MVLRI Webinar: Journal of Online Learning Research
Hello everyone. We'd like to welcome and thank you so much for joining us today for another installment of the Research Webinar Series hosted by our team here at the Michigan Virtual Learning Research Institute or MVLRI. The goal of MVLRI is to expand Michigan's capacity to support new learning models, engage in active research to inform new policies in online and blended learning, and strengthen the state's infrastructures for sharing best practices. Before we introduce today's presenters and the topic of their presentation, we want to share an important disclaimer, for our Research Webinar Series. This webinar will be recorded and shared publicly. Consequently, anything shared during this webinar, including chat comments, could be shared publicly. This webinar may represent a presenter's or an attendee's personal views, opinions, conclusions and other information which do not necessarily reflect those of MVU and/or the Michigan Virtual Learning Research Institute and are not given nor endorsed by MVU/MVLRI unless otherwise specified. Today's presentation will introduce us to the new Journal of Online Learning Research. With us today are the two founding editors of this journal, Drs. Leanna Archambault and Kathryn Kennedy. Dr. Leanna Archambault is an Associate Professor of Educational Technology at the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College. Dr. Archambault's research areas included teacher preparation for online and blended classrooms, the nature of technological pedagogical content knowledge, and the use of emerging technologies in education. Through her work, Dr. Archambault has emerged as a leader in her field. In addition to publishing in several prominent journals, she was awarded the Online Learning Innovator Award for important research from the International Association for K-12 Online Learning in 2010 and 2012. Prior to taking her position at Arizona State University, Dr. Archambault graduated from the University Nevada, Las Vegas with a PhD in instructional and curricular studies.
As a former middle school English teacher, Dr. Archambault is passionate about improving education, particularly through the effect use of technology to support learning. Dr. Kathryn Kennedy is a senior researcher for MVU's Michigan Virtual Learning Research Institute where she conducts and manages multiple research projects about K-12 online and blended learning. Kennedy formerly served as the director of research for the International Association for K-12 Online Learning or iNACOL as an assistant professor at Georgia Southern University in the College of Education's Instructional Technology Program. Her practical experiences and research interests included educator professional development for technology integration and instructional design in traditional, blended, and online learning environments. Together with her co-presenter Dr. Leanna Archambault, she co-chairs the Virtual Schooling SIG for the Society for Information Technology and Teaching Education or SITE. Kennedy won the 2010 and 2012 Online Learning Innovator Award for important research from iNACOL. Kennedy also co-edits the K-12 section of e-learn magazine, a practitioner based publication published by the Association for Computing Machinery or ACM. She received a PhD in curriculum and instruction with a concentration in educational technology from the University of Florida. We are very excited to have them both here. And with that, I'll now hand it over to our presenters. Thank you so much, Justin, we're very happy to be here and to introduce the new Journal of Online Learning Research. I'm going to go over our agenda for, for this webinar. First, we're going to talk about the history of the journal, how it came to be. And then, we're going to talk about the scope and of the journal itself and what we're going to be looking for in submissions. And we'll talk quickly about the submission and review process. And we'll also talk a little bit about special issues and how to propose a special issue.
And we'll also share our current statistics since being in effect for the past couple of months and our expectations for the future in terms of submissions. And then we'll take time to answer questions that you might have. So, please feel free to ask a question via the chat box as we're going along. And we'll monitor that chat box so we can answer those at the end of the presentation. So now Kathryn's going to share just a bit about the history of the journal. Hi everyone, can you hear me OK? OK. Perfect. I'm kind of going in and out of the room right now. So if I drop off, Leanna, please pick up where I left off. So in 2010 and 2011, Rick Ferdig, Cathy Cavanaugh, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes and Niki Davis were working together to start the International Journal of K-12 Online and Blended Learning or IJKOBL. Due to time constraints for all involved, the journal was unable to get published, unfortunately. So, at the SITE Conference in 2013, Rick Ferdig talked to both Leanna and I about moving forward with finding a publisher for that journal and using the work that had already been done by them in 2010 and 2011. So, Leanna and I chose AACE, or the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education, which is an international not-for-profit educational organization with the mission of advancing information technology and education and e-learning research development, learning and its practical application which we thought would be a great home for this particular journal. So we submitted the proposal for the journal in 2014 and, thank goodness, it was accepted. And that's why we're here today to talk more about it. We'll be publishing an inaugural issue in Spring 2015 and it will feature a tribute to the original art editors Rick Ferdig, Cathy Cavanaugh, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes. Niki Davis was unfortunately didn't have enough time to take part in that inaugural issue, so we'll have to honor her in a future issue. And currently, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes, Cathy Cavanaugh, as well as Peter Albion, are also associate editors for the journal.
