Representation of Lesbian and Gay Men in Federal, State, and Local Bureaucracies

Americans increasingly view lesbians and gay men as a legitimate minority, entitled to equal employment opportunities and perhaps to adequate representation in government. Scholars of public administration have extensively studied whether women and racial minorities receive fair representation and pay in the public sector, but we have generally ignored lesbians and gay men, largely because we lack data on the sexual orientation of government employees. Using a 5 percent sample of the 2000 Census, this paper provides new insights into one group of lesbian and gay employees: full-time workers with same-sex unmarried partners. It first determines whether they are as likely to hold jobs in the public and nonprofit sectors as workers who are married, have different-sex unmarried partners, or have never been married. Second, it explores whether lesbians' and gay men's representation is concentrated in particular occupations. It then examines whether workers with same-sex partners earn as much as other workers, and whether any disparities can be explained by race, gender, education, age, occupation, and location. Working Paper 08-2

Proposal for a Standard Article Metrics Dashboard to Replace the Journal Impact Factor

This paper proposes the creation of a dashboard consisting of five metrics that could be used to replace the journal impact factor. It should be especially useful in circumstances, like promotion and tenure committees, where the evaluators do not share the authors subject expertise and where they are working under time constraints

Change and Transition in Public Services

Academic libraries and, more important, all of higher education have been in the midst of a fundamental transformation over the past decade. Changes in information technology, requirements for increased accountability from stakeholder groups, and pressures to accomplish more with fewer resources have combined to produce a period of organizational restructurings that will require librarians to reshape their professional identities and roles

A Strategy for Academic Libraries in the First Quarter of the 21st Century

The paper presents a model for academic libraries for the next 20 years. The parts of the model are: 1.) Complete the migration from print to electronic collections; 2.) Retire legacy print collections; 3.) Redevelop the library space; 4.) Reposition library and information tools, resources, and expertise, and 5.) Migrate the focus of collections from purchasing materials to curating content. The interactions of the parts of the model and organizational issues for implementation are explored. THE PUBLISHED VERSION OF THIS PAPER, Lewis, David W. "A Strategy for Academic Libraries in the First Quarter of the 21st Century." College & Research Libraries 68(5):418-434 September 2007, CAN BE FOUND AT: http://hdl.handle.net/1805/159

Why Elsevier’s Outrageous Profit Margins Could Turn Out to Be a Good Thing

The paper argues, using Clayton Christensen's business models theory, that Elsevier's near 40% profit margins will limit the responses Elsevier can make to the disruptive entry of open access at the low end of the scholarly journal market

From Stacks to the Web: The Transformation of Academic Library Collecting

The existence of a ubiquitous and cheap worldwide communications network that increasingly makes documents easily and freely available will require a transformation of academic library collecting practice. It will be driven by a number of specific developments including: the digitization of content; the development of print repositories; the development of e-readers and print-on-demand publishing; the growth of open access; challenges to establish academic publishing organizations; and the growth of new forms of scholarship based on openness and social productivity. If academic libraries are to be successful, they will need to: deconstruct legacy print collections; move from item-by-item book selection to purchase-on-demand and subscriptions; manage the transition to open access journals; focus on curating unique items; and develop new mechanisms for funding national infrastructure

How to Think about the Pace of Substitution of Open Access Academic Journals for Traditional Subscription Journals

As librarians, academic authors and editors, publishers, and others interested in scholarly communication consider the future, one of the pressing questions is: How fast will open access journals replace traditional subscription journals? It is clear that there are more open access journals now than a few years ago and that open access journals have become an important vehicle for some scholarly communication, but how long will we have to wait for this vehicle to become dominant? This paper will consider this question and use a simple model to explore it. The conclusion is that between 2018 and 2019 open access journals are likely to comprise 50% of all academic journals and should be approaching 90% of all academic journals by 2022. While the data used in the study has some limitations and the methods are somewhat crude, I believe the conclusions are generally sound. I would invite others to refine the data and the methodology

Why Do P&T Committees Keep Hiring the Journal Impact Factor?

This paper asks why P&T committees continue to hire the journal impacts factor (JIF) when it is clearly understood that the measure is deeply flawed. It offers two alternatives to the JIF that can compete against the JIF