TakeruK

I'm going to give you some thoughts on what you wrote. I hope they are helpful as the point of view of a third party. Keep in mind though that I'm not from a bench science so my field might have a few differences in terms of culture. But also, I suspect lab-to-lab culture would vary a lot more than the difference between my experience with my research group and you with your lab. 1. I think it's really important to learn to never ever call people out in email. Especially if you are not able to tell when you are calling people out (as it sounds like from your description). Whenever I write an email, I always always double check to not reply-all unless I really want it to be reply-all. I set my Gmail default to "reply" not "reply-all" for this reason. My experience with this is mostly in emails with collaborators/coauthors. One thing to keep in mind is that asking questions, especially when it's in text form without context, can easily be misconstrued as "calling someone out" or "doubting their research". So, if I working with some coauthors and e.g. a paper draft gets circulated to the list and I have some questions about the methods used, I would never email the entire author list with questions. That would certainly sound like I was calling out the person that did the work. I would just email that single person individually and ask. 2. In my field's culture, it was totally inappropriate of you to expect the undergraduates to have stayed to finish the work beyond 5pm, unless there was a lab protocol that expected to stay for certain times. Even though you are assigned undergraduate help, the description here sounded like you expected them to drop whatever they were doing at 4:30 and come help you when your samples were ready for the next step. I feel like there could have been room for a ton of misunderstanding because i) the undergrads might not have known that you were expecting them to help at that time and ii) the undergrads might have expected more advance warning (e.g. you probably knew that you were planning to do your step of the sample handling before that afternoon, could you have told them your plan and asked ahead of time if they would be available?). 3. There is no such thing, to an undergrad, as a "friendly discussion" between the "three of you" (you, the faculty member and the undergrad), especially if the topic of the conversation is how the undergrad screwed up. It might have seemed friendly and innocent to you, but having been the undergrad in that position before, I can certify that it absolutely sucks. It feels like you are a child in trouble at the Principal's office. I'm not saying that students should not be "debriefed" when they make mistakes---they definitely need to learn! But I'm just saying that this scenario that you described as "friendly" read as very "not friendly" to me. Overall, my honest opinion is that there is one common theme between all three issues here. It is that you present your interpretation of events as the "truth" and the interpretation by others as "misconstrued". However, I think if you want to move forward and create better working relationships, it's absolutely critical that you stop thinking of other interpretations of misunderstandings of your intentions. Instead, I would suggest that you think of all of your colleagues' interpretations as equally valid alternative interpretation to yours. That is, I think you have been focussing so much on your intent and that all of your attempts to fix the problems have been to clarify your intent. However, I think the best way to move forward is to think more about your impact. And when things don't go well, think about what actions you can take to change the impact you have on your colleagues. That is, if you find that they were upset by something you said or did, instead of just trying to explain your intentions so that it "makes sense" to them the same way it makes sense to you, you can try to make amends by doing something that would have a positive impact instead. I hope that was helpful? I bolded the impact/intent words because these are the words I've learned in my training, and the mantra "impact, not intent" is what matters. Here, I might be leaving out a ton of details/info that are obvious to me but if they don't make sense, we could certainly talk about them further. Especially since even though you have provided some details, there could be further details that make my analysis not as valid. I would suggest that in your new quest to repair relationships, you start with the lab manager and other graduate students and work your way to the undergraduates.

One interesting thing that our department does is a "progressive bar crawl". The first place is first year graduate students + prospectives only and it's usually a dinner place where you can get some drinks if you wanted. It's a good time for some one-on-one conversations from people who are very "fresh" from the application stage. This is like 6pm to 8pm. Then, the group moves onto a pub/bar type place where it's mostly drinks and maybe some snacks. At this stage, the older graduate students are invited to join as well so it switches to a much more social setting. This would probably go 8pm to 11pm or so, depending on what the group is feeling. It's 100% acceptable to leave after the dinner stage or at any time during this stage, though. In recent years, we have done better in picking places for the second stage that is not just pure alcohol service---something that would have fun drinks and activities as well (for example, a place with coffee and alcohol as well as pool tables etc.). But we can still improve and we're being more careful in picking places that offer more variety.

