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Ethical norms

Statement of ethics and good practice
 
In order to ensure a culture of ethical and standardised publishing, Rhela adheres to good publishing practices and the 16 principles of transparency https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines-new/principles-transparency-and-best-practice-scholarly-publishing) of the Committee On Publication Ethics (COPE). For the handling of personal information in databases, in accordance with Colombian law, Rhela complies with the provisions of the Habeas Data Statutory Law 1266 of 2008.

 

  1. Regarding the website: the journal operates on the Open Journal Systems (OJS) platform, where it is possible to find accurate and updated information about its focus, scope, topics, editorial structure, policy and guidelines.

 

  1. Name of the journal: the journal has circulated for more than 20 years under the same name, since its creation, without generating misunderstandings with other publications.

 

  1. Peer review process: the journal describes in detail its peer review process, under the "double blind" system.

 

  1. Ownership and management: the journal is sponsored by Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia and the Sociedad de Historia de la Educación Latinoamericana.

 

  1. Governing body: the journal has the following editorial structure: an editor-in-chief, associate scientific editors and an editorial and scientific committee. It also has an editorial and production coordination and assistance area, which supports the management of the journal and all its technical and professional publication processes.This information is available on the journal's website.

 

  1. Editorial team/contact information: the journal includes complete information on its editorial structure, profiles, Orcid or online CV of its members.

 

  1. Copyright and licenses: the journal declares the relationship with its authors regarding the rights of approved manuscripts and the relationship with its readers, through a Creative Commons license.

 

  1. Article processing charge: the journal explicitly declares that it operates under the "diamond" open access model, i.e., it has no submission or publication fees.

  

  1. Process for identifying and dealing with allegations of research misconduct: the journal declares that it follows the COPE guidelines for dealing with potential cases of ethical dilemmas or malpractice in scientific research and publication.

 

  1. Publication ethics: the journal has an ethics policy that promotes scientific integrity, which is expressed through the procedures applied to promote and verify the quality of manuscripts.

 

  1. Periodicity of publication: the frequency of issues is clearly indicated in the journal's policies.

 

  1. Access: the contents are open access, under a Creative Commons license, and have NO subscription fees.

 

  1. Archiving: the journal has a preservation policy which is stated in its guidelines.

 

  1. Sources of income: the journal is fully sponsored by the Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia and the Sociedad de Historia de la Educación Latinoamericana.Its purpose is also scientific; it seeks to contribute to the advancement of knowledge in the field of the history of education within the particularities of the Latin American context.

 

  1. Publicity: the journal is advertised. The manuscript approval process is based on external peer review.

 

  1. Direct marketing: the journal does not engage in direct marketing strategies nor does it have any commercial purposes or fees for authors. Its intention is to create a community of collaborators (authors, reviewers, editors) and a diverse and inclusive audience of readers, within the particularities of its area and its thematic spectrum.

 

With respect to the presentation of manuscripts, following the ICMJE recommendations, authors should take into account three essential aspects:

 

 

a) Criteria for defining authorship or co-authorship:

  1. An author is someone who makes substantial contributions to the conception or design of a manuscript or to the collection, analysis or interpretation of the data it contains.

 

  1. An author participates in the writing of the manuscript or in a critical review of its contents.

 

  1. An author participates in the approval of the final version of a manuscript.

 

  1. An author is the one who agrees with all the parts of a manuscript and is responsible for the precision or integrity of each of its parts, so that any doubts that may arise are clarified or resolved.

 

b) Declaration of conflict of interest:

Conflicts of interest

A conflict of interest exists when the content of an article or its author, referee or member of the Editorial Committee has a blood relationship or a  manifest  friendship or enmity that may positively or negatively influence the evaluation. For this reason, the authors must report the existence of any type of conflict of interest. 

Authors must declare any conflict of interest that could potentially affect the implications or interpretation of the results of their manuscript. Thus, authors should complete and submit, along with their manuscript, a conflict of interest declaration form provided by the journal, in accordance with ICMJE guidelines.

 

c) Ethical implications of research:

Authors whose research has been submitted for review by the ethics committee, at their own institution or funding organization, must submit this endorsement to the journal, together with the manuscript.

Likewise, the ethical implications of the research that has been carried out should be directly stated in the manuscript and its methodology.

The journal may also request additional reviews of the submitted manuscript and  the research if any ethical concerns are identified by the editor-in-chief, the responsible editor, or the journal's editorial and scientific committee.  

On the other hand, it is expected that all those who collaborate in the journal from different roles (authors, reviewers, editors or editorial team), act under scientific integrity and that their behavior and decisions correspond to a scientific approach, based on transparency and the generation or validation of knowledge, for the advancement, in this case, of the study of the history of Latin American education and the areas related to the journal.

As for the main roles of those who participate in the journal, we should summarize the following:

Authors. The journal expects its authors not to engage in behaviors such as plagiarism, fabrication of data or manipulation of results, recycling of texts or simultaneous submission to other journals or publication media (to list some of the most frequent ethical problems).

It is also important that the authors who submit papers to the journal have a genuine interest in publishing and that they actively participate throughout the entire process: peer review, corrections, editorial production and post-publication. The final quality of the work and the impact it may have over time depends, to a large extent, on the interest of the authors.

Reviewers. When evaluating manuscripts, reviewers should have a scientific, academic approach. The journal evaluates manuscripts, not individuals, and concepts should be elaborated under this principle, avoiding personal attacks on authors.

Reviewers must also avoid misuse of both the manuscripts and the research data entrusted to them. Impersonation is also a bad practice; the journal selects and convenes its reviewers based on their academic background, experience and publications, so transferring the responsibility of evaluating a manuscript to a third party (student, resident, colleague), without consulting the reasons for it, to the editor-in-chief of the journal, is unacceptable and must be avoided.

Editors or editorial team. The editors and editorial team of the journal must ensure that the principles of transparency and the journal's processes and procedures are carried out in the best possible way, seeking fair treatment for all parties involved.

Rather than acting as gatekeepers of knowledge, the editors (and their team) should be "discreet collaborators" of the authors. Their intention should focus on making the journal a reliable repository of  the history of Latin American education so that the best possible version of each manuscript reaches a specialized reader.

Regarding corrections or retractions of articles published in the journal:

Corrections. Corrections to a published article will be made whenever the error identified in the article could lead to important misunderstandings (i.e., wrong names, affiliations, Orcid, among othes) or misinterpretation, due to an omission or unintentional wording or formatting errors.

Retractions

With regard to its policy on correction and retraction of published manuscripts, and any ethical dilemmas that arise in Rhela's publication process, the COPE recommendations and flowcharts will be followed: https://publicationethics.org/guidance

 

Rhela will retract a manuscript in the event of: 

- Plagiarism in whole or in part

- Unverified or falsified research results

- Finding the publication in another medium

- Use of documentation without proper permissions

Such cases will be analyzed by the Editorial and Scientific Committee of the journal and by the Editor-in-Chief before making a final decision on a retraction.

Likewise, any cases or particularities not described above will also be addressed from the perspective of the scientific integrity followed by the university's publishing house and COPE.