Article for Publication: Interest Statement

Please provide a 1-page interest statement in which you briefly outline the article you may write for publication. This interest statement should provide these four components:
– Your topic
– Your abstract or abbreviated outline of your article
– Type of article you will write: 1) Quantitative research article; 2) Qualitative research article; 3) Mixed methods research article; 4) Review article (These articles review the literature on a particular topic. To be published, such an article cannot just be a summary or synthesis of relevant articles. It must also provide some kind of critical perspective, pointing out contradictions, gaps, and puzzles in the literature, and suggesting directions for future research); 5) Theoretical article (these articles review and advance theory. They may trace the development of a certain theory then go on to propose a new theory, critique errors in the old theory, or suggest that one theory is better than another); 6) Trade/Professional article (These articles are for a non-academic audience and may include distilled versions of a research- or academic article that focuses on research-based implications and recommendations for practitioners).
– List of 3 journals that might be a good outlet for your article

  • For each journal you list please provide the following information about the journal, typically found on the journal’s website: About the journal (kinds of articles they publish); Aims and scope (the topics they publish and information about their audience); Guidelines for authors (suggested word count, manuscript style, other aspects that will be relevant for you to consider in deciding whether or not to submit your article here).

Article for Publication: Cover Letter

“A professional cover letter favorably disposes the editor toward you and your work. While some journals do not examine them very closely, other journals use your cover letter to decide whether to read the article at all or to pick peer reviewers.” –Wendy Laura Belcher, Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks

Write a Cover Letter that does the following (from Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks, p. 272-274):
– Name the editor. Address your letter to the actual person.
– Give the title of your article
– Note if the article was solicited in any way, thank the editor for requesting that you submit it and remind the editor of where the request was made.
– Include the abstract
– State the significance of the work to the field; how is it a contribution to our thinking or how does it fill a gap?
– Describe the appeal to readers. Explain why you think this particular journal’s readers might be interested in reading the article.
– Mention the journal by name. State your reason for wanting your article to appear in this particular journal.
– State that the article has not been published before and is not currently under submission at any other journal or publisher.
– Give the word count, especially if you have worked to meet the journals word limit.
– Include your full contact information. Be sure to include information for your co-authors as well, and indicate who the corresponding author is. It should be you if you are writing the cover letter and sending it to the editor.
– Omit status. Do not mention that you are a graduate student or independent scholar. Your status is irrelevant to the editor.

SAMPLE COVERLETTERS:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_j1lt0wbNwPDkVJMMdi0RIrKEmVcgGhZ9yUyStV8LgE/edit?usp=sharing
JOURNAL LIST (especially general education & edtech journals):
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1T5tvNNYwxrhPVFpy25csvxS8DXxELd9JgrQnqnYDHA4/edit?usp=sharing

PEER REVIEW FORM:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NEmmHWTHbCKeu_hDABIRJj5cN8J47BJB0gJvsxYJWx0/edit?usp=sharing

SAMPLE RESPONSE TO REVIEWERS’ LETTER (Optional: see my TIPS for this letter at the end of this page):
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XHit2KkbOeftTvNug1ZSUFHKwztueo_F0neLAASyBgg/edit?usp=sharing

Article for Publication: Draft #1, Draft #2, and Final Draft

A 10- to 12-page article (4,000 – 6,000 words) is required on some aspect of mind, media and society and/or something related to your research interests and expertise. Your proposal should draw on theory and empirical findings and should identify an important gap and/or promising new directions in knowledge. Your article should organized (approximately) as described below. However, you may make the case to amend this structure given the journal you have selected and that journal’s requirements. It is most important that once you’ve selected a journal(s) to submit your article to that you find a few articles from that journal that resemble the kind of article you want to write. Adjust the structure below to fit with what you see as the norms and expectations for that journal.

Introduction

  • Part #1 (Pages 1-2): (a) Need for study/literature review, (b) Purpose of study/literature review, (c) Organization of the manuscript

Part #1 should provide an overview of your project, situating your work within the context of a broader interest area and what is already known about a subject. Thus, Part #1 explains why this research interest is needed and why it is important. Part #1 also details how your study/literature review contributes to relevant theory and/or prior research. Finally, Part #1 also provides a conceptual framework for how your proposal is organized.

