This blog is dedicated to Dr. Carter G. Woodson architect of Black History Month (BHM) and one heck of a scholar for the people.
This month we celebrate BHM and the contributions of black doctors, writers, artists, engineers, designers, entrepreneurs, and scientists to America and the World. We celebrate them not only because of their contributions but also what they endured in a society where exclusion and racism have been part of the 400-year narrative. Today, the life of scholars at a university is designed to flow around publishing and funding. It wasn’t always like this, but it has morphed into this narrow view of an academic career. Universities rant and rave about reaching the 1 billion dollar mark for research funding. No one ever seems to think that most of this money comes from the Federal government and taxpayers’ dollars.
As we celebrate Black History, there are many black scholars whose voices, contributions, and genius have been muted by the very system that should be inclusive and promote new knowledge and scholarship. The topic is hard to discuss because it is part of a privileged system where thinking is paramount. It is also difficult because I know from first-hand experience what many black scholars have dealt with and it is not a pretty picture.
The Big Picture
At every university, young scholars enter into the famed tenure-track position with the thought of a glorious career (Figure 1). It is well known that such a scholar has to go up for tenure in the 5 or 6th year and if they are not granted tenure… they pack up their things, families and head out for another university or career. I’ll come back to this later.
In some universities such as the Ivy League schools, you are supposed to move your discipline with some breakthroughs and even then, you might not receive tenure. I haven’t said much about teaching, because research is what drives Public R-1 Institutions in the United States. You could be the best teacher in the world, but if you can publish and find the money you won’t have job security. A successful career as a faculty member includes securing grants, funding graduate students, presenting research at conferences, and publishing. After being tenured, this faculty member may receive additional awards and honors, become a chair of a department, dean, or president of a university. But if you can’t get through the first hurdle….kiss that last sentence goodbye!! This is where it becomes sticky for faculty members of color.
THE PEER REVIEW SYSTEM FOR PUBLISHING AND GRANTS
The piece of the puzzle that all faculty members have to deal with is how to get their work published or funded. Well, the two processes are basically the same, with just different players (Figure 2). In this case of publishing, it is an Editor and for funding, at government agencies, it is the program manager.
So imagine that you are spending months or even years working on ideas that you would like to share within your discipline. You find that journal and you submit the work and 2-3 people examine your work, send back a report to the editor, and then a decision is rendered (Figure 2). For a typical journal, this process takes from 2-6 months. In many cases, the reviewers will ask you to revise your manuscript. But who are the blind reviewers? Normally they are people in your discipline that are qualified to review your work–we think. You can even request certain reviewers but the process is blind and only the editor knows. There are some journals like Science and Nature where the editor decides if your paper can go forward. These journals only accept 10-15 percent of the papers they receive. If your paper is accepted, you generally have to pay page charges and sign copyright documents to the journal.
Funding an idea is the same exact process. You propose an idea, submit it to an agency and the program manager sends your proposed work out for review (Figure 2). The big difference is that money comes to play. This money will fund your graduate students or postdocs, send you to present your work at conferences, and pay the fees for publishing. It takes about 6 months to get a proposal reviewed.
Where the Peer Review systems go south for Scholars of Color that publish
Networks. So much of University life is around trying to move up the ranks by bringing in more money. There is an understanding that if you received your doctorate from certain schools then you have buying power. So, normally historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) cannot stand up to Ivy League, PAC-10, Big 10 schools, or most predominately white institutions (PWIs) for that matter. If you clustered the research dollars for all HBCUs in the country, it is much less than what Johns Hopkins University would receive in 1 year. This creates an export mindset where HBCUs make great undergraduates but really cannot fund large numbers of graduate students because it needs its faculty to bring in research dollars. The question is how can you do both at the same time when undergraduate students from our communities need the additional and mentoring which requires time. So many of our graduates must do their research at a powerhouse school and it is the professor that they study under, that provides the linkages to the larger network. In STEM disciplines, the network is almost always white. These are the people who will review your proposals and papers. Many black and brown scholars are not part of these networks. Even if they are, they represent a very small percentage (1-2%) in STEM disciplines
The Blind Review System of publishing. The blind review systems can be harsh to people of color. The reviews can be nasty, hurtful, and sometimes overtly racists. They can look to dissect your work, validate your calculations, or just outright reject your work with no basis. It is then up to the Editor to either accept the reviewer’s opinions to accept or reject the work or to find new reviewers (Figure 3). But what if there are reviewers that believe that black people are not intelligent and therefore no matter what they publish, it cannot be correct. It is easy to identify you as a person of color in some fields because there are so few. Sometimes, the reviewers try to go outside the boundaries of your work and carry you off from the objectives of your study. What can happen, is that ask you to revise but when you send in the reviews, they never respond back to the editor. Hence, you have to begin a new search. Your paper takes a long time to get accepted while you are on the tenure clock or in working on a funded proposal with no publications to report in your annual review.
