TakeruK

Generally, letters are requested because the committee wants to hear from their colleagues on whether or not you would be a successful researcher and student in their graduate program. The letter writers are often asked to evaluate your abilities in coursework and research in their field. Sometimes they are asked to compare you to other students in their department. Note that for the most part, these letters are not "character references". So, with the information provided here, it's not really clear how the humanities professor can write a more relevant letter than a third math professor. That said, there are some situations where a letter from the humanities prof can be really useful: 1. You had some personal or academic situation that can be best explained by the humanities prof. For example, if you had to take a leave of absence and/or your grades in one semester suffered due to some personal situation and the humanities prof can explain this because they knew you best, then a letter from them could be helpful. Or, perhaps you began your degree intending to major in the humanities but changed track. If you did really well in the earlier track then the humanities prof can provide a different perspective of your excellence. Or, if the change caused you to take an extra year or have otherwise weird academic track, the prof can comment on that. 2. You did some research work or some impressive coursework with the professor in humanities and the prof can highlight this. 3. You know that the department you are applying to places particular extra value in their students having cross-disciplinary talents and/or you are applying to a multi-disciplinary area of work. Note that these departments are not the norm, i.e. there aren't very many "liberal arts college" equivalents in grad school. If some of the above apply, then it might be worth considering either sending the 3 math letters and an extra humanities letter or 2 math + 1 humanities if you cannot submit more than 3 letters. However, before you do any of this, have you had a long conversation with your letter writers about grad school applications yet? You say you have strong relationships with them so hopefully that means they are willing to sit down with you to talk about grad school and letters. Usually they will ask who else are you asking for letters. If you start with the two math profs that you would ask no matter what, then you can ask them whether they think a 3rd letter from a humanities prof instead of a math prof would be a good idea. And you can ask whether having an extra letter from the humanities prof instead of just 3 math letters would be better.

I know that there is a lot of variation between fields on how likely you are going to get a response. In some fields, applicants are told not to contact faculty while it is highly encouraged in others. So this is hard to tell. One common piece of advice is that if you are going to write an email to a professor, make it short and ask a direct question that they can actually answer. And the question should be something that they might feel like they are the right person to answer. For example, I think lots of professors get very generic emails saying things like "I am interested in your research, how do I apply to your lab?" and they probably ignore these questions since they are not really the right person to ask. The applicant could find this information themselves and the professor may not have any influence on the admissions process at all. However, a question to an emeritus professor to ask if they will still advise students is a good question to ask. If you ask this in a short email, and you don't get a response, you could consider it as a "no" for now. If that is the only person you are interested in at that program, I would probably not apply there. If there are 2 or 3 other people you're interested in, then I'd say apply and then try to talk to the emeritus prof again (either via email or in person if visiting) to see if they will take students. I think the question about which department to apply to is a little trickier. Some professors will reply and some will not. When I emailed professors before applying, 1 out of 3 sent no response at all. If you don't get a response, then I wouldn't take it personally, but you don't really "lose" anything**. You'll just have to proceed without the information. (** Exception: If you are in a field or a program that tells its students to not contact faculty members, then it could make you look bad. So find out what's normal in your specific fields first).

For full disclosure, in my first year leading up to quals, it was more like 50-60 hours and in my final year applying for jobs it was also 50-60 hours. Unless you don't count time applying for jobs as work (my advisor and I did though, since the effort it takes to come up with new research proposals is still work and I'm working on the extension of those ideas now in my current postdoc position). But on average, of the most part, it was 40-50 hours per week! In college, I was a commuter student (90 minutes each way, so 1.5 hours on the bus each day!) I barely had time for extra activities except for whatever I can fit in between my classes. I couldn't ever stay for evening events unless I made special arrangements (e.g. carpool) since the buses to my home stopped running around 6pm each day. During my PhD, I lived 5-15 minutes away at all times, which opened up a ton more things I could do. And there are things like gym membership included (wasn't part of my undergrad fees) and all sorts of clubs. Definitely felt much happier and fulfilled when I sought out these opportunities.

