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Journal of Education for Business
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The Gatekeepers of Business Education Research:
An Institutional Analysis
Frank R. Urbancic
To cite this article: Frank R. Urbancic (2011) The Gatekeepers of Business Education Research: An Institutional Analysis, Journal of Education for Business, 86:5, 302-310, DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2010.520757
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08832323.2010.520757
Published online: 21 Jun 2011.
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ISSN: 0883-2323 print / 1940-3356 online DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2010.520757
The Gatekeepers of Business Education Research:
An Institutional Analysis
Frank R. Urbancic
University of South Alabama, Mobile, Alabama, USA
The author ranked the academic standing of universities based on faculty representation to the editorial boards of business education journals. Previous studies that ranked institutions for editorial board representation focused on journals that primarily favor publication of basic and applied research contributions. As a result, prior research has accorded either very minimal or no consideration for journals that publish learning and pedagogical research. This author addressed the aforementioned shortcoming by extending the editorial board ranking method to include 1,279 editorial board affiliations for 31 business education journals. The rankings provide a comparative perspective on institutional affiliations and participation in the peer review process for business education research.
Keywords: business education research, editorial boards, journals, ranking academic institu-tions, reputation
The reported results of studies that rank the relative standing of academic institutions provide relevant feedback as a ba-sis for faculties to monitor the progress and relative status of their programs (Kaufman, 1984; Mittermaier, 1991). Accord-ing to Urbancic (2004) the prestige associated with attainAccord-ing the highest ranks can prove valuable to a program in terms of attracting quality students, excellent faculty, increased bud-get allocations, and externally generated financial support. Chan and Fok (2003) and Gibbons and Fish (1991) discussed a number of different methods that have been used to rank academic standing, including an established method based on editorial board representation for scholarly journals. This method recognizes that selection for appointment to the ed-itorial board of a journal is an honor that confers status not only to the individual, but also to the appointee’s university. However, the problem with previously published studies that ranked institutions based on editorial board representation is a tendency to focus exclusively on journals devoted to ba-sic and applied types of business research. As a result, prior studies have disregarded the journals that publish research contributions to learning and pedagogy. The purpose of this
Correspondence should be addressed to Frank R. Urbancic, Univer-sity of South Alabama, Mitchell College of Business, Department of Accounting, 307 University Boulevard,, Mobile, AL 36688, USA. E-mail: furbanci@usouthal.edu
study was to address the aforementioned shortcoming by extending application of the editorial board ranking method to the area of business education research.
The need for this study relates to the precept that quality teaching in higher education is an imperative for business academicians. The standards for accreditation by the Associ-ation to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) International emphasize that “Student learning is the central activity of higher education” (Association to Advance Col-legiate Schools of Business [AACSB] International, 2008, p. 59). The standards of AACSB International add further importance to the learning mission by an explicit recogni-tion of contriburecogni-tions to learning and pedagogical research as one of three major categories of intellectual contribu-tions, along with contributions to practice (applied research) and discipline-based scholarship (basic research). Therefore, learning and pedagogical research that serves to advance teaching quality has significant value, as do the journals that publish the research and the editorial board members respon-sible for assuring journal quality.
The remainder of this article is organized into six sections. First, I assess the limitations of the study. Second, I review research studies related to the editorial method of journal analysis. Research questions are presented in the third sec-tion. In the fourth section I describe the methodology and procedure for the study. Results and discussion are presented in the fifth section. Last, I provide concluding comments and recommendations for future researchers.
GATEKEEPERS OF BUSINESS EDUCATION RESEARCH 303
Limitations
There were three limitations to this study. First, the analysis was restricted to the editorial boards of business education research journals for the areas of accounting, economics, finance, management, and marketing. The study therefore excluded other outlets for publication available in education journals that are outside of the primary business disciplines. However, the significance of this limitation is minimal be-cause education journals outside of the business journals are less likely to publish research with an emphasis on business education.
