With the dawn of a new academic term, faculty and students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and other leading research universities are grappling with their scholarly priorities for the coming year. UNL educational psychology professor Kenneth A. Kiewra, who has spent a quarter century studying the work habits of successful scholars, offers guidance based on his observation that scholarly productivity is a little-taught skill.
"Productive scholars break new ground and do it again and again," he said. "How do they do it? Most graduate students, junior faculty and even senior faculty have little idea. That's because the methods of the productive are rarely taught and remain a hidden curriculum."
In his 2024 book, " Be a More Productive Scholar," published by Cambridge University Press, Kiewra compiled insights from interviewing dozens of productive scholars over the past 25 years, detailing their stories and methods and offering more than 100 recommendations to boost scholarly success.
Here are four inspirational guideposts from Kiewra for scholars and others who wish to achieve greater success:
- Believe you can. People do amazing things. Pete Kostelnick ran 3,067 miles across the U.S. in 46 days, averaging a staggering 72 miles a day. Rich Mayer has published more than 600 works, including 30 books over his scholarly career. How do these and other amazing talents arise? Was Kostelnick born to run? Was Mayer churning out research reports in preschool? Of course not. Talent is made, not born. Kostelnick hated running early on and his early times were, like most beginners, pedestrian. Mayer’s resume was once blank. Ralph Waldo Emerson aptly said, “Every artist was first an amateur.” So believe that if Kostelnick and Mayer can do it, you can too. Benjamin Bloom was among the first to study talented individuals, 120 of them in six domains. Bloom’s overriding conclusion was this: What these extraordinary people have accomplished, most anyone can accomplish when conditions are right. That’s why it is important to understand how successful people go about their work, follow their examples, and believe you can be successful too.
- Gravitate to centers of excellence. Those seeking success go where the action is, where the best teachers, colleagues, and resources are at hand. UNL is one example of a center of excellence that attracts successful scholars in many disciplines for graduate programs, postdoctoral fellowships and academic posts where they can collaborate with like-minded experts and contribute to the body of knowledge. Dancer and choreographer Martha Graham sashayed from California to New York, which was the hub for dance. American author T.S. Elliot segued from the U.S. to London to join the Bloomsbury Circle, a group of talented English writers.. sts conducive to productivity. Scholar Logan Fiorella gravitated to University of California, Santa Barbara for graduate training in order to study under Rich Mayer. Fiorella said, “I was drawn to Mayer’s work, his scientific approach, and clear writing style.” Fiorella also benefited from Mayer’s “machinelike work ethic” that gets work accomplished and published and Mayer’s ability to open collaborative doors with other scholars because “Mayer is someone that everyone knows.” In today’s electronic networking world, gravitation need not be migratory. Scholars routinely arrange remote collaborations with mentors and colleagues.
- Establish an identity. Do you know who Michael Connelly is? If you appreciate crime novels, I’m sure you do. Penning nearly 40 such novels cements Connelly’s identity as a crime writer. Productive scholars establish their identities. Scholar Alexander Renkl advised scholars “to have a topic connected to your name.” Scholar Richard Anderson advises budding scholars not to become normal scientists who follow the crowd, replicating and contributing footnotes to others’ work. Anderson prompts scholars to avoid familiar paths and conduct pioneering science that breaks new ground. Einstein said, “The one who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The one who walks alone is likely to find themselves in places no one has been before.”
- Embrace feedback and failure. In the cartoon strip Zits, teenage son Jeremy asks his mother what she thought of his written work. She returns his paper heavily marked in red. Jeremy says, “When I said I was open to feedback, I meant compliments.” Don’t we all? But compliments won’t tell us what’s wrong and how to improve. Scholars need critics, not cheerleaders. Scholar Ming-Te Wang said, “Receiving feedback is sometimes painful, but you need to get over it because feedback is what makes you better.” So does failure. Scholars understand that everyone fails and that there is often more flops than hits. Even educational psychology icon Rich Mayer fails. He said, “I’ve probably had more papers rejected from Journal of Educational Psychology than anyone. You have to learn how to take rejection and criticism” and learn from it.
