European Centre for the Development

of Vocational Training

PUBLISHING IN VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND TRAINING JOURNALS

European Conference on Educational Research

10-12 September 2008-09-15
Göteborg, Sweden

Submitting work to the

European Journal of Vocational Training

Éric Fries Guggenheim

Editor in Chief EJVT

I. Short history of the European Journal of Vocational Training

1. Cedefop creation, 1975

Cedefop was created in 1975 mainly at the instigation of the social partners and especially
of the Workers’ Unions. Maria Weber of DGB plaid a prominent role in this creation. The
social partners whished to develop Vocational Education and Training in Europe, diffusing
the best practices and fighting for the parity of esteem with general training. Though
article 128 of the EEC treaty signed in March 1957 stated than the Council of Ministers of
the Community would lay down, on a proposal of the Commission and after consulting
the Economic and Social Committee (ESC) ‘general principles for implementing a
common vocational training policy capable of contributing to the harmonious
development both of the national economies and of the Common Market’, many
governments refused to relinquish their sovereignty in what regarded a very delicate field,
that they implicitly considered, as it is the case for Education matters, as pertaining to
their national domain. The creation of Cedefop in 1975 was an attempt to find a way to
launch a common action in favour of the development of vocational training.

2. Cedefop Bulletin, 1977.

In the funding regulation of Cedefop (article 3.1) the funding of a “Community Vocational
training bulletin is explicitly foreseen. This Bulletin was created in 1977, under the name
of ‘VOCATIONAL TRAINING – INFORMATION BULLETIN of the European Centre for
the Development of Vocational Training’. This Bulletin contained information on Cedefop
life, on its work programme for example, as well as minutes of meetings and report on
seminars made at Cedefop, and some articles of reflection on Vocational Education and
Training. The European Journal of Vocational Training is in a way the heir of the
‘Cedefop Bulletin’ a 24-pages A4 booklet published in six languages, Danish, Dutch,
English, French, German and Italian. And the editorial in the very first issue, No 1 of
1977, specifies that in publishing this Bulletin, the Centre ‘is continuing the work done by
the Directorate-General for Social Affairs of the Commission of the European
Communities in establishing and developing the Bulletin’. Thus at the outset it was
conceived as an instrument of the Centre’s Information Service, and was designed to
contain information and articles supporting the Centre’s work programme (seminars,
conferences and study projects).
3. Vocational Training Bulletin, 1982.
Nonetheless, from the outset the Bulletin published themed dossiers alongside information
on the Centre and the conferences it organises. These dossiers comprised two or three
articles written and signed by vocational training experts in Europe. In 1981 the Bulletin
acquired an editor and an editorial team composed of Cedefop experts. From 1982
onwards, the journal retained the title Vocational training, but was no longer presented as
a Bulletin from Cedefop but as a ‘regular publication of the European Centre for the
Development of Vocational Training’. The editor, Duccio Guerra, became
‘Editor-in-chief ’, and in his editorial in issue No 8 of May 1982, although the Community
nature of the journal was reaffirmed, Duccio Guerra’s definition of its target readership
was much broader than what one would expect from a Community bulletin: ‘The
publication is addressed to decision-makers, those who develop and supply technical and
scientific decision-making aids and finally those required to implement these decisions.’
This description already explicitly includes researchers, the social partners and the players
on the ground expressly targeted today. So the birth of the European journal of vocational
training can be more precisely dated as May 1982, with the publication of issue No 8,
even though, as Duccio Guerra says, it had been a gradual process spread over seven
years. Published in the 6 previous languages until 1986 he was then published in 9
languages, adding a Greek, a Portuguese and a Spanish version to the 6 previous ones.
4. European Journal - Vocational Training, 1994
By the end of 1993, we had come a long way from the 1977 Bulletin, Vocational training.
Indeed, everything was in place to make it genuinely possible to describe the publication
no longer as a Bulletin, but rather as a scholarly journal. In 1994 Cedefop decided to
concentrate on quality, which led to a rigorous method of selecting articles for publication
and the establishment of an Editorial Committee that was largely independent of the
agency financing the journal, namely Cedefop. The first Editorial Committee of the
European journal - vocational training was chaired by Jean-François Germe and
comprised seven academics and academic researchers, three representatives of
associations and the social partners, five Cedefop experts, and one representative
ofCedefop’s Management Board, with a trade-union background. There have been three
Chairmen of the Editorial Committee since January 1994, first Jean-François Germe,
Professor at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (CNAM), France, then Jordi
Planas, Professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), Spain, and thirdly
the current Chairman, Martin Mulder, Professor at the University of Wageningen (WUR),
the Netherlands. There have also been three Editors-in-chief, namely Fernanda Reis, Steve
Bainbridge and Éric Fries Guggenheim. The Journal was published in the 9 languages of
the Vocational Training Bulletin until 1996. In 1997 for budgetary reasons, and because
of the very small amount of their readers, the Danish, Dutch, Italian, Greek and
Portuguese versions were abandoned. Nevertheless, in 1998 the Portuguese Government
decided to support a Portuguese edition, which made that the EJVT was in fact published
in five languages until the end of 2008, English, French, German, Portuguese and Spanish.
An other very particular characteristic of the EJVT was the fact that, until the end of
2008, it accepted articles written in 28 languages, the 23 official languages of the
European Union, including Irish, the two additional languages of the European Economic
Area (Icelandic and Norwegian), and the languages of the three candidate countries
(Croatian, Macedonian and Turkish).
5. European Journal of Vocational Training, 2006
After almost 30 years of developments in the course of which the publication has evolved
from the Cedefop Bulletin – Vocational training into the European journal of vocational
training in its present form, our publication has become a scholarly journal to be reckoned
with in the vocational training landscape. It has outgrown its youthful excesses, and it was
becoming more apparent every day that presentation in A4 format with covers of varying