Leanna is going to go ahead and talk about the scope, focus, and emphasis of the journal next. Thanks Kathryn. So the Journal of Online Learning Research is a peer reviewed, open access publication. And it was important for us to make it open access so that we can have research be accessible by those in the field, by practitioners. So, it will be open access. It's also an international journal, so you'll see that we're referring to primary and secondary pedagogy and that's primarily because K-12 tends to be a US term that we're familiar with but that may not translate to a broader international audience. And we're devoted to a theoretical, empirical and pragmatic understanding of technologies and their impact on primary and secondary pedagogy and policy in what we would call K-12 online and blended environment. So the focus of our journal is on publishing manuscripts that address online learning, catering particularly to the educators who research, practice, design and/or administer programs in primary and secondary schooling in online settings. We're also looking at research that focuses on educators who have chosen to blend online learning tools and strategies in their face-to-face classroom. Where really the goal is to try to create a one stop shop for research focused in on primary and secondary K-12 online and blended research. As I mentioned, the emphasis is both international, so, we have international members on our editorial review board and we hope to recruit articles that take place in other countries across the world as well as interdisciplinary. So we're looking for qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods research from multiple fields and disciplines sharing the goal of improving K-12 education from an online and blended perspective. And we're highlighting, we want to highlight implications for research policy and practice. So that's, kind of, a little bit about the emphasis and focus of the journal.
And next, Kathryn is going to talk about the submission and review process as well as applying for special issues and also a little bit about the current statistics we've had so far. Thanks, Leanna. So, the submission and review processes are handled in the AACE's publication system which can be found at aace.org. Then you click on Publications and Author Guidelines and Submissions. So the submission and the review process itself, we look for APA formatting and foremost and that their submissions are no more than 30 pages, double spaced, and that is including references and images. So the review process is it first gets reviewed by both Leanna and I and at that point we decide, "OK, Is it ready to go out? Or is it missing APA format? Is it not within the scope, focus and emphasis of the journal?" And, at that point, that's when we decide, "OK, do we need to editorially reject this? Or send it back so it can be resubmitted in the proper format? Or with the proper focus?" And then if the article does meet the scope and format, we send it out to three reviewers. Reviews are done within a month and there are, if you are interested, if you're not already, I can see a few of the participants are actually on the editorial review board. If you aren't a reviewer right now and you'd like to be, please feel free to contact us as well either Leanna or myself. And we'd be happy to add you on as a reviewer. And then once those reviews are done, Leanna and I look over the reviews and then make a decision and send that decision to the authors. So, now I'm going to talk a little bit about the special issues. One to two issue a year we'd like to have as special issues. And there are guest, guest editors. This is a special note for guest editors, can only be author or co-author on one of the articles within the special issue. So to submit a proposal to us for a special issue, we would want the topic and description of the special issue you are proposing as well as the relevance of that special issue to the field itself.
A time line of the special issue, when you think you would have everybody, have their articles in. The CVs for the guest editors as well, are needed. And then also the potential authors. Do you have people in mind, that you know would be great for this particular topic. And/or if you are going to do a call for proposals, what is that time line going to be and when are you going to expect people to have proposals? Are you going to have it be just a short two-page proposal or are you going to have an actual full chapter asked for from these authors? Now, I'm going to talk a little bit about the current stats and expectations. So, we began actually accepting submissions in August of 2014, when we got the journal up and running. We received seven papers so far, total. We had to editorially reject four of them mainly on the basis that they did not fit the focus and scope. Most were higher ed in scope, so we had to reject those. Now this is one thing I do want to mention, though. Leanna and I and the rest of the associate editors had discussed that we will be accepting higher ed pieces that particularly pertain to professional development for K-12 online teachers, administer, and other educators for blended and online K-12 environments. So those would be acceptable but, anything that has to do with higher ed that doesn't have to do with K-12 online learning we typically look at and say, "Please select one of the other AACE journals that are more higher ed focused." We also just recently rejected one after review. After we looked at all of the three reviews that came back on it. And two are currently are still out for review. So, our current expectations for the journal, and of course since this is our first year of putting it out there, we haven't even gotten our inaugural issue out, which is due out in spring. We're looking at four to five articles per issue and three to four issues per year.
