GETTING YOUR THESIS READY FOR PUBLICATION

Organized by:
Sol Friedberg, Boston College
Donna Flint, South Dakota State University

Panel Members:
Jeff Johannes, Assistant Professor of Mathematics, SUNY Geneseo
Ann Kizanis, Associate Professor of Mathematics and Associate Dean, School of Arts
and Sciences of Western New England College
Mike Rosen, Professor of Mathematics Brown University
Sol Friedberg, Professor of Mathematics, Boston College.

Abstract:
Publishing your thesis means sharing the fruit of your years of hard work with the world, completing one stage of your career and embarking on the next. What steps are needed to turn your thesis into a publishable paper? What should you cut? Should you figure out those last points you were stuck on? How long should this take? Should you ask someone to look at it before you consider it finished? Where should you submit your draft once you're ready? How do you do that? What if your submission is rejected? And what if it is accepted? This panel explored this important and exciting step of a mathematical career and aspects of publishing one's research.

Questions/topics for the panelists:
a) should you publish your thesis or resolve any loose ends/do more work on it first?
b) how to edit/modify your thesis for publication
c) who, if anyone, to show it to before your submit
d) where to send it
e) what to do if it is rejected
e') what to do if the editor is a human black hole
e'') what happens when it is accepted
f) what to do next
g) please share any "case studies" from people you know who have done well, and equally importantly any "case studies" concerning things that can go wrong (e.g. submit your thesis to a journal and don't hear from the editor for a year, but don't know that you should contact the editor after 3-4 months).

The format included initial presentations by each panel member. This was followed by general questions from the audience.

Panel Member's Initial Presentations.

Ann graduated from Wesleyan University in 1991 and has been teaching at Western New England College for 13 years.  She became Associate Dean two years ago, so half of her position is now administrative. Western New England College is primarily a teaching institution and so the challenge is to balance teaching and research with advising and governance duties.

Ann co-authored a paper while she was in graduate school.  Then during her first few years at Western New England, she wrote two papers based on her thesis. In preparing these, she omitted simple steps and extended other results while writing and editing the papers.  She then went on to write other papers based on questions that were raised in these earlier papers.  

Ann noted that in preparing a paper from your dissertation, you will condense some things, expand some things, but at some point you need to say "enough" and submit.  

Ann also noted that it is important to publish something before you are eligible to apply for tenure and promotion (within the first six years). In fact, when considering the time that may elapse from submitting a paper to actually having it accepted and appear in print, its a good idea to try to submit your work within the 2nd or 3rd year after dissertation (at the latest).

Show your papers to your thesis advisor (Ann had kept a good working relation with her advisor) or someone in your field for feedback.  Consider journals that publish papers in your research area and journals in which the top people in your field are publishing.

Each journal will have instructions for authors, such as:
  1. Style issues
  2. Electronic or hard copy submission
  3. Format (PostScript, pdf, dvi)
  4. TeX or LaTeX files
  5. Length of title and abstract, and perhaps length of paper
  6. Style of references
  7. Formulas and figures

Waiting time may be long but don't hesitate to inquire and request information on the status of your paper

If accepted, make suggested changes and carefully proof-read paper.

If rejected, look at suggestions if given, make changes, and submit to another journal.

Challenge is to keep a good balance between teaching and research.

Suggestions:

  1. Maintain a steady work ethic with your research and don't lose all the momentum
      you established in graduate school.

  2. Apply for release time.

  3. Teach overloads to accumulate credit hours that can be used for release time.

  4. Teach classes on MWF to have TTh as days for research.

  5. Apply for and take advantage of summer research grants.

  6. Apply for sabbatical when you are eligible.

Jeff Johannes

Jeff noted that your advisor may not have the best advice about where to publish- remember they are at a PhD granting institution and are established researchers- you may not fit that category.

Jeff also noted that giving talks about your work is a helpful to decide how to break up your thesis into papers.

Also, don't give up - it may take several tries before you get a paper accepted.

Mike Rosen

Mike suggested publishing your dissertation right away.  He also noted that in a post doc you are under more pressure (there are more expectations to publish). Publish your thesis ASAP; polishing and other loose ends can be used for future papers.  Also, look at journals and see what published  papers look like.

As far as who should look over your manuscript, it is important for your first few papers that you find someone to read them over prior to submitting them.

As far as where to send it, look at the journals backlog - if it's two or three years then publish elsewhere.

What to do in case of rejection?  You can be dejected; or you can consider if the referee has valid comments, correct them and try submitting again elsewhere.

If you don't hear from the editor for a long time, don't hesitate to email them to inquire on the status of your submission.

