International journal of educational development (2010-2014). Article themess and the journal policy

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

The purpose of this review is to analyze the methods of implementing the journal policy on a particular example of a nonRussian scientific journal. We have chosen a Scopus journal and analyzed the issues published within the years 2010-2014. The total number of the analyzed articles is 309 in 24 issues.

International Journal of Educational Development is a SCOPUS journal with the policyfocusedonexaminingdifferentaspects of education as an element of development. These aspects are theoretical constructs and practical issues of development and interrelations between development and education. Different social phenomena such as inequality, poverty and disease, conflict and crisis, human capability and social justice are the borderline areas of education and social development. Education in a broader sense as well as skills development as a tool to promote higher and more productive involvement of people in social processes are main aspect of studies in the journal. Low and middle income countries are given priority in the journal coverage [1].

We tried to see how this policy is followed in the journal issues in the years 2010 – 2014. Statistical approach was applied to the analysis of articles, abstracts and keywords according to the areas defined in the journal policy. Articla themes, keywords and abstracts ere analyzed by means of ststistical approach on the annual and content basis. The data was calculated in percent to make it comparable. The content and dynamics are defined and presented in tables.

First let us see how it works on annual basis year by year.

Article themes were grouped according to the areas specified for the role of education in social development in the journal policy the resulst of analysis can be seen in Table 1.

Table 1. Article themes 2010

Theme	2010, Volume 30 Issue 1	2010, Volume 30 Issue 2	2010, Volume 30 Issue 3	2010, Volume 30 Issue 4	2010, Volume 30 Issue 5	2010, Volume 30 Issue 6	2010 average
Competitiveness and productivity	50	64	27	55	89	70	58
Inequality, poverty and disease	30	27	18	-	-	10	15
Conflict and crisis	-	-	-	9	11	-	3
Human capability	-	9	9	-	-	10	5
Social justice	20	-	46	36	-	10	19

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

The year had 6 issues. The main focus of the articles was on competitiveness and productivity and education, and this is quite understandable as these factors are most important in the country’s development e.g. The Perpetual Education Fund: Providing higher education loans in the voluntary sector [4]. This theme is dominant in all issies except issue 3, where the focus is on social justice. Social justice is second important theme and is covered especially in issues 3

The main focus is on education management, and this is understandable as education management is the main tool to make education answer the requirement of the society. This group is dominant in all issues. Next category of keywords is social factors, while education content ranks only third. The last group includes geographicall factors. All groups but the first one show fluctuations in coverage in different issues. Let us see some of the groups the groups in more detail.

Education management was subgrouped into the following categories: education forms, financial aspects, actors of education process, actions and methods. Actions (36%) and forms of education (31%) were the most numerous groups. Financial aspects were (14%), actors (10%) and methods (8%). It shows the practical focus of the articlesaimed at the achievement of practical output.

Geographical factor was grouped into the following categories: Europe, Asia, North America, South and Central America, Africa and other. Australia was not mentioned in any issue of the journal in the years under consideration. In 2010 the distribution was as follows: Europe (0%), Asia (30%), North America (0%), South and Central America (12.5%), Africa (40%) and other (17.5%). Asian countries included Sri Lanka, China,

Nepal, Cambodia, India and Penan.China is the most frequently mentioned country. South and Central American countries are Uruguay, Bolivia, Gonduras and El Salvador. African counties include Uganda, Kenya, Senegal, Tanzania, Sub-Saharan Africa, Malawi, South Africa, Ghana, Eritrea and Benin. The most frequent countries are South Africa, Uganda and Malawi. Others include developing countries, developing nations, South Pacific etc.

Social factors were grouped as follows: rights (14%), social status (15%) and environment (71%).

Article themes were grouped according to the areas specified for the role of education in social development in the journal policy the resulst of analysis can be seen in Table 3.

The year had 6 issues. The main focus of the articles was on competitiveness and productivity and education, and this is quite understandable as these factors are most important in the country’s development, e.g. Developing a postgraduate dual-award in educational leadership: A Russian pelican meets an English rose [9]. This theme is dominant in all issies except issue 1, where the focus is on social justice, issues 4 and 6, where focus is on inequality.

