Journal of Theory & Practice in Education (JTPE) is committed to the integrity of the scholarly record. The journal follows the guidance and flowcharts of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the ICMJE Recommendations, and the Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing (4th edition, COPE-DOAJ-OASPA-WAME). The journal’s full policy set is published on the following pages:

• 📄 Peer Review Process
• 📄 Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement
• 📄 Similarity and Plagiarism Policy
• 📄 Generative AI Policy
• 📄 Editorial Independence and Editorial Board Submissions
• 📄 Corrections, Retractions, and Appeals
• 📄 Research Data Policy
• 📄 Open Access, Licence, and Copyright
• 📄 Repository, Self-Archiving, and Preprints
• 📄 Archiving and Digital Preservation
• 📄 Privacy Statement

1. Ethics documents required at submission

In line with the research ethics requirements applied by TR Dizin since 2020, the following must be uploaded with the submission, where applicable: (a) the ethics committee approval certificate for studies involving human participants, obtained before data collection; (b) evidence of permission from the developers or adapters of the data collection instruments used; (c) official permission from the institution(s) where data were collected. Submissions lacking the required documents are returned to the authors before similarity screening. The committee name, decision date, and number must appear in the Method section and in the Statements and Declarations; studies that do not require ethics approval must state the reason. Research involving minors additionally requires parental or guardian consent and age-appropriate assent.

2. Duties of the Editor-in-Chief and section editors

Editors evaluate manuscripts solely on academic merit and fit to scope, without regard to the authors’ identity, institution, nationality, or beliefs; safeguard the confidentiality of submissions and the anonymity of reviewers and authors; screen every submission for ethics requirements and textual similarity; assign at least two expert reviewers from at least two different institutions, none affiliated with any author’s institution, and observe diversity in reviewer selection; appoint a third reviewer when the first reports split; decide on the basis of the reports (Reject, Revision, or Accept), with the final decision resting with the Editor-in-Chief; manage their own conflicts of interest by recusing themselves and transferring the manuscript to an independent editor; follow up layout, language editing, and DOI assignment; and act on suspected misconduct, before or after publication, according to COPE flowcharts, including corrections and retractions.

3. Duties of reviewers

Reviewers accept invitations only within their expertise and when they can review in time; treat manuscripts as confidential documents; do not use unpublished material for their own advantage; evaluate objectively, with evidence-based comments on originality, contribution, theoretical grounding, and methodology; declare conflicts of interest and decline when independence is in doubt; report suspected ethical violations to the editor; do not upload the manuscript or any part of it to generative AI tools or any external service (see the Generative AI Policy); and submit a reasoned recommendation (Reject, Major Revision, Minor Revision, or Accept) through the review form.

4. Duties of authors

Authors submit original work that is not published or under review elsewhere; prepare the manuscript according to the Author Guidelines and the mandatory templates; run a similarity check and upload the report; upload the ethics documents listed above and a separate title page; complete the full set of Statements and Declarations, including author contributions (CRediT), funding, competing interests, ethics approval, informed consent, data availability, and generative AI use; respond to reviewer comments point by point within the given time; obtain approval of all co-authors for the submission and for any authorship change (see the Authorship Change Form); and notify the editor of any significant error discovered before or after publication.

5. Publication policy

JTPE publishes two issues per year (June and December) under a continuous publication model. Special issues may be published by decision of the editorial board; guest editors may be invited, and submissions by guest editors to their own special issue are handled independently. The journal applies the following fairness rules: an author may appear (as author or co-author) in at most one article in the same issue; the share of articles whose authors are affiliated with the publishing institution (Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University) is kept at no more than about one quarter of an issue; and an author may have only one manuscript under evaluation at a time. The journal charges no fees (see Price Policy) and supports the Budapest Open Access Initiative.

6. Contact for ethical concerns

Concerns about the ethics of a submission or a published article may be sent to eku@comu.edu.tr. Allegations are handled confidentially under COPE guidance; see Corrections, Retractions, and Appeals.