Hi Catria, I'm also so happy about our recent election results! Although the new Prime Minister's time in office has been short, I am currently very optimistic about the new direction our country is taking on research!! You will definitely qualify as per the eligibility requirements, as Oshawott stated above. Assuming you drop out at the end of this semester, and that you started in September 2015, you would have completed 4 months of a doctoral program. And, since you were admitted to this doctoral program directly from your undergraduate program, this means that you are eligible as long as, by December 31 of the year of your application, you have completed between 4 and 36 months. In addition, if this number is above 24 months, then you would only be eligible for a 2-year PGS-D. Since you already missed the application for Fall 2016 awards (that was Oct 15 2015), the next award you can apply to is for awards starting Fall 2017. Therefore, if you start a new graduate program in Fall 2016 (after taking 8 months off), then you will be eligible for the PGS-D for award year 2017-2018 (you'd completed 8 months by December 31 of the application year = 2016), and award year 2018-2019 (20 months), and award year 2019-2020 (32 months). Note that if you end up applying for award year 2019-2020, you would be eligible for just the 2-year PGS-D. Alternatively, if you wait a year and start a new graduate program in Fall 2017, then you will be eligible for the PGS-D award for award year 2017-2018 (4 months completed by December of application year = 2016), award year 2018-2019 (8 months), award year 2019-2020 (20 months) and award year 2020-2021 (32 months; but this will limit you to the 2-year PGS-D). The important thing I wanted to point out is that you don't have to worry about getting the PGS-D before getting into another PhD program--you'll have a few years after starting a new program before you are no longer eligible. In fact, many students do not get PGS-Ds until a year or two into their doctoral program. And, I want to also point out that the CGS-M is also still available to you, should you choose to attend a Canadian Masters or a Canadian direct-PhD program instead of a US program. All of the above examples were for direct-PhD US programs since I noticed you specified PGS-D, not CGS-D. To qualify for a CGS-M, you need to have completed between 0-12 months of a graduate program, and leaving before the end of the academic year will mean that you will be qualified for the CGS-M both prior to and during your first year of your Canadian Masters (or Canadian direct-PhD program). --- Okay all of that was just quantitative eligibility. The other issue to consider, that you brought up, is the chances of receiving such an award after dropping out of an existing PhD program. I don't have direct experience with this but I have some thoughts that may be helpful to consider. I will be honest---I hope it doesn't sound too harsh. But I am hoping that honesty is more helpful to you than pretending everything is fine and that you will appreciate that. First, the fact that you dropped out of an existing program will definitely hurt your chances at a PGS-D. Even though you have a very good reason to do so and that I think it is the right thing for you to do. I know you have not yet dropped out of the program, but I want to emphasize: Please do not make your decision to drop out depend on whether or not you will be eligible for NSERC awards in the future. NSERC awards are nice but your own health is much much more important. I also have experience with PGS-D at a US school and because of the reduced award value and the huge cost of grad students to the school, having this PGS-D award does not make a huge difference. In terms of monetary impact, it's a lot less valuable to US schools than US awards like NSF. Yes, the prestige value is still there, but it's not worth your health. Second, you have a small section in the PGS-D application under the "Applicant's Statement" (Part III, "special circumstances"). This is the only place where you, as the applicant, can write anything about your circumstances. Note that the entire section (Parts I through Part III) can only be 2 pages, so this will be a fairly limited area. Here you must advocate for yourself that you will succeed in the new graduate program. Unfortunately, I do not have any tips on how to do this well/successfully. Perhaps resources on campus right now could help you, from the Counseling Center and/or your professors that know you. It might be a good idea to continue to meet with the Counseling Center on campus until you actually leave and this could be one of the conversations you have near the end. Third, I think the LORs will be a very relevant part of your NSERC application. I think it would be very important to get some sort of favourable letter from someone in your current program for NSERC. I hope you can find someone who has been supportive of you and able to speak to your qualities. This is not absolutely necessary though, but I think something to keep in mind as you prepare to leave. --- And finally, I think if you are thinking about future graduate work, I would first think about applying to graduate programs again before the PGS-D. As I showed in the timelines above, you don't have to get a PGS-D before getting into another PhD program. I think the fact that you are doing well in a new PhD program would go a long way towards helping you get the PGS-D. From your past posts, I really think that you could benefit from some time away from school to reassess what you would want and how you would work with the stress of graduate student life. I think your own mental and physical health should take priority over any of these above things. After you take care of that, then you can see how you feel about PhD programs and after that, think about awards like the PGS-D. Don't forget that you are eligible for the PGS-D for quite a while!