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

Table 3. Article themes 2011

Theme	2011, Volume 31 Issue 1	2011, Volume 31 Issue 2	2011, Volume 31 Issue 3	2011, Volume 31 Issue 4	2011, Volume 31 Issue 5	2011, Volume 31 Issue 6	2011 average
Competitiveness and productivity	20	50	55	33	56	37	44
Inequality, poverty and disease	10	10	27	45	6	63	23
Conflict and crisis	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Human capability	10	-	9	-	-	-	3
Social justice	60	40	9	22	38	-	30

Social justice is second important theme and is covered especially in issues 1 and 5, while is not touched upon in issue 6, e.g. Respect and responsibility: Teaching citizenship in South African high schools [10]. The next important theme is inequality, poverty and disease, which is paid more attention to in issues 1 and 2, e.g. Respect and responsibility: Teaching citizenship in South African high schools [11].

Table 4. Key words 2011

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

The main focus is on education management, and this is understandable as education management is the main tool to make education answer the requirement of the society. This group is dominant in all issues. Next category of keywords is social factors, while education content ranks only third. The last group includes geographicall factors. All groups but the first one show fluctuations in coverage in different issues. Let us see some of the groups the groups in more detail.

Education management was subgrouped into the following categories: education forms, financial aspects, actors of education process, actions and methods. Actions (41%) and forms of education (40%) were the most numerous groups and show acualyy equal rating. Financial aspects were (10%), methods (5%) and actors (4%). It shows the practical focus of the articlesaimed at the achievement of practical output.

Geographical factor was grouped into the following categories: Europe, Asia, North America, South and Central America, Africa and other. Australia was not mentioned in any issue of the journal in the years under consideration. In 2010 the distribution was as follows: Europe (9%), Asia (36%), North America (0%), South and Central America (11%), Africa (42%) and other (2%). Europe includes Russa, Ukraine and Easten Europe. Asian countries included China, Nepal, Cambodia, India, South Korea, Taiwan and Bangladesh.India is the most frequently mentioned country. South and Central American countries are Chile, Nicaragua, Haiti and Dominican Republic. African counties include Rwanda, Kenya, Ghana, Sub-Saharan Africa, Lesoto, South Africa, Ghana, and Kenya. The most frequent countries are South Africa, SubSaharan Africa and Ghana. Others include Latin America.

Social factors were grouped as follows: rights (19%), social status (18%) and environment (63%).

Article themes were grouped according to the areas specified for the role of education in social development in the journal policy the resulst of analysis can be seen in Table 5.

Table 5. Article themes 2012

Theme	2012, Volume 32 Issue 1	2012, Volume 32 Issue 2	2012, Volume 32 Issue 3	2012, Volume 32 Issue 4	2012, Volume 32 Issue 5	2012, Volume 32 Issue 6	2012 average
Competitiveness and productivity	45	53	46	42	75	55	51
Inequality, poverty and disease	9	18	31	50	12.5	27	23
Conflict and crisis	9	6	-	8	-	9	6
Human capability	9	-	-	-	-	-	2
Social justice	28	23	23	-	12.5	9	18

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

Table 6. Key words 2012

The main focus is on education management, and this is understandable as education management is the main tool to make education answer the requirement of the society. This group is dominant in all issues. Next category of keywords is social factors, while education content ranks only third. The last group includes geographicall factors. All groups but the first one show fluctuations in coverage in different issues. Let us see some of the groups the groups in more detail.

Education management was subgrouped into the following categories: education forms, financial aspects, actors of education process, actions and methods. Actions (46%) and forms of education (24%) were the most numerous groups. It is interesting tio note that this year methods comeb next (13%), actors (10%) and financial aspects were the last, only (7%). It shows the focus of the articles to educational side of the process.