A second limitation of the study was attributable to differences in the size of journal editorial boards. For example, 6 of the 31 journals examined for this study were specialty journals with fewer than 20 editorial board members each. By contrast, the three largest boards included for this study were Academy of Management Learning & Education (97 members), Journal of Marketing Education (89), andIssues in Accounting Education (79). Such wide variations in board size among the journals could possibly bias the relative ranking of some institutions based on membership dominance for a particular journal or discipline. Third, the editorial board method assumes that editors primarily invite scholars with strong publication and cita-tion records to serve on the boards of academic journals. However, some members with lesser research accomplish-ments could be chosen primarily for their dependability in submitting timely reviews. An editor may also extend in-vitations based more on convenience or collegiality rather than scholarship. For example, board invitations could be extended to one or more faculty members of the editor’s school or to coauthors of the editor. Editors might also call on longtime friends known from their time together as fellow PhD students. The extent of these practices could vary be-tween different journals, but their overall impact is assumed to be negligible for purposes of the editorial board ranking method. Editors are ultimately responsible for maintaining and enhancing a journal’s reputation for quality. For this rea-son, editors have an incentive for offering board memberships to accomplished scholars.
Related Research
According to AACSB International (2005), the relative aca-demic standing of business schools has taken on increased significance in recent years. Consequently, the business school rankings, as annually reported in the popular press by Businessweek,U.S. News and World Report, andWall Street Journal, generate substantial interest and controversy among the various constituents of business education (AACSB In-ternational). In addition to the popular press, other rankings of academic standing can be developed by applying various methods such as counting the number of published articles by faculty, determining the number of citations to published research, or conducting opinion surveys to measure peer
ratings and perceptions of quality (Chan & Fok, 2003; Gibbons & Fish, 1991; Kurtz & Boone, 1988; Mittermaier, 1991; Urbancic, 2004; Volkan, Colley, & Boone, 1993). Ac-cording to Urbancic, the inherent subjectivity of the survey method places it at a disadvantage relative to the more objec-tive methods. The methods that involve counts of published articles or citation analysis gain objectivity, but these meth-ods involve a tediously elaborate process for data collection. The editorial board method avoids the aforementioned draw-backs, and presents a unique perspective on the relative ranks of institutions with business education programs.
Considerable power over a discipline is vested in the ed-itorial board members of academic journals. The process of editorial review serves as a quality control checkpoint on the body of knowledge for a discipline, and editorial board mem-bers are widely regarded as the gatekeepers of the academy (Crane, 1967; Kerr, Tolliver, & Petree, 1977; Lee, 1997). As gatekeepers, their decisions control the type of research that is published, determines the success of academicians as scholars, and sustain journal quality. According to Gilmore, Carson, and Perry (2006), journal editors endeavor to en-hance journal reputation, and for this reason they are highly selective in offering appointments to the editorial board.
Krishnan and Bricker (2004) determined that the value added by a journal to its published articles is a func-tion of the journal’s editorial board reputafunc-tion as measured by scholarly productivity. In a study of finance journals, Tanner (2000) observed that a journal’s quality correlated highly with the citation records of its referees. Based on their study of accounting journals, Beattie and Ryan (1989) observed that the members of editorial boards are far more frequently cited than other researchers. Hardin, Liano, Chan, and Fok (2008) examined the scholarly accomplishments of the editorial board members for the highest journals in finance and concluded that selection to the board of a top-five journal required substantial research achievement. Rynes (2006) asserted that scholars with strong publication and ci-tation records are the most obvious candidates to receive an editorial board invitation to an academic journal. So in effect the editorial board method encompasses the other methods used to rank the institutional affiliations of academicians such as citation counts or article counts, but without the need to confront problems such as errors in citation databases and adjusting for coauthorship credit.
A study by Trieschmann, Dennis, Northcraft, and Niemi (2000) added validity and relevance to the use of editorial board memberships as a basis for an assessment of academic quality by demonstrating a positive correlation between the numbers of memberships held for the best basic research journals in business and the published rankings of business schools. Other studies have emphasized that a ranking based on editorial board representation reflects the quality of fac-ulties and their visibility relative to other institutions, but it is much easier to obtain than rankings based on other crite-ria (Gibbons & Fish, 1991; Mittermaier, 1991; Volkan et al.,
TABLE 1
Previously Published Studies of Editorial Board Representation
Study Area Number of journals reviewed Education journals reviewed Brinn & Jones, 2008 Accounting 48 Accounting Education(UK)
Accounting Educators’ Journal Issues in Accounting Education Journal of Accounting Education
Volkan, Colley & Boone, 1993 Accounting 54 Accounting Educators’ Journal Issues in Accounting Education Journal of Accounting Education
Mittermaier, 1991 Accounting 13 Issues in Accounting Education
Gibbons & Fish, 1991 Economics 25 None
Chan & Fok, 2003 Finance 16 None
Kaufman, 1984 Finance 10 None
Chan, Fok & Lai, 2005 International business 30 None
Urbancic, 2005 Marketing 8 None
Kurtz & Boone, 1988 Marketing 13 Journal of Marketing Education
Urbancic, 2004 Real estate 3 None
Boone, Gibson & Kurtz, 1988 Transportation 6 None
1993). However, editorial board membership is not a perfect ranking measure. The task of reviewing papers is burdensome (Brinn & Jones, 2008). According to Chan, Fung, and Lai (2005), good researchers may choose not to be on editorial boards because of time constraints or for other reasons. As a result, limited participation on an editorial board does not necessarily imply that the nonranked schools are of lesser quality. Therefore, a ranking of institutions based on edi-torial board memberships is intended to compliment rather than replace other types of rankings for academic quality.