I think this is a tricky situation that doesn't have a single clear answer because it depends on a lot of factors. But if you want some generalizations about research-based PhD programs (as opposed to professional or Masters programs), I would say: If you are holding onto a funded offer for Fall 2015 but both parties have agreed that you will start in Fall 2016, then I would say that this is effectively you committing to said offer and it would be poor form for you to still be applying to other schools for Fall 2016. However, you have to do what you have to do---if you have changed your mind about going to this school in Fall 2016, then you should let them know that you are no longer interested, withdraw your spot and apply elsewhere. If you are holding onto an unfunded offer for Fall 2015, and the school is allowing you to start in Fall 2016 instead, then I would say what rising_star says would apply. I would say that you don't have any commitment (legal or otherwise) to this school and you should be applying to funded programs if that's what you're seeking. In addition, even if the school says you would be considered for funding in Fall 2016, this does not change anything. In short, I think you are only ethically bound to the school if they have promised you funding for the deferred start date. If you are in this situation but still want to apply to other programs, my opinion is that you should let the school know otherwise you could be burning a lot of bridges. But again, each case is different and the general advice might not apply to each specific case.

In addition to what Monochrome Spring said, many schools will not combine all of your courses together into one GPA (e.g. the "3.7"). Instead, they will keep the GPA from your home university and the GPA from your exchange university as two separate programs and GPAs. After all, each school has its own GPA system and combining them would not be a good idea. You can rest assured that it is very likely that the schools you apply to will put a much higher weight on your home university's GPA.

These are things I wrote in my personal history statement when I wrote one: 1. Wrote about my experience as a first generation college student. 2. Wrote about my experience working in the summers to pay for college tuition because my family has no savings for college and I don't want to take the risk of having a student loan. 3. Wrote about why I am motivated to pursue higher education: my parents were refugees that fled their home country after a war so they had no chance to pursue any sort of education. They gave up their old lives to move to Canada where they know their future children would have a better chance. 4. Wrote about all of my non-academic reasons for wanting a graduate degree. I interpreted the personal history statement to write about me, as a person. I didn't write about my research experience at all. Instead, I thought about two questions: "What challenges have I overcome to get to where I am? and "Why am I applying to graduate school?". The answers to these questions that were professional/academic related went into my SOP. The ones that were more personal than academic went into my Personal History Statement.

I would interpret question #1 as undergraduate level only. For #2, I am not sure---my instinct would be to interpret "ethical/professional misconduct" as related to academic integrity. I think the best thing to do is to ask the school. You can keep the details vague and you should also contact them from an email address or phone number that is not associated with you. Also, you will likely be talking to someone in the graduate office, not your program/department (the program will be the one making the real admission decision).

compared to General GRE: yes, it's not any different and I would have also said that the general GRE should be optional, but I didn't want to get too off topic (since the OP is discussing subject GRE). compared to doing well in unrelated classes or finding time for research: I am not sure why it has to be all or nothing. What I mean is that if a student only has X hours outside of classwork to do things that will help their graduate school chances, then having fewer required things will help students with limited resources. For example, if all programs made the Physics GRE optional, then if the student invests all X hours into research, they can demonstrate excellence there. Or, if they invest all X hours into doing really well in coursework (maybe their school doesn't have research opportunities), then they can demonstrate excellence there. But if you require the Physics GRE as well as the other things, then excellent researchers without a ton of spare time will have to split their efforts and look worse on paper. This argument takes into account these assumptions though: 1. Doing well on the Physics GRE is not necessary to do well in graduate school. 2. A school usually asks for students to provide information on many things: X, Y, Z, etc. such as LORs, GPA, GREs, research experience etc. I'm working under the assumption (as has been my experience in graduate school) that grad schools don't necessarily only want students that have excellence in all categories. Instead, most graduate schools seem to want to use the application process as a way to identify excellence. Each item, X, Y, Z etc. is another chance for an applicant to show excellence. 3. Schools are trying to ensure they get a variety and diversity of excellence---that is, not just the "traditional" grad student route and that schools are careful to ensure their application system does not "weed out" students they actually want to attend but don't meet the "mold". So, if that is the case, I think schools will be better off being less restrictive on what materials are submitted. Instead of treating applications as a "test" or a "trial" where they look for reasons to reject, they can allow candidates to submit their best materials and look for reasons to accept. The down side is that with more variety in materials submitted, it could mean more work for the admissions committees. But I think it's worth it.