Geographical factor was grouped into the following categories: Europe, Asia, North America, South and Central America, Africa and other. Australia was not mentioned in any issue of the journal in the years under consideration. In 2012 the distribution was as follows: Europe (2%), Asia (39%), North America (4%), South and Central America (2%), Africa (45%) and other (6%). Europe includes Russia. Asian countries included China, ndia, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Oman, Taiwan, Indonesia, Occupied Palestinian

Territories and Bangladesh.China is the most frequently mentioned country. South and Central American countries are Uruguay andChile. African counties include Rwanda, Kenya, Ghana, Sub-Saharan Africa, Lesoto, South Africa, Ghana, Tansania and Kenya. The most frequent countries is Sub-Saharan Africa. Others include Caucasian Asia, ExSoviet countries and Turkic republics.

Social factors were grouped as follows: rights (18%), social status (21%) and environment (61%).

Article themes were grouped according to the areas specified for the role of education in social development in the journal policy the resulst of analysis can be seen in Table 7.

The year had 6 issues. The main focus of the articles was on competitiveness and productivity and education, and this is quite understandable as these factors are most important in the country’s development, e.tg. Cultural analyses in a Taiwanese kindergarten: A postcolonial reflection and study [20].

This theme is dominant in almost all issies and most focused on in issue 1. Interestingly, it ranks third in issue 6. Social justice is second important theme and is covered especially in issue 6, where it is the leading theme, together with inequality. This issue is focused on social aspects of education, e.g. The continua of identities in postcolonial curricula: Kenyan students’ perceptions of gender in school textbooks [22].

Table 7. Article themes 2013

Theme	2013, Volume 33 Issue 1	2013, Volume 33 Issue 2	2013, Volume 33 Issue 3	2013, Volume 33 Issue 4	2013, Volume 33 Issue 5	2013, Volume 33 Issue 6	2013 average
Competitiveness and productivity	73	60	37	54	55	12	51
Inequality, poverty and disease	-	10	37	11	18	38	18
Conflict and crisis	-	10	-	-	-	-	2
Human capability	-	10	13	-	-	-	3
Social justice	27	10	13	35	27	50	26

The next important theme is inequality, poverty and disease, which is paid more attention to in issues 3 and 6 and is not discussed in issue 1, which is focused on competitiveness, e.g. Poverty & privilege: Primary school inequality in South Africa [24]. Human capability is next. It is discussed in issues 2 and 3, e.g. Developing a pedagogy of mutuality in a capability approach: Teachers’ experiences of using the Open Educational Resources (OER) of the teacher education in sub-Saharan

Table 8. Key words 2013

The main focus is on education management, and this is understandable as education management is the main tool to make education answer the requirement of the society. This group is dominant in all issues. Next category of keywords is social factors, while geographicall factors rank third. The last group includes education

Africa (TESSA) programme [22]. Conflict and crisis is the last one and it is discussed only in issue 2, e.g. Dropping out: Identity conflict in and out of school in Ghana [21]. So, we see that this the interest greatly varies to different aspects of education influence.

content. All groups but the first one show fluctuations in coverage in different issues. Let us see some of the groups the groups in more detail.

Education management was subgrouped into the following categories: education forms, financial aspects, actors of education process, actions and methods. Actions (35%)

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

and forms of education (27%) were the most numerous groups. It is interesting tio note that this year methods come next (19%), actors (17%) and financial aspects were the last, only (2%). It shows the focus of the articles to educational side of the process.

Geographical factor was grouped into the following categories: Europe, Asia, North America, South and Central America, Africa and other. Australia was not mentioned in any issue of the journal in the years under consideration. In 2012 the distribution was as follows: Europe (0%), Asia (43%), North America (0%), South and Central America (5%), Africa (49%) and other (3%). Asian countries included China, India, South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, Vietnam, Iraqu, Bhutan, Thailand, Malaysia and Bangladesh.India is the most frequently mentioned country. South and Central American countries are Paspua New Guinea and Chile.

African counties include Ethiopia, Southern Africa, Liberia, Nigeria, SubSaharan Africa, Lesoto, South Africa, Tansania and Kenya. The most frequent countries are Sub-Saharan Africa and Kenia. Others include East-West.

Social factors were grouped as follows: rights (16%), social status (27%) and environment (57%).

