Guidelines for external reviewers

Introduction

The International Council for External Reviewers at the journal Investigación en la Escuela is composed of a permanent group of experts in the various fields of interest covered by our journal. These experts form a permanent panel of experts from a wide range of universities in several countries.  Moreover, the Investigación en la Escuela’s permanent panel, and based on specific needs, counts on the collaboration of other specialists whose careers and experience are acceptable for the Editorial Council when assessing certain projects.    

This group of reviewers is responsible for the blind assessments of all manuscripts as an internationally accepted mechanism that guarantees excellence and the impact of scientific work.  Reviewers assess, analyze and critique each manuscript to verify its scientific quality; based on this and other journal criteria, the text may be accepted for publication, require improvements or be rejected.  

The accuracy and seriousness of the journal’s external reviewers guarantees the quality of the reviews, as well as that of the manuscripts accepted for publication.   Thus, the reports drafted throughout this process provide authors with input regarding the strong points of their work, and those aspects that might need improvement. 

All reviews are anonymized by means of the OJS platform, which follows a strict calendar of deadlines to guarantee authors a reliable and timely review.  Although responsible before Investigación en la Escuela management and editing bodies, all reviewers are independent.  Likewise, members of the Scientific Council and Editorial Team may be members of the Council of Reviewers, but independence and anonymity is guaranteed at all times throughout the review process.  Each reviewer receives a certificate recognizing his/her work, and the journal website publishes the complete list of the previous year’s reviews.

Criteria for Accepting/Rejecting the Review of Manuscripts

The Council of Editors selects a reviewer for each manuscript based on individual suitability.  A reviewer may accept or reject the task based on the strict principles listed below:

- Knowledge and experience in the field covering the manuscript.  Upon accepting the task to review a document, the reviewer states that he/she has sufficient knowledge and experience in the field. 

- Availability of time. The reviewer shall have the necessary time to carry out an exact and quality review. 

- Conflicts of interest. Should there be excessive closeness, whether personal or professional, between the reviewer and the author of the work proposed, and in such case that these might be identified, the reviewer shall reject the task.

- Confidentiality. Throughout the review and edition process, reviewers are committed to not sharing the manuscript’s content, nor contacting other specialists to comment its content without specific authorization from the editor.

Should the reviewer be unable to comply with one or several of these criteria, he/she reports the situation on the OJS platform, so that the case is taken into consideration for future collaborations and the task assigned to another reviewer.  

Review Criteria

The criteria to be considered when reviewing original manuscripts are listed below. These shall be reasoned in the external review protocol.

- Suitability of the title.

- Suitability of the abstract.

- Suitability of the key words.

- Relevance of the subject.

- Review of the literature.

- Methodological rigor.

- Results, discussion and conclusions.

- Order presented.

- Correctness of the grammar/language used.

- Bibliographic references.

Upon taking into consideration these items, reviewers shall proceed to review the text using an online form (See document) that must be as justified and reasonable as possible.

All explanations by reviewers shall be respectful and constructive.  These shall not include comments or personal information of any kind.  Clear and compelling information should be provided regarding any deficiency.  The review shall be explained and supported so that both editors and authors are able to understand the reasoning behind the comments made.  Moreover, the reviews should indicate when the comments expressed a personal opinion or based on authoritative criteria. 

Reports may be forwarded to the authors as drafted by the Reviewer. Therefore, it is important that formal aspects be presented carefully (organization, clarity, writing, grammar, etc.).  Remember that in many cases, reports include the reviewer’s assessment and request changes in terms of formal aspects of the article, in which case, it is essential that these be carefully considered.    

Lastly, reviewers shall take special care in formulating their assessment to avoid—to the extent that it is possible—their words being interpreted by the author as offensive. It is necessary that rigor and even the harshness of their assessment be compatible with exquisite respect for the author’s work. 

Review Process Using OJS

Once an expert becomes a member of the Council of Reviewers, he/she registers on the journal’s OJS Platform.  From that point onwards, he/she may receive requests to assess articles.  The possible reviewer shall receive an email in his/her personal mail box requesting him/her to review a manuscript. Using the platform, this request shall be accepted or rejected within a period of ten (10) days. 

To notify his/her decision, the reviewer shall log on using his/her assigned user name and password, which was facilitated upon registering (in case of loss, if the reviewer recalls his/her user name, he/she may request a new password automatically). Select the role as reviewer to access the screen with the list of “Active Dispatch.”

Upon clicking on the article to be reviewed, a page will appear with information about the text: title, authors and abstract, the status of the review (dates), the steps to be taken to complete the review and the corresponding standards.

1. Depending on the reviewer’s decision, select accept or reject the assignment.
2. Upon accepting, the reviewer shall draft a report.
3. Once an acceptance email has been sent, proceed to download the manuscript and save a copy.  
4. Once the downloaded article has been reviewed, an assessment form needs to be filled out. 

Once the recommendations have been selected, a screen appears allowing the reviewer to send an email to the editor reporting that he/she has concluded, in which case, the user has to click on the “Send Review to the Editor.”  This last action must be carried out so that the editor knows that the review has concluded.  

Upon sending this email, the manuscript’s review process concludes. This review is assessed by the Theme Editors and their assistants, who make the final decision based on the assessment together with expert and editorial criteria. One of the possible decisions is to launch a new review (second review), in which case the collaboration of the same reviewer will be requested, and who would repeat the already described steps.