Previously published studies of editorial board member-ships have presented rankings for the institutional affiliations of faculty representatives in the areas of accounting (Brinn & Jones, 2008; Mittermaier, 1991; Volkan et al., 1993), economics (Gibbons & Fish, 1991), finance (Chan & Fok, 2003; Kaufman, 1984), international business (Chan et al., 2005), marketing (Kurtz & Boone, 1988; Urbancic, 2005), real estate (Urbancic, 2004), and transportation (Boone, Gibson, & Kurtz, 1988). As seen in Table 1, the aforemen-tioned studies of editorial board representation in business vary in terms of the area and the number of journals re-viewed. A common shortcoming of these studies is their focus on journal outlets that primarily favor publication of basic and applied research contributions. As a result, prior studies have accorded very minimal or no consideration at all to journals that publish learning and pedagogical research. For example, business education journals were completely excluded from analysis by seven of the 11 studies listed in Table 1. Only four of the studies in Table 1 included an edu-cation journal for analysis, and in those studies the eduedu-cation journal(s) was or were substantially outnumbered by the ba-sic and applied journals reviewed. This lack of recognition for business education journals is unfortunate in light of the importance attributed to education research. For example, St. Pierre, Wilson, Ravenscroft, and Rebele (2009) asserted
that “Careful attention to what we teach, how we teach it, and how we can accommodate and facilitate students’ learn-ing is a most worthy endeavor” (p. 129). Therefore, journal publication in that endeavor should be recognized and val-ued on a basis that accords parity of esteem with other types of research. Within this context, the present study helps by providing information from an appraisal based on editorial board members for journals that publish business education research.
Research Questions
Hawes and Keillor (2002) and Polonsky, Mittelstaedt, and Moore (2008) contended that mission should be a primary consideration in evaluations of research relative to academic standing. The standards for accreditation by AACSB Inter-national (2008) recognize that priorities may vary, and the mission of an institution should determine the appropriate balance of activity among the three different types of intel-lectual contributions in terms of basic, applied, and education research. Just as institutions may have different missions, more relevant information about the relative academic stand-ing of participants in the business research process can be provided by analyses that separately examine each of the three types of intellectual contributions. However, as noted previously, prior studies of editorial boards in business have only examined journals that publish basic and applied types of research. Therefore, the purpose of the present study was to address the aforementioned shortcoming by extending ap-plication of the editorial board ranking method to journals that primarily publish business education research. Findings from this extended application contribute another perspec-tive on the relaperspec-tive academic standing of business schools in a mission-based accreditation environment.
GATEKEEPERS OF BUSINESS EDUCATION RESEARCH 305
Based on the preceding discussion, the following research questions were investigated:
Research Question 1: Which institutions’ faculties rank highly for the most memberships to the editorial boards of journals devoted to the publication of business edu-cation research?
Research Question 2:How is the ranking for editorial board representation changed by adjusting for differences in the numbers of faculty members at business schools? Research Question 3: Which institutions’ faculties rank
highly in terms of their memberships to the greatest number of different journal editorial boards?
Research Question 4:How do the leading business education research gatekeeper institutions compare to nationally ranked business school programs?