I know Black faculty members who have told me that their work was rejected so many times (more than 10). Reviewers are asked not to share the work of the submitter with anyone else, but it is very likely that they do because sometimes the reviews look so similar. I believe that some might even stoop so low as to have their graduate student or even undergraduates review a manuscript for a faculty member of color.
Editors How many editors understand what is going on? How many want to challenge their colleagues who may write a biased review? How many editors understand the pressure of being black or brown at a University and how it is tied to your livelihood. Do they think that we live in a colorblind world???? The worst part of it is when I heard a black mentor tell me that they were broken by the peer-reviewed system. The reviewers did not know how to reject the paper at the end the editor said that they could not accept the research. I had a submitted paper (to PLOS) with several colleagues and it took nearly a year to address the reviews and then the editor finds a third reviewer who just straight out rejects the work. The editor did not give us a chance to respond and just rejected the work. I will never submit a journal there again. I actually believe that some of the editors are racist and act as gatekeepers. I can prove that, just a gut feeling.
WHERE THE PEER REVIEW SYSTEMS GOES SOUTH FOR SCHOLARS OF COLOR THAT seek funding
Because of the connections between publishing and funding, the consequences for faculty members of color are even more critical in the pre-tenure phase. Because if a faculty member cannot gain funding, how can they support graduate students to help with their scholarships, how can they pay for conferences and publications (Figure 4)?
The Blind Review System of Funding
Our large science agencies such as the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Department of Energy (DOE) and NASA produce announcements of opportunity. Scientists can apply for funding and these grants are reviewed by individuals or panels. The key person is the program manager who normally has the final decision on funding. In the case of NSF, there are criteria from poor, fair, good, very good, and excellent. Generally, one poor or fair score torpedoes a proposal. The number of reviewers can vary from 3-6. NIH has a panel of scientists who examines proposals. At NIH, your proposal must make it to the discussion phase just to be considered. Studies have shown how bias NIH is towards black scholars that submit proposals — many do not make the discussion. While all of this seems pretty normal, if we start asking important questions about representation of reviewers, panels and program managers it becomes clear that not many are people of color.
When reading through the comments from proposal reviews one also feels that somehow race enters into the story. For example, NSF has criteria called broader impacts. A broader impact might including increasing diversity. However, no one knows if that score really even matters to the overall proposal. In the final outcome, the word of the reviewers and the program manager carries all of the weight. However, there are coded words that have a meaning. For younger faculty members of color:
1.) Try to find a more senior person on your proposal – for a person of color it means find a white senior colleague.
2.) Find someone in who is a specialist in subject X. You realize that you already have people of color who are specialist in subject X.
3.). The process was so competitive and we can’t fund everyone. Well who go funded?
Are there any Solutions?
Yes, but they require that we evaluate the current system of funding and publishing carefully. Some think that this system is old and started back in the 1700s but it really less than 50 years old. The original peer review was in the hands of editors and now it’s the Editor and blind reviewers. Peer review is also relatively new to funding agencies and came out the need of a congressman to know what kind of work was being funded. To learn more about the system of peer review in journals and grants please read.
- Rethink the blind peer review system
Any system that depends on a few people where the actions remain behind the curtain needs oversight. I say that the blind-blind review has the best chance for a fair review. This means that originators of the work should not be known to the reviewers. It complicated because the references often give away the authors. Maybe there are other ways, but either close the curtains completely or have full disclosure in a system where racism, sexism, and other forms of bias exist in the minds of reviewers.
- EDITORS and program managers should be held accountable if bias is found in the acceptance rate or unacceptable behavior of reviewers are found
There is an accounting system at publishers and where the contributions (which institutions) are submitting journals. If Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), African Institutions, or those in the African Diaspora are being rejected at a significant rate, the editor must bear responsibility. If black or brown submitters are identifiable their data should also be examined. Editors should identify reviewers who have a record of rejecting or doing other unethical behavior and remove them for good as reviewers. Doesn’t matter if they are a good reviewer or not. Racist behaviors are not acceptable in a blind review system. In a similar manager, racist and biased behaviors by reviewers are unacceptable when taxpayers are supporting federal research. I am sure that most taxpayers would not be supportive of such behavior and the program manager should not support it either. If a program manager does support such treatment they should be removed. Both Editors and Program managers should look at their attitudes towards race, privilege, and racism. This is a necessary reflection followed by a discussion if an anti-racist position is to be taken.