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degrees of colourfulness and authors’ photos at the head of their articles, was inconsistent
with the scholarly nature of its content
This is what led the journal’s Editorial Committee to opt for B5 format, which is much
easier to handle, and to use only one colour on the cover in addition to black and white.
So the journal has acquired a new image, but it has not changed course or become any
less rigorous. It has simply brought its appearance into line with its practice – serious and
sober. So even though the change effected with this issue, No 37, January-April 2006, is
much more obvious than that effected in issue No 8 in May 1982, it is actually much less
radical. Your journal remains unchanged as regards its content, which naturally we are
constantly working to improve.
The Editorial Committee currently comprises 14 members – 10 lecturers/academic
researchers, one expert from the European Training Foundation (ETF), 2 experts from
Cedefop, and one representative of Cedefop’s Governing Board, who represents the
Government’s Group. The representatives in these three last categories all have a solid
academic training, and were recommended by the Editorial Committee for this reason.
The rule is that all new members of the Editorial Committee are appointed by Cedefop’s
Director on a recommendation from the Committee.
In July 1999, an Editorial Secretariat was created on the initiative of Steve Bainbridge, the
then Editor-in-chief of the journal. This Secretariat composed of four Academic
researchers, assists the Editorial Committee in its work and has become particularly
important since, at the instigation of its current Chairman Martin Mulder, the Editorial
Committee adopted the double-blind peer review as its working method. This means that
members of the Editorial Committee and, in particular, the reviewers, do not know the
identity of the authors of the articles submitted to them, and the authors do not know the
identity of their reviewers. The Editorial Secretariat is responsible for anonymising
proposed articles received and for acting as intermediary between authors and the
Editorial Committee and its reviewers. At the instigation of the Editorial Committee’s
current Chairman, Martin Mulder, the journal has also decided to establish an Editorial
Advisory Board comprising well-known personalities and researchers in the field of
vocational training who will serve as ambassadors, as it were, for the European journal, in
the vocational training world.

II. What do we publish in the EJVT

The EJVT publishes Original articles, non published in any other refereed Journal. We
accept nevertheless article already published in the grey literature on draft presentation, as
long as they are reformatted for the EJVT. The authors keep they wrights on their article
and may republish them if they want elsewhere after publication in the EJVT as long as
are mentioned the first publication in the EJVT and the publisher’s name, Cedefop.

The field of publishing occupied by the journal is, of course, that of initial and continuing
vocational training (ICVT). However, this field has been interpreted very broadly ever
since the journal began. Thus in addition to articles directly addressing vocational training
issues, naturally it publishes articles on lifelong training, on the relationship between
training and employment and labour-market access, and on the relationship between work
and training. However, it also publishes articles on educational sciences, the philosophy of
education, history, the sociology of education, economics, law and political sciences when
they are addressing an issue directly associated with ICVT or an issue of general interest
with direct consequences for ICVT.

The Journal publishes four kinds of articles: research, policy analysis, case studies, and
personal accounts. Articles should focus on European issues or address issues that can be
transferred to, or are of interest for, other countries. Articles submitted to the journal must be
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precise, yet accessible to a wide and diverse readership. They must be clear in order to be
understood by readers from different backgrounds and cultures, not necessarily familiar with the
vocational education and training systems of different countries. Readers should be able to
understand clearly the context and consider the arguments put forward in the light of their own
traditions and experience.

