AIMS AND SCOPE

ESC – Educação, Sociedade & Culturas (Education, Society & Cultures), published by the Centre for Research and Intervention in Education (CIIE) of the University of Porto, Portugal, is a peer-reviewed, open access and multilingual scholarly journal. Founded in 1994, its main mission is to contribute to the debate and dissemination of scientific knowledge in the field of educational sciences by promoting the publication of empirically based articles that draw on a variety of theoretical and methodological frameworks. It is based on the intention to establish and deepen the dialogue between cultures and interdisciplinary perspectives and to contribute to qualifying the public debate on traditional and emerging educational and social problems, particularly those related to diversity and difference, exclusion, inequality and social injustice from a global and situated perspective. It also aims to promote a critical analysis of the policies and practices developed formally and informally in the socio-educational field.

Readership
ESC is aimed at an international audience of academics, researchers and students in the journal's areas of interest, as well as educators, teachers, policy makers and the general public.

Keywords
Education; Training; Cultures; Diversity; School; Inequality

Property, Publishing and Support
ESC is the journal of CIIE - Centre for Educational Research and Intervention, which is based at the Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences of the University of Porto (FPCEUP) and is an R&D unit funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT). CIIE publishes the journal through FCT funding under its multi-annual programme (grants no. UIDB/00167/2020 and UIDP/00167/2020), with the support of the UP Digital Service of the Rectory of the University of Porto.
The journal is also supported by FPCEUP and U.Porto.

Website
https://ojs.up.pt/index.php/esc-ciie/index

 

EDITORIAL POLICY AND PRINCIPLES

ESC accepts submissions of original work on empirically-supported research with a strong theoretical-methodological component in all fields related to the educational sciences and the social and human sciences and which focus on objects in the field of education/training as they relate to social problems. Submissions must fall within the scope and mission of the journal and be relevant to an international audience.
The journal publishes themed and non-themed issues, and accepts submissions of free-themed articles on an ongoing basis.
The journal accepts submissions in Portuguese, English, French and Spanish.
The selection of articles for publication is based on criteria of quality, originality and relevance, with no limitations in terms of conceptual or methodological paradigms and perspectives. The contents of the published articles and the opinions expressed in them are the sole responsibility of their authors. Without prejudice to the plurality and responsibility of the authors, when submitting an article, they must ensure that inclusive and non-discriminatory language is used. Texts with content and language that is in any other way discriminatory will not be accepted.

PEER REVIEW PROCESS
ESC articles go through a rigorous peer review process with double anonymity for authors and reviewers (double-blind peer review), in order to ensure fairness and impartiality. To this end, authors are responsible for ensuring that the work submitted does not contain information, self-references, or document properties that would allow them to be identified.
Each article is subject to initial scrutiny by ESC editors and/or guest editors, whose criteria for acceptance for evaluation will be in compliance with the journal’s editorial policies and scope, and with all submission rules. Articles must strictly follow the submission guidelines and use the template provided. Articles that do not strictly comply with the submission rules, namely citation and bibliographic referencing, will be returned to the authors without the peer review process being initiated. If the resubmitted manuscript still does not comply with the rules, it will be definitively rejected.

If the article is compliant and is considered potentially suitable for ESC, it is submitted to at least two reviewers, experts in the field and in the research topics in which the text is focused, who may be members of ESC Editorial Board or external experts invited for this purpose.
The assessment of articles at this stage is based on:

  -  Original/innovative contribution and relevance to the scientific field;
  -  Consistency between objectives and results/conclusions;
  -  Theoretical and empirical grounds and consistency of argumentation.
  -  Methodological adequacy.
  -  Adequate and timeliness bibliographical references.
  -  Clarity of presentation and organisation.
  -  Textual accuracy and compliance with scientific writing requirements.