I think it's important to be realistic about your ability to make a difference and also the risks that comes to you for taking these actions. You are not helping anyone if you are acting ineffectively and harm yourself in the process. I think it's admirable that you are passionate about these issues. I am too. But I think your naive approach here is likely to do more harm than good. More harm not only to yourself but possibly to the people you're trying to help as well. If you do get your idea up and running and people submit stories, how are you going to protect their anonymity? People often only come forward if they believe the offender (whether it's harassment or other misconduct) will be properly punished. If you promise or seem to promise this to people and you don't succeed, nothing good will happen. And the people that shared their stories are now at risk because of you. No, the experienced people here aren't just telling you that your idea is bad because they want to protect the system or find excuses not to act. We are saying it's a bad idea because many of us have gone through similar processes or seen processes like this happen before. I completely agree with you that we should act when there is wrongdoing. I would even say that it is our moral imperative to do something if we have the power to do so. I just strongly disagree with your proposed method, mainly because I think it does more harm than good. But I won't stop there. Let me tell you about what I know actually works! I spent 4 out of 5 years of my PhD program in my grad student government advocating for policy changes at various levels at my school. I am a big proponent of action and out of my colleagues on the government, I often land on the side of more action. We have had some successes in implementing important changes for our students. In addition, in my field, there were two major sexual harassment cases of faculty members that became public knowledge during my grad school career. In the end, both of these offenders are no longer employed at their schools. Student action definitely was part of the chain of events that led to these bad professors leaving their jobs, but it's not in the way you're proposing. So, instead, let me tell you a little bit more about what actually happened/worked. First, it is important to remember that the people with actual power over the employment status of a professor are the administrators at their school. The specific administrators depend on how each school is governed. These administrators are charged with the duty of protecting their school and their community: that is, the faculty, postdocs, staff, students, etc. That is their priority and even if they have personal opinions otherwise, it would be in neglect of their duties to act against the interests of the groups they represent. So, an appeal for the administrators to "do something" has to take these considerations into account. What reason would these administrators have to entertain an appeal from random students across the country? It doesn't really matter what an external organization of students want---it would make no sense for a specific school's administration to cater to the requests/demands of a random group of students. Instead, the appeal must come from the groups the administrators represent or have consequences for these groups. So one external body that might sway the administrators would be the funders. Either the private organizations or the government (e.g. Title IX enforcement). These groups have impact on the campus community. This was what I was trying to leverage in my post above. But another important group are the people at the schools themselves. The faculty at the school can influence the administrators. The students at the specific school can influence the administrators. And the students at the school can influence the faculty at the school to influence the administrators. But not an unconnected external group of students that have no power over the administrators. In one of the cases I alluded to, the Title IX case found the professor responsible for sexual misconduct over several decades. The Title IX case complainants (the term for the people who bring the case to the Title IX office) were three people he harassed in the past and are now ranging from junior to senior scientists. After the investigation concluded and the result determined, the case became public knowledge and the media wrote about it. So there's no pretending it didn't happen. While the Title IX office determines the result of the investigation, it's another administrative body that decides the punishment. These bodies generally protect tenured professors so the original decision was a fairly light punishment. A lot of people in my field protested this injustice. Many from outside the department, but the things that caused a change were actions from people the administrators actually cared about. The grad students in the department all cosigned a letter stating that they do not feel comfortable with this faculty member in their department, advising students, teaching students. But perhaps the most powerful action, it was the faculty members in the offender's department that wrote a letter to the administrators that they lost confidence in their colleague to carry out his duties as a tenured professor and do not believe him fit for the department. This letter was signed by almost every faculty member in the department. Ultimately, because of these actions, the offender was asked to take early retirement, which he did. Note that despite these extraordinary actions against the professor, he was still not "fired". He "retired". In another case, a very similar chain of events happened. The Title IX investigation found the offending professor guilty of sexual harassment. The administrators' punishment was a one year suspension and a committee would determine if the prof was ready to return after one year. During this one year off, the professor continued harassment via social media, so the suspension was extended another year. All of this published in the media. Even in the journal Science. Near the end of the two years, a committee of faculty members across campus was struck to determine if the professor was ready to return to campus. Through pressure from students on campus, the committee held many town halls and meetings with students to hear impact of this professor's actions on students. Many faculty members initially thinking the harassment was "minor" because it was not physical realised the mental and emotional damage done through testimony of students. I am not sure what their final decision was, but they noted to the professor that his return would cause a huge divide on campus. I don't know what else they said to him, but the offender decided to resign his tenured faculty position. Again, despite huge public and media coverage, strong testimony on campus against his return, the professor still resigned, he was not fired. And this result was an unprecedented outcome for a tenured professor. In both cases, due process found the offender to be guilty. The administrators responsible for discipline chose something fairly light for the "convicted" tenured professor. There was public outrage and backlash from others in the field. People important to the administrators made arguments against the offender. And yet, the best we can get is that they were somehow convinced to resign or retire. And, still people in the field believe that this type of thing is not a problem. And there are still people who support the guilty party and think they were treated unfairly. I don't mean to tell these stories to discourage you from taking any action. Or to make excuses for inaction. Instead, I want to make it more clear the obstacles in the way so that you can take proper actions that will actually help people. There is huge amounts of obstacles in the way and if you present yourself as a group able to help people, you really need to be able to deliver on your promise. If you are not doing your due diligence to ensure that you treat their information responsibly and actually lead to helpful results, you are going to cause more damage to the people that trusted you with their information. I also share these stories to convince you of a different path to action. I think the key step to convincing administrators is when their key stakeholders appeal to them for action. And their most important group are the faculty members. So instead of some likely ineffective watchdog type advocacy, I think it is far better to engage in efforts to encourage faculty members to support their students when one of them comes forward with information about a professor acting unethically and inappropriately. This could be education campaigns or other awareness. And when you do hear about a case in your field, you could provide moral and resources support for students in the affected department so that they can determine the best action they need to take for themselves.