Now that is really, really dependent upon, obviously, the number of submissions that we have and the quality of those submissions. So that might change and if that ever does change, we will be in touch through the journal home page so you that know exactly what the expectations are in terms of how many issues will be coming out. So I know that was a really quick synopsis of what the Journal of Online Learning Research is all about. We're happy to field any and all questions. We really appreciate you guys being here and your interest in us. That's a great question, Kevin. So these are open access. It's open for all. You would not have to go through a university. It will be directly posted on the journal's website and we'll be sharing those out with our researchers list that you're currently on. Yes, they are peer reviewed. So, I see a question from Amy about, talking a little bit more about ideas for special issues. We're fairly open to what, you know, what you might propose as a special issue. As long as it pertains to K-12 online, blended learning. I know certain researches have different areas that they're focusing in like the role of online teachers, and so maybe that could be something that there's a special issue centered specifically around and the various roles of parents and teachers in an online environment. I think it could really, it really would be a good opportunity for anyone who's interested in a particular area to propose a special issue and really focus on that, but we're very open to ideas along those lines. I'm just going to mention, Susan's question's very important. We will accept higher ed pieces that have to do with teacher preparation for K-12. Yes. That's right. There was another question as well about the different types of genres that we would look at. Versus. Typical research articles versus those murky areas that you're trying to, kind of, work through. Those questions that are hard to answer especially when each of these contexts for each blended and online K-12 learning program are different from one to another.
These really difficult questions would be great to bring up in these types of articles. And those would typically be more of those think pieces. Really just putting out those really hard to answer questions to the field and say, "How are we supposed to look at this type of situation when the variables are not all of the same? It's not the same across the board. It's not a one-size-fits-all deal. How do we answer these questions?" So, we are very open to those types of think pieces as well and I want to make sure that that is emphasized in this presentation. That's a great question, Dawn. So, we are accepting to all of those types of submission. So, it is very open. We wanted to be open as possible to whatever you're working on. So yes, those position papers, those application pieces. All of those things are important because our audience mainly, when we put together this journal we wanted it to be also accessible to practitioners as well. And a lot of times when, you know, researchers publish in university or, you know, peer reviewed journals it goes directly into the databases that are paid for only and you can't get access to them. So, when we put together this proposal, we really had in mind that we wanted this to be an accessible journal for people in the field, on the ground, doing the work. So those application pieces are really important as well. Kevin, that's a great question. Yes, definitely. Teacher action research is really important. Again, it's that practitioner-based research on the ground, doing the work and you're asking those really difficult questions in your own context. And I think it is useful, especially if it has implications for the field at large and even a subset of the field that have that same type of context. I think those are really important pieces as well. I also want to mention that Kathryn and I will be attending both the Symposium, iNACOL Symposium, as well as the SITE, S-I-T-E, Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education, Conference in March.
And so that will be a great place for us to see some of the research that's out there and, hopefully, encourage those authors that we think have potential to develop a submission. So, we'll be recruiting and promoting the journal at both of those outlets. So if you happen to be there, please connect with us if you are interested in submitting something for the journal. Amy, I am going to follow up on your question, but it is similar to what Leanna was just talking about. We are going to be at iNACOL Symposium as well as SITE and AERA and we do often present at AECT as well. Anywhere that you can spread the word that you can spread the word about this publication. It's important. And, I know that, AACE is planning to do a push out, of a press release, for the start of the journal to its many, many members. I can't remember the exact number of members, they have, but they have a lot. And I wanted to read off Joe's information as well that he mentioned to Dawn, because often times we don't publish the chat. He mentioned that the journal can also be a vehicle to those on the ground to signal needs to the research community and trying to bring together the research community with those practicing K-12 online learning. Often times, I've heard of researchers not having that connection with those who are doing the work. And this is the best way to do it. It's to see what work is being done and to see what other questions these programs have and that needs to be explored. And thanks, too, for your comment about the Virtual Symposium, I think that's, we'll also attend not just the in-person conferences which require travel but also online webinars such as this. And other avenues and vehicles online so that we can promote the journal. Are there any further questions from anyone? Also, for those of you at universities just to be thinking about if, especially, for those of you who are at universities with a, a focus or certificate program focused on K-12 online teacher preparation.
