Situation
Assistant Professor Percy is coming up for tenure in a year and has been told that she really needs one more article accepted in a refereed journal to have a shot. She submitted an article to a journal six months ago and, when she recently inquired about its status was told that she should hear in about two weeks. Another two months go by. Professor Percy sees a solicitation for a special issue of another journal for which her article seems appropriate. She sends it off and crosses her fingers.
Questions
- Does Professor Percy have an obligation to inform the editor of the first journal? Should she, in fact, have withdrawn her article there before sending it to the second journal?
- Does Professor Percy have an obligation to inform the editor of the second journal that her article is already under consideration elsewhere?
Discussion
Professor Percy might want to consider the time and effort devoted to reviewing her article by colleagues solicited by journal #1 and the overall commitment of time and effort by all members of the discipline to reviewing articles submitted for publication. She would certainly want to query the editor of journal #1 before sending her article to journal #2. She may save herself sometime and potential embarrassment if, for example, her acceptance or rejection is forth-coming. This would also give the editor a chance to explain the lengthy delay and also give Professor Percy a chance to make clear her circumstances and deliberations. If she feels wronged by the editor of journal #1, Professor Percy might want to investigate what action she might take to redress the wrong apart from a dual submission and when it might be best to take such action. Another issue in this case is Professor Percy’s responsibility for the thinness of her tenure file. In choosing “the Hail Mary approach” over the “gopher approach” to career development, she unthinkingly elected her present predicament.
