Important Announcement for Authors – Change in the Journal’s Language Policy

Dear Authors,

In line with recent updates to our journal’s publication policy, all manuscript submissions to the journal will be accepted only in English as of June 2025. This change has been introduced to help the journal reach a broader readership in the international academic community and to enhance the global visibility of your scholarly contributions. This policy applies to manuscripts submitted after the implementation of the new language policy. Manuscripts submitted before this date and already under editorial evaluation may be published in the language of their original submission.

Manuscripts That Will Not Be Considered for Review under the Publication Principles

• The journal conducts an initial assessment of the scientific quality of submitted manuscripts. Studies with the characteristics listed below will not be sent for peer review:
• Studies that are limited to descriptive literature reviews, simple bibliometric studies;
• Qualitative studies that rely solely on stakeholder opinions and present only descriptive findings, without being developed within a strong conceptual framework or supported by data triangulation;
• Simple metaphor studies that lack a theoretical framework;
• Descriptive quantitative studies conducted with a single or limited number of data collection tools and focusing only on differences between variables;
• Correlation studies on topics that have already been extensively examined in the literature and that do not offer an original contribution;
• Studies specific to fields outside educational sciences, such as engineering education, accounting education, or nursing education;
• Qualitative studies that reduce qualitative data primarily to frequencies or numerical counts without sufficient interpretive depth, analytical rigor, or meaningful engagement with the qualitative evidence;
• Manuscripts that do not adequately engage with current and relevant international scholarship or fail to position a local research problem within the broader theoretical and empirical literature.

Submission procedures and other publication criteria remain unchanged. For any questions, please contact the editorial board.

Manuscript Submission Requirements

Manuscript submissions must include the following four essential components:

1. Title Page: The title page should include:

• Manuscript title
• Author name(s) (the corresponding author should be indicated)
• Email addresses
• Author affiliation(s), address(es), and ORCID information
• Statements and Declarations (Conflict of Interest, Author Contributions, Ethical Statement, Prior Presentation of the Study if any, produced from a Project or Thesis, etc.)
• Acknowledgments (of people, grants, funds, etc.)
• Short Biographies of the Authors (maximum 50 words each)

2. Ethics Approval Documentation: For research requiring ethical review, official approval must be obtained before data collection from a competent Research Ethics Committee (REC), Institutional Review Board (IRB), ethics committee, or equivalent authorized body. For research conducted outside Türkiye, documentation issued by the competent ethics review body of the institution or country in which the research was conducted is accepted. The Editorial Office may request verification of the document, an English or Turkish translation, or additional information from the issuing institution when necessary. For studies that do not require ethical review, the manuscript must clearly state and justify why ethics approval was not required.

3. Anonymous Manuscript File: Main manuscript file with author information and metadata removed (for double-blind peer review).

4. Plagiarism Report: Plagiarism screening report documenting the originality of the manuscript.

Important Note: The "Statements and Declarations" section should ONLY appear on the title page and not in the main manuscript file. Although this section will be included in the published article, it should be kept separate from the main file to maintain anonymity for peer review.

 Format-Free Submission: "Your Paper Your Way"

The Journal of Education Faculty at Mehmet Akif Ersoy University has adopted the "Your Paper Your Way" approach for manuscript submissions. This author-friendly initiative aims to simplify the submission process and reduce the time and effort authors spend on formatting their papers before initial review. There are no strict formatting requirements for initial submission, but all manuscripts must contain the following essential elements:

• Abstract
• Keywords
• Introduction
• Materials and Methods
• Results
• Conclusions and Discussion

If your article includes videos or other supplementary materials, these should also be included in your initial submission for peer review. It is recommended that you divide your article into clearly defined sections as suggested below.

Word Count

Authors should limit their manuscript submissions to a maximum of 8000 words (excluding references). The acceptance of longer articles to the journal is subject to the decision of the editorial board.

Article Structure

Authors are welcome to structure articles in the manner they need to best convey their research. The information below provides a guideline for how an article can be structured.

