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  • 26
    Forget about what's normal-- What exactly are you getting out of this exercise?
    – Anonymous
    Commented May 25 at 20:37
  • 13
    An NDA is about protecting commercial interest. This sounds much more like an attempt to cut off potential co-authors from future papers, which is not only unethical but also entirely uncommon.
    – xLeitix
    Commented May 26 at 9:13
  • 12
    "The professor mentioned that the NDA would mean any material produced during this project would belong to the university, and individual students would not be credited.". Neither of these seem to require (or even follow from) an NDA. In many (most?) countries being employed, even for minimal pay, is sufficient for the former and absolute standard. The latter is just a big why would they do that?!? - the point of an NDA is to protect valuable information (in a commercial or similar sense), withholding attribution especially in an academic context is the exact opposite of that.
    – MisterMiyagi
    Commented May 26 at 9:21
  • 10
    This sounds so shady that I have to ask: was this communicated in English, and was the concept really referred to as NDA? Otherwise: it's pretty standard that Universities keep the right to use whatever is invented/developed/etc. at their premises, you usually accept this when you enroll as a student, or sign the contract to become an employee. But that's absolutely not about the removal of your name from your work, and it's often explicitly written on the same IPR page that the right to publish always remains with the inventor.
    – tevemadar
    Commented May 26 at 11:57
  • 3
    @Anonymous, as Stephan pointed out, I am trying to gain 1) experience and 2) a RL for my PhD application, based on the status of the faculty. However, after reading Bryan's and others' answers, I doubt I would be getting much experience or a strong letter. I do have other collaboration opportunities that could result in publications, but I was hoping to do more during the summer. Given the short amount of time before applying for a PhD, these seem like a better option.
    – Danny Wen
    Commented May 26 at 13:10