“It is one of the noblest duties of a university to advance knowledge, and to diffuse it not merely among those who can attend the daily lectures – but far and wide”.
-Daniel Coit Gilman
As President of the John Hopkins University, Gilman practiced what he preached. In 1878, 2 years after he took office, he started the university's press. It remains America's oldest, continuously operating university press. From Harvard and Yale in the US to Oxford and Cambridge in the UK, university presses transmit knowledge of research, new thinking and big ideas worldwide. Unlike the west, few Indian universities have a robust publishing program or even a press.
After the Dental Council of India made it mandatory for the academic staff to have publications in indexed journals, there was a sudden spurt in the number of articles. However, the total print options that are available today are few. This led to many institutions publishing their own journals containing a good amount of articles from their own stable. But how many of them were peer-reviewed? How many of them were meaningful?
The opportunities for us to leverage our expertise to produce quality publications exist. So, why do not many of us utilize it? Lack of initiative may be or the lack of interest in original publishing. It is not that we have little to publish, but those among the faculty who want to publish their research simply do not do it for lack of time or for the lack of an encouraging academic environment back home. Professors have heavy teaching loads and little time to write. Also, a lot depends on the encouragement and assistance provided by the institution for producing publications.
To advocate, we, at the Journal of Indian Society of Periodontology, intend it to be the “go-to” journal for this profession. In addition to offering a broad range of content, we are determined to take advantage of the unique aspects of online publishing and to readily share information with colleagues. In the last few years, there has been a tremendous increase in the number of manuscripts submitted. However, there is a limit to the number of papers that can be accepted for publication in the JISP, as there is a limit to the number of figures and tables that can be published within our pages.
I would encourage you to write in with your comments and feedback in the “Letters to the Editor” section: What do you want from your journal? What changes would you prefer to see in it? How would you prefer to access it?
The tools are in place. Yes, we all have challenges and we will turn them into opportunities. Let the Journal of Indian Society of Periodontology be your companion to a beginning, and hopefully, a good one.