METHOD
Application of the editorial method begins with identifying the specific journal boards to include for analysis. For this study, I reviewed the descriptions of manuscript topics and guidelines of the journals provided by Cabell’s 2009 Direc-tory of Publishing Opportunities in accounting, economics, finance, management, and marketing to identify scholarly journals that extensively publish business education research articles. Application of this approach (supplemented by an Internet search for additional information about each jour-nal’s editorial board) produced a set of 31 refereed journals. An alphabetical list of the journals appears in Table 2. The list excluded professional training journals (e.g.,Journal of Executive Education,Journal of Leadership Education). The analysis also excluded journals based outside of the United States. The data collected for analysis consisted of the insti-tutional affiliations of the editors and editorial review board members of all 31 journals.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Institutional Affiliation Rank Based on Memberships
Research Question 1 involves which institutions’ faculties rank highly for the most memberships to the editorial boards of journals devoted to the publication of business education research. Findings provided by an analysis of the institutional affiliations of editorial board members for business educa-tion journals were based on a total of 1,279 editorial board members with affiliation to 527 institutions for 2009. The total of 527 institutions included 509 academic institutions and 18 nonacademic institutions (e.g., banking, consulting, manufacturing) and each one of the nonacademic institu-tions had only one journal board member, for a total of 18. A majority of members (1,261) were affiliated with academic
TABLE 2
Business Education Journals
List of business education research journal titles
Academy of Management Learning & Education
Accounting Educators’ Journal Accounting Information Systems
Educator Journal
Advances in Accounting Education Advances in Financial Education Business Education Digest Decision Sciences Journal of
Innovative Education
Global Perspectives on Accounting Education
INFORMS Transactions on Education
International Journal of Information and Operations Management Education
Issues in Accounting Education Journal for Advancement of
Marketing Education Journal for Economic Educators Journal of Accounting Education Journal of Applied Finance
Journal of Applied Research for Business Instruction Journal of Economic Education Journal of Economics and Finance
Education
Journal of Education for Business Journal of Financial Education Journal of Hospitality & Tourism
Education
Journal of Human Resources Education
Journal of Industrial Organization Education
Journal of Informatics Education Research
Journal of Information Systems Education
Journal of Legal Studies Education Journal of Management Education Journal of Marketing Education Journal of Real Estate Practice and
Education
Journal of Teaching in International Business
Marketing Education Review
institutions. The 509 academic institutions consisted of 363 universities located in the United States, and 146 non-U.S. universities. A list of the institutions with the most member-ships is presented in Table 3. Only institutions with six or more editorial board memberships are listed in Table 3. Ap-plication of this criterion yielded a list of 48 universities, and all of the universities were accredited in business by AACSB International. Because all of the journals reviewed are based in the United States, it is not surprising to see that all 48 institutions listed in Table 3 are U.S. universities. Although fewer in number and not listed in Table 3, some non-U.S. universities are notable for multiple memberships. For ex-ample, the University of Melbourne, with 4 representatives on the editorial boards of the business education journals, had the most memberships of the 146 non-U.S. universities. And following Melbourne was a group of non-U.S. universities, each with 3 memberships: Auckland, Bond, Hong Polytech-nic, National University Singapore, Simon Fraser, University of Hong Kong, and Waikato.
As the top group, the 48 universities in Table 3 account for only 9% of the 527 institutions in this study, but with 379 board representatives these 48 universities hold 30% of the 1,279 editorial board memberships. James Madison University, at 15, has the most faculty representatives to the editorial boards of journals that publish business education research. Rounding out the top group of universities with 11 members each are Indiana, Kansas State, Michigan, Middle
TABLE 3
Institutional Affiliation of Editorial Board Members for Business Education Journals
Institution Number of board members Institution Number of board members
James Madison University 15 Auburn University 7
Babson College 7
Indiana University 11 Bowling Green State University 7
Kansas State University 11 Clemson University 7
University of Michigan 11 George Washington University 7
Middle Tennessee State 11 Georgia State University 7
Northern Illinois University 11 University of Nevada at Las Vegas 7 New Mexico State University 7 Southern Illinois at Carbondale 10 Northeastern University 7 Texas A&M University 7
Baylor University 9 Texas Christian University 7
University of Central Florida 9 Virginia Commonwealth 7
University of Delaware 9 Western Michigan University 7
Florida Atlantic University 9
Georgia Southern University 9 University of Akron 6
Illinois State University 9 Ball State University 6
Michigan State University 9 Brigham Young University 6
Mississippi State University 9 Case Western Reserve University 6
University of Richmond 9 University of Denver 6
Stanford University 9 University of Georgia 6
Massachusetts at Amherst 6 University of Connecticut 8 University of Missouri at Columbia 6
DePaul University 8 North Carolina at Chapel Hill 6
Miami University of Ohio 8 University of Notre Dame 6
New York University 8 Pennsylvania State University 6
Texas Tech University 8 San Diego State University 6
UCLA 6
Note.Top 48 academic institutions combined=379. Remaining 461 academic institutions combined=882. The 18 nonacademic institutions combined= 18. Total number of institutions=1,279.
