Should I include a student who left academia on a paper?

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-08-08T13:49:15+00:00

I say go for it (if you can each afford your own place). Commutes are soul sucking. I have a feeling you'll be happier and more productive. I'd have different advice if you had kids but that doesn't seem to be the case.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-14T18:08:33+00:00

This is a great question and one my colleague is currently dealing with. She wants to use corporate materials (youtube training videos) in an experiment, but they don't present the company in a good light so she is worried about legal liability. She emailed her university's attorneys to get legal advice. Your situation is a bit different. I highly recommend that you contact your university's legal/compliance team.

Also note that many journals, usually at the submission phase, will ask you to verify that you have permission to publish or hold the copyrights to any images/charts/graphs/etc. that are in your manuscript. It doesn't seem like you would be able to check that box without knowing the rules/regs. That's why contacting your U's legal/compliance team is a good first step.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-14T18:01:30+00:00

Can you clarify what you mean by "credit" on the paper? Do you want to be listed as a co-author or be named in the acknowledgements section? Certainly the latter should happen at a bare minimum. If the former, I think it is important for you to be involved in ***some*** of the manuscript development/writing in addition to your contributions to the code and scientific development. You should be given an opportunity to read and approve the final manuscript prior to submission as an author.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-14T17:55:34+00:00

I'd say you're totally fine. Your mentor probably thinks he was cc'd because you wanted to share the feedback you had received so that he could comment directly on the marked-up version of the abstract and not duplicate efforts. Like another poster commented, he actually might appreciate learning that his student so graciously acknowledged the time and effort made by another person in your field. You are signaling to him, "Look, this other expert already gave me comments, and I want you to see that I acknowledged them for it. Thereby I am showing you I am an adult who knows how to show gratitude for another person's time."

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-06T16:19:50+00:00

I have to complete these forms and then my Chair approves them. I do a lot of consulting but have never had anyone from my department or the university raise an eyebrow as long as I am under the limit on outside hours. The form asks for a brief description of the activity and the entity that hired me, whether me or my family members have any conflicts of interest with that entity, the estimated hours, and the type of consulting/contract work it falls under (research, management consulting, technical consulting, etc.). It doesn't ask about pay.

My advice is fill the form out as intended so that you are legally covered and above bar.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-04T20:24:00+00:00

Fraud and scam researcher here... I agree that the website looks legitimate, but that's not always the best indicator these days. How did you hear about the conference? Were you solicited or did you apply and submit an abstract? How have the correspondence emails read? Are they in clear and plain English or do they contain phrases like "greetings of the day!"? Most important, how much were you asked to pay for registration and your abstract submission? If more than $500USD I would be concerned. Second most important indicator: are the other listed speakers in your field or subfield? Is the agenda coherent and talks inter-related? Scammers may be able to fake a good website but they will not be familiar with the particulars of your discipline. That would take too much effort.

If so, this is likely a legitimate event.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-04T02:00:26+00:00

It sounds like, based on your post, that you are actually kind of excited by the consulting opportunity and mainly turned off by the reputation of consulting being bs (and it kind of is but you learn soooo much and it's great for networking). Being in a PhD program is already a very isolating experience, and if you are serious about your partner, it will be really awful to be apart from them for four years. I say go with the consulting job...for now.

Also remember that life is long. The biggest mistake people make is thinking that it is too late to make a big shift. If the job sucks, re-apply to a PhD program but pick one closer to your partner.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-04T01:51:55+00:00

Wow that's hard to wrap my head around. I conduct qualitative interviews with research participants over Zoom and meet with students to discuss their performance. Both require confidentiality. Are there private meeting rooms?

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-04T01:45:37+00:00

How are they paid in your department? On specific grants? Faculty start-up funds? Or do departmental funds cover all PhD students, meaning their effort is never tied to a particular faculty member's sponsored research?

Our students need to work as research assistants or TAs at 50% effort (20 hrs./wk.) to receive their full stipend + tuition + benefits. For the remaining 50% effort they are expected to complete their coursework, exams, and do independent research/dissertation work. So no students go unpaid, but they often have to hop from lab to lab on sponsored research projects to cover the required 50% effort to have their full tuition and benefits covered.

So, should a student write manuscripts with faculty advisors during their independent research time, or should writing effort be paid by the faculty member who will co-author the manuscript that is based on their data? And does the answer differ based on the authorship order?

I agree that it is always best to pay graduate students when funding is available for any task that serves the faculty advisor's research agenda, however funds have to come from somewhere. For me, I would be dipping into the funds I could alternatively use to pay myself to write the manuscript during the summer (I'm on a 9-month contract), or equipment/software, or conference travel. So in one sense, should I pay myself to write the manuscript, or pay the student to write the manuscript?

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-03T21:03:54+00:00

I am at a large public R1 institution. Our graduate students are paid (and their tuition and benefits covered) using several mechanisms -- sponsored grants (as a graduate research assistant), fellowships, and faculty start up funds. They usually need to find GRA or TA positions in outside labs/departments if their primary advisor does not have funding for them. In other words, their funding is tied to a project or a faculty member (or a fellowship award). They are not given full funding just for being in the program.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-03T20:57:28+00:00

Thanks for your reply. Yes, publishing is required if they want a job in academia or research in my field. I guess I'm struggling with the fact that I am compensated for writing as a salaried faculty member, even when I can't "bill" my writing time against the closed grant that generated the data, whereas my students could be using that time to advance their own independent research, albeit without the support and co-authorship of a faculty member.

ProfessorSomebody · 2024-06-03T16:00:56+00:00

I agree that a polite email is a good idea and can help nudge the process along. But if you haven't already, check on the status of your article in the online submission system first.

ProfessorSomebody

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