Making of ACAS 3: Publication Wing

 

'Publish and perish' can be an arguable reframing of 'publish or perish' aphorism as low-quality publishing can boomerang. The rat race to have publications in one's credit even when one is neither interested, trained or willing to publish these days is forcing us to attempt the act. The teachers are expected to have good language skills and academic writing capabilities, even though the years spent in colleges and universities may not have given many of us those skill sets. This has a telling impact on the work the faculty members do at the HEIs. With research projects becoming an integral component of the student lives in HEIs, how can they teach what they don't know, forget their competence to publish their research articles? The thought of establishing a Publication Wing at Al Shifa College of Arts and Science (ACAS) arose against the backdrop of such thoughts. 

The Rationale

It is very ambitious for a small, newly founded degree college to aspire that high. I have repeatedly told my colleagues that the benchmark we set is indeed high and that what we will achieve may not really measure up, but we will definitely give it a try. My intention in setting up the rather ambitiously called ' Publication Wing' was to basically inspire the faculty and student community into writing. It was not to matter much, initially, whether we met the quality standards or we brought out as many works as we wished to. What mattered was that they were writing or trying to. The assorted skills which the publication wing has triggered or improved among the faculty and by extension are many: writing, editing, proof reading, reading, layout, procedures related to ISBN and ISSN, networking with scholars and faculty around are some of those. 

The Challenges

Naming wings and placing a coordinator is in one sense easy as all you need to do is to pick a potential candidate and assign the task. But as always the heart of the matter is in the coordinator assuming true ownership and in the faculty members believing themselves that they can deliver. Rather than being an institutional task to deliver it has to be an individual goal to achieve. That, turning the faculty members to willing contributors, willing doers, is always the primary challenge. This was addressed with an approach which blends persuasion with soft compulsion. The need for continuous professional development has been the burden of the song at ACAS as I have, I think, successfully, driven it into them that without professional growth, it doesn't make any sense to dream on to scale higher. importantly the faculty of the college has truly begun to believe in it and started making efforts. 

The real challenge in publication is not to make people commit to publish, but the space between commitment to contribute and actual contribution. There's a period in which the editor/coordinator has to stalk the potential author reminding and reminding! This has happened here too. Another important aspect, especially when you have a bunch of very young, unpublished faculty members, is the quality time you spent with them, involving in coaching them in the very basics of research writing. Rather than expected them to deliver overnight, you have to handhold them through the baby steps. This is important as the leadership needs to be realistic about the true needs of those whom they try to develop. I did make use of platforms like blogs and report writing for newsletter to expose them to the challenges of writing at the basic level. 

The Implementation 

Constitution of a Publication Wing with a senior faculty member, was the first step. All Department Heads were members of the body. Ms. Saritha, Head of English has  coordinated the Wing from its inception and she did a commendable job, taking full ownership of the responsibilities. The design support which we often received from Mr. Midhulaj, Asst Professor of English at ACAS, too was quite important. The meetings of Publication Wing initially were occasions for dropping ideas and discussing plans. Later on the plans began to assume clarity and purpose. From that stage we moved to preparation of Action Plans which were integrated to the strategic plans for the institution. As these were time-bound, there naturally was a pressure to comply and deliver. Research and academic writing sessions were held and the faculty members were given confidence and capacity building support regularly. Later it was more of dept and one on one mentoring to make them not just deliver at faculty level but also to lead at dept level. 

The Takeaways

In th second year (2022) of the establishment of the Publication Wing, we set a target of one book for each dept each year and this couldn't really be met for one reason or another. This was a very ambitious target to meet considering we are a very young institution run with young faculty members. Major hurdle was an odd contributor delaying us and we had to delay ourselves as the paper was halfway through. The fact that all Departments don't equally own up the task was another obstacle. This is the case in all instiutions, I know. But in 2022, the Publication Wing came out with 2 books. This was important for us because, irrespective of the number and quality, we were beginning to deliver on the decisions taken and plans made. Quality can be improved book by book.  It always is such a delight to watch the faces of the editors and the contributors when they hold the final print copy in ther hands. In 2023 we added 6 more and in 2024, another three. These numbers, achieved within 3 years, are exclusive of the journal issues brought out by the Publication Wing. 

What made it more enjoyable is the efforts we took to add variety to the job. The books we brought out included Teacher Reminiscences, Student story and poetry collection, anthology of teacher blogs, interviews with women achievers and so on. I didn't want the books brought out to be narrowly academic but desired to have works involving the interaction of faculty and students with different segments of the society outside. This helps the faculty and students to Meet and connect to a wider and richer life experiences. 

The Way Forward 

What is left behind are the baby steps, initiating certain micro-habits and the confidence to try their hands at writing. What has to follow is the jump in quality and switch of responsibility of leadership initiatives from the centre to the margins: I mean departments and individual faculty members are to use these days of initial exposures and begin to have plans of their own. The entry of FYUGP offers lots of challenges but opportunities too. It sure will offer plenty of publishing opportunities. Finally, as I always emphasise, the faculty has to forget that they are doing it for someone else, some other institution. They are doing it for your professional growth. As long as one represents an institution, they can lay a temporary claim on it. But it is permanently going to be part of one's  professional life story, their resume, wherever they are! 

Babu. P. K. Ph D.