Tennessee State, and Northern Illinois, followed by Southern Illinois University with 10 board members. Based on Table 3’s data, the combined group of 48 universities averaged 7.9 (379/48) editorial board memberships each. By compar-ison, the average for the remaining 461 universities with ed-itorial board representation was substantially lower, at only 1.9 (882/461) members.
A Rank Based on Size-Adjusted Memberships
Research Question 2 involved how the ranking for editorial board representation changed by adjusting for differences in the numbers of faculty members at business schools. Be-cause some of the institutions listed in Table 3 had a very large number of business school faculty, it was relevant to consider the desirability of an editorial board ranking based on a size adjustment for differences in the numbers of faculty. There were contrasting viewpoints on this issue. According to Mittermaier (1991) and Kaufman (1984), a size-adjusted ranking was not relevant to the purpose of a ranking for editorial board representation. Mittermaier stated that “Prospective students, faculty members, and donors are likely to choose an institution based on its overall visibility, and visi-bility would be measured by total editorial board membership
rather than membership adjusted for size” (p. 230). On the other hand, in their editorial board study of finance journals, Chan and Fok (2003) provided size-adjusted data and showed that faculty size has a significant influence on relative ranking positions. Both of the aforementioned viewpoints have merit. Therefore, in this study I made a compromise by assigning rank based on application of a size-adjustment ratio (number of business faculty divided by the number of board mem-berships), but only for universities with at least six or more editorial board memberships. This compromise approach to ranking avoids a sacrifice of visibility for the sake of achiev-ing a comprehensively applied size adjustment.
Size-adjustment ratios were computed using the total number of full-time business school faculty per AACSB International Data Direct divided by the total number of editorial board memberships. Table 4 presents the top 40 institutions for editorial board memberships to business edu-cation journals by rank according to their size-adjusted ratios. Numerically lower ratios are associated with higher rank-ing in Table 4. Southern Illinois University led all other universities in rank based on an outstanding 4.00 ratio. In other words, Southern Illinois had a full-time business faculty of 40 and held 10 editorial board memberships. No-tably, the first six universities at the top of Table 4 also
GATEKEEPERS OF BUSINESS EDUCATION RESEARCH 307 TABLE 4
Top 40 Ranking of Editorial Board Member Affiliations Based on Size-Adjustment Ratios
Rank Institution Ratio
1 Southern Illinois at Carbondale 4.00
2 Kansas State University 4.55
3 University of Richmond 7.22
4 Mississippi State University 8.11
5 James Madison University 8.27
6 Northern Illinois University 8.55
7 University of Akron 10.33
7 University of Missouri at Columbia 10.33
9 Texas Christian University 10.57
10 New Mexico State University 10.71
11 Clemson University 10.86
12 University of Delaware 11.22
13 Illinois State University 11.44
14 Texas Tech University 11.50
15 University of Nevada at Las Vegas 11.71
16 Case Western Reserve University 11.83
17 Stanford University 12.11
18 Middle Tennessee State University 12.18
19 Bowling Green State University 12.29
20 Georgia Southern University 13.11
21 Western Michigan University 13.14
22 Ball State University 13.17
23 Auburn University 13.29
24 Michigan State University 13.44
25 San Diego State University 13.50
26 Virginia Commonwealth University 13.57
27 University of Connecticut 13.63
28 University of Central Florida 13.78
29 Baylor University 13.89
30 University of Michigan 14.91
31 University of Denver 15.83
32 Massachusetts at Amherst 16.33
33 Indiana University 16.36
34 Florida Atlantic University 16.44
35 Miami University of Ohio 17.13
36 University of Georgia 17.17
37 UCLA 17.33
38 George Washington University 17.71
39 Northeastern University 17.86
40 University of Notre Dame 18.83
appear in the top-rated groups of Table 3 and include South-ern Illinois (4.00), Kansas State (4.55), Richmond (7.22), Mississippi State (8.11), James Madison (8.27), and North-ern Illinois (8.55). Following this group are five universities that improved significantly in Table 4, compared with their position in Table 3, and include Akron (10.33), Missouri at Columbia (10.33), Texas Christian (10.57), New Mexico State (10.71), and Clemson (10.86). The other extreme con-sists of five universities that ranked much lower in Table 4 relative to their position among the top groups in Table 3. This group of universities includes Central Florida (13.78), Baylor (13.89), Michigan (14.91), Indiana (16.36), and Florida Atlantic (16.44). Finally, despite holding six or more editorial board memberships, several universities did not
have a low enough ratio to qualify for listing among the top universities in Table 4. This group consists of DePaul, Babson, Georgia State, Texas A&M, Brigham Young, North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Pennsylvania State. Also, at the time of the study, full-time faculty data for New York University was not provided by AACSB International.