To add to the reply from fuzzy though, in my field, there's a reason why it's not anonymous. It's because the school wants to also gauge the chances of you accepting the offer that is made. For example, for a particular subfield in my program, our biggest competitor is Harvard. Almost every single person that do not accept our offer in this subfield goes to Harvard. And, we have also noticed that students with attributes/interests XYZ (not giving details for some anonymity) tend to choose Harvard more often than not, if they have Harvard as a choice. So, if we are aiming for, say, 6 students, we might normally make 10 offers. However, if say, 5 of them have attributes XYZ and also have applied to Harvard, we know we might want to make a few extra offers just in case. On the other hand, if say, 8-9 out of the 10 do not have Harvard listed, then we are more certain that they will come here and might stick to only 10 offers. This information does not affect your own offer, but it could be used to help the program decide how many other offers to make. My school will certainly not say "well this person applied to Harvard and is probably good enough to get in, therefore we don't want this excellent student" (?!?!!) At least in my experience, this type of information is not used to hurt you in any way (and I can't really think of a reason for a school to not want a student because they applied to a certain other school). Also, even if you leave it blank, if you have an interview or any contact with the faculty there, one of the most common questions you'll be asked is "where else are you considering?". I always ask this when I meet prospective students because I might have visited the same places and their followup question is often "Why did you pick [your school] over [other school]?". It's certainly fine to leave the field blank, and it's also fine to be evasive if you get the question in-person. Be just be prepared to have a smooth answer so that it doesn't sound weird. After all, if you replied "I don't want to tell!" to that question in person, it would be strange behaviour. Instead, if you asked what other schools are your top choices, you can say something like "Well, I'm not sure yet until I visit them!". In my field though, although we certainly compete with other schools, it is friendly---a prof here might even suggest certain colleagues at other programs for you to talk to during your visit there.

I used to think the same way but recently, I have been revising these thoughts. I now personally believe that (and advocate for, whenever possible) schools should have a minimal amount of required items and then have a large list of possible "optional" items. The reasoning is that excellence can be defined and demonstrated in a lot of different ways and I think schools should strive to recruit a large diversity of excellence. When you have a strict list of things you are considering then you are strictly defining excellence to be a narrow thing. Students that are excellent but don't fit into the narrow mold would not do well in this system. The Physics subject GRE in particular is a polarizing test in my field. Many people think it's not very effective because doing poorly on it doesn't really mean you're a bad physicist. But doing well on it could mean you really know your stuff. And others do argue that the Physics GRE is something that is more of an "equalizer" for those with non-traditional backgrounds---for example, students in countries without a Physics undergrad degree program can use a high Physics GRE score in order to demonstrate excellence in that way. However, there are also other thoughts that show the Physics GRE places others at a disadvantage. For example, if a student is working part-time to pay tuition or supporting a family, the extra time required to study for and do well in the Physics GRE can be a barrier. Also, if you are living in rural parts of the United States or outside of the United States, then it's even harder and more prohibitive to register for and write the test. Rejecting students on the basis of poor Physics GRE scores alone is generally a bad practice. So, to me, I think the clear answer is to make the Physics GRE scores optional! If you are able to do well in the Physics GRE, then you should be able to submit it and demonstrate your excellence there. However, if you are not able to do well in it (or if you don't want to do it), then you don't have to submit it and you should not be penalized. Instead, you can demonstrate your excellence through other means. To me, I think this fits the purpose of graduate admissions a lot better---the goal is to find signs of excellence in the applications, not signs of failure, so we should structure the applications to give students the best chance to demonstrate why they are great for our programs. (Note: All of this is assuming your post means you want schools to just say things are "required" or "not required" and remove categories like "recommended" or "optional". I agree with you that "recommended" is useless but "optional" is a good category. "Recommended" places a value judgement that shouldn't be there if you really intend it to be optional. So if this is also what you meant then I guess I'm not really saying anything new :))