This journal would be a great avenue for graduate student research and action research along those lines. So, kind of think about that in the back of your mind as you're working with masters and doctoral students as well. OK everyone, we will leave the chat window open for a little bit longer if you have any of those questions that you'd like to ask our presenters, please do so. And they can go ahead and probably reply within the chat window or you guys can feel free to reactivate your mics and answer any questions. It looks like we have a question from Leslie. Did someone want to field that one? Sure. Leslie, that's a great question. It will be searchable on the AACE's journals page. So if you go to, let me find the landing page, hold on, just a second. It's AACE.org/pubs/jolr, for the journal and I'm going to paste that in the chat box in just a second. But you'll be able to search all the oh, thank you, Kevin! All of the articles there as well as it will probably be in places like Academic Search for , I'm assuming. Great. Thank you, Kathryn. Just a reminder that our next webinar within, not necessarily this series, but our next webinar with be Tuesday, October 28th 3pm Eastern Time, which will be our Fall Collaborative. So, a gathering of online learning researchers to come and present maybe some of their work in progress and get some feedback from those in the field. This week we'll have, sorry, next week we'll have Beth Robelia and Elana Geiser Hogan who will be presenting on some of their research in progress and looking to get some of your feedback as well. And lastly, we just want to remind you guys that you are encouraged to follow us via email or contact us via email MVLRI@mivu.org, follow us on Facebook mvlriinstitute, Twitter MVLRI underscore MVU is our handle and on Linked In as well.
If you are interested in presenting in the webinar series, if you'd like to participate in one of our collaboratives and have something to share with us, or if you'd like general information about the work that we are doing at the Institute, please reach out to us. We are waiting eagerly to hear from you. With that, if anyone has any more questions, please feel free to use the chat window and I will go ahead and end the meeting fairly soon. Thanks everyone! Have a great day.
As a former middle school English teacher, Dr. Archambault is passionate about improving education, particularly through the effect use of technology to support learning. Dr. Kathryn Kennedy is a senior researcher for MVU's Michigan Virtual Learning Research Institute where she conducts and manages multiple research projects about K-12 online and blended learning. Kennedy formerly served as the director of research for the International Association for K-12 Online Learning or iNACOL as an assistant professor at Georgia Southern University in the College of Education's Instructional Technology Program. Her practical experiences and research interests included educator professional development for technology integration and instructional design in traditional, blended, and online learning environments. Together with her co-presenter Dr. Leanna Archambault, she co-chairs the Virtual Schooling SIG for the Society for Information Technology and Teaching Education or SITE. Kennedy won the 2010 and 2012 Online Learning Innovator Award for important research from iNACOL. Kennedy also co-edits the K-12 section of e-learn magazine, a practitioner based publication published by the Association for Computing Machinery or ACM. She received a PhD in curriculum and instruction with a concentration in educational technology from the University of Florida. We are very excited to have them both here. And with that, I'll now hand it over to our presenters. Thank you so much, Justin, we're very happy to be here and to introduce the new Journal of Online Learning Research. I'm going to go over our agenda for, for this webinar. First, we're going to talk about the history of the journal, how it came to be. And then, we're going to talk about the scope and of the journal itself and what we're going to be looking for in submissions. And we'll talk quickly about the submission and review process. And we'll also talk a little bit about special issues and how to propose a special issue.
And we'll also share our current statistics since being in effect for the past couple of months and our expectations for the future in terms of submissions. And then we'll take time to answer questions that you might have. So, please feel free to ask a question via the chat box as we're going along. And we'll monitor that chat box so we can answer those at the end of the presentation. So now Kathryn's going to share just a bit about the history of the journal. Hi everyone, can you hear me OK? OK. Perfect. I'm kind of going in and out of the room right now. So if I drop off, Leanna, please pick up where I left off. So in 2010 and 2011, Rick Ferdig, Cathy Cavanaugh, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes and Niki Davis were working together to start the International Journal of K-12 Online and Blended Learning or IJKOBL. Due to time constraints for all involved, the journal was unable to get published, unfortunately. So, at the SITE Conference in 2013, Rick Ferdig talked to both Leanna and I about moving forward with finding a publisher for that journal and using the work that had already been done by them in 2010 and 2011. So, Leanna and I chose AACE, or the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education, which is an international not-for-profit educational organization with the mission of advancing information technology and education and e-learning research development, learning and its practical application which we thought would be a great home for this particular journal. So we submitted the proposal for the journal in 2014 and, thank goodness, it was accepted. And that's why we're here today to talk more about it. We'll be publishing an inaugural issue in Spring 2015 and it will feature a tribute to the original art editors Rick Ferdig, Cathy Cavanaugh, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes. Niki Davis was unfortunately didn't have enough time to take part in that inaugural issue, so we'll have to honor her in a future issue. And currently, Joe Freidhoff, Susan Lowes, Cathy Cavanaugh, as well as Peter Albion, are also associate editors for the journal.
