Manuscript Language and Length
AJEE publishes in English (British/Australian). Please ensure this is applied throughout your manuscript.
AJEE publishes original work in the following manuscript types: article*, communication*, review, and thesis synopsis and report synopsis
* these articles types may be covered under one of the agreements Cambridge University Press has made to support open access. If funding is unavailable for the other article types, waivers are available.
Article
Contemporary and innovative contexts and practices are reported in readable academic prose applying the literature of the field, making contributions to the field. Articles may focus on research theory and/or practice. Literature reviews are considered if a critical perspective and innovative contribution is evident.
The word limit is up to 7,000 inclusive of references, abstract, figures, tables, and appendices. Supplementary materials are welcomed. See details below about manuscript specifications.
Communication
Communication contributions are welcome and encouraged to be rigorous, provocative, and exploratory.
A communication explores an issue or challenge or comments on an aspect of environmental education theory and/or practice. A communication is scholarly contribution that is academically crafted and referenced to build on the literature of the field.
The word limit is up to 3,000 inclusive of references, abstract, figures, tables, and appendices.
Review
AJEE is excited to expand our reviewing practices to generate broader explorations and representations of ideas and knowledge in various forms through our journal. Reviews of contemporary books, films, art including music, and other media and artifacts are welcome. AJEE is open to suggestions for useful and engaging reviews. Please consider copyright requirements and audience access to the reviewed item when selecting an item to review.
The word limit is up to 1,500 inclusive of references, abstract, figures, tables, and appendices. Include reviewers name, institution, and bio.
A review can be initiated either by invitation from the Review Editor or through nominating an item for review to the Review Editor.
Thesis Synopsis
AJEE welcomes Thesis Synopsis from researchers who have recently (within two years) completed Honours, Masters or PhD research. AJEE is excited to create this opportunity to introduce you as a new researcher to our community and completing a thesis synopsis which is an important way to share your research with the field.
A thesis synopsis can be initiated either by invitation or through nominating to the Thesis Synopsis Editor.
The word limit is 400 words (Honours), 800 (Masters), and 1000 (PhD and EdD) inclusive of references, abstract, figures, tables, and appendices and we have a template here for your application.
The following guidelines are provided to support your preparation of a Thesis Synopsis.
Criteria for acceptance:
- Synopses will only be accepted for publication if they have already been examined and passed.
- Synopses should be submitted for publication within two years from the date the degree was awarded/conferred.
- The acknowledgement of the conferring institution and the relevant research supervisors by name and institution is required.
- The full thesis online access details are to be listed to facilitate broader dissemination.
- Any publications arising for the research study are to be noted.
- Up to six key words pertaining to the synopsis are to be provided to facilitate online searches.
- Only synopses of theses that relate to the field of environmental or sustainability education will be accepted.
Report Synopsis
AJEE encourages and promotes scholars to share their research by considering publishing their study report undertaken within the last three years through a Report Synopsis. A Report Synopsis can be initiated either by invitation or through nominating to the Report Synopsis Editor.
The word limit for a Report Synopsis is up to 800 inclusive of references, abstract, figures, tables, and appendices and we have a template (HERE) for your application. The following guidelines are provided to support your preparation of a research report.
Criteria for acceptance:
- A Report Synopsis should be submitted for publication within three years from the date of publication or submission of the report (or conclusion of the study).
- Any publications arising from the research are noted.
- Up to six key words pertaining to the research are to be provided to facilitate online searches.
- Only reports that relate to the field of environmental or sustainability education will be accepted.
- Please submit the report through ScholarOne Manuscripts. An Author biography (100 words) will be called for in the submission process
Manuscript Style
AJEE is housed and managed by Cambridge University Press and uses ScholarOne Manuscripts to manage manuscripts. Please create a profile to become an author or reviewer for AJEE. Ensure that you include your current details and return to update if they change.
At least two separate files need to be submitted online.
- Title page: Please provide a title page for the Editors. The title page is not shared with the referees. The title page must state the following:
- the title of the document, up to six keywords, and suggested running head of no more than 50 characters
- the name, affiliation, address, telephone number, fax number, and e-mail address of the corresponding author;
- the name and affiliations of all authors;
- a short (50–100 word) biographical note of each author;
- any acknowledgements, financial support, or competing interest statements that may identify the authors;
- that this manuscript is an original work that has not been submitted to nor published anywhere else;
- Article document: The Article document should include the complete article without any identifiable author details but including the title, abstract, body of the article, tables if any, figure captions if any, and references.