If you are asking whether or not it would be worth it to put in the effort and time necessary to turn your manuscript into an article that would be accepted by a journal, then my answer would be "maybe". As long as the time doesn't detract from other things you really need to be doing (coursework, other application materials etc.) then yeah, it is much better for you to have a submitted article within the next month than for you to put in the same amount of work but spread over a longer period of time and not getting it submitted until next summer. However, whether or not it is realistic that you can get the amount of work necessary done in time is something you have to decide (perhaps with consultation with an advisor/mentor). I find that most people, including myself, underestimate the amount of work necessary to get to the submission stage. However, if you are asking if you should just submit whatever you have now just to say that you did submit something, then I don't think that's a good idea. I would only submit something that is truly ready for submission and peer review!

I just want to say that what you are feeling is commonly felt by many other grad students. I think the nature of a PhD research program makes these existential questions more prevalent. We're all doing very specific and niche research. It may be very interesting to us (at least at one point) and we may be very good at it, but ultimately, all of our hard work and effort and unless we're very lucky, we're not going to change the world. At the end of the degree, maybe a dozen people will really care about our results. Perhaps a few hundred may know about it and file it away in their minds. At the same time, society and culture tells us that our 20s are supposed to be our "best" years where we do a lot of fun times before "settling down". I just turned 30 so I see these messages in TV shows etc. all the time. Grad school is like an apprenticeship, where we are generally underpaid compared to our abilities/work because we are getting a qualification/degree out of it. (Not saying this is a good thing---I strongly believe that people should be paid in proportion to their labour, and that grad students should be paid much better wages. But I'm just stating reality here). Comparing ourselves to our friends/acquaintances who aren't in trainee/apprenticeship programs will always suck, because it's comparing two different career paths. Apples and oranges. So, I want to say that during my 7 years of grad school at two different programs, I've felt this way many times. I've met tons of other students that feel the same way at some point. I really think grad school emotions is a rollercoaster of feeling like we have the best job ever and questioning all of our life decisions that led to this point. I also want to say that out of all the examples of people feeling this doubt, there are two phases in grad school where this happens the most commonly. The first is during the student's first year. A lot of life changes has happened, usually, and sometimes grad school reality is not grad school expectations. The second is halfway through the program (the "mid-grad-school-life crisis"). Usually there is a little bit of a slump after quals/candidacy and before the dissertation/defense preparations begin in earnest. It's a point in your career where you might have finished some of the initial project goals you had at the start and now you start thinking "now what?". And it's a point where it's time to seriously consider your next steps beyond the PhD and it's normal to feel unqualified to think up your own projects, or to be apprehensive about the unknown. Sorry that the above is not really advice on what to do, but rather just affirming that you're not alone in how you're feeling. It doesn't make you a bad academic or mean that you're not cut out for the academic world (not that you need to be either). But now I want to share some tips that help me (and others) manage these feelings of doubt/uncertainty and helped me get closer to my own career goals: 1. Find support in others. One good way is to talk to your grad school friends about your feelings. A post like this is a good idea. I read threads elsewhere on these forums where people say they're not in grad school to make friends, and I can get that. It's a work environment and you don't need to be BFFs with your cohort. But I personally found that conversations about grad school life with people actually in grad school have been the most helpful for me to process and manage these feelings. So, if you're not interested in being best friends with your colleagues, at least cultivate a relationship where you can act as each others support network. If humour helps you, there are plenty of blogs/comics/websites that chronicle the woes of being a grad student (just be mindful that you're not reading these things and spiraling further into self-doubt). Some of my favourites are PhD Comics, Lego Grad Student, and WHATSHOULDWECALLGRADSCHOOL. 2. Rediscover your passion. We all chose this path because at some point we were deeply interested in our work (whether it's the topic, or the idea of discovering new things or whatever). I find it really helpful to take a step back occasionally and remember what I love about the field. I very rarely read popular science articles or news stories or TV shows about space/astronomy/planets because it feels a lot like work. But it was these things that led to my love of the field in the first place. Sometimes it's helpful to revisit these things and read or watch something you wouldn't normally watch. Another way I find my passion is to talk to others who work on my specific subfield. I always get a huge surge of motivation and excitement after a conference. I find that continuing to engage with my colleagues on professional Facebook groups and Twitter keeps me connected to my subfield. This is especially important if your department doesn't have a ton of people in your area. Also, it's another way to build a support network. Finally, for me, I try to do a lot of public outreach. Talking to non-experts about my work forces me to examine the big picture, which gets me excited about the work again. And seeing/hearing the audience's excitement is very motivating. These things help me feel like I am actually doing something I enjoy, not being stuck in a routine. 3. Prioritize your non-work commitments. I don't want to prescribe a set number of hours because everyone has different work habits and preferences. But for me, I did not want to work more than 40-50 hours per week. If I worked 40 hours per week, my stipend would work out to a barely livable wage (definitely not in the city where my PhD school was though). So while that's part of the reason I set a limit on working hours for myself, the main reason is to avoid burnout. There is a lot of pressure in academia for academics, especially students, postdocs and pre-tenure profs to feel like they have to devote their whole life to work otherwise they were not worthy. At some level, this is indeed driven by competition: there are only so many permanent jobs available after all. But, you're not going to succeed if you're burnt out. So, I eagerly took on and carved out time in my schedule to do things I enjoy doing. It sounds like you are already doing some of this. It took me a few years to develop the courage (and wisdom) to say "no" to work related things in favour of my personal life, but when I did it, I felt a ton better about myself and my workload. I used to think that I needed a "good" excuse to say no to something or reschedule something, but I now realise that this meant I was prioritizing work above all else, which was not healthy for me. So, I do prioritize work during the work day, but if someone wants to meet with me at 5pm? I am happy to suggest the meeting happen the next day, or the next week. And I'm not afraid to say the reason is that "I want to go home and cook dinner so that I can watch X show" or "Sorry, I can't, I am playing tennis with my friend at 5:30pm" or whatever. To me, work should not trump the other parts of my life so I compartmentalize work commitments to business hours on working days. This also applies to taking vacation time and doing the things on my bucket list. Find out what the policies are at your school and plan to do some of the things you always wanted to do while in school. There is definitely some balance required of "living in the now" vs. "preparing for the future", but it's easy to just think you'll do something later. Taking the time to do something on your "later" list now can feel really good and help with motivation too. 4. Check in with yourself often. As I said, grad school is a roller coaster of emotions. My plan was that I would do grad school/academic career path for as long as I feel happy doing so. That is, for every "down" in the rollercoaster, there needs to be an "up". I told myself that if one day, the rollercoaster never goes back up, then I will know it's time to do something different. To me, this means that the grad school / academia journey isn't a decades long process before I get any stability. It's very daunting to think of it that way. Instead, I just take it one year at a time. If I'm still happy and I still see a path towards my eventual goals, I'll stay. At the same time, I try to take actions that will increase my ability to achieve my overall life goals where possible. For me, this means learning skills that are employable outside of academia, developing and making contacts with people in the geographic region I want to stay in etc. I suggest these things because I find that my friends who decided to devote 100% of their time and energy into research because they can't imagine any other life run into self-doubt / burnout more often. Each person has to find their own balance of how much to devote into their research career versus an alternative career, but I can't imagine 100% towards research is ever a good balance. Or, to put it another way, I find that my colleagues and friends who took time to diversify their skills and experience were able to leave academia and find happiness/success elsewhere when they reached the stage where they were no longer happy in the academic track. But my friends who didn't do this either became successful in academia through their achievements, or they seem to be very unhappy but stuck where they are. So, I think it's important to check in with yourself often, gauge how you feel and have an "escape plan" if this academia thing doesn't work out. For me, even just knowing there's a way out provides me with a lot of peace of mind and helps me manage self-doubt.

