Questions tagged [career]
For questions about careers and jobs in mathematics (inside and outside academia)
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Etiquette of publishing folklore results
I am wondering what is the etiquette of publishing a "folklore" result?
Though special cases of the result are well-known, the proof is not readily available in any reference text or paper I've seen....
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Are there any informal rules to follow before submitting a paper? [closed]
EDIT Possibly my question might sound strange, sorry about that. I got a PhD in another country years ago. Recently I moved to the US and have a tenured position. Assume I wrote a paper and want to ...
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How hard is it for a teaching-oriented lecturer to get tenure in mathematics in the United States? [closed]
My questions is different from this post.
Suppose a math's PhD is
1) not very successful in his PhD program research and fails to find an ideal postdoc.(But he is still eligible to gain a PhD ...
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Does one need an external, peer-reviewed grant to become tenured faculty in this field? [closed]
As a secondary question, how important is it to be awarded grants to remain employed as a PhD mathematician at an academic research institution? Is it common or uncommon for PhD mathematicians to have ...
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Partial differential equations outside of academia [closed]
I've seen a number of career/jobs questions on mathoverflow before, so I thought I would ask. Please excuse me if this isn't the best place for this specific question. Lately I've been really ...
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Is it possible to have a research career while checking the proof of every theorem that you cite?
A colleague raised the above question with me; more precisely he said:
Suppose that a mathematician were resolved not to publish any theorems
unless they had checked the proof of every theorem ...
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Adapting arguments and plagiarism
I'm currently working on my PhD thesis. I have several suggested problems to work on, some of them are very similar to some problems that my advisor have worked before and published already, either in ...
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When a journal doesn't give your work a fair chance [closed]
There is no way around the fact that determinations about the relative contributions of papers and journal acceptances will always be highly subjective. In addition, editors and referees are busy ...
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Is it possible to pursue a career in mathematics only working within a small subset of the subject? [closed]
This is a bit of a meta question I guess but I was wondering to what extent does a career mathematician need to use multiple areas of math in their profession?
Example, is it possible to exclusively ...
0
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1
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Computational Algebra and Symbolic Computation - Where? [closed]
Following the line of this question, I'm in my last year of M.Sc., and I'm looking for a place where I can start my PHD. Since that question has been asked 4 years ago, I thought it may be wise to ask ...
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What would you do if you improve your own result that is submitted but not published?
Here is a hypothetical situation:
You have proven a result and written up a paper about it. You have submitted your article to some journal and it is being reviewed.
While you are waiting, you have ...
0
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1
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Will this be a case of self plagiarism or will it annoy the referee? [closed]
About 2 months ago, I uploaded a fairly long paper (P1) to arXiv and it is currently under review.
Now, I am writing a second paper (P2) on a somewhat different topic. But quite unexpectedly, it ...
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Use of an appendix in a long paper
I am writing a long paper (around 100 pages). I would consider 50 pages of it interesting in that it solves a problem of some significance in my field and contains an number of difficult ideas in the ...
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Publication in proceedings
Why and how publishing a paper in proceedings?
What are the difference with a "classical" journal?
What's the list of the main proceedings in which one can publish?
Do proceedings papers (never, ...
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Research and exposition: how does writing "basic" books affect your "serious" research work?
I can see the benefit of writing a mathematical monograph: you revise and organize your own work and recollect the key ideas of your own research. But this applies only to books aimed at researchers ...
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Collaboration or acknowledgment?
This post is a sequel of: When should a supervisor be a co-author?
This time the topic is about the interaction between two professional mathematicians (in particular junior-senior, but not ...
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Graduate program applications that require questionnaires and other non-letter material
In the December 2014 AMS Notices, a letter to the editor (http://www.ams.org/notices/201411/rnoti-p1311.pdf) by Deconinck and Medlock addresses the problem of (math) graduate programs requiring letter ...
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Where to find (personal) motivation [closed]
I think it would be appropriate to make this question CW...
It is likely that this question will not survive here on MO for long, but I do hope that the community gives it a chance. I also hope to ...
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transition from academia to industry [closed]
crossposted to https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/23644/transition-from-academia-to-industry
I am currently doing a post-doc in pure Math [teaching and research] in the US.
The academic ...
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What areas of pure mathematics research are best for a post-PhD transition to industry?
I have a student who is looking to start a PhD in pure mathematics. She is talented and motivated, and will do quite well. She is still in a phase of her development where she is still open to the ...
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How to choose a good place for postdocs [closed]
I am finishing my Ph.D. and I am waiting to hear back from postdocs. I don't have offers yet (although I heard that some schools have already offered) but I have a question about how to tell which ...
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Advice for pure-math Phd students [closed]
Pursuing a Phd in pure math can be a daunting task. A number of students who begin a Phd in pure math don't complete it, and there are high-quality dissertations and those which are not so high ...
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Is it worthwhile to give off-topic talks?
I am a graduate student. Occasionally for some reason I am asked to give a talk on my research at a conference whose stated purpose is almost completely unrelated to my research. To preserve my ...
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Beginner's questions on the post-doc application
I am going on the (research oriented) post-doc job market (mainly in the US) this winter and would like to ask some questions. I am aware of the site http://academia.stackexchange.com, but I am ...
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How do you not forget old math?
