Publication records play important role in one’s promotion and tenure process, specifically for a research institution. Many universities give a credit only for peer-reviewed articles. However, many so-called “predatory journals” claim that they are peer-reviewed.
Sometime, it is not easy to objectively assess a candidate’s published journal article’s quality. Commonly the quality of the journal (impact factor and ranking), the number of authors (if it is not a sole authored article), and sometimes the number of citations are criteria to assess the quality of the article.
I knew that some universities and departments use the Cabell’s journal list, black list and white list, for the standard of acceptable and not acceptable journals for promotion and tenure process. However, many journals fall in a gray area, and they are not predatory journal nor journals with well-recognized impact factors (SSCI and SCI).
Using an external reviewer is one idea to assess a candidate’s published article. However, it does not work well as it is intended. Usually, a candidate gives a list of possible external reviewers (outside his or her university) and the promotion and tenure review committee chair chooses reviewers among them. I mean that the external reviewer can be biased and makes a favorable comments on the quality of publication although it is not the case.
Given the discussion above, do you think that one can develop a numeric assessment tool that measures the quality of published journal article so that everybody can accept its result? Or if you think it is impossible, what other alternatives are available to evaluate one’s published article for promotion and tenure purpose?
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