The Worst Reviewer Comment I’ve Received
The worst reviewer comment I have ever had (to date) is, “This paper sounds like it was written by a child”. How would you handle the response to this comment? As much as it hurt, my coauthors and I decided…
Amplifying The Voices Of PhD Students
The worst reviewer comment I have ever had (to date) is, “This paper sounds like it was written by a child”. How would you handle the response to this comment? As much as it hurt, my coauthors and I decided…
Ask most PhD students whether their PhDs have gone to plan and they’ll say, “nope”. In fact, many probably won’t even remember what their PhDs were initially about…they have changed so much since then. While changing topic is good when…
In a recent tweet, we asked people whether it’s important for a PhD student to like their supervisor. The overwhelming majority voted yes. And it makes sense, no one wants to get stuck with someone they don’t like for four…
Abstracts are incredibly important. After the title, the abstract of your paper (or presentation) is probably the most important part because most people will use it to decide whether it’s worth reading any more of your paper or not. What’s…
Near the start of my PhD, a professor gave me insight into what publishing in academia was really like. This professor was one of the more successful ones in my department, and the most liked among PhD students, especially his…
Reviewing a paper takes time, and sometimes you just have so many other things to do that you don’t get around to reviewing your student’s paper for weeks or even months. Even when you realize that you have had the…
After a doing a PhD, most want to do a Postdoc. Only about 30% of PhD holders get a Postdoc position. The prevailing belief is that the number of papers you have, and the impact factor of the journals they…
It’s no secret that the chances of a PhD student developing a mental health problem is very high in academia. But, what makes academia so different? Why are the chances so much higher than most other industries? One reason could…
I was having a conversation with a supervisor (who was taking our supervisor training course here), and we were discussing whether it was good for a supervisor to let their students fail. We both quickly agreed that letting your student…
When it comes to research, laziness is universally frowned upon because as researchers, we’re expected to always go the extra mile. Always do that little more to make your research better, more robust, stronger. But, when it comes to writing…