Bayesian Models

On 12th February, Reza Haffari and I organised a workshop to support research students in their journey. It seems our Monash faculty each has their own special superpower, and their quality and relevance blew me away:

• Maria Garcia De La Banda was a careers expert
• Christoph Bergmier was an efficiency expert
• Reza Haffari pondered the big philosophical questions
• Dinh Phung thought about being the best researcher you could be

Anyway, they presented lots of good material which is on the Monash hard drives. But here I’ve summarised the main resources we all mentioned.

Famous Tutorials/Papers/Books for Research Students

• Eamonn Keogh’s advice on how to get a data mining paper published (more or less applies to any experimental AI field) http://www.cs.ucr.edu/~eamonn/Keogh_SIGKDD09_tutorial.pdf
• Marie desJardin’s advice to PhD students in AI from 1995 : still relevant,  https://www.csee.umbc.edu/~mariedj/papers/advice.pdf
• Marie’s AAAI-2017 Doctoral Consortium talk on Presenting Your Research
• Thomas Garrity’s “All the Mathematics You Missed“, intended for graduate students:  https://www.amazon.com/All-Mathematics-Missed-Thomas-Garrity/dp/0521797071
• Rob Hyndman (professor in Monash BusEco) has written a bit
  • https://robjhyndman.com/hyndsight/phdfail/
  • https://robjhyndman.com/hyndsight/7secrets/
  • https://robjhyndman.com/seminars/research++/

Living productively

(resources from Profs Dinh Phung and Reza Haffari at Monash FIT)

• Randy Paucsh, The Last Lecture, an NYT best selling book about achieving your dreams
• Stephen Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”, a classic book on lessons in life
• Eckhart Tolle’s “The Power of Now”, about personal growth and spirituality, https://www.amazon.com.au/Power-Now-Guide-Spiritual-Enlightenment/dp/1577314808
• Mark Manson’s “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a XXXX“  about living with integrity, https://www.amazon.com.au/Subtle-Art-Not-Giving-Counterintuitive/dp/1925483592/

Writing

• Strunk & White’s “Elements of Style”, a short book summarising good writing, with 5 editions since 1920, considered one of the 100 best English language books ever written, often bought with “On Writing Well”
• William Zinsser’s “On Writing Well”, a classic guide to writing non-fiction, often bought with Strunk & White
• Jacque Barzun’s “Simple & Direct”, a writer’s guide, https://www.amazon.com.au/Simple-Direct-Jacques-Barzun/dp/0060937238

Research writing (including for nonnative speakers of English)

(resources from Julie Holden at Monash FIT)

• Cargill, Margaret, and Patrick O’Connor. Writing scientific research articles: Strategy and steps. John Wiley & Sons, 2013.   ( an updated version is being currently written)
• Glasman-Deal, H. (2010). Science research writing for non-native speakers of English. London: Imperial College Press. Hargrave-Andrew Library 808.0665 G548S2010 and Monash University Library ebook)
• Swales, J., and Feak, C. (2012). Academic writing for graduate students: A course for nonnative speakers of English ( 3rd ed.).  Ann Arbor: the University of Michigan Press. (Hargrave-Andrew Library 808.042 S971A 2004)
• Swales, J., and Feak, C. (2000). English in today’s research world: A writing guide. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. (Matheson Library 808.042 S971E 2000)
• Weissberg, R., and Buker, S. (1990). Writing up research: Experimental research report writing for students of English. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents. (Hargrave-Andrew Library 808.0666 W432W)
• Graff, G., and Birkenstein, C. (2017). “They say / I say”: The moves that matter in academic writing. New York: Norton & Company. (Caulfield and Matheson Libraries 808.042 G736T 2017).  The full text of the 2010 edition is also available to download at https://www.iss.k12.nc.us/cms/lib/NC01000579/Centricity/Domain/2741/They%20Say%20I%20Say%20Full%20Text.pdf

Resources on quality conferences/journals

• http://www.guide2research.com/topconf/
• https://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php?type=j&area=1700
• https://www.scopus.com/sources.uri 

Understanding reviewers

• Neil Lawrence’s summary of the famous NeurIPS experiment where they had two sets of reviewers for a conference, and the difference was enormous! https://inverseprobability.com/2015/01/16/blogs-on-the-nips-experiment
• https://acl2017.wordpress.com/2017/02/23/last-minute-reviewing-advice/
• https://sites.umiacs.umd.edu/elm/2016/02/01/mistakes-reviewers-make/

The journal editorial process 

(didn’t have “known” resources here, so went Googling … these seemed reasonable)

• https://www.editage.com/insights/peer-review-process-and-editorial-decision-making-at-journals
• https://www.elsevier.com/connect/7-steps-to-publishing-in-a-scientific-journal
• https://www.councilscienceeditors.org/resource-library/editorial-policies/white-paper-on-publication-ethics/2-1-editor-roles-and-responsibilities/   (a bit detailed ….)