Abstract

• An abstract of 150-250 words is required.
• It should briefly state the purpose of the research, the principal results, and major conclusions.
• Since the abstract may be presented separately from the article, it must be able to stand alone.
• It should not contain undefined abbreviations or unspecified references.
• Citations are not mandatory, but if essential, include author(s) and year(s).
• Non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential, they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract.

Keywords

• Provide 4-6 keywords that can be used for indexing purposes.

Introduction

• State the objectives of the work and provide a sufficient conceptual framework.
• Clearly define the research problem and emphasize the significance of the study.
• Indicate the original contribution of the study and its potential impact on the field of education.
• Avoid summarizing the results.

Literature Review

• Present a critical review of the existing body of knowledge related to the topic.
• Show theoretical and/or empirical connections with previous studies.
• Explain how your research fills a gap in the literature.
• Prefer a thematic organization rather than a chronological order.
• Synthesize key concepts and current debates.

Materials and Methods

• Clearly define the research design, participants, data collection instruments, and procedure.
• If quoting directly from a previously published method, use quotation marks and cite the source.
• Any modifications to existing methods should also be described.
• Explain data analysis methods in detail.

Results

• Results should be stated clearly and comprehensibly.

Discussion

• Explore the significance of the results of the work, rather than repeating them.
• A combined Results and Discussion section is often appropriate.
• Avoid extensive citations and detailed discussion of published literature.

Conclusions

• The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a short Conclusions section. Recommendations for future studies can also be presented in this section. 

Text Formatting

• Manuscripts should be submitted in Word format.
• Use a normal, plain font (e.g., 10-point Times Roman) for text.
• Use italics for emphasis.
• Use the automatic page numbering function to number the pages.
• Use tab stops or other commands for indents, not the space bar.
• Use the equation editor or MathType for equations.
• Save your file in docx format (Word 2007 or higher) or doc format (older Word versions).
• Manuscripts with mathematical content can also be submitted in LaTeX format.

Headings

• Should be no more than three levels.

Abbreviations

• Abbreviations should be defined at first mention and used consistently thereafter.

Footnotes

• Footnotes can be used to provide additional information, which may include citation of a reference included in the reference list.
• They should not consist solely of a reference citation.
• They should not contain the bibliographic details of a reference.
• They should not contain any figures or tables.
• Footnotes to the text are numbered consecutively; those to tables should be indicated by superscript lowercase letters.

References

Use the APA 7 format, which is widely used in the social sciences field.

• The reference list should only include works that are cited in the text and have been published or accepted for publication.
• Personal communications and unpublished works should only be mentioned in the text.
• Reference list entries should be alphabetized by the last names of the first author of each work.
• Journal names and book titles should be italicized.
• If available, please always include DOIs as full DOI links in your reference list (e.g., "https://doi.org/abc").

Tables

• All tables should be numbered consecutively.
• Tables should always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• For each table, please supply a table caption (title) explaining the components of the table.
• Identify any previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference at the end of the table caption.
• Footnotes to tables should be indicated by superscript lowercase letters (or asterisks for significance values and other statistical data) and included beneath the table body.

Figures and Illustration Guidelines

• Authors are strictly advised not to use SmartArt objects, pre-designed diagram templates (e.g., flowcharts), or other built-in graphic elements created via Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, or similar office software in their submissions. These elements may cause formatting issues during the production process and are incompatible with the journal’s publication standards. All figures and illustrations should be prepared in high resolution, designed to support the scientific content,
• If the figure was created by the author, indicate which graphics program was used.
• Prefer png or svg formats for figures.
• Name your figure/visual files with "Figure" and the figure number, e.g., Figure 1. eps.
• All figures should be numbered using Arabic numerals.
• Figures should always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• Each figure should have a concise caption describing accurately what the figure depicts.
• Identify previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference citation at the end of the figure caption.
• Figures should be placed within the text and not submitted as separate files. Only if the file size of the manuscript causes problems in uploading should large figures be submitted separately.
• When preparing your figures, size them to fit in the column width.