Author Guidelines

Article Structure

Articles should be submitted through the online submission form in Microsoft Word format.

Contributors are expected to submit the initial draft of their paper in the IAFOR Journal house style which is APA (the American Psychological Association), for details see Purdue Owl. If accepted for publication, the paper’s style will likely be slightly modified to provide consistency across papers. There may also be minor editorial edits to ensure the academic rigour of the language, grammar and spelling. British and American English are both acceptable, but spelling and punctuation conventions should be consistent with the form of English used.

Only papers that demonstrate the following attributes will be accepted:

• Written in correct and fluent English at a high academic standard;
• Sufficient reference to the current, worldwide, mainstream literature (usually within the last 5 years, and scholarly references. Avoid the use of websites and popular sources);
• Showing sufficient evidence of research (as a research article or comprehensive review);
• Applicable to the topics covered by the journal. The well-written manuscript should address critical issues and current trends and research in education. This would include exploring significant themes, exceptional programs and promising practice in the field of education, and educational policy. For more information about the Aims and Scope of the Journal, see the About the Journal page.

Contributors whose command of English is not at the level outlined above are responsible for having their manuscript corrected by a native-level, English-speaking academic prior to submitting their paper for publication. These standards are non-negotiable and strictly enforced by the Editor-in-Chief and Editors of the IAFOR Journal of Education.

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Title

The title of the paper should be 12 words or fewer.

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Abstract

A concise and factual abstract is required (maximum length of 250 words). As far as possible, the abstract should state briefly the context of the research, the purpose of the research study, the methodology, the principal results and major conclusions and significance. It is understood that opinion articles, literature review articles and other non-empirical forms of study may necessitate slight changes in the abstract structure. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. For this reason, references should be avoided, but if essential, then cite the author(s) and year(s). There should not be footnotes. Also, non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.

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Keywords

Immediately after the abstract, provide a maximum of six keywords, all lower case and separated by commas.

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Introduction

Present the purposes of the study and provide background for your work.

The introduction should contain a clear statement of what the manuscript is about, why it is relevant, the purposes, background of the study, and general organisation of the remainder of the paper.

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Literature Review

Include a pertinent literature review with explicit international connections for relevant ideas. Discuss the findings of published papers in the related field and highlight your contribution.

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Methodology and Methods

Writing should provide sufficient detail for readers to understand how you engaged in your inquiry. The type of research should be clearly stated and should have a source citation to give it validity. Research questions should be unmistakably stated. Clear descriptions of your participants along with strategies used to collect and analyse data should be described. There should also be reference to ethics approval

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Findings/Results

Findings should be linked to the research questions. Correct terminology should be used when discussing findings or results. The findings or results may benefit from a table or figure but these should be used sparingly and should not repeat findings already explained in text. Findings or results should be unbiased.

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Discussion

This section should explore the significance of the results of the work, not repeat them. Combining your results and discussion into a single section may be suitable.

Returning to relevant literature from the introduction should show how your work connects with or interrupts already published literature.

Authors should note that, unless the manuscript is an opinion paper, they should refrain from trying to convince the reader of anything. Rather, the discussion should share what has been found, observed, or learned. Opinion words and intensifiers should not be used. The reader should be able to make decisions based upon the quality of the study and writing as to whether the information is worthwhile.

Please avoid one-sentence paragraphs.

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Recommendations

This section should outline any recommendations coming out of the research. These recommendations may include changes in the research methodology, for future research in the area, for adoption of particular practices, or for policy change. There should be justification made for each recommendation.

Recommendations should be presented in paragraph form rather than as a bulleted list.

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Conclusions

The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a Conclusions section, which can include the main findings, the implications, and limitations.

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Appendices

If there is more than one appendix, they should be identified as A, B, and so on. No appendix should contain data from the study nor any other material relied on in the article for findings and results.

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Acknowledgements

Collate acknowledgements in a separate section at the end of the article before the references and do not include them on the title page, as a footnote to the title or otherwise. List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g. providing language help, writing assistance or proofreading the article).

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Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly. Insert them using Word's footnote function, ensuring that they are numbered consecutively throughout the article in superscript Arabic numerals. Please do not insert footnotes manually.

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References

Citation in text

Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference list (and vice versa).

Reference style

All referencing (both in-text citations and the reference list) should follow the referencing style used by the American Psychological Association (APA). Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Seventh Edition, ISBN 978-1-4338-3216-1. The instructions can be found at Purdue Owl.

The reference list should be arranged first alphabetically and then further sorted chronologically if necessary. Please single-space, and indent after the first line of each.

Full DOI's need to be added, where available, to the referenced work. Please note: It is is not the responsibility of the editor to add DOIs for an author.

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