Analysis of scholarly productivity of the academic staff of East African School of Library and Information Science (EASLIS), Makerere University

Abstract

Scholarly productivity measures the quantity of research outputs in peer reviewed journals and scholarly presentations in conferences or other similar gatherings of an individual or an institution. The study analyzed the scholarly productivity of the East African School of Library and Information Science (EASLIS) academic staff for the last 15 years; 2004 to 2019. The objectives of the study were: to establish the scholarly productivity of EASLIS academic staff for the last 15 years (2004 to 2019), to understand the various bibliometric tools used in determining scholarly productivity, and to explore the bibliometric indicators in Publish or perish (PoP) software for the analysis of scholarly productivity. Mixed research method was adopted. Google scholar as a bibliometric tool and PoP software were used to retrieve the data of the 18 academic staff that were included in the study. The findings show that a total of 147 publications were made by 18 EASLIS academic staff from 2004 to 2019; with cumulative citations of 952; h-index of 44 and g-index of 81. Generally, PhD holders at EASLIS were found to have more impact in terms of scholarly productivity than their counterparts without PhDs, thereby making greater contributions towards the overall intellectual capital of the University. It is recommended that scholars publish their works in visible journals such that their scholarly works do not go unnoticed. Academic institutions are also encouraged to embrace the use of bibliometric tools such as Google scholar and PoP software to establish scholarly productivity and impact of their academic staff, and to use such statistics in guiding the recruitment and promotions of their academic staff.