While this is a highly unlikely scenario, I agree that this could happen. However, I don't think any reasonable department would make a decision like this based on this single application question answer. They know that students might change their mind (or lie) on these questions, so I think it's way more risky for a department to make a decision based on this question alone than it is for a student to answer this question. Instead, based on what I know about admissions, if your scenario comes true, then I think the department would likely: 1. Make both offers and take a risk 2. Don't make any offers until other offered applicants say no and open up enough spot to make 2 offers 3. Call the two candidates and ask them if they are still interested in their program 4. Flip a coin (or more realistically, examine other parts of the application and reweigh their decisions to decide based on that) With some exceptions, schools generally want to make offers in batches and they can usually handle one (or more) fewer or extra person each year. Especially the top schools, like the one you name. It's not common for schools to make offers one-to-one with availalbe spots, they always have to take some risks and make more offers than spots. The reason why schools (especially good schools with $$) don't make exactly 5 offers for 5 spots is that they are likely to lose one or two applicants to another school and if they wait until they get those declines, it's likely the 6th and 7th candidate on their list will have already taken offers elsewhere. This is why they would make more offers than spots, to ensure they can get the best candidates they can get!

This is a very common question and it's not meant to be a trick question. They just want to know what other schools their applicants are also considering. The responses may not be linked to each person and might just be presented in aggregate for statistical purposes. However, even if they use your specific response, I think it makes the most sense to be honest. Usually there is only space for 4 or 5 names, so don't name all of your schools if you are applying to like 12+. Just pick 4 or 5 that are both 1) similar in rank to the school you're applying to and 2) representative of your entire list. Very few schools will reject you because they think you're good enough for another place. This behaviour makes no sense, because why would they turn down a good student? All programs want the best fit students for themselves. However, the info can still be useful to the program. Programs generally need to make more offers than they have spots for, because the best candidates likely have more options and may not choose them. So if the school wants 8 new students, they might make 16 offers. But then if they see that their list of 16 offers are listing other top programs that typically "take" their students, then they might make one or two more. Or vice-versa, they might make fewer offers if their chosen candidates seem to signal that they will take the offer if given.

