Over the past 100 years, higher education in the U.S. has transformed itself. Once principally focused on teaching (and the related application of scholarship to teaching), in today’s world nearly all prestige and rewards accrue to activities referred to as “research”. While this research focus has led to some impressive discoveries, it has also led to a system where considerable effort is expended upon publication with little or no concern for any consequent practical impact. In applied disciplines, such as business, education, engineering and even medicine, this has produced twin concerns:
- That most of our research activity produces findings unlikely to have any impact, and that justifying the large flow of resources required to continue this activity is therefore becoming increasingly difficult.
- That even where our research findings might be of value to practice, we have been unable to communicate that fact—whether by virtue of resistance or, more often, by lack of incentives to put forth the considerable effort required—making the “value” of these findings moot.
The purpose of this panel is to provide a forum for participants to discuss how we might rethink how we conduct our research in order to increase its impact. During the first hour, first the panelists then the participants will identify institutional and disciplinary obstacles to changing the way we think about research. Examples of such obstacles might include:
- Editorial policies of journals
- Metrics used to evaluate faculty research productivity and research quality
- Levels of prestige (or lack thereof) associated with different types of research
- Habits instilled by doctoral education and subsequent “socialization” of faculty (referred to as “trained incapacity” by early 20th century economist Thorstein Veblen)
- Misapplication of rules for rigor from one research domain to materially different domains
- And so forth…
Our plan is to compile a list of concrete, practical examples of such obstacles. Then, in the second hour, our goal is to follow the same structure in eliciting ideas—actual or potential remedies to these obstacles—from panelists and participants. Hopefully, these ideas will include concrete examples of both:
- Activities or policies attempted by universities to increase research impact
- Possible approaches that have yet to be adopted
The session will be highly interactive, with panelists speaking briefly, off the cuff, without formal presentations. Also, as an experiment, we left room on the panel so that if a conference attendee should feel that he or she has particularly useful insights or experiences, he or she can be added to the panel.
If you feel you fall into that category, you are encouraged to speak to Dr. Nagib Callaos or Dr. Grandon Gill prior to the scheduled start time for the panel.