Article themes were grouped according to the areas specified for the role of education in social development in the journal policy the resulst of analysis can be seen in Table 9.

Table 9. Article themes 2014

Theme	2014, Volume 34	2014, Volume 35	2014, Volume 36	2014, Volume 37	2014 average
Competitiveness and productivity	64	50	75	63	64
Inequality, poverty and disease	27	25	25	12	23
Conflict and crisis	9	25	-	-	8
Human capability	-	-	-	-	-
Social justice	-	-	-	25	5

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

The year had 4 issues. The main focus of the articles was on competitiveness and productivity and education, and this is quite understandable as these factors are most important in the country’s development, e.g. Evidence that class size matters in 4th grade mathematics: An analysis of TIMSS 2007 data for Colombia [26]. This theme is dominant in almost all issies and most focused on in issue 3. Inequality, poverty and disease is second important theme and is covered in all issues, e.g. School resources and the gender reading literacy gap in South African schools [28]. The next important theme is inequality, poverty and disease, which is paid more attention to in issues 1, 2 and 3 and is less discussed in issue 4, which is focused on competitiveness, e.g. Poverty

& privilege: Primary school inequality in South Africa [24]. Conflict and crisis is next. It is discussed in issues 1 and 2, Higher education in the heart of armed conflict: The pivotal role of student affairs [27]. Social justice is the last one and it is discussed only in issue 4, Constructions, contradictions and reconfigurations of ‘Manhood’ among youth in Palestinian camps in Lebanon [29]. Human capability is not discussed this year. So, we see that this the interest greatly varies to different aspects of education influence.

Table 10. Key words 2014

The main focus is on education management, and this is understandable as education management is the main tool to make education answer the requirement of the society. This group is dominant in all issues. Next category of keywords is social factors, while geographicall factors rank third. The last group includes education content. All groups but the first one show fluctuations in coverage in different issues. Let us see some of the groups the groups in more detail.

Education management was subgrouped into the following categories: education forms, financial aspects, actors of education process, actions and methods. Actions (39%) and forms of education (32%) were the most numerous groups. It is interesting tio note that this year actors (15%) followed by methods (10%), and financial aspects were the last, only (4%). It shows the focus of the articles to educational side of the process.

Geographical factor was grouped into the following categories: Europe, Asia, North America, South and Central

America, Africa and other. Australia was not mentioned in any issue of the journal in the years under consideration. In 2014 the distribution was as follows: Europe (0%), Asia (50%), North America (4%), South and Central America (12.5%), Africa (21%) and other (12.5%). Asian countries included China, India, Nepal, Vietnam, and South Asia. India and China are the most frequently mentioned countries. South and Central American countries are Colombia, Brazil and Honduras. African countries are Uganda and Kenya. The most frequent country is Uganda. Others include Latin America, small states and developing countries.

Social factors were grouped as follows: rights (19%), social status (17%) and environment (64%).

Now let us consider the integrative picture of the analyzed data. First the themes of the articles are presented in Table 11 to give an overview of the journal policy as to the implementation of educational objectives.

Table 11. Article themes 2010-2014 perspective

Theme	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	Average
Competitiveness and productivity	58	44	51	51	64	52
Inequality, poverty and disease	5	23	23	18	23	20
Conflict and crisis	3	-	6	2	8	4
Human capability	5	3	2	3	-	3
Social justice	19	30	18	26	5	21

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

We can see the following hierarchy of the studied themes. Competitiveness and productivity is obviously dominant as it covers more tham half of all articles published. It also has always the figures of approximately the same order that do not chanhe much from year to year. This is a clear sign of jopurnal policy targeted to achieving practical outcomes in education development. Next in line are inequality, poverty and disease and social justice which have approximately the same figures. However, they differ from the first theme in their dynamics. Inequality, poverty and disease figures slightly fluctuate from year to year by maximum 8%, while three of the five figures have the same value. This may be the sign of stable interest to the theme within the period ubder considweration. The case with social justice themes is different. All the values are different and vary by maximum 25% and minimum 4%. We can also see a correlation with the values of the first theme which is as follows: the higher the value of the first theme, the lower is the value of the last one. See e.g. years 2011 and 2014. Human capability and conflict and crisis themes make a total of 7% of the whole bulk of the articles under consideration. This can be explained by the sporadic character of these themes as a tool to boost education development, as conflict and crisis are local phenomena and human capability is just an element of education process that is to be influenced by other tools especially when country’s development is an objective.