What we call "supervisors" in other countries are often just called "advisors" in the USA. 1. It depends on the program. If you want to work with someone in Dept X and you are applying to Dept Y, you should ask the prof in Dept X and also the prof in charge of grad students in Dept Y to ensure that you can do this. Then, you should also check out the grad student handbook (i.e. a list of all the policies) to ensure that everything is okay. While you're at it, it would be a good idea to also ask about courses---if you are in Dept X (or Y), are you allowed to take courses outside of your department? I applied to US programs in multidisciplinary fields so these were common questions for me too. I often found that speaking with the prospective advisor in the US can often yield insights. Another thing to consider is where you want to be relative to your advisor. If Dept X and Dept Y are far away from each other, would you prefer being in the same building as your advisor or not? etc. 2. This depends on the school. Usually yes. However, many of them may not want to supervise students. You should definitely talk to the professor in question before taking a position at the school. Note that emeritus profs aren't usually paid and they basically only work whenever they want to, so it will be a different working style. Also, they might choose (or be forced to, for health or personal reasons) to leave the department during your time there, so I'd make sure there is a non-emeritus prof who could co-advise you if necessary.

I'd still say you should contact all the math programs where you were planning to send in an application. Sometimes the wording on the website implies a stricter requirement than in practice. For example, my PhD program said "strongly recommended" for the subject GRE and in reality it is completely optional. The reason it says "strongly recommended" is that the University only allows the department 3 choices: "required" (application rejected if not sent), "strongly recommended" (= "optional"), or "not required" (GRE score will be discarded before department sees it).

1. Both times I wrote the GRE subject tests, everyone on standby got in. As long as there is space, they will let you take it. One of my tests was delayed almost an hour because it took a long time to register all of the standby testers. I would recommend going to a place with a very large room (i.e. if you can find out that it's in a large lecture hall on a University campus or something, then your chances might be higher than if it's in a small room somewhere). 2. After Oct 28, if you cannot take the test, then you should contact all the math programs you are interested in and see if they will consider your application without the subject GRE test. Sometimes there is no getting around a requirement, but you only know if you ask. Based on those answers, you can decide if you want to still apply this year only to programs that will consider you without a subject test, or wait another year to apply.

It is common for the application software, which is managed by the University, to have sections not required for your specific application. For example, none of my programs required Writing Samples but that page exists for almost all of my applications. If you are not sure, it is a good idea to do what others have suggested and check if they want you to submit one. It is likely that they will say it is not required and therefore should not be submitted. Don't write a proposal and submit it if it has not been requested.

It's not a big deal. Something like this is very common at many schools. My PhD school only confers degrees once per year (in June) so people who defend in August, start postdocs in September don't actually get the degree itself until they have already been a postdoc for almost an entire year! So, there's no need to explain why your first degree date is after the start date of your second degree. I wouldn't mention this at all in your SOP. But I can see why you want to have a clear/easy-to-understand CV. I think you have a few easy choices: 1. On your CV, don't list months. It's common in academia (at least in my field) to only list years. So, since you finished your 1st degree and started your 2nd degree in the same year, there will be no apparent overlap. 2. On your CV, list the dates of attendance in the place where you put dates (e.g. left side, right side, whatever your format is). Then, for your first degree, you can make a note in that listing that says "Degree conferred: June XYZ" or something like that. I think this is a concise and elegant way to put it. 3. Another common date format for degrees is to only list the degree earned date, not the date range of attendance, except for the degree in progress. So you can list something like: 2016 - present: 2nd Masters degree 2016: 1st Masters degree 2014: Bachelor's degree (of course, putting actual info in instead of my generic headings).

I think there are really two steps to asking for a letter from a prof. The first step is the actual asking for permission to use them as a letter writer. For most people, most of their letter writers will surely say yes, so this is more like the "heads-up" stage. Still probably a good/polite/professional idea to formally ask for a letter instead of assuming you'll get one even from your own advisors. During this stage, you can mention things like approximately how many schools you plan to apply to, when the deadlines are, and what you're interested in. You should also ask them what documents they want from you, when do they want the official ask for each school, when they might want reminders, and if they anticipate any extended travel time / time away from the office. If you have a good mentor-mentee relationship with them, you could even discuss your grad school plans, your career goals, your potential list of schools etc and get general advice on applying to grad school. So, right now would be a good time to do this first step if you haven't already. The next step is to actually make the requests with the application form and they write and upload the letter. When you start making these requests, you should provide whatever documents they asked for. I also like to prepare a one-page "cheat sheet" with a list of all the letters you are requesting. I organized them by due dates and listed school names, departments and a few POIs. My letter writers didn't want to see my SOP, but I did provide some basic stats at the top of the page (GREs, GPAs) and a short paragraph describing my research and career goals. I sent this summary/info sheet around early November. Most of my letter writers wanted me to send the actual request 2 weeks before the deadline and then a reminder thru the system 2 days before the deadline and said that I should send another reminder 2 days after the deadline if it has not yet been submitted. I found it helpful to have decided these things ahead of time so that I wouldn't feel bad about "bugging" them if they told me to do it. If they don't bring up the topic, you could consider politely/professionally asking when they would like to see the submission request and whether they would find a reminder X days before the deadline helpful. With different letter writers, you might have different responses so keep notes on how each person wants their requests sent!