Institutional Representation on Multiple Editorial Boards
Research Question 3 involved which institutions’ faculties ranked highly in terms of their memberships to the greatest number of different journal editorial boards. This question relates to editorial board ranking studies by Boone et al. (1988) and Gibbons and Fish (1991), wherein it was rec-ommended that an assessment of institutional affiliation with journal editorial boards include consideration for the number of different journals with which a university achieves repre-sentation. Findings for this research question are presented in Table 5 and include a list of universities that have attained fac-ulty representation on at least six or more different business education journal editorial boards. This criterion was met by only 28 universities (5%) from the 527 institutions with editorial board representation. Illinois State University
TABLE 5
Institutional Representation on Multiple Editorial Boards
Institution Number of boards
Illinois State University 9
James Madison University 8
Kansas State University 8
Southern Illinois at Carbondale 8 University of Central Florida 7
DePaul University 7
Florida Atlantic University 7
Indiana University 7
Miami University of Ohio 7
University of Michigan 7
Michigan State University 7 Mississippi State University 7
University of Richmond 7
Virginia Commonwealth University 7
Auburn University 6
Ball State University 6
Baylor University 6
Clemson University 6
University of Delaware 6
Georgia Southern University 6 Middle Tennessee State University 6 University of Missouri at Columbia 6
New York University 6
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 6 Northern Illinois University 6
University of Notre Dame 6
Stanford University 6
Texas A&M University 6
topped all other universities by virtue of representation to nine different business education journals. Following Illinois State in Table 5 are three universities that were also highly ranked in Table 3. These universities with representation to eight journals each are James Madison, Kansas State, and Southern Illinois at Carbondale. A further comparison of data between Tables 5 and 3 revealed several changes in the relative positions of universities. This positional realignment can be better understood by considering the number of board memberships a university has concentrated with an individual journal(s). The data for Northern Illinois University and Illi-nois State University served as examples of journal concen-tration and the change in rank positions between Tables 5 and 3. Data obtained for Northern Illinois University consisted of seven memberships for two journals and one membership to each one of four additional journals. Therefore, Northern Illinois, with its total of 11 board memberships, is highly po-sitioned per Table 3, but because of representation on only six different journal boards Northern Illinois is placed lower in Table 5. On the other hand, Illinois State University had a total of nine memberships, but held no more than one mem-bership for any journal board. Therefore, Illinois State leads all other universities in Table 5 with nine different boards even though its relative position is lower in Table 3 by com-parison to Northern Illinois.
