Assessing Micro-Scholarship

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 Assessing Micro-Scholarship

Sol Roberts-Lieb 5/23/22 @ 8:29 CST
Micro-Scholarship breaks the traditional mold of scholarship through its use of peer-reviewed micro-assets that are stackable to form macro-assets. The question is how do we improve the assessment of scholarship in general and in specific Micro-Scholarship. 

Traditional Scholarship is assessed through peer-reviewed publications and attendee evaluations at presentations. Note: The presentation evaluation may be as much about the style of the presentation (skill) as it is about the validity of the scholarship (content).

Question: What process can we introduce to assess the impact and validity of Micro-Scholarship?

  • Assessing the Scholarship of Teaching: Valid Decisions from Valid Evidence - NEWDIRECTIONS FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING, no. 86, Summer 2001 © Jossey-Bass, A Publishing Unit of John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
  • THE SCHOLARSHIP OF TEACHING Boyer said, "the work of the professoriate involves four different functions: discovery (advancement of the frontier of knowledge in a discipline), integration (putting research discoveries in broader contexts, making connections across disciplines), application (applying the outcomes of discovery and integration to socially consequential problems), and teaching (helping students to  acquire specified knowledge and develop specified skills and attitudes"

This blog post will be updated to include thoughts on how Micro-Assets can be consistently and continuously evaluated to help the scholar advance their work and their career.

What is Peer Review? Who is a Peer?

A piece of work is considered scholarly when it's supported by evidence and peer reviewed. Usually work is counted for advanced when it is published. The reason isn't because of the publication but that publication represents it has been vetted and peer reviewed. What consists of peer review? Who is deemed "qualified" to be a peer? The answer to this question has a deep impact on Micro-Scholarship. If journal publication isn't the end goal for a micro-asset, how is the work vetted as scholarly? 

Major Question: Can a work be peer reviewed without a publication?


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by Poh-Sun Goh
27 May 2022, 1138pm, Singapore Time

The collective views and 'reviews' of a wide body of practitioners (in the field), members of a professional body, or to use an artistic or culinary analogy the opinions, views and 'behaviour' of 'the audience', 'the market', and 'diners' or 'customers' at a gallery, or dining establishment, are arguably as valid, as that of a 'professional art or food critic or reviewer'. 

An equally valid question for consideration, and discussion, is whether 'attention', the duration, and frequency of 'attention' (time, and engagement); and 'consumption' (of content, or 'culinary output') is an equally if not more valid 'assessment' and true evaluation of the value and quality of a piece of work, whether of scholarship, or in our day to day cultural, artistic or dining experience. 

Arguably the size of the (active informed) user base, the audience, and the frequency and duration of engagement, and use, including referring to, discussion, and 'citing' published work, both micro-scholarship and macro-scholarship, is an equally, if not a more valid 'assessment' and true 'market value or evaluation'.

The size of the queue, and enthusiastic, repeated patronage counts as much as the opinion of a professional critic (in both dining, the arts, and scholarship!).