Who is this course for?
This course is designed for editors and members of editorial boards of journals included on the Journals Online platforms. It is particularly relevant for editors of Southern journals with limited experience of editorial processes and journal publishing. It is also appropriate for more experienced editors who wish to refresh their understanding and share their experiences with others.
There is no cost to participate in this course. It is offered as an open online course by INASP.
Note: This is Part 2 of the course, and it is meant for participants who completed Part 1 of the course in 2021.
Is this course right for you?
- My journal is included on AJOL or one of the Journals Online platforms
- I am the editor of a journal and I want to improve my editorial skills
- I am the editor of a journal and I want to learn more about the journal publishing process
- I am an editorial board member and I want to contribute to the improvement of my journal
- I am part of the management team for one of the JOL platforms and want to deepen my understanding of the publishing process in order to improve our services
If you answered "yes" to two or more of the above statements, then this course is right for you!
What did previous participants say about the content in this course?
- "The online course was very educative, informative, insightful, challenging with rich content. It made me reailse how much work was involved in raising the standards of our journal, it made me also respect the work of high impact journal Editors in Chief."
- "Giving the participant the freedom to engage in the course when they have time is the best option. Giving a deadline was also extremely helpful to plan and schedule other commitments so that we had time to ourselves to focus on the course."
- "The course was well designed and I had a lot of time to devote in this online course."
What will you learn?
On completion of this course, you will have developed or improved your skills in:
- Explaining the ethical issues associated with publication – particularly from the perspective of authors and authorship
- Examining the intellectual property rights that affect your journal, and developing systems to ensure the legality of what you are publishing
- Exploring indexing services, how they measure impact and influence journal visibility and credibility, and how to include your journal in indexes
Length of the course
4 weeks
Topics covered
- Module 5 / Week 1: Publication ethics
- Module 6 / Week 2: Copyright and licensing
- Module 7 / Weeks 3 and 4: Indexing and increasing impact
Expected time commitment
4 hours per week
Learning resources and activities
Guided readings with mini quizzes, reflection questions, videos of editors sharing experiences; discussion forums with moderator support; and an action plan assignment for each module
Note:
- This is a largely asynchronous course: you can study in your own time and engage on the forums whenever you'd like to. Unless you are notified about live video sessions, please assume that there will not be any such events.
- There will be firm weekly deadlines for the action plan assignments. You will be notified about the deadlines well in advance.
What support you can expect
A course moderator will be available but may not be able to respond to every single question. There will be a number of participants from Africa and South Asia so queries to the discussion forum should generate responses.
When the course begins, limited technical support will be available on the “technical support” forum in the course. Unfortunately we will not be able to respond to individual email requests for support before or during the course.
What feedback you can expect
The course moderator will give personalised feedback on the action plans you submit.
Completion criteria
You will receive a certificate of completion for each module after submitting a satisfactory action plan. If you submit action plans for all the modules, you will receive a certificate of completion for the entire course.
Each certificate will contain a code that can be used to verify its authenticity.
Internet and device requirements
To make the most of this course, you should ideally have reliable access to the internet for the duration of the course. The course materials are not particularly heavy as they are text based (videos are given optional resources), so the course will not consume a significant amount of internet data.
We recommend that you use a computer for learning on the course because you will be expected to prepare Word documents with your action plans. You can access the guided readings using a browser on your smartphone, but please note that some elements might not be rendered well on a small screen.
Is there any advice on how to learn online?
This PDF document may be useful to help you prepare to learn online. It also contains answers to frequently asked questions.
Can the learning resources be reused or adapted?
Yes. The learning resources have been developed by INASP and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