III. The publication process

The Editorial team, i.e. Editor in Chief, Editorial, Committee and Editorial Secretariat,
publishes a generic call for contributions in the Journal, and specific call for thematic
reviews both in the EJVT and through the different Cedefop networks, EROCALL,
ReferNet, TTnet, as well in their personal relations. The Editorial Advisory Board is also
invited to circulate these thematic call for contributions. They are also published on the
Web page of the European Journal in the Training Village Web site, as well as the
recommendations to authors, or format requested by the Editorial Committee

The submission process is very sensible. The author send his/her article proposal to the
editor in Chief by e-mail. And then begin the difficulties. It is not easy to get an article
published in the journal. The Editorial Committee requires strict compliance with its
format and sets very high standards for the scholarly nature of papers published in the
journal. It is very rare for an article to be published as it is, without a request for revisions.
Admittedly the rejection rate is quite low for an international journal, ranging at first
reading between only 30 % and 40 % of articles submitted. However, the Editorial
Committee asks authors to make many complex revisions with regard to both the
substance and the form of the article, and many author do not go to the end of the revision
process, which makes that we publish a less than the half of the proposals received.
Once the Editor in Chief has received an article proposal he checks whether the article
corresponds to the editorial policy of the EJVT, to the format and the standard quality
requested by the Editorial Committee. If the article proposal fits with the Journal requests,
the Editor in Chief chooses two referees who will report on the article proposal during the
nearest possible meeting of the Editorial Committee of the European Journal. The Editor
in Chief chooses as well a member of the Editorial Secretariat who will be the
intermediate between the author and the Editorial Committee to make sure that the
process is anonymous.
The scale of the Editorial Committee is as follows:

[A] article accepted as it stands,

[B] article accepted under the condition that some revision be realised,
[C] article rejected as it stands but the author should be encouraged to rewrite a new
paper along the requirements of the Referees and the Editorial Committee,
[D] article rejected
In cases [A] and [B] the article is accepted and will not be presented to the Editorial
Committee any more. However in case [B] the Editorial Committee asks for some
revisions. It is the Editorial Secretariat member in charge of the article who will follow the
paper and will judge if the revisions introduced by the author are satisfying or if the author
should realise some more modifications.
In case [C] the article is not accepted, in any case not as it stands. But the theme of the
article is judged of interest for the readers of the Journal and the author is encouraged to
rewrite his/her article following the instructions of the Editorial Committee. It is the
member of our Editorial secretariat in charge with the article who will transmit to the
author the revisions requests of the Editorial Committee. The new paper will then be
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presented again to the Editorial Committee which will evaluate it again. There is at least
one iteration, but very often two and some times more, depending of the professionalism
of the author and the seriousness of the ways he/she revises and rewrites his/her article.
In fact the editorial committee and the editorial secretariat really “works” together with
the authors who are very ably assisted by the journal’s Editorial Secretariat, which
endeavours to ensure that authors receive requests that are as clear and detailed as
possible, so that they can provide the best possible response to the Editorial Committee’s
comments and requests. Thus the Editorial Secretariat monitors the articles as they
evolve. The revision process is quite an ordeal, however, as an article may be sent back to
the author as many as two or three times, which is why some authors become discouraged
along the way and in the end only 40 % to 45 % of the articles submitted to the journal
end up being published.
The Editorial Committee is sovereign and its decisions are without appeal. The Editor in
Chief and the Editorial Secretariat intervene in the debates but do not participate in the
votes.
Once the articles are accepted by the Editorial Committee and checked in their final
version by the editorial secretariat, the Editor in Chief prepares the issues, and transmit
them to the publication and diffusion service of Cedefop, as Cedefop is the EJVT
publisher. Between the moment when an article is received by e-mail and the moment
when it is in an issue and in the hands of the final reader, there is an average of 1 year 10
months, which is quite long but in a way a warranty of quality.

IV. Our aims and the kind of difficulties encountered in striving to reach them

Our aim is to contribute to the development of Initial and Continuing Vocational

Education and Training through the publication of quality articles selected independently
of the institutional position of Cedefop. By quality articles we mean articles of an
academic format even for Policy analyses articles, case studies or personal accounts. We
definetly want the EJVT to be free of any kind of Eurospeak.

To elucidate the choices made by stakeholders, particularly the vocational training policy
choices, the Journal considers that it is necessary and possible to bring together the
reflections of stakeholders and of researchers. The Journal has a broad target group
consisting of decision-makers, social partners, trainers, researchers, and private- and
public-sector stakeholders and contributes to the debate and discussion on vocational
training in Europe. The European Journal of Vocational Training has the ambition to give
the floor to every one among the people contributing to VET development, without
consideration for they personal status, function and language, forming a bridge between
these different cultures of science, policy and practice in the field of vocational training.