It's hard to estimate the "chances" because everything depends on your own set of skills/qualifications, what you're looking for and who happens to be hiring when you're looking. However, I can tell you a little bit about the steps foreign workers must go through to be hired! You might have heard about the difficulty of being sponsored by a company for H1-B visas. These are definitely costly to obtain and there are time limits. In addition, the current US government is trying to change these rules, which might make it even more difficult and provide more disincentives for US companies to hire foreign workers. You say you are interested in something in between a MS and PhD degree. I am assuming you will be attending your MS program on F-1 student status. As a F-1 student, you will be eligible for OPT (Optional Practical Training) after completion of your degree (you're actually also eligible during your degree but I mentioned "after" here since you asked about afterwards). Here's the official info: https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/students-and-exchange-visitors/students-and-employment/optional-practical-training. As a STEM MS graduate, you would be eligible for the extension, which means you can be in the US on OPT status from your F-1 obtained for your MS program for up to 29 months. So, this doesn't mean that you'll get a job for sure, but your OPT status means that you don't have to worry about an employer having to sponsor you for any special status or pay for any visa related costs. It's all done via your MS school. US employers are currently not allowed to discriminate based on your immigration status (unless you are working for a lab that requires citizenship or something)---they can only ask if you are eligible to work in the US. Your OPT status will make you independently eligible to work, so as long as you are looking for a temporary position, I don't think you have to worry about the same things as others worrying about H1-B and green card sponsorship. You should talk to your MS program's international student for more information on OPT. When you do start your PhD program, you will be on a different F-1 visa/status, so the OPT time you take for your MS F-1 will not affect your eligibility to do the same after finishing your PhD. That is, you will still be able to work for up to 29 months after graduating from your PhD program before you need to worry about things like attaining another more permanent status. Finally, a note: These rules do change from time-to-time so you should stay up to date on the progress and try to be flexible where possible. For the past few years, there's been a plan to change the STEM OPT timelines. They want to increase it from 29 months to 36 months, which would be a good thing. But these changes can move slowly....it might not take effect by the time you graduate from your MS. At the same time, changes can also be negative for you. Some changes (e.g. law changes like the 29 month->36 month thing) are slower to take effect while others (e.g. executive orders from the President) can take effect very quickly. My advice is that you should aim for your goals but as an international person in the USA, it would be a good idea to have some sort of backup plan in case things change drastically for the worse.

In terms of research misconduct (e.g. fake results, etc.) then I would say that the number of "good professors" far outweigh the number of "bad professors". I don't think any special actions is necessary to determine who are the "bad professors". Typically, when you are deciding on an advisor, you will talk to a lot of people about it. You might talk to profs/mentors at your undergrad school, your fellow grad students in your program, etc. Usually people do this to find out who is a good "fit" for them, such as whether the prof micromanages or not, work expectations etc. However, sometimes, if you are talking to the right people, you'll find out other "red flags" about the prof as well. Unfortunately, this "whisper network" method isn't great and plenty of cases of harassment by faculty members that have come to light in the past few years show that many people, especially those most vulnerable, aren't "in the know" about these bad actors. I would agree with @_kita that public forums aren't a good way to "name" these bad actors. Our grad student organization used to run a "rate my advisor" type service where graduated students can leave feedback on their advisors. However, even this doesn't work well because 1) anyone can say anything, and 2) even if we withheld reviews for 5-10 years and then released them, advisors who find these reviews can probably figure out who wrote them. I am not sure what the best action would be. I am in favour of formal investigation by an appropriate body (for the appropriate offense) and public announcements of persons found guilty of inappropriate action. For sexual harassment/misconduct, the school's Title IX office should be the appropriate body, however, some schools have Title IX offices that mostly exist to cover up and protect the University. In addition, these results are always confidential and if the offender moves to a different school, no record is transferred. I would like to see expansion of Title IX policy to include a publicly accessible database of investigations that lead to disciplinary actions. However, the current US Government is leaning towards reducing the scope of Title IX. Another possibility is through the national societies for our discipline. Other professionals, such as doctors, have national regulatory bodies that report on professionals who have violated policy. At this stage, most academic national societies can't really function as regulatory bodies because academics are not regulated and they are not compelled to be a member of their national society. But, I think we can change that. In one of my fields, the American Astronomical Society is the main national society for Astronomy. Almost every faculty member is a member and you need to be a member to vote in their elections and give input which are used to drive national level policies that affect our research. So, it would be pretty strange for a faculty member at a research-oriented school to not be a member. If these societies have the resources to conduct investigations and maintain a database of offenses, that would help keep everyone in check. However, these societies are often reluctant to do such things because they don't have the staff, resources and they are concerned about liability (i.e. they need legal protection in case the offender decides to sue, and in the case where they come to the wrong conclusion about one of their members). Although I am not sure how to provide these resources to the national societies, I think this is a possible solution. One society (the American Geophysical Union) took the step of including sexual harassment as a form of scientific misconduct (http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/09/scientific-society-defines-sexual-harassment-scientific-misconduct). I think this is a step in the right direction and I hope the other societies I interact with do the same. Another way might be for funding agencies to develop their own code of conduct enforcement/investigation team. There could be one single body to regulate all federal public funds for all the public agencies. Private funders would have to set up their own system or perhaps they could contract the federal team to do the work. This would require some significant investment from the national government though.

