Questions surround journal used by UNC Asheville center to justify health grant

A University of North Carolina Asheville research center cited an academic paper to help justify a grant for one of its health programs. But the journal that published that paper has drawn serious questions about its editorial practices, its publishing model, and its ties to a company a federal court found liable for fraud, according to a Carolina Journal investigation.

The paper appeared in the Journal of Higher Education Theory and Practice (JHETP), a product of the North American Business Press (NABP), and was referenced in a grant report to the Dogwood Health Trust as justification for the North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness’s (NCCHW) Student Health Ambassadors (SHA) program.

The SHA program paid students to work on campuses across western North Carolina during the COVID-19 pandemic to mitigate viral spread, provide health education, and promote student mental health.

The questions surrounding NCCHW’s research came to light through a lawsuit filed by former center research assistant Aidan Settman against UNC Asheville. Settman’s complaint, reported by CJ in March, alleges widespread research misconduct, fabricated evidence, and deliberate concealment of program failures, claiming his termination was retaliatory for raising those concerns internally.

UNC Asheville has denied the allegations and has declined to comment further while the lawsuit is pending.

Rejected paper

NCCHW researchers later sought to publish a separate paper on the SHA program in the Journal of American College Health (ACH) — a reputable, peer-reviewed bimonthly publication. ACH rejected that paper. An email reviewed by CJ included concerns from an ACH reviewer that the paper made “exaggerated” claims on the results of the study, had numerous instances of missing information, and lacked scientific merit.

The reviewer found the paper’s central assertion — that the SHA program was directly responsible for low COVID-19 rates on campus — to be scientifically unsound and lacking substantiation. “Commentary on the results of the study is not appropriate for the results section, and seem to be exaggerated,” the reviewer wrote in one section.

The rejection also pointed out the authors’ failure to establish a causal link between the SHA program and the low incidence of COVID-19. 

“While the incidence of COVID cases appears to be a very promising metric… it seems that this statement may be misleading if the authors’ [sic] are not able to attribute the low incidence of positive COVID-19 cases to the ambassador program. In short, there may be other confounding factors that are responsible for this that do not appear to be ruled out,” the reviewer wrote.

Beyond the exaggerated claims, the paper also suffered from a fundamental lack of scientific rigor, according to the critical review. The reviewer also cited a need for “more information… on how data were collected and analyzed; without this information it is difficult for readers to understand and evaluate the scientific merits of this study.”

Publisher under scrutiny

The 2021 JHETP article cited in the Dogwood grant report raises concerns of its own. CJ’s review of NABP and JHETP uncovered significant questions about the integrity of the publication’s editorial board, the legitimacy of its business practices, and its connection to a man with ties to a publishing company found liable for fraud by a federal court.

Perhaps most significantly, JHETP’s editor-in-chief, Robert Tian, also currently serves on the editorial board of a publication, the Academy of Educational Leadership Journal, of Allied Academies, which is a subsidiary of OMICS International. In 2019, a federal court found OMICS International liable for deceptive practices following a complaint by the Federal Trade Commission, ordering the company to pay $50.1 million in civil penalties.

The FTC alleged that OMICS deceived researchers by hiding publication fees, making false claims about peer review, and listing prominent academics on editorial boards without their knowledge or consent. Allied Academies has been on Beall’s List — a widely used registry of potentially predatory academic publishers — since 2015.

The quality of JHETP as an academic publication is also in question on several other fronts. The journal was dropped from Scopus — one of the world’s two most prestigious academic indexing databases — in 2024. Journals are typically removed for failing to meet quality standards, citation irregularities, or editorial deficiencies.

JHETP also ranks Q4, the lowest possible quartile, in the SCImago Journal Rankings. Moreover, NABP’s journals are rated tier C,the lowest designation, on the Australian Business Deans Council Journal Quality List, a widely used international benchmark for business research.

Editorial affiliation

The questions about editorial integrity are not limited to metrics, and they extend beyond JHETP itself.

CJ initiated and reviewed correspondence with individuals listed on editorial boards across several NABP journals. In multiple cases spanning four publications, those individuals said they had no editorial relationship with the journals and had never been asked to serve in that capacity.

