Schole follows a double-blind review process. All manuscripts submitted to our journals are peer-reviewed by experts strictly and thoroughly. To ensure the rigor, fairness, and effectiveness of peer review, our peer reviewers are expected to familiarize themselves with the best practices of peer review, and with the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers.

• A minimum of two suitably qualified international external experts, who are not members of the journal’s Editorial Board, review each research article. 
• The journal’s Editors-in-Chief make all publication decisions based on the reviews provided. The Editorial Board Members assist the Editors-in-Chief in decision making on specific submissions.
• Academic Editors provide administrative support for the review process. They uphold the integrity of peer review while delivering rapid turnaround and maximum efficiency to all stakeholders including authors, reviewers, and editors.

Requirements for reviewers

The reviewers should:

(1) hold a Ph.D or be a Ph.D candidate;

(2) work in institutions of higher learning or research institutes;

(3) be a prolific writer of research papers in the field of the submitted manuscript;

(4) have no conflict of interest with the authors of the manuscript;

(5) remain responsive throughout the peer review.

Guidelines for reviewers

We ensure that the peer-review process is fair, unbiased (double-blind) and timely.

The potential and active reviewers are identified based on author suggestion and the bibliographical knowledge.

The reviewers’ evaluations and comments play a crucial role in taking the final decision on the manuscript in consultation with the editors and considering multiple contributing factors such as the relevance and impact of the research work. For this we adhere to the COPE guidelines. Reviewers can decline to comments if they find any conflict of interest with the manuscript.

The reviewers are encouraged to be in contact with the assigning Editor. Sensitive issues such as conflict of interest, plagiarism, published data need to be submitted to the assigning Editor whereas the recommendations and critical evaluations regarding the content of the manuscript needs to be submitted to both the editor and the author.

The process of review and recommendations are confidential since the unpublished manuscripts are classified in nature. Review needs to focus mainly on improving the scientific merit of the manuscript and needs to be very objective in nature.

The review comments should have sufficient clarity with supporting references. Please include the strength, weakness, relevance and impact of the research work as well as the originality of the presentation.

Finally the extent of suitability or likelihood of the publication of manuscript needs to be mentioned. The editor can forward the review comments to the other potential reviewers also in addition to the authors. Reviewer should not cite the unpublished manuscript.

Supplementary material is subjected to peer review.

Editorials and Biographies do not undergo peer review.

In case of editors as manuscript authors, editors shall not review and process their own academic paper. Submitted manuscripts written by editors will be assigned to at least two international independent external reviewers. Decisions will be made by other Editorial Board Members who do not have conflicts of interests with the author. The proportion of the submissions authored by editors should not exceed 20% of the total submissions.

Reviewer report

The reviewer report should assess the manuscript comprehensively, and provide constructive comments on how to improve the manuscript, particularly where revisions are recommended. In the report, reviewers should focus on the following points:

The title and content is within the scope of the journal.

The information provided is relevant to the wide readership of the journal.

All the sections within the manuscript such as title, abstract, key words, methods and conclusions are consistent with the objective of the paper.

The writing is easy to comprehend.

The methodology is clear and easy to be repeated by another researcher. The methodology has consent and ethical approvals as and when appropriate and applicable. The analytical and statistical methods are appropriate and relevant to the study. The findings and conclusions are adequately supported by the data.

The references adequately represent the data and interpretations are up to date without missing on key citable information.

Recommended decisions

At the end of their review, reviewers need to provide an overall recommendation for the next processing stage of the manuscript: 

Accept

The article can be accepted without any further revision.

Accept after minor revision

The article can be accepted for publication in principle, after it is properly revised according to the reviewer comments. The revised article will not be sent to the reviewers again.

Accept after major revision

The article can have a good opportunity of being accepted for publication, after it is significantly modified according to the reviewer comments. The authors need to respond to the comments point by point, or provide a clear response if they disagree with some comments. Normally, only one round of major revision is allowed. The revised article will be sent to the reviewers for another round of review. The major revisions should be completed within a suitable period.

Reject

The article should be rejected due to the technical flaws, e.g., the lack of contribution of the research content.

The recommended decisions are visible only to our editors, not to the authors.

Competing Interests

Although conflicts of interest will not disqualify you from reviewing the manuscript, it is important to disclose all conflicts of interest to the editors before review. If you have any questions about potential conflicts of interests, please do not hesitate to contact the editorial office.

 Guidelines for editors

Roles and Responsibilities of Editor/Editorial Board Members

Editor should maintain a bird’s eye view on avoiding erroneous information. On identifying the error, editor must take measures to rectify it immediately by publishing addendum.

Editor must comply with the policy guidelines provided by the publisher related to reviewing and editorial policy.

Editors must closely monitor the journal for ensuring the fairness, timeliness, thoroughness, and civility of the process.

Editor is responsible for the overall growth and progress of the journal; hence, she/he is responsible for the timely release of the issue.

Editor takes measures to add all the significant developments in the field for the growth of the journal.

Editor can discuss the controversies also to clear the doubts centering particular scientific phenomena or practice.

Editor must make ensure that the content and the author information present in the manuscript should be legible.

Editor must evaluate the manuscript whether or not it is falling within the scope of the journal.

Taking efforts to attract recent and relevant research to cater to its reader’s interest.

Editor should take steps to discourage unethical practices like plagiarism and violation of copyrights.

The decisions of editor-in-chief are final related to acceptance or rejection of the article for publication upon receiving the review comments.

Editor should evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without any bias towards race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors.

Editor or any Editorial staff should maintain confidentiality related to the submitted manuscript, names and affiliations of the author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate depending on the need and stage of processing.

Editorial Workflow of Manuscripts

Initial submission of the manuscript by the corresponding author.

Registration of the manuscript details and generation of the manuscript number.

Verification of compliance with the scope of the Journal.

Preliminary quality evaluation of the article. Non-duplicity(Plagiarism checking) and originality.

Screening for potential and active reviewers and assignment to the reviewers.

The Managing Editor screens for at least 2 independent reviewers.

Securing the review comments within 30 day time frame.

Upon the receipt of reviewer comments in the system, the Managing Editor can either make a recommendation to the Editor-in-Chief, based on the reviews and his/her own opinion, or start a discussion among the reviewers if there is some disagreement. The discussion involves all reviewers, the Managing Editor and the Editor-in-Chief.

Based on the review comments, final decision (Accept/Re-review/Minor revision/Major revision/rejection) is taken in consultation with the editorial board and editor in chief. Final disposition of the manuscript would be any one of the following:

Accepted: Can be published as it is for the time being with minor typos or artifacts.

Accept with minor revision: The manuscript will have to be slightly revised following the reviewers' comments, but there will not be any additional round of review. The Action Editor and/or the Editor in Chief are responsible for verifying the implementation of modifications.

Revise and resubmit: It is agreed that the topic is worth publishing, but the paper requires major revisions before it can actually be published. The revised paper will not be considered as a completely new submission, though: if a revised version is sent within 6 months, it will most probably be handled by the same Action Editor.

Rejected: The paper is out of scope, or does not contain any substantial contribution, or may be simply too difficult to understand. In any case, the same work should not be resubmitted without substantial improvisation.

After an agreed decision has been reached, the authors are notified by the Editor-in-Chief or the Managing Editor.

Revision of the manuscript, application of style sheet, assignment of the DOI number within 7 days.

Copy editing of the manuscript and generation of the Author-proof.

Generation of the galley proof and approval by the author(s).

Hosting on the website with volume and issue number and year of publication.

Archiving of the article in the database.