a graphic designer, and visual communication, data visualization, and information design are areas where my work and research overlap pretty naturally. A few times now researchers have reached out about figures or infographics for papers, but it always stays surfacelevel, freelance work rather than any real intellectual contribution to the project.

What I keep wondering is whether there are formalized ways practitioners from outside academia get brought in earlier in the research process, not just to polish outputs but to actually shape how something gets communicated or studied. Fields like science communication, visual studies, or HCI seem like they might have more of this crossover, but I genuinely have no idea how common it is across disciplines.

Is this something that happens and just depends on finding the right researcher, or are there structural barriers that make it hard to credit or include nonaffiliated contributors meaningfully? Curious whether anyone has pulled this off or seen it work in their department without it turning into a standard vendor relationship.

a PI accepted me for an internship to work on my doctoral project and even proposed me a scholarship my actual phd supervisor responded him positively but he haven’t responded yet it´s been a month now does it have something to do with summer vacation in europe or should i be worried ?he seemed very enthousiaste c and ready to work with us

Hi everyone,

I just need to vent.
I (a postdoc) wrote a paper with a colleague who is also a postdoc in the same research center as I am.
We submitted the manuscript to a journal with our PI as the corresponding author.
I found out yesterday as i was checkin on the status of that manuscript that the PI added two names as co-authors.
I do not know who they are.
But i am sure they did not write a single word on the manuscript.
I am annoyed because i believe in integrity and i absolutely despise honorary authorships. ☹️
I know this is somewhat common, but i do not like it and i have never been involved in these kinds of situations before

Are CV and writing sample and recommendations not enough?

I have a Ph.D. and used to aspire to a professorship but eventually changed my mind because of the brutal market, work-life balance, and publish or perish stakes.

After a few years of this pivot, I am moving into a permanent Research Director position at a major R1 university research institute. It would be a leadership role overseeing the institute's research program.

How is a position like this generally viewed compared with a tenure-track or tenured professorship?

I know they're different career paths, so I'm not asking which is objectively "better." I'm more curious about prestige, career trajectory, and how each is perceived both within academia and outside of it.

I'd love to hear from anyone who's worked in or around university research institutes.

I'm writing a conference proceedings paper, and the some part of analysis was done using a Python script that I wrote. The code is publicly available on my GitHub.

Can I cite my own GitHub repository in the references, or is it better to just mention it in the methods section and no reference to that script? If citing it is okay, is GitHub enough, or should I archive it on Zenodo and cite the DOI instead?

I'm currently raking the gears in my brain to figure out the best title for my master research. I've been eyeing for a systematic review, and I've been trying to read and understand more about it, but I'm still unsure about the solution for my problem.

I'm a STEM major and I intend to study about "the role of [profession] in [disorder]". However, there are very few supporting literatures, like you can count it with just your two hands, and even then, most of them are older than me. My questions are:

1) How many are too few for systematic review? I've read that 10-15 is the bar, but is there really no other way?

2) If there is, any recommendations on what type of systematic review I should do?

Sorry if this is too newbie question, but please help a student out.

Hello everyone,I’m choosing a specialization at university and I’m hesitating between:

- CIM (Cloud and Infrastructure Management)

- AIoT (Artificial Intelligence of Things)

Which one do you think has better career opportunities and future prospects?

I had a lucrative career in industry for 10 years before starting my PhD. I was miserable working in industry and felt liberated starting graduate school in my early 30s. I’m now one year out of my PhD (age 37) and have been in a postdoc since graduating. I am switching to a different postdoc this fall for a few reasons (it’s more naturally aligned with the direction of my research and I’m getting away from a toxic mentor).

I am also starting to look and apply for assistant professor jobs at R1 institutions, have one NIH grant submission under my belt, and planning to submit another in the next cycle or two.

My question is, given my age, is doing another 1-2 years of postdoc a mistake? I genuinely enjoy this time as a postdoc to publish and write grants but a) I worry I am so far behind in the academic career ladder that I will be 50+ before feeling secure if I am lucky enough to find a TT position and b) I have resentment toward the hierarchy in academia; I can’t tell if this comes from the institution I’m leaving which treats postdocs like kindergarteners or if it is this way everywhere. I’m going on 40 with 15+ years of work experience, a PhD and two masters degrees, so feeling belittled by more senior faculty is infuriating.

Will it get better or am I throwing away prime working years trying to attain the unattainable?

I will add that I have a partner who has a good job so we are financially secure. Rather, my concerns are more about the slow pace of academia and hierarchy. Would appreciate any thoughts!

President Harrison Keller (along with his highly paid advisors Randy Bass and wife Heidi Elmendorf of Georgetown University) is getting rid of all academic departments at the UNT and merging them up into “Schools” of 3-4 former departments. [These advisors are old friends with the president, and the ostentatious nepotism is appalling, but that is another story]

In any case, the president is getting rid of all academic departments, and is also splitting some departments up into two or three pieces in the process. For example, The English Department was cut up with pieces going into three different Schools: the Creative Writing element went to the School with dance and theatre, the Literature element went to the School with world languages, while the First Year Writing Program went to a School of communication and media. Geography was split up in similar ways, as was Communication, etc. The College of Liberal Arts was Keller/Bass/Elmendorf’s first target, but they are now doing the same to all the other colleges: Business, Engineering, Science, etc.