- Any graphic documents. A list of figure captions should follow the tables in the article document. Captions must include sources and permissions for copyright material.
Acknowledgements
Acknowledge individuals or organizations who provided advice or non-financial support. If there are no acknowledgements, include the heading 'Acknowledgements' followed by the text 'None.'
Conflicts of Interest
Conflict of interest exists when an author has interests that might influence his or her judgement, even if that judgement is not influenced. Authors must disclose potentially conflicting. Non-financial interests that could be relevant in this context should also be disclosed. If no relevant interests exist, this should be stated. This requirement applies to all the authors of a paper and to all categories of papers If there are no conflicts of interest, include the heading 'Conflicts of Interest' followed by the text 'None.'
Financial Support
Provide details of the sources of financial and in-kind support for all authors, including grant numbers. Grants held by different authors should be identified as belonging to individual authors by the author's initials. Where no specific funding has been provided for research, please provide the following statement: 'This research received no specific grant from any funding agency, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.'
References
All references must be complete and accurate on submission. Include all and only those references cited in the paper. Do not cite papers in preparation. Papers may be cited as "in press" where they have been accepted for publication. Papers will be declined for publication if they have references that are found to be incomplete or inaccurate. References should be selective, appropriate, and easily accessible.
References follow the format and style described in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). For general publication categories the format should follow the examples below. Please pay particular attention to capitalisation, punctuation and spacing. Submissions that do not conform to these referencing guidelines will be returned to authors for correction.
The following examples illustrate the recommended form for publications:
- Journal articles: Jickling, B., & Spork, H. (1998). Education for the environment: A critique. Environmental Education Research, 4(3), 309–327.
- Cutter-Mackenzie, A. (2009). Multicultural school gardens: Creating engaging garden spaces in learning about language, culture, and environment (special issue guest edited by D. Greenwood and M. McKenzie). Canadian Journal of Environmental Education, 14(1), 122–135.
- Books and reports: Hart, P. (2003). Teachers' thinking in environmental education: Consciousness and responsibility. New York: Peter Lang.
- Australian Government Department of the Environment Water Heritage and the Arts. (2009). Living sustainably: The Australian Government's National Action Plan for Education for Sustainability. Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.
- Chalkley, M. Haigh & D. Higgitt (Eds.). (2009). Education for sustainable development: Paper in honour of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005–2014) (pp. 199–213). New York: Routledge.
- Theses: Hillcoat, J. (1999). Beyond the commodity: Meaning-making, sustainability and the self. Unpublished PhD thesis, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia.
Tables and Figures
Both Tables and Figures should be titled with a short and concise description, numbered separately but consecutively (Table 1, … ; Figure 1, … ), and referenced in the text. Tables should be clear, concise, and able to stand alone. with footnotes included to clarify entries. Figures should be provided as a high quality format. For imported scanned material a minimum resolution is 300 dpi. In multi-part Figures, each part should be labelled (Figure 1a, Figure 1b, …).
A list of figure captions should follow the tables in the manuscript.
Figures, graphs, illustrations and photographs (but not Tables) should be prepared to the correct size and each one supplied as an individual file as outlined above. Include placement instructions in the Article document, such as "[Insert fig 1 here]". Figures created in Microsoft Word, Excel or PowerPoint need to be saved as PDFs. Figures created in a drawing program should be saved as EPS (encapsulated postscript) files. Figures created in Photoshop or with other photographic software should be saved with a minimum resolution of 600 dpi and in TIF format. Minimum resolution for scanned graphics is 300 dpi for halftone work (e.g., photographs) and 600 dpi for line art, and these should also be in TIF format. All figures and graphs should be in black and white line art (artwork that has only text and lines, no shades of grey or blocks of colour). All photographs should be supplied as separate files in JPEG or TIFF formats for a minimum 300 dpi resolution. (As a rough guide, the file size of each photograph should be above 200 KB). If you request colour figures in the printed version, you will be contacted by CCC-Rightslink who are acting on our behalf to collect Author Charges. Please follow their instructions in order to avoid any delay in the publication of your article.
