Alas, Susan is attacking one of the most prized strategies for achieving fame in science -- publish papers with errors, which will draw critical responses and generate tons of citations.
Bill Silvert ----- Original Message ----- From: "Susan Kephart" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, August 23, 2007 8:01 AM Subject: Re: Number of times cited in a CV? > Dear Jonathan: > > Below is my quick response on "cited X time" in CV's. Others may > view this practice differently of course, depending on the > institution perhaps: > > I've been on search committees for many years, and have seen this > practice increasingly in recent years in applications for tenure > track positions in liberal arts institutions that emphasize both > research and teaching. For our searches at least, I consider it an > unnecessary use of the applicant's time and don't recall that topic > ever coming up as a positive in a committee meeting. At the pre- > interview stage, my colleagues and I tend to be much more interested > in the caliber of the paper, the rigor of peer review for the journal > it is published in, comments on that person's research from faculty > mentors/recommenders whose own work is highly regarded, and most > importantly , the ability of the author to write cogently about the > significance of his or her research, as well as how that research > might be continued and developed in the future. A few strong papers > in excellent journals on a CV, and a pdf of an exemplar paper can go > a long way towards shifting someone's application up a notch than how > many times a paper is cited IMHO . . Folks on the search committee > should be discriminating enough to recognize stellar contributions to > the literature without being alerted to citation frequency, or look > it up for themselves if they care. Many citations can either mean > a top notch research effort that is well-respected or just a popular > topic too (which has some value at times in relation to funding). > Also, lots of minor papers or ones where the author is rarely first > or second author are fine for folks who just completed a PhD and are > hunting short term sabbatical or post-doc positions but not for > tenure track positions in general.