I am trying to not forget my old math. I finished my PhD in real algebraic geometry a few years ago and then switched to the industry for financial reasons. Now I get the feeling that I want to do a ...
4
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2
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Industry jobs involving mathematics, machine learning and biology [closed]
I have a MSc in Mathematics and a PhD in Bioinformatics (in two different European countries); during the PhD I was developing computational methods to analyse DNA sequence data, mainly using a ...
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Preparing for Set Theory Research
Is reading Jech's text on Set Theory too little, just enough, or overkill to prepare oneself to do independent research in set theory? This would be my first attempt at doing independent research ...
12
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0
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State of research in moduli space of flat connections
I am a recent PhD student trying to settle into a research topic. Even though I have a current project I am working on, I am not particularly enjoying it and would like to switch. Before braving the ...
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Research topics restricted to students at top universities?
Hello everybody.
I am a Ph.D student in North America looking for advice about my prospective research area.
My supervisor works in a research area, let's say area A, so as soon as I was accepted as ...
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1
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How to find a topic to do research with as a Post-Doc? [closed]
I will soon finish my PhD in arithmetic geometry. My advisor told me that I will have to find my next research topic on my own. How do I do that? (Except for "continue where the PhD thesis ends") Can ...
user19475
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Does this qualify as "self plagiarism" or something?
Over the last few years, I have been writing several papers in the same direction as part of a research program. This means that the same exact setup is introduced at the beginning of each of my ...
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What does a mathematician expect from mathematics education? [closed]
Consider that my question is not a personal and/or subjective question. Perhaps, you have hired a mathematics educator in your department and you are interested in finding a way to communicate with ...
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Is it possible to get another math PhD
My undergrad being in a field other than mathematics (and not in the US), I couldn't get into the Princeton/Harvard/MIT tier of universities for my math PhD. I settled for a lesser program and got my ...
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how do I withdraw my submitted paper? [closed]
I submitted a paper and unfortunately, about a week later, found a glaring error in reasoning in one of the proofs. Since the paper had been submitted only 1 week, the journal website said it hadnt ...
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Should one attack hard problems? [closed]
When I applied for a PhD student position I had an interview with two professors. Somehow we touched the problem if $P$ is $NP$ and, once we got there, for some reason both professors made it clear ...
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How should a professor feel peace of mind when a student leaves academia? [closed]
I apologize if this is the wrong forum for this question -- if so, could somebody please point me to the correct one?
I'm a professor who recently started advising graduate students, and I'm trying ...
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Some career start-up (postdoc) questions [closed]
Hi, I hope below can be categorized under career questions.
Based on your experiences what are the major issues/concerns and differences of professor sponsored postdoc positions (compared to ...
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Shortlists and job offers [closed]
I hope this question is appropriate for MO. I started application process this year. I've searched several online ads for a job and found a wiki page, which contains names of people that have been ...
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Publishing a bad paper?
First, I apologize if mathoverflow is a bad fit for this question, but it is the only place where I can think to get advice from professionals given my circumstance. I'm also sorry about any vagueness ...
18
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2
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The non-traveling mathematician problem
This is a career question. I have just begun a research postdoc position in Southern California. It has been hard, but I've enjoyed teaching my first graduate courses and working on research and ...
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Training towards research on birational geometry/minimal model program
Being a not yet enrolled independently supervised graduate student in mathematics, with prospects of applying to American graduate schools hopefully in a 1-2 years' time, I have a background of having ...
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Seven pages -- too long for a research statement for postdoc application?
My question is rather straight forward. I am currently applying for postdoctoral positions in (pure) mathematics. I am almost done writing my research statement and it seems to come out to about seven ...
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Publication and Career as a fresh Ph.D
This may be a little off topic.
But as new Ph.D in geometry/topology area, I have a feeling that it is relatively harder to publish a descent paper. However after seeing some peers who study PDE or ...
39
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What can an algebraic geometer do outside academia? [closed]
This question is inspired by this
and this. But it is not a duplicate, read on. Please don't close it: I choose to be anonymous just not to be identified.
About to be on the job market, disenchanted ...
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going from one subject in PhD to another in Postdoc. [closed]
Hi, my question is:
Is it acceptable to do a PhD in mathematics in a topic such as Number Theory and or Analysis and change subjects in postdoc to something different than these topics such as ...
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Contacting an eminent mathematician
I have recently started a PhD. and am researching an area that two now eminent mathematicians devoted considerable time to in the 1980s. However, there appears to have been fairly moderate focus on ...
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Does your dissertation matter for industry research jobs?
Suppose Mr A. is a graduate student who, for some reason, does not want to go into teaching or academic research. Mr A. did a Doctoral dissertation, but it is in a narrow area. This area is not ...
23
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How to assess research "impact" for tenure/promotion committees
Over the last several years, the college-level promotion & tenure committee at my university has increasingly been seeking to apply "objective" criteria for assessing the impact of candidates' ...
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Changing Careers: Becoming a Professional Mathematician
First, I apologize if this question is too soft or doesn't comport precisely with what is considered a good question, but I know of no other place to ask it.
A little background: I obtained an ...
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How to make the move to a research university from a liberal arts school?
Some mathematicians are in positions that emphasize teaching at predominantly undergraduate colleges but find themselves desiring positions at research universities. This may happen because their ...