What to work on next?  Keep your momentum going.  Go to seminars, go to meetings, go to the library and look at papers that are being published.  Being exposed to this should inspire you.

Sol Friedberg

All of Sol's students have published their dissertations.

If you are in doubt about whether or not to include a detail that was in your thesis in the version you are submitting for publication or instead to leave it out, it is best to take a balanced view.  On the one hand, it is OK to leave some things in your submission that can be cut- editors and referees sometimes want material cut, so if you turn in a bare-bones paper, they could cut something that you feel is important.  However, unlike a dissertation, research papers often don't include all the details, for example a long but straightforward calculation may be described as "a simple calculation shows".  Definitely include details that you think are important or new.

Perhaps the most important part of your paper is your introduction. It should clearly say what you've done, why it's interesting, what are the new ideas.  You should try to explain to the reader why your paper is a genuine contribution and why they should be excited about it.  Since this is the part of your paper which will be read more often than any other part, it makes sense to devote a lot of energy to polishing it.

Use your time wisely, don't worry about details like formatting it in a special way, TeX versus LaTeX, etc.  I've never heard of a paper being rejected because it was in the wrong format and I do not think that worrying about this is a good use of your time.  It is the mathematics that is important, not the appearance.

Your thesis advisor may or may not have good advice about where to send your paper for publication.  You also might see where other recent students of your advisor have published. You might also wish to contact these students for advice about where to send the paper.

What to do if your paper is rejected?  Know that you are going to get rejections; it's not the end of the game (and sometimes they are way off base).

If the editor is a "human black hole" (which does happen), don't let it go for a year.  Contact them and inquire.

Different journals (and different editors) have different styles of mathematics.  Some journals publish mostly very abstract material, others like more hands-on mathematics.  Look at the kinds of papers the journal is publishing to see whether or not yours is a good match.  Also try to submit the paper to an editor who is likely to be interested in it, based on their own work and what you know about their interests.

Sometimes after many many many months of waiting you might get an email saying that they have accepted your paper (congratulations!) and then another message saying that you now have 3 days to review the galley print which is attached. If necessary, it is possible to say "I'm sorry, I've got three finals to grade. I'll get it to you in two weeks," in spite of the scary-sounding warning that you must return the page proofs within 3 days of receipt.  (Note, it may be best to tell them you will return it in 2 weeks, rather than to ask if this is okay.)

The hardest thing to do is to find tractable/feasible problems for research.  Be on the lookout for them as you read other work in the field. If you can't find something to work on, look and ask around.

Talk to other people; find people to work with.  It's very hard to do mathematics in a vacuum. And be sure you are using your time well (e.g. be careful doing computer experimentation, as it can be very time consuming.  If you're doing it be sure that it's worth doing).

Overall it should be fun.

Questions From The Audience.

You get acknowledgement that the manuscript was received within a week or so of submission.  As far as hearing back from the referees, if you don't hear back within five or six months, you should contact the editor (but keep in mind this could vary depending on the length and complexity of the work).

2.  What if you contact the editor but don't hear back?

Try contacting them again. Your ultimate recourse is to withdraw the paper.

3.  Any recommendations regarding copyright?

Most journals require you to sign away your copyright.  Most of us do it without worrying.  Regarding preprints, anything that is available on the web is "fair game" (provided it is quoted with full attribution, of course).

4. What can you do if your library is not very good?

Use the web.  For some journals you may be able to get the whole article on the web, others only have table of content (titles and/or abstracts).  Use Interlibrary loan, or try to travel/visit other universities that have better library resources.

5.  What about writing an expository paper from your thesis, is this a good idea?

Yes for some career paths.  No for others.

6. Is there a conflict of interest between an expository and a research article?

Not really, but you need to be prepared if your research paper gets rejected.

7.  What about joint papers?

How much credit do you get?  Need to be cautious because if you publish jointly with a well known person from the field, some people will only credit this to the big name.  Make sure that not all your papers are joint.

8.  What about tenure and number of publications?

This varies greatly across different institutions and schools.

Some final comments from the panel:

Ann:    
Be sure to submit papers in requested format.
Deadline for page proofs (meet them if possible, be honest if you can't);
Sometimes you need to get away in order to clear your mind (she told story about coming
up with ideas while she was hiking in Europe)

Sol:    
Preprints on personal web pages are a good source for keeping current.
After you get your PhD you need to keep learning (a good way to do this is to read journals). You need to be open to this.
Finding people to discuss your ideas and mathematical plans with is very useful.  Your former advisor may or may not be interested in this.  Also consider building a working relationship with other former students of your advisor or other young people in your area.