Dear Oguzhan,
To me, a standard giving credit only to articles published in
journals covered by the ISI Web of Science doesn't make sense. This
cannot be a Bologna standard. It may be a local or national
misinterpretation of a Bologna recommendation, confusing the part
with the whole.
Why not ask the person who has given you this ruling to find the
actual clause in the Bologna agreements? If he or she can't find it,
perhaps you can ask your way upward until you locate the person who
can actually cite the clause and give you the document.
I'm ready to change my mind if someone will simply show me. I have
not been able to find it. I think it is a misunderstanding. Someone
at your university or your national ministry obviously believes that
this is a Bologna standard. If they have decision authority over you
and your students, they can force you to operate on their
misinterpretation. Given the fact that no one else in any Bologna
nation I know follows such a standard, I think this is a
misunderstanding. There are two reasons to believe this.
The first is that I work in two Bologna nations and I have worked in
a third. These three nations -- Norway, Denmark, and Sweden --
conform to the Bologna standards. None of these three emphasizes
publication ONLY in ISI journals.
The list of 111 journals comes from the Norwegian national database
of publishing channels. The register is accessible in English at
http://dbh.nsd.uib.no/kanaler/
Norway belongs to the Bologna process, and the Norwegian ministry of
education gives full publishing credit to an article published in any
journal in the register. The ministry does not insist on only ISI
journals. Some journals count for more points than other journals --
an article in a level 2 journal (including many ISI journals) counts
for 3 points in the national metric system, while an article in a
lower level 1 journal counts for only 1 point. But all journals in
the register count for full publishing create, and the ministry
allocates national research funding based on the points.
The second reason to believe that there is a misunderstanding either
at the university or the national ministry level is that there are
simply too few ISI journals to permit such a standard. Even in well
developed fields, there are too few journals.
If we do the math for any field, the figures tell the story. Take the
number of ISI journals in any field. Multiply available pages by
average article length by the number of PhD candidates PLUS the
number of full-fledged working researchers already employed in
university departments in the field PLUS (in many fields) the number
of additional independent researchers, government researchers, and
industry researchers seeking to publish. If every researcher were to
publish ,only in ISI journals and all researchers were to publish,
there would not be enough ISI journal pages in any field to permit
even one article per decade by each researcher. There are certainly
not enough available journal pages if you add in those who have not
yet earned a PhD. Expanding the ISI database by ten would not cover
the shortage of pages in most fields.
There probably should be more design journals covered in the ISI Web
of Science system, but the number of all journals in our field still
remains far lower than the number of doctoral students. The posts to
this list have suggested why it may be inappropriate demanding that
students publish at all, let alone in ISI journals.
You did not make this standard, so I'm not arguing with you. I argue
against the standard. It is impossible. Meeting this standard is a
physical impossibility given the number of available ISI journal
pages. Even if all design journals were suddenly granted ISI index
status, I doubt that there would be enough pages to accommodate ONLY
Turklish design researchers and research students. Forget about the
rest of us.
If 111 journals publish 4 to 6 issues each per year, with 6 articles
per issue, that would be fewer than 4,000 articles per year. Since
many journals are quarterly, the actual number of possible articles
is significantly lower. There are over 70 universities in Turkey. If
you add up all academic staff and full-time paid researchers in the
fields covered by the 111 journals I listed, including general
design, industrial design, fashion design, communication design,
typography, multimedia design, etc., along with art, architecture,
and the related critical and historical disciplines divided among two
or three departments or faculties in each university, it's likely
that the Turkish university system employs at least 3,000 scholars,
possibly more. There must be two or three times as many doctoral
students. What with the space for 3,000 articles being taken by well
cited scholars such as yourself, how are 6,000 to 9,000 to publish?
Even if all 111 journals were in the ISI, there would not be enough
space.
If your university or the relevant Turkish ministry adheres to this
standard, the effect will be to cripple your own system.
And I'm not yet asking where the rest of the world's scholars will
publish. My vice chancellor expects me to publish from time to time,
and I can't see where I'd find a place what with all those doctoral
students ahead of me in the queue. My dog is not worried about his
position in the pack, but ordinary workaday scholars like me have to
print something from time to time.
You've mentioned comparisons with leading universities in the EU and
the US. This comparison is now easy, and the statistics on publishing
in ISI journals is available. The Academic Ranking of World
Universities from Shang Hai Jiao Tong University uses ISI journals as
one of its criteria for evaluating the world leading 500
universities. You will see that even universities on this select list
-- five hundred for the entire world -- do not include doctoral
students in their averages. A university that averages one ISI
article per year per full-time employed academic staff member is
generally doing quite well.
There is a strange note in your comment, though, and I do not
understand this. You seem to be saying that ONLY journals in ISI
journals are widely disseminated or cited. This does not seem right
to me. Any properly documented journal can be cited. Even journals
that do not appear in the ISI indices may have significant impact
with wide citations. The only minor drawback to a journal that is not
in the ISI Web of Science -- SCI, SSCI, AHCI -- is that the ISI
indices only cross-reference citations to and from other journals in
the ISI indices. Other bibliometric and scientometric systems can
locate citations from other journals, and anything published can be
cited.
As David Durling mentioned, books and monographs also count -- and
most systems count a book from a top publisher as equal to or greater
than a journal article even though the ISI system does not include
books or book chapters.
The most thorough studies on journal impact and citation rates that I
know of are done in the field of management studies by William
Starbuck of New York University. You'll find his material on his web
site.
http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~wstarbuc/
Many decent journals with reasonable impact rates can be found
outside the ISI Web of Science.
While I understand you viewpoint on this, I've got to say that I
suspect someone has made an error. This doesn't affect me personally.
My university prefers ISI indexed journals because they tend to have
greater prestige and higher impact, but we welcome and respect all
good publications. So does the national ministry.
It is my belief that you are subjecting yourself and your students to
an inappropriately high standard. Requiring students to reach a
standard they cannot achieve is punitive, and it will ultimately
undermine your doctoral program.
Why not ask to see the actual Bologna standard that sets publishing
in ISI journals as the primary standard. I don't mean the local
interpretation of the standard, but the actual Bologna standard in
the relevant documents from the EU directorate in Brussels.
If I'm wrong on this, you'll find out and I'll learn something. If
I'm right, you can correct a misinterpretation that supposedly
expects of still-developing research students what most leading
universities only expect of professors. Even professors are not
expected to publish every article they write in an ISI journal.
Yours,
Ken
--
Oguzhan Ozcan wrote:
Dear Ken
One year later still we discuss this but unfortunately there is no
advance. I repeat my view again after several reaction here
1. Disemination we must consider AHI and SCI indexed journal only
because of cite reasons for real dissemination. Of course there are
111 journals but there is only 5 or 10 AHI and SCI indexed journal
only in this classification. Maybe this 111 journals are quite
valuable but the problem is citing according to Bologna process.
2. Of course I don't mean all master and PhD must publish in this
way. This is computation. The computation brings quality compared
with EU and USA high end dissemination.
Solution: We need to establish more design journal which can be
accepted by ISI. I can not see this afford yet to achieve Bologne
Process
Oguzhan
--
Ken Friedman
Professor
Dean, Swinburne Design
Swinburne University of Technology
Melbourne, Australia
+61 3 92.14.68.69 Tlf Swinburne
+61 404 830 462 Mobile
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