Factors related to publication success among faculty development fellowship graduates.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES This study's purpose was to understand factors related to scholarly project publication among fellowship graduates and to explore the role of collegial relationships and institutional characteristics on ever having published and number of publications. METHODS We surveyed 5 years of graduates (2000-2004) from the Michigan State University Faculty Development Fellowship Program (n=90) via e-mail. The survey instrument included questions about barriers and facilitators, colleague relationships, and aspects of their institutional environment, the latter adapted from a validated survey by Bland et al. RESULTS The response rate was 70%. Only seven graduates had published the results of their fellowship project; 44% had published at least one paper. Barriers to publishing scholarly project results included lack of time and assistance, inability to finish projects, and rejection of a submitted paper. Factors associated with publication included types of collegial relationships and a number of institutional factors in addition to the Bland score. CONCLUSIONS Few of our fellowship graduates published the results of their scholarly project, and less than half published papers. We identified multiple barriers and facilitators that could be addressed by the fellowship programs and home institutions to enhance publication success.