If money isn't an issue, then all the fancy features that @juilletmercredi mentioned are great. My only concern would be that while these are great features to have as an early warning system, it might not be a good idea to rely on them since, chances are, you'll end up having to drive cars without these features at some point. I would agree with @juilletmercredi that compact sedans are a great choice for new drivers. They are big enough to handle like a typical car, cheap enough for most first-time drivers, and easy enough to maintain for new car owners. My first regular car was the Chrysler Neon (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_Neon) but they don't make them anymore. My next car was a 2002 Chrysler Sebring (2nd generation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_Sebring). I am now driving a Honda Civic. I learned to drive in a much bigger car though, which meant learning to park was a lot harder, but now that I'm driving smaller cars, it made the transition super easy.

I got my scores within 3 weeks. Check with UW and see if they will accept temporary self-reported scores (minus the AW) for the application and allow you to submit an amendment with your full scores once it's ready. UW was my first deadline too. It caught me by surprise, the listed deadline was Jan 6 but the real deadline for international students like me was Dec 1. I found this out on Nov 28!! I had took the Physics GRE on Nov 12 of that year and scores were not going to be available until Dec 12. I asked them if I could submit my scores later and the department was fine with it since they won't review the applications until January anyways. So, if UW is the only school that is cutting it close, just ask them first. There might be nothing to worry about if they are willing to accept your GRE scores a few days after the deadline. If not, then you could consider rescheduling to an earlier date just to avoid the stress, but on the other hand, if UW isn't your top choice, it might not be worth missing out on the days to study since the GRE scores affect your other applications too.

I guess you could experiment on yourself and try this in the days leading up to the test to see if this strategy will prevent you from having to use the bathroom during the equivalent test time. Note that it does take some time between arrival at the testing centre and actually starting the test (not sure if you were planning on going through the check-in process and then immediately going to the bathroom (requiring you to do some of the check in again) or if you were planning to go before arriving. Also, at my testing centre, they let me start an hour earlier than my registered test time. I arrived super early since the test was in a different city so I had to crash at a friend's place the night before and then figure out that city's transit system. So, if you also arrive early and don't want to start early, might be a good idea to kill some time before checking in (keeping in mind that they do want you to check in a bit before your test time).

I only took one bathroom break and it was during the long 10-minute break. So I haven't tested that myself. However, I did use the Instructions page not counting down time for all my other requests (e.g. for more scrap paper). For these requests, I just got up from my station and went to the desk where the exam invigilator/front desk employee sat. All test takers were in a computer lab room and the one employee watching us was in the other room that had a window into our room. But that one employee was also responsible for phone calls to the testing center, checking in new arrivals etc. I also took the opportunity to take a longer break on the instructions screen (closed my eyes, cleared my mind etc.) in addition to the 1 minute you get between sections. I don't remember with certainty whether they even checked my screen when I asked for the bathroom break during the 10-minute break. I think there is likely a ton of variations based on the working policies at each of the testing centres contracted by ETS to conduct these exams. My experience was different from others I talked to. For example, when I went to the bathroom, I just informed the front desk person / invigilator and they told me where to go. When I returned, I just had to show that my pockets were empty and they checked my ID again. Other people told me that they were escorted to the bathroom and/or had to go through metal detectors. Since the employee doesn't actually work for ETS, they don't really have any power over your test score. If they suspect you did something wrong, their choices are basically: 1) do nothing, 2) let you complete the exam and file a report with ETS or 3) kick you out. So I'd say that if you need to use the bathroom outside the long break, you might as well ask if you are able to go. If they say no, then you haven't really lost anything.

When I took the computer-based General GRE years ago, when you are on the Instructions screen, the timer doesn't count down. So, that is the best time to take a bathroom break.

To be clear, I don't mean to say this is the only way to define a successful professor. There are definitely more than one way to succeed in academia and I think what you described is certain one way to be very successful. Not necessarily the way that I would want to be successful but that doesn't invalidate that mode of success. Also, I don't mean to say that every institution would define this person as successful. As I wrote above, it really all depends on what each institution is looking for in their employees. The University is the entity that sets the job description for their faculty members so whether or not the description you gave is going to be considered a "successful professor" at any given school depends on what that school wants out of their faculty members. But to answer the question generally, many schools, especially the research intensive ones, would count this person as very successful. To expand on what I wrote above, some schools do not even consider mentoring/advising/graduating students as a necessary part of a professor's job (i.e. having done so might help a prof on their tenure/promotion review, but not contributing much in this area might have no negative effects at all).

I know tons of professors that considered highly successful. Schools would work hard to either convince people like this to join their department, either by convincing them to leave their current appointment, or if they're on the job market, by offering better packages. I have heard of one school offering someone like this tenure directly (this person had just graduated with a PhD not long ago). A common recruitment tactic in my field is for high ranking research institutions to find assistant (i.e. untenured) profs at other schools (of all levels) and offering them a tenured position at their school and a bunch of money to move their current students over. So yeah, people matching your exact description are generally considered very successful by the "powers that be" in academia. Whether we agree with these metrics are not doesn't change what they are. In fact, at my PhD school, there are people that get tenure reviews saying that they spend too much time mentoring students or teaching instead of developing international reputation, publishing field-changing work, etc.