Table 12. Key words 2010-2014

We can see from Table 12 that the content of the articles in the long term perspective has a stable structure. The ranks of the categories do not change and the valuses are actually the same from year to year within

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

Table 13. Gegraphy 2010-2014

Geographical areas	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	Overall Average
Europe	-	9	2	-	-	3
Asia	30	36	39	43	50	38
North America	-	-	4	-	4	1
South and Central America	12.5	11	4	5	12.5	9
Africa	40	42	45	49	21	41
Other	17.5	2	6	3	12.5	8

The overview of the geographical factors gives an interesting picture, both in general and longitudinal aspects. Overall average values clearly indicate two priority areas that cover nearly 80 percent of the published the category. This is an indicator of strictly followed editorial policy.

Now let us have an overview of the categories.

materials. These areas are Asia and South and Central America. These areas are dominant in almost all years under consideration and the values are approximately the same within the category from year to year. The only exception is Africa in 2014. However, in theses areas there are some focuses. In Asia we see that China and India are priorities, while countries of outh East Asia, Arabic countries and countries of the Pacific area are studied mucher rarer, and so are the former CIS countries. Focus on China is especially interesting. All this leads us to a question of what is a developing country?

How do we define it? And what countries are chozen for the journal’s research and on what grounds. The same questions arise when we view Europe, North and South and Central America. The policy of the journal in this respect does not seem clear enough. Sometimes the geographical aspect is approached in wider sense e.g. Latin America, Turkic republics ets.

Table 14. Elements of education management 2010-2014

Elements	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	Overall Average
Education forms	31	40	24	27	32	30
Finance	14	10	7	2	4	7
Actors	10	4	10	17	15	11
Actions	37	41	46	35	39	40
Methods	8	5	13	19	10	11

Elemens of education management give the following picture. Overall average shows the dominance of two elements – education forms and actions, taken to change the existing education system. These two elements account for 70 percent of the total material. The values stay near the same from year to year and thesr are no definite variations. This factor is easy to understand as these two elements are the basic tools for managing the system of higher education. All forms of education are mentioned in the key words and the most frequen one is international education. Actions are presented by a wide scope of elements and the most frequent ones are education policy and different programmes, both local and international. Actors of the education

Table 15. Social factors of education management

Factors	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	Overall Average
Rights	14	19	18	16	19	17
Social status	15	18	21	27	17	20
Environment	71	63	61	57	64	63

Social factors influence people’s lives and therefore education. The analyzed material shows that the most important factor of education development is environment.

process and teaching/learning/research methods bear the same values. Actors are subjects of the education process: teachers, students, administrators as well as parents and local authorities and community. We can see that interest to this category of education management tool is increasing in the period under consideration. The same applies to the methods. This can be interpreted as growing interest to the content focused elements of the education process in the course of educationnsystem development. Financial aspect of education management is very interesting. The role of it is the lowest in the obtained hierarchy. The tendency of decreasing intereset to the problems of financing education is also clearly seen.

Environment is understood as natural and social environment, e.g. globalization, poverty, corruption etc. The next important facror is social status. It is connected with

International Journal of Educational Development (2010-2014).

Article themess and the Journal Policy

M.N. Sycheva, A.D. Shcherbov

religion, gender, nationality and status in the local community e.g. poor, immigrant etc. The last social factor is civil and human rights e.g. equality, social justice etc.

We arrived at the following conclusions. The leading theme of the journal is education development as an element of development in all segments of the society. It is clearly traced in all journal issues in the period under consideration. The publications correspond to the declared journal policy. A certain hierarchy of themes is seen in the long-term perspective. The themes may vary within the deaclared scope during a year and certain issues may be focused on a particular theme/ themes.