In academia, there really isn't a difference between a resume and a CV. Many applications that ask for one or the other would use the terms interchangeably. Some people use the convention that a resume is a short version of a CV but that's not universal either. You can google some grad students in your field/departments you want to apply for and see what their CV/resumes look like. If it helps, my section headings are: Education Research Experience Publications and Presentations Awards (research fellowships) Teaching & Outreach Volunteer & Service For Research Experience, for each item, I listed 2 or 3 bullet points that described the project in greater detail. Publications & Presentations and Awards are just simple lists. The last two section has 1 bullet point per item (usually the item heading was the position/organization and the single bullet point was a summary of the responsibilities). For schools that didn't impose a length limit, with this format, my CV was between 2-3 pages. In academia, there is usually no "one page" limit, unlike what we might have learned in high school. So, there's no need for little tricks to condense all your items to fit into 1 page (e.g. making the font size of the empty lines smaller, playing with margins etc.). I took advantage of the no page limit to give all my sections good white space so they look visually appealing. The schools that did have length limits had a limit of 2 pages. In these cases, I didn't try to change the format too much to squeeze things in. Instead, I just removed or shortened some descriptions so that it fit (e.g. maybe only show 2 presentations instead of all N etc.)

This is okay. The school needs to know your SSN because they are paying you and need to report your income to the IRS. You do have to be careful with your SSN. You should only provide it to services you trust and only when it's actually necessary (sometimes places will ask for it even though it's not necessary). Your school is an example of a place you can trust and must provide SSN information. It's not a problem that they have a photocopy of the card. In fact, the card itself is not very important. I keep my SSN with me on a slip of paper in my wallet, and never actually take the card anywhere. When I need to provide my SSN (e.g. at the DMV), I just read off or copy from my slip of paper. If your school uses your SSN in a bad way, then they will get into a lot of trouble. Also, according to FERPA regulations, the school must take a lot of measures to keep your SSN safe. It's in your student record, but they are not able to tell anyone the number unless it's a school office/official that needs to know (e.g. perhaps the Payroll department to fill out your tax forms).

It used to be this way. I had it administered this way and I felt it was much more advantageous for the student. I could use my CGS-M as leverage when making decisions. However, I can see how it could hurt schools. In particular, the best students (the ones who get the CGS-M) are going to want to go to the best schools. So, the allocation of federal dollars would end up being disproportionately heavy on the schools that probably already have lots of other funding. Also, there used to be a rule that supervisors with NSERC grants can't use their NSERC grants to pay grad students with NSERC CGS-M, PGS-D, or CGS-D awards. This meant even more inefficiencies in federal allocation of money. Now, each university has an allocation that they can provide to their top students. I don't think it will necessarily be more competitive at smaller schools, because the top students will still be vying for positions at the top schools. I think this change will help schools outside of the top 3 (in my field: UBC, McGill, Toronto, in no particular order) gain quality students and catch up. This is good for Canada and students overall as we will have more places producing great research.

Call to ask if you're uncertain, but this is what I've done and it was not a problem for me :)

I can't make the decision for you but my point of view is that if you want to be a gynecologist while also being an activist, it makes more sense to pursue the MSc and scientific training now/first. I am sure the MA program would also advance your understanding and your ability to be an effective activist but at this point, I think the MSc will do more for you. You will have more opportunities and resources in the short term so that you can become a more powerful ally and activist in the long term. Or, another way to look at it: you don't need an MA to be a LBGT activist, but you will need a MSc to become a gynecologist. Also, you can also consider how much good and activism you can do as an activist/ally while in fields other than LGBT-related work. I personally think it would be great to have activists for diversity studying all the fields out there! Of course, this is just my personal opinion and personal take on things but hope it helps you decide for yourself! :)

At best, this will do nothing. At worst, it will hurt you.