The current shape of the Journal reflect these aims and political choices. The main
characteristics of the EJVT being its unique language regime, its multidisciplinarity and
the very large conception of its editorial field, and its institutional openness.

But all these quality brings also a lot of attached difficulties.

– The unique language regime implies very high translation costs and it contributes to the
slowing down of the production process.
– The scientific independence of the EJVT from Cedefop, makes that it has never been
really considered as the first priority in the publication plan and has always suffered
important delays, even if these delays are currently decreasing in a sensible measure.

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– It disciplinary and institutional openness, makes that no specific scientific field can
really claim that it is congruent to the Journal. We have thus some difficulties to be
recognised by the disciplinary institutions: for example when applying for the scientific
recognition of the French CNRS, to which section should the EJVT apply: Economics,
Sociology, Educational Sciences, Management or more specifically “Human resources”
management. Now such a recognition is of huge importance for the researchers
publishing in our Journal for this has heavy consequences for their career.

Nevertheless despite all these difficulties the Journal enjoys a good reputation in the
international academic world as indicated by the Australian VET Research Association
(AVETRA) which in the frame of the Australian Research Quality Framework (RQF)
journal ranking exercise, rank the EJVT in the 8 th position among 22 international VET
periodical publications.

V. Prospects for the future

The European Journal of Vocational Training is as indicated above scientificaly

independant of its publisher and financing institution, the European Centre for the
Development of Vocational Training. But it is completely depending of it as regards its
funding.

Now as a consequence of the necessity for the European institutions to find a budget for
the financing of two project voted by the European parliament without specific financing
line (the European GSP Galileo project and the project of a European Institute of
Technology), the conciliation committee of 23 November 2007 decided to reduce the
budget of 10 European Regulation Agencies, out of which Cedefop, by Euro 50 millions
on 5 years, i.e. approximately 1 million a year for each agency.

As the EJVT does not appear as a Cedefop priority anymore in its Middle Term Priorities
for 2009-2011 it was decided to pass the budget cut on the EJVT. On the bases of an
evaluation of the EJVT by an external consultant, as well as of the first hypothesis of the
Director of Cedefop and of Cedefop Bureau concerning the possible sources of saving, a
working group proposed some general orientations to Cedefop Governing Board
concerning the European Journal of Vocational Training up from January 2009.

– From 2009 onwards, the Journal will be published only in English with the possibility
for authors to submit articles in English, French and German.
– The production, distribution and marketing of the Journal will be externalised to a
private publisher specialised in scientific journals.
– The scientific and rigorous character of the journal will be strengthened while keeping
three categories of articles: research, information, reflection. Articles should have a
European or international character.
– A double blind review will be kept to maintain the standards of a scientific journal.
– An open pool of peer reviewers should be built, including Editorial Committee and
former Editorial Secretariat members, Cedefop colleagues and external researchers
including members of Cedefop’s and the Commission’s networks.
– The production and review process should be shortened and simplified, with a target
duration of one year from submission to publication of an article.
– Cedefop will consider increasing the number of issues to 4 per year, after the transition
phase.

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– It is envisaged to publish one thematic issue per year, to be managed by guest editors.
– Editorship will be carried out by an internal editorial team of 3 colleagues. The team
should cover different academic disciplines and be able to screen articles received in
English, French or German.
– A full-time editorial assistant should be allocated to the Journal.
– The Editorial Committee should become an ‘Editorial and Scientific Committee’,
which ensures the scientific steering of the Journal.
– The Editorial Secretariat is abandoned and its tasks are internalised.
– The Editorial Advisory Board should be kept in its current format.
Of course these proposals must still be approved by the Enlarged Bureau of Cedefop 7-8
October 2008 and after that by the governing board of Cedefop by written procedure. But
it clearly appears that the European Journal of Vocational Training will, keep and even
strengthen his Scientific character. It is by the way planned to undertake the application
procedure to the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) of the Institute for Scientific
Information (ISI) - Thomson in October 2008 after the Enlarged Bureau meeting.

We can thus but encourage you to send your article proposals to the Secretariat of the
EJVT by e-mail at the address: catherine.wintrebert@cedefop.europa.eu in your mother
tongue until the end of the year 2008 and in English, French or German up from the first
of January 2009.

VI. For more information

on the EJVT: http://www.trainingvillage.gr/etv/projects_networks/EJVT/

on Cedefop: http://www.cedefop.europa.eu/
on Cedefop projects and activities: http://www.trainingvillage.gr/etv/default.asp