- RETHINK the value of a journal Article
Journal such as Science and Nature are seen as elite journals with only 10-15% of manuscripts accepted. Does this mean that the other 85% aren’t any good? What does it mean for scientists who will spend decades working on a particular topic and never publish in Science; are they less? What message are we sending to undergraduates and graduates who feel that they must publish in order to be considered good scientists or even to get into graduate school or find a job? Does this type of competition lead to greater disparities with scholars who have published going to elite institutions instead of smaller universities, HBCUs, or Hispanic Serving Institutions? Where does this race lead to??? A proliferation of journals where scientists see the more they publish, the more privileged they become? Research is humbling at best, takes time to reflect on, often needs revisions, and is meant for others to follow the popcorn trail. It is a lot more than citations, which universities love and funding agencies feel that the money has been justifiably spent. Black scholars should not feel compelled to get their work accepted in only the top journals. Promotion and Tenure review committees should not insist on this measure and they should not penalize faculty members to submit their work to journals that have a focus on black issues.
- Reimagine the value of funded research
Research networks are old and built with a certain level of exclusion that exists with schools of thought. Quite often, researchers who do not follow the existing paradigm are locked outside forever. When money is involved, greed and power always assert their presence. The so-called experts may protect their turf by making sure that people outside their networks don’t make their way in. This is a fractal pattern that exists throughout all of American society and Western Civilization for that matter. It is a kind of intellectual capitalism where the rich get richer and favors large public institutions. The disparities in research dollars continue to increase limiting research and scholarship at small institutions and MSIs. The funders will say, we have special money set aside for MSIs…really? How much of your multi-billion dollar budget is set aside? How often do these institutions get a chance to lead in important research efforts that help the nation and the world? The data is right in front of all of us. We are just accepting what is presented without ever thinking that we are all supporting federal agencies and research at universities through our tax dollars. Equity should be part of the consideration.
Adopt an Anti-Racist Research Posture at Institutions of higher learning and funding agencies
The moment that we think that only certain types of people or institutions are responsible for producing research we fall back into the 17th century with Henry Oldenburg and deciding the fate of research contributions. If we believe that only one or two BIPOC undergraduate/graduate students, faculty members are representative of a department what doe that mean? Is that the case with basketball and football teams where the teams are at least 50% or more black and TV and sneaker contracts are on the line? It looks like the intellectual and basketball arenas are the same: Black Athletes and White Scholars. Things that make you go hmmm.
If we really want to change this, it starts with leveling access to education. Public institutions were not made for white students or faculty members just as HBCUs were not made for Black students or faculty members. They just evolved with Jim Crow America. If public institutions want to limit the entrance of black and brown students and faculty, then large sums of money need to be diverted to MSIs and community colleges so that scholars and researchers have a chance to blossom. These institutions can develop their own journals so that research and scholarship can be produced to serve the nation and the world.
Final Thoughts
Some may read this blog and think that the writer is jaded. When I have to go through some of the nonsense, I am angry. As a whole, I have experienced a gratifying career. I have had excellent role models (black, white, and Hispanic) that have been kind enough to show me the good path. I have spent most of my career studying the African Continent and have learned so much about how the African climate and weather system works. The continent has been my greatest teacher. I have enjoyed modeling and taking measurements with so many bright black scientists and students. I find great rewards in seeing their careers evolve. If I am granted a wish before I leave this planet, I would like to create an electronic journal that is interdisciplinary, inclusive, and fair for people of color. This journal will be devoted to serving the community, finding solutions for the grand challenges such as Climate Justice, and letting the scholarly work that brings happiness to its producers see the light of day. I would hope that other scholars and like-minded people would help in this quest.
This journal would be modeled after the genius that Dr. Carter G Woodson laid down when he started The Journal of Negro History in 1916 and later renamed to The Journal of African American History.
Epilogue
The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown the world of journals into confusion. Preprints have come out by the hundreds or thousands reporting findings from all over the world. These articles have not been peer-reviewed and have hundreds of citations. There is a lot more research ongoing than would be suggested from the traditional peer-reviewed system. Voices and thoughts are being shared. No one is sure how to put the cat back in the bag –even when the pandemic ends. This might be good news for scholars of color.