Publication Frequencies of Departments Conferring the PhD in Special Education

Abstract

The purposes of this study were to provide estimates of current research productivity of faculties in doctorate-granting special education programs and to compare them to previously reported reputational rankings. To these ends, the publication frequencies in 29 professional journals of 81 faculties were tallied over a 5-year period. The mean program and per capita publication frequencies over the 5-year period were 17.06 and 1.60; only 6 program faculties surpass a one publica tion per faculty member per year criterion. The 10 most productive faculties on total and per capita publication frequencies were presented along with three leaders in each of eight specializations. Both total and per capita frequencies correlated weakly but positively with reputational rankings, suggesting that current reputation is only modestly related to current productivity. Furthermore, the low mean program and per capita publication frequencies suggest that high productivity is the exception and not the rule among faculties in doctoral-granting programs.