Can you do the dinner (or some other meal) without having to pay for your students? (i.e. everyone pays their own share). To make it simpler, you could order catering from a local restaurant and have them deliver the food so that it's cheaper and more convenient than going to a restaurant with 20 people! Whenever I planned events with food like this, ordering pizza usually comes to less than $5 per person and ordering Thai or something like that comes to $7 or so per person...and people are happy to pay for their share since they get more food/variety for less money than if they went themselves. Alternatively, if a meal is a good way to do your event, what about a potluck? Or something like a "dessert baking competition"? I've been part of planning plenty of social/get-to-know-you events for various school things I volunteered with so here are some other ideas: - Scavenger hunt around campus - Attend a cultural event together (maybe some sort of festival or something in your town?) - Most towns/cities have a "cheap theatre" that plays movies that have already gone to DVD. Tickets are usually like $2 or so each. - Walking tour of cool stuff around your town - Reverse trick-or-treating at your campus residences (i.e. get your freshmen to dress up in their costumes and then you go around the dorms handing out candy). Alternatively, go around the residences near campus or a senior centre etc. Just a few ideas. It might help if you provided some parameters/requirements for these events (i.e. what purpose must they serve? do you have to pay for all costs? can you get funding? can you ask attendees to pay their own way? etc.)

I agree with you that this definitely depends on the school and how each school writes the "job description" for their profs. That is, I don't think there is a right answer because each school is hiring profs to do the job the school wants them to do. The school has the prerogative to define the duties expected of their employees. However, we can still have our preferences on what we'd like, individually, so I'll answer your question with what I'd look for in a graduate advisor! I did my PhD at an R1 school where profs have a teaching load of 3 quarter-length (10 week) courses every 2 years. Most teach one core course per year and one speciality course that only runs every other year. The core course rotates every 3 years-ish, so it's more work for the prof the first time but it gets a lot easier for years 2 and 3. They also have some department service duties, for example, sitting on or chairing various committees. It seems like some committees are reserved for tenured faculty (e.g. the quals examination core committee) while others tend to be for junior faculty (e.g. the colloquium committee). There are also university level commitments for administrative type things as well as research promotion type things, e.g. the fundraising office will often ask profs to present their work to donors, alumni etc. in order to get people to donate to the school. If the prof holds grants or other fellowships funded by the school or outside sources, these might come with some service requirements as well. In all, I would say that at a primarily research focussed school like my PhD program, I would expect that profs spend around 50% of their time on research-related activities, 35% on service and 15% on teaching. Teaching is easy to define: it's time spent preparing for and delivering courses. I would define service as everything that doesn't directly advance their own (or their group's research). For example: the talks/committees mentioned above, but also peer review, serving on conference organizing committees etc. Research is everything related to their group's research. This includes **both** supervising/advising their grad students as well as conducting their own research. I think this part is the most interesting to me. In my opinion, the main effort of a professor's research time should not be doing their own research but to lead/supervise research carried out by those who work/train under them. One example is my PhD advisor: all of their papers since 2014 have only been led by their students or postdocs. They might come up with some new research ideas but it is their group that carries it out. My advisor got tenure this year. There are usually 5-7 grad students and 3-4 postdocs in their group. I feel that my advisor's main research output is to ensure that their group are productive scientists. And in my field, this counts as your own work too, since you win awards and earn tenure based on what you and your group produces. But this is just one style. Another professor in the same department only ever has 1 full grad student at a time and 1-2 postdocs. They still produce their own research and actually spend most of their time doing what they want to do. This person is many years past tenure (but not a super senior prof either) and has been working this way since the beginning. I've talked to this person about their stance on mentoring and advising and they basically said that they don't take on more than 1 student at a time because the time it takes to mentor/train a student is not worth the science that student produces. So, clearly this person has a different view on why they train students compared to others. But this is also acceptable to my department! I think this is a good thing, as long as people know what their potential advisors are like before committing to a group. Finally, on the topic of tracking down busy profs: My advisor is a superstar with a super busy schedule but they are also super organized. We have a regular weekly meeting time and we always give each other 1-2 weeks advance notice if a meeting needs to be rescheduled. This really works well for my advisor and I because we both have similar organizational personalities. For another advisor, I sometimes had to stalk them on Twitter to see if they are even on campus. I remember one day I wanted to find them so I checked their Twitter and learned that they were in DC receiving an award from the POTUS (the previous one, not the current one). For another busy prof who was on my committee, I had to camp outside their class in order to ask them a quick question about scheduling my defense date as they were leaving. I did work with both of these super busy people for a short while but our personality fit wasn't good. I would get stuck on things that would have immediately moved forward if I had a 10 minute chat with them but sometimes it took 2 weeks to actually get that 10 minutes. I also felt that cancelling meetings minutes before they are scheduled is a sign of a lack of mutual respect for each other's time so I found it very unfun to work with these people (they are generally great people to have as colleagues or to bounce ideas of off, but not as an advisor). But this is just me---clearly plenty of other students prefer this flexible, non-scheduled style