IASL Procedures & Guidelines (Handbook of Organization)

Guidelines: School Libraries Worldwide

General Guidelines

• Two issues of School Libraries Worldwide are published per year in January and July.
  
• The editorial team for School Libraries Worldwide includes the Editor, up to two Associate Editors, and up to 20 Editorial Board members, all selected as much as possible from around the school library world.
  
• The editorial team members share responsibilities for deciding on themes for issues, as appropriate; identifying potential authors; reviewing submissions; revising articles selected for publication; disseminating Calls for Papers and other information about the journal; updating information about the journal; and advising the IASL Board of Directors in relation to policies related to the journal.
  
• The IASL Web Manager is responsible for publishing School Libraries Worldwide on the IASL website.
  
• The Secretariat is responsible for managing relationships with indexing and subscription agencies.
  

Editing and Production Process

• Themes for issues and submission deadlines for issue are set by the Editor and Associate Editors and/or Guest Editors.
  
• Calls for Guest Editors are regularly sent out to Editorial Board members and to individuals identified by the Editor Board members.
  
• Calls for Papers are sent out on the IASL web page, IASL Newsletter, IASL-LINK discussion list and other listservs as well as to individual potential contributors.
  
• Articles are submitted to the Editor.
  
• The Editor scans incoming articles, assigns at least two reviewers for each article, and sends the articles out for blind review. Reviews are sent to the Editor.
  
• The Editor and/or Guest Editor recommends the disposition of articles after receiving reviewers' comments.
  
• The Editor and/or Guest Editor make revisions to the accepted papers. Papers requiring major revisions are returned to the author with suggestions for revisions.
  
• The Editor and/or Guest Editor make the final decision as to the content of each issue.
  
• The Editor and/or Production Editor formats the articles for publication and returns them to the authors for final proof-reading.
  
• The Editor emails the Table of Contents, the article abstracts and the final articles to the IASL Web Manager. The articles are provided to the Web Manager in PDF format.
  
• The Editor selects one article in each issue as an open access article and informs the Web Manager of this decision. Generally the article is selected on the basis of the widest appeal to the general school library community.
  
• The IASL Secretariat ensures that each issue is included in indexing services such as ERIC Clearinghouse on Information and Technology (USA); Contents Pages in Education; Children's Literature Abstracts (IFLA Children's Library Section); Library Literature (Wilson, USA); Library and Information Science Abstracts (Bowker-Saur, UK); and Bibliothek Forschung und Praxis (Germany).
  
• The IASL Secretariat also manages subscription orders and back issue requests.