More detail on artwork is here.Policy on prior publication
When authors submit manuscripts to this journal, these manuscripts should not be under consideration, accepted for publication or in press within a different journal, book or similar entity, unless explicit permission or agreement has been sought from all entities involved. However, deposition of a preprint on the author’s personal website, in an institutional repository, or in a preprint archive shall not be viewed as prior or duplicate publication. Authors should follow the Cambridge University Press Preprint Policy regarding preprint archives and maintaining the version of record.
English language editing services
Authors, particularly those whose first language is not English, may wish to have their English-language manuscripts checked by a native speaker before submission. This step is optional, but may help to ensure that the academic content of the paper is fully understood by the Editor and any reviewers.
In order to help prospective authors to prepare for submission and to reach their publication goals, Cambridge University Press offers a range of high-quality manuscript preparation services, including language editing. You can find out more on our language services page.
Please note that the use of any of these services is voluntary, and at the author's own expense. Use of these services does not guarantee that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, nor does it restrict the author to submitting to a Cambridge-published journal.
Competing Interests
All authors must include a competing interest declaration in their title page. This declaration will be subject to editorial review and may be published in the article.
Competing interests are situations that could be perceived to exert an undue influence on the content or publication of an author’s work. They may include, but are not limited to, financial, professional, contractual or personal relationships or situations.
If the manuscript has multiple authors, the author submitting must include competing interest declarations relevant to all contributing authors.
Example wording for a declaration is as follows: “Competing interests: Author 1 is employed at organisation A, Author 2 is on the Board of company B and is a member of organisation C. Author 3 has received grants from company D.” If no competing interests exist, the declaration should state “Competing interests: The author(s) declare none”.
Authorship and contributorship
All authors listed on any papers submitted to this journal must be in agreement that the authors listed would all be considered authors according to disciplinary norms, and that no authors who would reasonably be considered an author have been excluded. For further details on this journal’s authorship policy, please see this journal's publishing ethics policies.
Author affiliations
Author affiliations should represent the institution(s) at which the research presented was conducted and/or supported and/or approved. For non-research content, any affiliations should represent the institution(s) with which each author is currently affiliated.
For more information, please see our author affiliation policy and author affiliation FAQs.
ORCID
We encourage authors to identify themselves using ORCID when submitting a manuscript to this journal. ORCID provides a unique identifier for researchers and, through integration with key research workflows such as manuscript submission and grant applications, provides the following benefits:
- Discoverability: ORCID increases the discoverability of your publications, by enabling smarter publisher systems and by helping readers to reliably find work that you have authored.
- Convenience: As more organisations use ORCID, providing your iD or using it to register for services will automatically link activities to your ORCID record, and will enable you to share this information with other systems and platforms you use, saving you re-keying information multiple times.
- Keeping track: Your ORCID record is a neat place to store and (if you choose) share validated information about your research activities and affiliations.
See our ORCID FAQs for more information. If you don’t already have an iD, you can create one by registering directly at https://ORCID.org/register.
ORCIDs can also be used if authors wish to communicate to readers up-to-date information about how they wish to be addressed or referred to (for example, they wish to include pronouns, additional titles, honorifics, name variations, etc.) alongside their published articles. We encourage authors to make use of the ORCID profile’s “Published Name” field for this purpose. This is entirely optional for authors who wish to communicate such information in connection with their article. Please note that this method is not currently recommended for author name changes: see Cambridge’s author name change policy if you want to change your name on an already published article. See our ORCID FAQs for more information.
Supplementary materials
Material that is not essential to understanding or supporting a manuscript, but which may nonetheless be relevant or interesting to readers, may be submitted as supplementary material. Supplementary material will be published online alongside your article, but will not be published in the pages of the journal. Types of supplementary material may include, but are not limited to, appendices, additional tables or figures, datasets, videos, and sound files.
Supplementary materials will not be typeset or copyedited, so should be supplied exactly as they are to appear online. Please see our general guidance on supplementary materials for further information.
Where relevant we encourage authors to publish additional qualitative or quantitative research outputs in an appropriate repository, and cite these in manuscripts.
Author Hub
You can find guides for many aspects of publishing with Cambridge at Author Hub, our suite of resources for Cambridge authors.