  • Part #2 (Pages 2-8): (a) Theory and Literature, (b) Questions and/or Hypotheses

In Part #2 you want to tie your study to relevant theory and prior research, moving your reader through a systematic argument that ends in clear and appropriate research questions or hypotheses. In short, at the end of Part #2, it should be clear to your reader why your particular study needs to be conducted in a particular way with a particular sample. Those of you who elect to do literature reviews should talk with us about generating questions that focus the literature review and generating inclusion and exclusion criteria for assembling the sample of articles to be reviewed

Method

(**This will be adapted for practitioner/trade magazine articles & slightly adapted for literature review articles. It is most important to tell us the type of article you are doing and to model your article after other articles published in the journal you are targeting.)

  • Research design – e.g., type of research design, whether conditions will be manipulated or naturally observed, procedures for conducting study.
  • Sampling procedures – Sampling procedures for selecting participants, including sampling method, settings and location where data will be collected, and whether participants compensated.
  • Data collection methods – Please describe the sources of data that will be collected, why they are appropriate given your research questions, and how they will be collected, from whom, over what time period
  • Data analysis methods – Please describe how each source of data will be analyzed and why this analysis is appropriate given your research questions.
  • Results – Please present your results in answer to each research question.
  • Discussion Please discuss the significance of the results in light of the prior research and theory. How do you explain the results you found? What was surprising or expected?
  • Limitations – A key part of a research proposal is to justify both the sample and research design in relation to the research questions or hypotheses. Remember, no study is perfect, and so a compelling argument for a given study also discusses the methodological and/or conceptual limitations of the design and sample.

ARTICLE FOR PUBLICATION: RESPONSE TO REVIEWERS LETTER TIPS

As you begin your article revisions, please check out our Sample Response to Reviewers Letter above.  I drew this sample from an actual response letter my co-author and I wrote for a journal manuscript we revised and resubmitted this fall. This letter accompanied our revised draft.

TIP 1:  For this assignment, you can accept or reject the tracked changes edits from your reviewers and from me. In your Response to Reviewers Letter you DO NOT have to write down each change suggested in the tracked changes documents and how you responded to it, unless they are significant changes (e.g., suggestions to re-write the conclusions, for instance, that were not also in the Peer Review Memo you received).

TIP 2: Focus your letter on addressing each reviewer’s critique as listed in the Peer Review Memo you received from us.  We put Reviewer 1’s comments in one color and Reviewer 2’s comments in another in your Peer Review Memo. In your response letter, I suggest that (after you review the sample provided) you write something like: “Reviewer 1 commented blah, blah, blah, whatever they said;” and then “MY RESPONSE” under which you tell how you have addressed the reviewer’s critique or suggestion in your revision.

TIP 3:  If you find significant changes being suggested that were mentioned in your Tracked Changes document(s) but NOT in your Peer Review Memo, please address them as well in your memo. For instance, if your Peer Review 1 Tracked Changes document suggested re-organizing sections of the paper but did not make this suggestion in the Memo, I would list the suggested change in your Response to Reviewers’ letter and how you addressed it.

TIP 4: As demonstrated in the example, be as specific in how you addressed the Reviewer’s points as you can.  You want to convince them, and the editor, that you took these reviews seriously and addressed their critiques well in your revision.

TIP 5: If you disagree with a reviewer’s suggestion or for whatever reason cannot do what they are asking and do not make the change, it is perfectly okay to explain why you disagree or why you cannot do what they are suggesting, BUT do not ignore the reviewer’s point.  State what the reviewer asked for and if you did not make the change, explain why in your response.

TIP 6:  Always be respectful, appreciative, and professional in your Response Letter. Reviewers volunteer their time and typically spend several hours preparing their reviews. Use your very best writing skills in these letters. Remember, you are judged not only on your revision but also on your written Response Letter and how seriously you have taken the revision task.