THE PEER-REVIEW PROCEDURE
The procedure and the rules for peer-review of submitted manuscripts
The manuscripts submitted to “The Academic Journal of Moscow City University”,
Series “Informatics and Informatization of Education” undergo the double-blind peer-review process (reviewers do not have any information about the author of a manuscript, while the author does not have any information about the reviewers).
1. The members of the Editorial Council and the Editorial Board as well as invited Russian and international editors who are competent specialists in the relevant fields of science conduct the reviewing of manuscripts.
The Editor-in-Chief, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Science Editor, Head of the Publishing Office choose editors for reviewing articles.
The review period takes 2-4 weeks, but it can be extended at the request of the reviewer.
2. Each reviewer can refuse reviewing manuscripts in case there is an obvious conflict of interest that may affect processing and interpretation of the manuscript’s content.
Based on the results of the manuscript’s peer-review, the editor gives recommendations on further actions regarding the manuscript (each decision of the reviewer is justified):
the manuscript is recommended for publication;
the manuscript is recommended for publication after the revision without additional peer-review;
the manuscript is recommended for revision and additional peer-review;
the manuscript is not accepted for publication even after revision.
the journal’s Editorial Board send the reviews of the manuscripts to the author(s).
In case there are any revisions of the manuscript, the members of the Editorial Board suggest the author(s) taking them into account or partially or completely rejecting them in a reasoned way.
The revision of the manuscript should not take more than 2 months from the date of sending an e-mail to the author(s) regarding the manuscript’s revision.
The revised manuscripts are submitted for the second round of peer-review.
4. In case the authors refuse to revise their manuscripts, they should notify the Editorial Board in a written or an oral form about the withdrawal of the manuscript from reviewing.
The Editorial Board will be forced to withdraw the manuscript from reviewing in case the authors do not provide a revised version of the manuscript within 3 months from the date the Editorial Board send a message on the results of the manuscript review with recommendations for revision.
In such situations a corresponding notification is sent to the authors on the withdrawal of the manuscript from reviewing due to the expiration of the time period allotted for revision.
5. The members of Editorial Board conduct no more than three rounds of review for each manuscript.
In case the reviewers or the members of the Editorial Board have major comments after three rounds of review, the manuscript is rejected and not considered further.
In this case the authors receive a corresponding notification clarifying that the manuscript is withdrawn from review.
6. If the authors and reviewers have unresolved contradictions with regard to the manuscript, the editorial staff on agreement with the Editorial Board and the Editor-in-Chief may send the manuscript for an additional round of review.
In case of contradictions, the Editor-in-Chief has the final decision on the publication of a manuscript at the meeting of the Editorial Board.
7. The decision of refusing to accept a manuscript is made at the meeting of the Editorial Board based on the reviewers’ recommendations.
Manuscripts, which are not recommended for publication by the decision of the Editorial Board, are not accepted for additional review.
A report of refusal to accept and review a manuscript is sent to the author by e-mail. The message includes reasons and grounds justifying the refusal to accept the manuscript.
8. After the members of Editorial Board make a decision to accept a manuscript, they inform the author, and indicate the publication deadlines.
9. A positive review is not a sufficient ground for accepting a manuscript for publication.
The members of Editorial Board make the final decision on publication.
In case of contradictions, Editor-in Chief makes a final decision on publication.
10. The authors have the right to challenge the Editorial Board’s decision on refusal to accept a manuscript and withdraw it from review.
In this case the authors should send an appeal to the Editorial Board, addressing it to the Editor-in-Chief.
The appeal should include the reasons for the author’s disagreement with the editors’ decision (it should be based on the reviewers’ conclusions), arguments in favor of reconsidering of the decision, as well as a revised manuscript (in case a revision was needed).
At the meeting of the Editorial Board the Editor-in Chief considers disputable issues and authors’ appeals and requests to reconsider the decisions made.
The decisions made by the Editor-in-Chief are not subject to challenge.
11. The original reviews and the review documents are stored at the Publishing House for at least 5 years.
12. The reviews of the manuscripts (as well as the correspondence between the authors and the members of the Editorial Board) are not available in open access, and are used only within the internal document flow, as well as to communicate with authors.
Copies of the reviews may be sent to the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation upon request.