Oh I see, I guess it's really different than anything I'm used to then! In Canada, you often find a project/supervisor first too, but they would already be attached to a school (so then you would just apply to whatever school they are at). You would only get an acceptance letter when you are accepted to that school. So that's why I was confused. It does sound like a strange situation, hope you are able to figure it out!

I want to just clarify that I don't mean to make you feel like you have to defend yourself or that I don't believe that you are asking useful questions! It's just hard to offer any further thoughts without more information. Moving on, I am a little confused when you say "I need to find a university here to get my PhD in" ? Aren't you already accepted to the PhD program at the University where this professor works? Also I have another question for you---when you say HR person, do you mean the Human Resources department staff at the University? Or as you later mention (and someone else asked), the professor's administrative assistant or lab manager instead? If it's the Human Resources staff, then it is a little strange unless you are only asking about employment related things. If it's an administrative assistant or a lab manager, then that's perfectly normal. Especially in big labs, for questions that are logistics based (e.g. where is my mailbox? how do I get paid? do I get a desk or computer?), it makes sense for someone else to handle these requests. The admin person for the lab might be an administrative assistant, but it could also be a postdoc or a staff scientist.

I think this is spot on advice on how to not sound like "an undergrad". An "undergrad mindset" would be thinking "My goal is to get an A, what do I have to do to achieve that?", while a "graduate student mindset" would be the approach "What is my paper lacking? How can I improve it?". You can also bring in the past papers for the course and talk about how you could improve those papers and apply what you have learned to your final paper.

I don't think it is necessarily a problem. What kind of questions are you asking? If it's research related, I think it makes sense for you to wait until you arrive before talking about it. After all, you are not yet being paid to think about the work and neither is the professor responsible for you until you begin on December 1. I guess it's hard to tell whether this is weird or not without knowing the nature of your questions!

Exactly. Well, the science is important too, but they are not focussed on whether or not you complete said project, but instead on your ability to identify a good research problem, demonstrate your preparedness and that you will be able to potentially complete it. Also, yeah, the CGS-M had almost one major change every year starting in 2012, so I guess they are still trying to figure out what the new standard will be.

This might depend more on the field, but if I was answering this question, I would only provide awards that are on a similar level to those listed. For this specific question, it looks like they are looking for awards that will fund graduate level work. That is, awards that you can take to their school should you get a spot in their PhD program, rather than awards already granted for undergraduate work. But sometimes they do want to know that information too. In that case, some criteria you could use to determine whether it's a "major award" like this are: 1. Awards which you had to apply and compete for, not those that are granted to the top X% of the class by the University. 2. Awards which were granted based on submitting a research proposal (this may be field dependent) and/or granted so that you can do research work. (The criteria for granting the award may still be coursework based though, especially for undergraduate research awards). 3. Monetary value---in my field, I'd say awards that are the equivalent of $10,000/year or more (so if it's a 3-month summer research award, then it should be valued at least at $2,500). But this is just an arbitrary number based on the norms in my field.