Comparison With Nationally Ranked Business Programs
Research Question 4 involved how the leading business ed-ucation research gatekeeper institutions compared to nation-ally ranked business school programs. A perspective on this question was attained from a comparison in terms of Busi-nessweek’s national ranking for institutions. The compari-son withBusinessweek data in Table 6 is provided for the 48 institutions from Table 3 with the greatest visibility as measured by the most editorial board representatives to the business education research journals. Table 6 lists the nu-merical rankings for best business school undergraduate, full-time MBA, and part-time MBA programs according to Businessweek(2009a, 2009b). More than half (26 of 48) of the schools listed in Table 6 had achieved national recogni-tion for their business school programs. These 26 narecogni-tionally ranked business schools exemplify a dual commitment to quality education and an emphasis on the importance of re-search that advances learning and pedagogy in business. The University of Michigan epitomizes this commitment, based on elite ranks of 4, 5, and 5 for the three types of business programs, respectively. Other institutions notable for elite rank in Table 6 are Notre Dame (number 2 for undergradu-ate business), Brigham Young (number 5 for undergraduundergradu-ate business), Stanford (number 6 for full-time MBA program), and UCLA (number 2 for part-time MBA program). The University of Richmond, a smaller business school, had nine
TABLE 6
Leading Business Education Research Gatekeeper Institutions in Relation to Nationally Ranked Business
School Program
Nationally Ranked Business School Programs
Institution James Madison University 15 44
Indiana University 11 20 15 Kansas State University 11
University of Michigan 11 4 5 5 Middle Tennessee State U. 11
Northern Illinois University 11 Southern Illinois at
Carbondale
10
Baylor University 9 45 University of Central Florida 9
University of Delaware 9 38
Florida Atlantic University 9 Georgia Southern University 9 Illinois State University 9
Michigan State University 9 36 Mississippi State University 9
University of Richmond 9 12 17
Stanford University 9 6
University of Connecticut 8 41 DePaul University 8
Miami University of Ohio 8 18
New York University 8 15 13 23 Texas Tech University 8
Auburn University 7
Babson College 7 23 32
Bowling Green State
Georgia State University 7 29
Nevada at Las Vegas 7 52
New Mexico State University 7
Northeastern University 7 27 Texas A&M University 7 37 Texas Christian University 7 34 Virginia Commonwealth U. 7
Western Michigan University 7 University of Akron 6 Ball State University 6
Brigham Young University 6 5 22 Case Western Reserve
University
6 39 14
University of Denver 6 53
University of Georgia 6
Massachusetts at Amherst 6 60
Missouri at Columbia 6
North Carolina at Chapel Hill 6 13 17 University of Notre Dame 6 2 20 Pennsylvania State
University
6 38
San Diego State University 6
UCLA 6 14 2
GATEKEEPERS OF BUSINESS EDUCATION RESEARCH 309
board members and was highly ranked in undergraduate pro-gram (number 12) and part-time MBA propro-gram (number 17). New York University had eight board members and was na-tionally ranked in all three types of business programs.
The editorial board approach yielded 22 business schools in Table 6 that did not have a nationally ranked program ac-cording to theBusinessweekdata. This disparity was inherent to the present study’s exclusive focus on business education journals for its methodology.Businessweekrelied on method-ology for its ranking that differed substantially from the ap-proach used for this study.Businessweekused nine measures to determine the ranks for undergraduate business program. Some of these measures included student surveys, corporate recruiter surveys, starting salaries, student–faculty ratios, and number of internships. To determine the best MBA programs, Businessweekrelied on three components: survey of gradu-ates (45%), survey of corporate recruiters (45%), and intel-lectual capital (10%). Despite the substantial methodologi-cal differences, it is notable that a majority of institutions were common between the top schools per Businessweek and the business education editorial board leaders of this study.
Concluding Comments
Previous studies that ranked institutions based on editorial board representation disregarded journal outlets for research contributions in learning and pedagogy. As a consequence, an important component of academic mission has been previ-ously ignored. In the present study this inequity was rectified by examining faculty representation on the editorial boards of business education journals. First, the research results of this study suggest that nearly one third of all editorial board memberships are held by a relatively small group of academic institutions. However, the collective journal presence for this group of institutions does not constitute an elitist dominance of the editorial boards because there is an extensive board representation held by institutions outside of the lead group. Second, the results from this study also indicate that members affiliated with U.S. universities are the primary gatekeepers of published business education research. Nonetheless, re-sults also indicate that research in learning and pedagogy is shaped by significant participation in the review process by non-U.S. academic institutions in terms of faculty representa-tion on journal editorial boards. Finally, the results show that the relative positions of universities included in the rankings were significantly changed by an adjustment for differences in the number of faculty for business schools. Therefore, a more balanced perspective of editorial review board rank is provided by adjustment for faculty size.
Studies that use the editorial board method to rank in-stitutions assume that each membership to a journal review board signifies an equal role in the gatekeeper process, when in fact some members may review more papers than do other members. Therefore, future researchers should investigate
the extent of actual differences in the review activity of board members for an appropriate multiyear time period as a basis for refinement to ranking based on editorial board mem-berships. Additional research is also needed to learn more about how editorial review board members are chosen. This research could be accomplished through a survey of jour-nal editors. Aggregate information that provides an overview of the qualifications, background, and experience of board members would add to an understanding of the peer-review process. In conclusion, the extent of representation by faculty on editorial boards reflects positively on program quality, en-hances academic reputation, and increases visibility relative to other institutions. Therefore, a ranking based on editorial board memberships complements other types of academic rankings based on opinion surveys, publication counts, or citation analysis.
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