In case of significant divergence among reviewers, the opinion of a third reviewer will be requested. The final decision will be taken by ESC editors.
Once the review process is complete, the corresponding author will be informed of the opinions and the corresponding preliminary editorial decision. The authors will be notified by e-mail of the decision to accept, accept with minor changes, accept with major changes, or reject the article. In cases where changes or reformulation of the article are requested, a deadline, generally up to one month, will be given for submission of the new version, taking into account the limitations and weaknesses pointed out and the suggestions proposed in the peer review. Two documents should be submitted through the platform: the revised version of the article with the changes inserted and visible; and a supplementary document with the changes and/or responses to the changes proposed by the reviewers, explaining how they responded to the request.  These documents will be reviewed by the original editors and reviewers, and new changes may be suggested, or a decision to reject or publish the manuscript may be proposed.
The final decision is the responsibility of the editors and is communicated to the corresponding author. It is estimated that the whole review process, from submission to the first editorial decision, will take up to six months.
Authors can track their articles on the ESC submission and management platform and should wait for the editorial decision before changing any submitted elements or documents.
The editors reserve the right to make any necessary changes to the originals without compromising their content.

PUBLICATION FREQUENCY
The journal is published three times a year, i.e., one issue every four months. It was published in print and online until 2022, but from 2023 onwards it will be published exclusively in electronic format. 

OPEN ACCESS POLICY
ESC journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge and democratisation of knowledge.

CREATIVE COMMONS, COPYRIGHT AND SELF-ARCHIVING POLICY
Authors retain copyright without restrictions on their articles and grant the journal the right of first publication.
ESC articles are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA). Readers are free to copy, display, distribute, and adapt an article, as long as the work is attributed to the author(s) and ESC, the changes are identified, and the same license applies to the derivative work. Only non-commercial uses of the work are permitted.

Authors are encouraged to share and deposit the published version of the article in any institutional or subject repository or websites immediately upon publication, alongside a link to the URL of the article on ESC’s website, with DOI number and correct citation details. This will guarantee that the definitive version is readily available to those accessing the paper from such repositories and websites and means that it is more likely to be properly cited.

SUBMISSION AND PUBLICATION FEES
Publication in this journal is completely free of charge for authors and there are no submission, processing, or publication charges, fees, or costs.

DATA SHARING AND AVAILABILITY
ESC expects authors to be open and transparent about data or other material related to published content. To ensure that study results are reliable, authors are encouraged to deposit data in an appropriate repository and describe where the data can be found.

ARCHIVING AND DIGITAL PRESERVATION
This journal uses PKP Preservation Network (PKP PN) system, provided free of charge by OJS (Open Journal Systems) platform. This system ensures the creation of permanent archives of the original version of the journal's content for continuous access, preservation, and restoration.

ORCID UNIQUE IDENTIFIER
ESC requires each author to include ORCID ID in the submitted proposal. ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier (ORCID ID) that authors own and control, and which distinguishes them from any other researcher. ORCID ID can be obtained at https://orcid.org. 

PRIVACY POLICY
The names and email addresses entered in this journal site will be used exclusively for the stated purposes of this journal and will not be made available for any other purpose or to any other party.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

ESC was launched in 1994 by Associação de Sociologia e Antropologia da Educação (ASAE), under the leadership of CIIE (Centre for Research and Intervention in Education of the University of Porto) founder and Director, Professor Stephen R. Stoer. Two print issues were published each year. In 2003, ESC journal ownership was transferred to CIIE, and from then onwards (since issue 19), ESC is published by CIIE. Between 2011 and 2016, three issues a year were printed, before returning to two issues a year in 2017.

In 2020, a new homepage was in place, with web-based electronic submission and review of manuscripts, grounded at OJS journal-hosting platform, with the support of U.Porto support services. Effective 1 January 2023, ESC switched to a fully electronic journal. Since 2021, the journal moved again to three issues each year (two of them thematic, dedicated to topical themes), meeting the increasing number of manuscript submissions.

 

PAST EDITOR-IN-CHIEFS

Stephen R. Stoer, CIIE/FPCEUP, Portugal (1994-2003)
José Alberto Correia, CIIE/FPCEUP, Portugal (2004-2009)
Helena. C. Araújo, CIIE/FPCEUP, Portugal (2010-2019)