It's been awhile since I have been part of the very large classes (either as a student or a TA). I don't think it's weird that the TAs have answers to the problem sets before the problem set is due. In the classes I TA now, I definitely have the answers ahead of time (sometimes they are provided to me and sometimes it's because I created the problem set myself). I think it is perfectly ethical for TAs to be instructed to "lead" students to the right answer. I think whether or not the instructor chooses to run the class this way is the prerogative of the instructor, because it's a matter of teaching philosophy, not academic honesty. I actually choose to TA/teach in this way. For our courses, the instructor and I do not consider problem sets to be testing situations---that is, the point of the problem set is not to test whether each student understood the material. Instead, we believe the problem set is the way students will absorb and understand the material. So, in my tutorial/recitation sections, I basically discuss a strategy and outline the steps to the solution for all of the homework problems. In other classes (where the problem set is meant to test understanding), the TAs would be outlining steps to similar problems, but in my classes, I outline the steps to the actual problems. When students are stuck, I give them hints so that they are lead to the right answer. We expect that all of our students will score close to 100% on the homework if they complete the homework. We do this because we're following pedagogical research that students must construct their own knowledge and one way to do so is to "do" the material, not just sit in a classroom and listen to a lecture. And when I outline the steps, we follow scaffolding strategies where we might provide more details in the beginning and then remove them a bit at time as the term progresses. As I said, it's a matter of teaching philosophy on how the head instructor/head TA wants to treat problem sets. The role ethics / academic honesty would play in this situation is not whether or not TAs are leading students to the answer, but whether or not all 20 TAs are trained the same way so that all the students in the class get the same treatment. It would not be fair if 15 out of the 20 TAs were doing one thing while the remaining 5 did their own things. Here, the onus and responsibility is on the department / head instructor to ensure consistency between their TAs (this could require TAs attend a "sync-up" meeting each week or whatever). --- I do think it's a little weird that the proctors get answer keys for the exams before they need them to grade the exams though. In the exams I'm used to (especially the big classes), proctors are not supposed to answer any questions about the exam contents at all. So, they don't need the exam keys. Pretty much the only things you can talk to a proctor for are things like extra scrap paper, confirming if a page is missing, questions about logistics (how much time is left?) etc. Sometimes the head instructor says no one can ever ask any clarification questions at all, and others say such questions can only be answered by the instructor (not the TA) so that everyone gets the same response. Again, I think the main ethical/honesty problem is whether or not all students have the same access to the same resources during the exam. If each one of the 20 TAs have the keys and are answering questions about exam content, it's very hard to keep it consistent (but possible with adequate training). And also, of course, exams can be structured in different ways due to different teaching philosophies. Exams at this school may follow different formats than the school(s) you've been to in the past because they might be seeking different outcomes/goals. However, from your description here, it doesn't sound like this is the case. The homework issue may or may not be explained by a difference in goals/philosophies though. --- Finally, I think the best thing for you to do, if you are still concerned and want to take action, is to talk to the course instructor and head TA. Maybe pick just one concrete issue to talk about / frame the conversation. The distribution of answer keys and worry that each of the proctors will say different things to students during the exam sounds like a good one. Bring it up as a concern without accusing anyone of trying to encourage cheating and ask them what the reasons are for providing proctors with solutions. Maybe there is a good one? Anyways, maybe you can work this out through discussion. If you still feel that there is something unethical happening, then I think you should discuss it with the next appropriate authority. But please do look out for yourself too---people don't generally like being accused of academic dishonesty so be careful that you are not hurting yourself!

Agree with this x1000, for this context and almost every other context. Whenever you make a request or ask for a concession, you always always should ask for what you actually need. Don't say "2 more weeks please" if you don't even know that you will find out from the other school in 2 weeks. And, there's no point asking for only half of what you need! Other examples are: if you are applying for funding for travel to a conference and you need $600, then you should just ask for $600 and if they only grant you $300, well at least that's $300 less you have to find from another source. (Of course, this includes the reasonable assumption that you won't be asking for more than the maximum allowable, e.g. if a grant has a firm maximum request of $500, then requesting $600 is silly).

Sorry to hear this It must be really frustrating to encounter these editors acting as "gatekeepers"! Since your committee says your paper is well written, it's likely they are seeing it from a reviewer point of view, not the editor's point of view. It really sounds like that the problem is not you, but these editors/journals weird decisions. You already know this but I'll say it anyways---you didn't screw up your thesis and you are not a crappy scientist. Have you talked to your thesis advisor / committee members / coauthors about these editor responses? Maybe they have some tips or strategies. One thing that is possible in my field is to include a cover letter with your submission. In this cover letter, you could specifically point out how your paper meets the journals' goals and "jurisdiction". I've seen cover letters that explicitly cite similar articles previously published by the same journal. Would it be possible to resubmit to one of the first two journals with a cover letter to address the original concerns (and whatever changes to the manuscript necessary)? Also if it helps, I have some horror stories with editors too: one of our group's paper got turned away from by the editor multiple times and there were multiple revisions and resubmissions before it got to the referee stage; another person had an ineffective editor that let the referee get away with not responding for almost a year (normal time for review is 4-6 weeks here); and another person waited 11 months for the first review and is now waiting 8 months and counting for a second review. Just to be clear though, journal editors are often volunteering their time and are not really paid for this work, so I don't want to sound ungrateful. And I think the majority of experiences are effective, efficient and pleasant. But frustrations with journal editors are still something many will encounter, so you're in good company :)