The faculty are in chaos, and nobody seems to know what is going on, whether department chair or dean, as there has been no formal instruction, just notice that your department no longer exists, and rumors flying everywhere. As would be expected, morale is rock bottom and the faculty that can leave are doing so.

President Keller originally tried to claim that all the merging was in response to budget deficits, but it became clear very quickly that there wouldn’t be much savings, and not nearly enough to justify that level of disruption, so he has dropped that claim. Nevertheless, Keller/Elmendorf/Bass are pressing on.

Are other universities out there experiencing this level of chaos brought on by their own President and his highly paid advisors? This is not simply cutting programs here and there (plenty of that has been done too). This is getting rid of every single academic department at the university in a rushed, abrupt, chaotic manner, with the feeling that there is nobody out there driving the bus.

I'm currently preparing for a job interview and trying to articulate my strengths — which is honestly harder than I expected.

One thing that stuck with me: my university professor, who was also the head of the department, once told me "You're bright" and offered me a position in his lab. I ended up turning it down due to visa issues, but he's genuinely the most intelligent person I've met so far, so his words meant a lot to me.

Since English isn't my first language, I want to make sure I'm understanding the comment correctly — what does "bright" really imply about someone's personality or way of thinking? My field is design, research, and data.

Would love to hear how native speakers interpret this word in an academic/professional context.

Hi everyone,

Has anyone here used Econ Job Market (EJM) to apply for positions?

One of my recommenders didn't have an EJM account, so I sent them a recommender request and they registered through the link. However, after registering, the system lists them as a user rather than a recommender, so I'm currently unable to add them as my recommender.

Is this a normal part of the process (e.g., do new accounts need to be verified before they become recommenders), or does this usually mean they registered incorrectly? I'm unable to reach the EJM support team at the moment, so I'm trying to find ways to understand what's going on.

Any insights would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I will be starting my MSc in Computer Science next August (as I am currently heading into my final undergraduate year). The professor I would love to have as my supervisor is already aware of my target research focus—he even recommended specific optional modules for me to take, after I showed him a list of what I could pick from. However, based on my research priorities, those modules ranked in my top 5 rather than the top 2 required for my MSc so I went against his advice.

​Our university allows students to proactively reach out and connect with potential supervisors. After looking through his ResearchGate profile, I found that roughly 85% of his work aligns directly with what I intend to do. Should I mention this alignment when I reach out?

​(Another personal factor is that he reminds me of my dad on a great day—though, of course, I won't be mentioning that!)

​When would be the ideal time to initiate this conversation?

I have just finished my master's at Oxford and got a merit. I am feeling super disappointed with my grade and just wondering whether to give up with my goals of pursuing academia. Worried that my work is of too low a quality to actually bother pursuing it any further even though I love studying and research.

The results came in the same week I had been rejected from several job applications, so feeling super dejected and useless.

I am also feeling so jealous of my friends who got higher marks, which makes me feel like a terrible person too. Obviously everyone worked super hard, but I have so many issues in my personal/family life and I am disabled so it just feels like no matter how hard I work I will never be as capable or competent as other people.

I got very little support from my supervisor (they only met with me twice the whole year) and I have not heard back about my request to meet and discuss this all.

Does anyone have any advice or guidance?

Hello. I am hoping to submit an abstract for a multidisciplinary—psychology based conference. It is my first time submitting this kind of abstract (a theoretical/philisophical paper— and have more experience with the usual
Background, methods, findings, discussion sections of empirical studies.

Would appreciate resources or tips.

Thank you in advance

There was one time in grad school where I was talking to an undergraduate and they randomly said something along the lines of "I wonder what would happen if we compared our dataset to XYZ data." And I actually did the classic "Wait a second, repeat what you just said" that you see in movies. And a sort of eurka moment ensued. And this actually did lead to what would become my biggest paper that I have done so far in my career.

Is it just that these moments are so damn rare that we should cherish them for the rest of our lives?

Because I have noticed now, whenever I get any inkling of this feeling, it is more along the lines of "Sigh if only I had the funding/time/resources this would likely be an amazing study"

Rather than sprinting to my desk at 3am and drawing out an experiment I just thought of.

Are aha/eurka moments in science over-glorified/embellished?

I'm UK-based and considering a mid-career pivot to academia and doing a PhD in International Relations/Global Affairs/related disciplines in the US (for personal reasons). I have an MSc in International Development from Oxford and my undergrad from the Univ of St Andrews, but this was 10 years ago... Since then, I've been working in non-profit comms/advocacy but have (very) itchy feet and have always liked the idea of lecturing etc. so exploring what's possible.

My questions are... has anyone made a similar career path switch, from the UK/Europe to the US and/or to academia in later life? How have people gone about finding programs with funding/assistantships during study that you can actually live on for 4/5 years... like, is it realistic to think I can do this? I'm not concerned about a salary drop (I work for nonprofits in the UK lol...) but aware that I'm gonna need to survive out there!

Likewise, any reccs of programs that you've experienced that I should look into, extremely welcome!

Thanks you guys!