February – 2009

Editorial

Brigette McConkey
IRRODL, Managing Editor

IRRODL is Growing!

My first three months as the managing editor of IRRODL have been action-packed. In addition to preparing this general issue, the IRRODL team has steered papers for our upcoming Middle East issue, Bridge over Troubled Waters, through the peer review process, and we are progressing towards the peer review stage of another special issue, Trends and Issues in Open and Distance Learning in Africa. Also, after deliberating on a record number of proposals for our Openness and the Future of Higher Education issue, we are now awaiting completed papers. I look forward to publishing these special issues, under the direction of our guest editors, over the course of this year.

On the technical front, I have been working with the IRRODL team to customize Open Journal Systems (OJS) in order to realize the full value of this open source software. We are so impressed with the automated work flow that OJS facilitates and its ease of use and responsiveness to complex conditions that we now ask authors and reviewers to upload their proposals/papers/reviews to IRRODL’s OJS-powered Web site. The advantage for authors of registering with our site and submitting via OJS is the ability to log in and check the status of active submissions and to have a record of past submissions. For reviewers, OJS offers one-click access to the blinded paper as well as a guided step-by-step procedure to upload a peer review and to offer the editor(s) a specific recommendation. We encourage readers of IRRODL to register as reviewers and to provide a list of your reviewing interests and a brief biographical statement in your profile.

As well, IRRODL is seeking a book review editor. If you are interested in writing reviews of recent books published in the field of open and distance learning, please contact Terry Anderson at terrya@athabascau.ca. To learn more about this opportunity, click here.

Recently, we examined the activity on IRRODL’s Web site and compiled a list of the top 25 articles downloaded in 2008, which are presented below:

  1. Setting the New Standard with Mobile Computing in Online Learning
  2. An Assessment of the Effectiveness of E-learning in Corporate Training Programs
  3. Building Sense of Community at a Distance
  4. Blended Learning and Sense of Community: A Comparative Analysis with Traditional and Fully Online Graduate Courses
  5. Plagiarism by Adult Learners Online: A Case Study in Detection and Remediation
  6. Table of Contents Current Issue
  7. Getting the Mix Right Again: An Updated and Theoretical Rationale for Interaction
  8. Use of Distance Education by Religions of the World to Train, Edify, and Educate Adherents
  9. Feedback Model to Support Designers of Blended Learning Courses
  10. Second Language Acquisition Theories as a Framework for Creating Distance Learning Courses
  11. Elements of Effective E-Learning Design
  12. Defining, Discussing and Evaluating Mobile Learning: The Moving Finger Writes and Having Writ . . .
  13. Open Content and Open Educational Resources: Enabling Universal Education
  14. Increasing Access to Higher Education: A Study of the Diffusion of Online Teaching among 913 College Faculty
  15. Learning Objects: Resources for Distance Education Worldwide
  16. Theoretical Challenges for Distance Education in the 21st Century: A Shift from Structural to Transactional Issues
  17. Integrating Mobile Learning into Nomadic Education Programme in Nigeria: Issues and Perspectives
  18. Structure, Content, Delivery, Service, and Outcomes: Quality E-Learning in Higher Education
  19. Online Education Systems in Scandinavian and Australian Universities: A Comparative Study
  20. Distance Education and Corporate Training in Brazil: Regulations and Interrelationships
  21. The Emergence of Open-Source Software in China
  22. Combating HIV/AIDS Epidemic in Nigeria: Responses from National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN)
  23. Interaction and Immediacy in Online Learning
  24. Perceptions of Social Loafing in Online Learning Groups: A Study of Public University and U.S. Naval War College students
  25. Eportfolios: From Description to Analysis

I am excited to be a part of IRRODL’s tradition of publishing articles that are referred to year after year as well as articles that are on the cutting-edge of open and distance learning, and I hope to be able to contribute to the innovation and openness that have led to its success. Please contact me if you have any questions or comments about IRRODL (brigettem@athabascau.ca).