For contributors

The University of Sydney Journal of TESOL accepts the following types of contributions:

• Reports of research: empirical research carried out by the author/s; literature reviews; meta-analyses
• Discussions: discussion of current theoretical or pedagogical issues in TESOL
• Pedagogical practices: presentation of innovative teaching ideas, approaches, activities, and tools
• Interviews: interviews with scholars or teaching professionals
• Reviews: for example, review of websites, teaching textbooks or academic books.

	Contribution	Criteria for Submission
1	Reports of research	5000–8000 words, including abstract and references
2	Discussions	3000–5000 words
3	Pedagogical practices	3000 words maximum
4	Interviews	Written interviews: 2000 words maximum Audio interviews: 20-minute maximum (podcast or other multimedia format)
5	Reviews	2500 words maximum

Submission of manuscripts

Authors should submit their contribution electronically to usydtesoljournal@gmail.com.

Guidelines for contributors

A separate title page should be provided with the following information: title, the author’s name, affiliation, address, email address and both a mobile phone number.

1. Titles should be concise and adequately informative of the content of the contribution.
2. Contributions should provide an abstract of approximately 200 words that provides a brief overview.
3. Contributions that refer to the work of other scholars must provide a reference list. For written contributions, this reference list should be provided at the end of the paper. For other kinds of contributions, a reference list should be provided in a separate Word file.
4. Reference lists (and in-text citations) should follow the conventions of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th edition). See http://www.apastyle.org/aboutstyle.html. Contributors are responsible for the accuracy of their references and citations.
5. Written text in contributions should be double-spaced throughout (including abstracts, reference lists, footnotes, and materials in tables) with 3cm margins on all sides. Contributors should use 12-point, Times New Roman font.
6. No information that identifies the contributor/s should be included. Use ‘author’ when referring to authors’ own published work. However, in multimodal contributions, such as interviews involving audio(visual) recordings, identification of the contributor/s may be unavoidable.
7. In written contributions, headings and subheadings should be used.
8. In written contributions, all tables and figures should be placed at the end after the reference list. The place in the text where the table or figure is to be placed should be indicated with [INSERT TABLE (e.g., 1) ABOUT HERE] or [INSERT FIGURE (e.g., 1) ABOUT HERE].
9. In written contributions, pages should be numbered consecutively.
10. In written contributions, footnotes or endnotes should be kept to the minimum.
11. In written contributions, the use of certain kinds of texts as data for analysis (for example, discourse analysis, corpus analysis) requires permission from text owners for the use of their texts.
12. For reports of original research, it is recommended that contributors consult the following articles prior to submission:
    • Chapelle, C. & Duff, P. (2003). Some guidelines for conducting quantitative and qualitative research in TESOL. TESOL Quarterly, 7, 157–178. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588471
    • Mahboob et al. (2016). TESOL Quarterly Research Guidelines, TESOL Quarterly, 50(1), 42–65. https://doi.org/10.1002/tesq.288
13. For interviews, contributors should submit a proposal (maximum length one page) initially that answers the following questions:
    • Who is the interviewer?
    • Who is the interviewee?
    • What will be the focus of the interview?
    • What will be the format of the interview?
    • How will this interview be of interest to the readership of the journal?
14. Contributions about pedagogical practices can have a variety of formats including podcasts, videos and short written pieces that include multimodal components, such as PowerPoint slides.
15. For reviews, books and other resources to be reviewed should have been published within the past three years.

General policies

The following policies apply to contributions submitted for consideration to the University of Sydney Journal of TESOL:

1. The journal is dedicated to following best practices on ethical research and publication recommended by the American Psychological Association (https://www.apa.org/ethics/code#).
2. It is the responsibility of contributors to inform the Editor of any similar work already published elsewhere. Contributions already published elsewhere are not eligible to be considered for publication in the journal.
3. Contributor/s must inform the Editor at the time of submission of similar/related versions of their contribution that have appeared or are being considered elsewhere. Contributions submitted simultaneously for publication elsewhere, including on the Internet, will not be considered.
4. The editors of the University of Sydney Journal of TESOL reserve the right to make editorial changes to any contribution accepted for publication for the sake of clarity or style. Authors will be consulted only if these changes are substantial.
5. The views expressed in the University of Sydney Journal of TESOL do not necessarily represent the views of the TESOL Research Forum in The University of Sydney School of Education and Social Work, or the editorial board of the journal.
6. The University of Sydney Journal of TESOL expects contributors to adhere to ethical standards for research involving human subjects. All contributions that involve the collection of data involving participants must meet the human participants ethics requirements established by the affiliated institution/s of the author/s.

Guidelines for evaluation of contributions

Research papers and discussions

Reports of original research and discussions will undergo an external blind peer-review process.

Stage 1: In-house Evaluation

The editors will initially briefly review a submitted contribution to decide whether the contribution will be sent out for review. Examples of factors that will be considered are whether the contribution falls into the area of TESOL, whether it is suitable for the journal’s readership, and whether it follows the journal’s manuscript guidelines (See above).

Stage 2: Blind Review

The contribution will then be sent to two reviewers for blind review. The following evaluation criteria are used by the reviewers:

• Suitability for publication in the University of Sydney Journal of TESOL
• Relevance and interest to readership
• Insightfulness
• Methodology, design or approach (for original research papers only)
• Quality of writing and other media (for example, clarity, structure, language use, presentation)

Stage 3: Decision Making

The editors will make a decision about the contribution on the basis of the reviewers’ recommendations. The following are the possible decisions:

• Publish as is: no changes are needed
• Publish with revisions: the contribution needs to be revised. The revised contribution may be evaluated by the editors or may be sent to the reviewers again. The contribution will only be published if the revisions made are considered to be satisfactory
• Revise and resubmit: the contribution needs to be substantially reworked. The resubmitted contribution will be sent to reviewers again
• Reject: reasons will be given to the author for this decision

Pedagogical practices, interviews and reviews

Interviews, pedagogical practices and reviews will undergo an evaluation that is carried out by the editors and one external reviewer.

The following evaluation criteria are used:

• Suitability for publication in the University of Sydney Journal of TESOL
• Relevance and interest to readership
• Insightfulness
• Innovativeness and creativity (pedagogical practices only)
• Quality of writing and other media (for example, clarity, structure, language use, presentation)

The following are the possible decisions:

• Publish as is: no changes are needed
• Publish with revisions: the contribution needs to be revised. The revised contribution will be evaluated again by the editors. The contribution will only be published if the revisions made are considered to be satisfactory
• Reject: reasons will be given to the author for this decision