Peer Review for Journals Guest Editor Center
Role of the Guest Editor
Generally, guest editors (GE) will want to go through all of Special Issue
submissions, weed out the papers that can be administratively rejected and then
assign reviewers to the others. Generating a reviewer pool by confirming with
referees ahead of time, even before the submission deadline helps guarantee
adherence to our schedule. You will want to ask reviewers to complete and
submit their comments to you within a maximum of three weeks
upon receiving a copy of the paper. Authors should be instructed to
submit their papers via Manuscript Central. They
are to specify exactly which Special Issue they are submitting to by making the
proper selection in "Manuscript Type" drop-down menu on the first
screen of the submission process.
Since the review process for Special Issues should be placed on a fast-track
schedule, authors will be given a solid deadline for completing their major and
minor revisions, at two months and two weeks,
respectively. Authors should also submit a summary of their changes and
responses to the reviewers' original comments. Major revisions should
preferably go back to the original reviewers for a second round of reviews with
another two week deadline, by just making sure that their
original concerns were addressed.
Minor revisions are to be reviewed by the GE only, unless you need one of
the reviewers to make sure that their remaining concern(s) were fully
addressed. The authors should be given two weeks to make their
minor changes and the GE's should take no more than one week
to review them and make final recommendations.
In an effort to adhere to our strict page budget, we are trying to better
enforce our long standing page limitations and formatting guidelines with our
authors. In order to help them adhere to these guidelines, we need your
support. One way you can help us meet these objectives is by suggesting
ways to maintain the lengths of their manuscripts should you decide to ask the
author to add new content. You should offer suggestions as to what they can
take out so their manuscripts still adhere to our page
limitation and formatting requirements detailed on the author center page.
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Deadlines for Special Issues
Because the proposed schedule gives guest editors (GE) essentially five
months to complete the peer review process for Special Issue (SI) papers from
start-to-finish, we must strongly encourage you follow a faster-paced review
schedule by doing the following:
- Assigning reviewers within two weeks of the submission
deadline
- Giving reviewers three weeks to review their papers
- Giving authors two months to revise their
manuscripts
- Giving reviewers another two weeks to conduct a second
review
- Giving authors two weeks to make any necessary minor
changes before a final decision is made
It is important to conduct an initial review before reviewer assignment to
weed out poorly written papers or those that are not within scope of the
special issue. We also encourage GEs to try and confirm with reviewers ahead of
time, so that they know what to expect and agree to the time commitments.
A good opportunity to do this is during the SI's corresponding workshop or
conference.
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Making Decisions on
Manuscripts
The editor will determine the disposition of the manuscript, based on
remarks of the reviewers, and the editor's own assessment of the manuscript.
The editor's recommendation must be well justified and explained in detail. If
the editor's recommendation conflicts with the reviews, or if the reviews
conflict with each other, editors must be careful to explain the basis of their
recommendation to help avoid an appeal of their decision. In cases where
revisions (major or minor) are requested, these should be clearly indicated and
explained in the "Comments to Authors" section of the recommendation
form. The editor must then promptly convey this decision to the author. The
author may contact the editor if instructions regarding amendments to the
manuscript are unclear. All decisions are final and irreversible.
- Accept: An accept decision means that an editor is
accepting the paper "as is" and with no further changes
whatsoever. The paper will not be seen again by the editor or by the
reviewers.
- Major Revision: A major revision means that the paper
should go back to the original reviewers for a second round of reviews. We
strongly discourage editors from making a decision based on their own review of
the manuscript if a major revision had been previously required. This may
cause problems in the future if reviewers were to see a published paper that
they did not have a chance to re-review.
- Minor Revision: The minor version may not go back to the
reviewers, if the editor feels the revisions are sufficient / appropriate. Any
revision in length by more than 10% should be a "Major Revision".
- Reject: The manuscript is not suitable for
publication.
- Resubmit: This may be an alternative decision to asking
for a second major revision.
- Administrative Reject: The editor rejects the manuscript
without assigning it to reviewers due to significant deficiencies.
- Out of Scope: The manuscript does not fall within the
scope of the journal. We ask that you please suggest a more suitable
journal for submission.
Second Major Revision
If a paper has already gone through two rounds of reviews, the option
of a second major revision is not available.
There is no rule against a second major revision as such; however, we
strongly advise against it since the authors were already given specific
instructions in the past and did not fulfill the requirements. If a major
overhaul is required to the current version of the paper before it can be
considered for the journal, we suggest closing the current file and
recommending rejection. This will give the authors an unlimited amount of
time to thoroughly revise their paper and resubmit it as new.
A recommendation of "Resubmit" is available. editors may recommend that
the author resubmit the paper as new as an alternative to asking for a second
major revision. If you wish, we can instruct the authors to request the
same editor be assigned to their new paper, increasing the chances of an
expedited review. Overall, this procedure will help avoid damaging the journal's submission to
publication time, which is one of the foundations of its highly regarded
reputation.
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IEEE Review Process Statement (6.10
Publication Activities)
The IEEE shall not accept or publish manuscripts in an archival journal
without prior peer review. There shall be a review process of manuscripts by
two or more independent referees who are conversant in the pertinent subject
area.
Editors of all regular technical periodical IEEE publications, except IEEE
SPECTRUM and Society newsletters shall follow the review process which shall be
defined in the Publications Services and Products Board Operations Manual.
Referees shall treat the contents of papers under review as privileged
information not to be disclosed to others before publication. It is expected
that no one with access to a paper under review will make any inappropriate use
of the special knowledge which that access provides. Contents of abstracts
submitted to conference program committees shall be regarded as privileged as
well, and handled in the same manner.
Periodicals which are published in cooperation with non-IEEE organizations
shall be encouraged to have a review policy that ensures the quality of papers.
This policy should be generally consistent with the IEEE review policy
contained in Policy 6.10 and procedures which shall be specified in the PSPB
Operations Manual.
The review process shall ensure that all authors have equal opportunity for
publication of their papers. Acceptance and scheduling of publication of paper
in these periodicals shall not be impeded by added criteria and procedures
beyond those contained in the review process.
To access Section 6 Publication Activities in its entirety, visit the IEEE Publication
Services and Products Board page.
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Writing an editorial
- Editorials should give a brief
overview of the special issue, giving a short introduction to each paper.
Manuscripts should be referenced in the order they are to appear in the
publication. To protect the identity of the reviewers, no reviewers lists will
be published. However, it is encouraged to acknowledge the general
contributions of the reviewers as part of the editorial.
- Editorials cannot be regular papers. Special issue guest editors are also prohibited from submitting papers
to their own special issues. Submitting to one's own special issue may be
misunderstood by certain members of the journal's readership as
unethical.
- Editorials should be no more
than two pages in length, including guest editor biographies and photographs.
Biographies should be moderate in length, otherwise they will be edited.
- Editorials should not include references unless absolutely necessary, and even then they should be limited to a maximum of four.
- Editorials must include each guest
editor's complete and current affiliation and contact information.
- Editorials must be submitted in an
editable format, such as a Word document or text sent via e-mail. Guest editors
are responsible for reviewing the galley proofs of their editorial for accuracy
of typesetting and communicating any corrections to IEEE Computer Society staff
within 72 hours of receipt.
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