The School of Accountancy at MU’s Robert J. Trulaske, Sr. College of Business, ranked ninth in the nation in faculty productivity, according to Academic Analytics. To compile the rankings, the company reviewed 375 institutions and more than 160,000 faculty members. Their method, they say, is “the only objective measure of faculty productivity.”
The most recent ranking defined faculty productivity as the number of books written by faculty between 2002 and 2006; journal publications from 2004 to 2006; citations of faculty work in other scholarly publications; federal grant funds; and other honors and awards. Using information provided by university websites, plus 64,000 books acquired by academic libraries, and 15,000 scholarly journals, Academic Analytics looked at 11 academic fields, and weighted each criterion according to importance within that field.
School of Accountancy faculty received high ratings for journal publications, with 64 percent of faculty contributing articles to scholarly journals, and 43 percent cited by other authors. According to Bruce Walker, dean of the Trulaske College of Business, “Publishing articles in scholarly journals adds to the body of knowledge in the accounting discipline, increases the quality of the classroom experience for students, and eventually enhances an institution’s reputation. Mizzou’s accounting faculty has a well-deserved reputation for being not only effective instructors but also productive researchers.”
Allen Bluedorn, associate dean of graduate studies and research, indicated that faculty members who conduct research and publish articles can share their experience with doctoral students, who will be expected to be productive in the area of research when they graduate and become faculty members at business schools. “Also, faculty members who publish bring their research into the classroom,” Bluedorn says.
Bluedorn was not surprised by the School of Accountancy ranking among the top 10 in the nation. “Knowing the faculty as I do, I can say they are as strong a group of researchers and publishers as I have known during my 27 years at MU.”