What happens when university undergraduate and graduate students from multiple disciplines organize a network of collaborative research and publication partners? The outcome resembles the Publish or Perish Club at the University of Nevada. Its mission is to increase student publications through a culture of research by means of workshops, peer collaboration, faculty advising, and co-authored publications. The intensive level of intrinsic motivation to publish in peer-reviewed scholarly journals empowers the student initiated club to produce many single author or co-author publications. The Publish or Perish Club (PPC) is a professional student organization that encourages undergraduate and graduate student scholarly research and publication in partnership with university faculty and administration. Membership in the PPC is open to all University of Nevada, Reno students and faculty. The PPC provides opportunity for students of all grade levels and amongst all disciplines to collaborate on research and design articles for publication. At a research institution, it is mportant to prioritize valid research and publication throughout campus culture. PPC collaborative student and faculty networks increase publication rates, increase professional competitiveness and experience, emphasize a culture of active publication, and synergize research efforts throughout university disciplines to provide robust perspective and expertise on relatable studies. These cross-disciplinary, interactive co-author partnerships compliment research studies from multiple professional perspectives and encourage interdisciplinary research.
Monthly PPC meetings provide workshop platforms to design and edit publications while building co-author networks. During the academic year, the PPC hosts coffee socials to further encourage smaller group discussion around topics including, but not limited to research, publication, presentations, and professional competitiveness. An end of semester awards ceremony provides students and faculty scholarships to support future research.
PPC members have increased their professional network to include more scholarly writers, have increased opportunity for co-author or editing support, and established new publication goals. Students are also learning how to prepare thier course assignments to be transformed into future publications and presentations. The PPC student initiative is demonstrating creative ways to increase professional competiveness through cross-discipline collaboration, communication, and publication education.