Two individuals listed on JHETP’s masthead who were contacted by CJ said they had no editorial relationship with the journal. One said she had published two papers with the journal but had not done any editorial work for it and had not been asked to serve as an editorial member.

A second said she had published one article in the journal and did not consider herself in an editorial position with it. “I can confirm that I am not an editor nor have I served in any editorial capacity — contributor or otherwise — for the journal,” she wrote. Both asked not to be identified by name.

The pattern held across other NABP journals as well. A professor at a major research university denied any editorial role with NABP’s American Journal of Management. “I’m not on the editorial board for the journal, have never been on the board, nor do I think I’ve even ever reviewed a manuscript for the journal,” the professor wrote in correspondence reviewed by CJ.

A professor at a Canadian university said the same of NABP’s Journal of Leadership, Accountability and Ethics: “I published with them but I have never been on the Editorial board.” A professor at a Florida university denied serving on the editorial board of NABP’s Journal of Organizational Psychology, noting he had “published an article with a student there, however, some time ago.”

Not all responses reflected an outright denial. William Swart, a professor at East Carolina University listed as an editorial contributor to JHETP, said he did not specifically recall whether he had agreed to serve in an editorial capacity, but acknowledged he would likely agree to lend his name to a journal he’d had a good experience publishing with, with the understanding his involvement would be limited.

“I would only agree to do that if I had a good experience with the journal, which I did have,” Swart wrote.

JHETP’s masthead page, which previously identified those listed as “editorial board members,” as can be seen on the Wayback Machine, has now been updated to refer to them instead as “editorial contributors.” One of the individuals contacted by CJ said the new designation left her puzzled. “I’m not sure what ‘editorial contributor’ means,” she wrote.

Pay to publish

JHETP has also drawn criticism for its publishing model. Correspondence reviewed by CJ shows that authors are required to pay a subscription fee to publish in NABP journals — $395 for the Journal of Organizational Psychology and $625 for JHETP. Upon acceptance, authors are also offered a menu of paid services: priority editing for $100, combined editing and formatting for $120, or formatting alone for $50.

A separate email reviewed by CJ confirms that NABP collects these fees via PayPal invoice — a consumer payment platform that established academic publishers do not use. The same staff member, signing on behalf of Dr. Donald Smith, handles publication correspondence across multiple NABP journals simultaneously.

The journal’s review process, according to its own correspondence, takes “up to 25 days” — a fraction of the two-to-six months typical of genuine academic peer review.

Business address questions

NABP’s headquarters is listed at 30 N. Gould St. in Sheridan, Wyoming — a registered agent address shared by hundreds of thousands of LLCs. The address has become notorious for hosting fraudulent companies that have scammed customers out of money for undelivered goods, according to reporting from the Wyoming Tribune Eagle.

Wyoming does not require business owners to be listed in public records, only registered agents, and imposes no corporate or personal income tax, with relatively low filing fees. The combination makes the state attractive to entities seeking to minimize transparency. Wyoming LLCs have been linked in published reports to money laundering, hacking, and foreign sanctions evasion.

A law passed in 2025 allows the Wyoming secretary of state to dissolve businesses that provide false or fraudulent information. But broader attempts to require registered agents to maintain records of actual business owners have failed to pass the legislature.

Response

CJ contacted NABP and Robert Tian with detailed questions about the journal’s editorial board practices, its subscription fee model, and Tian’s concurrent affiliation with a subsidiary of OMICS International. No response was received by press time.

CJ also contacted UNC Asheville regarding the 2021 JHETP publication and its use in the Dogwood Health Trust grant report. Specifically, CJ asked whether UNC Asheville or NCCHW was aware of concerns about JHETP’s standing at the time the paper was submitted or published, whether the university has a policy governing which journals faculty and researchers may publish in, and whether the Dogwood Health Trust was informed of the journal’s standing when the paper was cited as justification for grant funding.

UNC Asheville declined to comment.

The 2021 JHETP paper on the SHA program remains available on the journal’s website.

“Questions surround journal used by UNC Asheville center to justify health grant” was originally published on www.carolinajournal.com.