Leanna is going to go ahead and talk about the scope, focus, and emphasis of the journal next. Thanks Kathryn. So the Journal of Online Learning Research is a peer reviewed, open access publication. And it was important for us to make it open access so that we can have research be accessible by those in the field, by practitioners. So, it will be open access. It's also an international journal, so you'll see that we're referring to primary and secondary pedagogy and that's primarily because K-12 tends to be a US term that we're familiar with but that may not translate to a broader international audience. And we're devoted to a theoretical, empirical and pragmatic understanding of technologies and their impact on primary and secondary pedagogy and policy in what we would call K-12 online and blended environment. So the focus of our journal is on publishing manuscripts that address online learning, catering particularly to the educators who research, practice, design and/or administer programs in primary and secondary schooling in online settings. We're also looking at research that focuses on educators who have chosen to blend online learning tools and strategies in their face-to-face classroom. Where really the goal is to try to create a one stop shop for research focused in on primary and secondary K-12 online and blended research. As I mentioned, the emphasis is both international, so, we have international members on our editorial review board and we hope to recruit articles that take place in other countries across the world as well as interdisciplinary. So we're looking for qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods research from multiple fields and disciplines sharing the goal of improving K-12 education from an online and blended perspective. And we're highlighting, we want to highlight implications for research policy and practice. So that's, kind of, a little bit about the emphasis and focus of the journal.
And next, Kathryn is going to talk about the submission and review process as well as applying for special issues and also a little bit about the current statistics we've had so far. Thanks, Leanna. So, the submission and review processes are handled in the AACE's publication system which can be found at aace.org. Then you click on Publications and Author Guidelines and Submissions. So the submission and the review process itself, we look for APA formatting and foremost and that their submissions are no more than 30 pages, double spaced, and that is including references and images. So the review process is it first gets reviewed by both Leanna and I and at that point we decide, "OK, Is it ready to go out? Or is it missing APA format? Is it not within the scope, focus and emphasis of the journal?" And, at that point, that's when we decide, "OK, do we need to editorially reject this? Or send it back so it can be resubmitted in the proper format? Or with the proper focus?" And then if the article does meet the scope and format, we send it out to three reviewers. Reviews are done within a month and there are, if you are interested, if you're not already, I can see a few of the participants are actually on the editorial review board. If you aren't a reviewer right now and you'd like to be, please feel free to contact us as well either Leanna or myself. And we'd be happy to add you on as a reviewer. And then once those reviews are done, Leanna and I look over the reviews and then make a decision and send that decision to the authors. So, now I'm going to talk a little bit about the special issues. One to two issue a year we'd like to have as special issues. And there are guest, guest editors. This is a special note for guest editors, can only be author or co-author on one of the articles within the special issue. So to submit a proposal to us for a special issue, we would want the topic and description of the special issue you are proposing as well as the relevance of that special issue to the field itself.
A time line of the special issue, when you think you would have everybody, have their articles in. The CVs for the guest editors as well, are needed. And then also the potential authors. Do you have people in mind, that you know would be great for this particular topic. And/or if you are going to do a call for proposals, what is that time line going to be and when are you going to expect people to have proposals? Are you going to have it be just a short two-page proposal or are you going to have an actual full chapter asked for from these authors? Now, I'm going to talk a little bit about the current stats and expectations. So, we began actually accepting submissions in August of 2014, when we got the journal up and running. We received seven papers so far, total. We had to editorially reject four of them mainly on the basis that they did not fit the focus and scope. Most were higher ed in scope, so we had to reject those. Now this is one thing I do want to mention, though. Leanna and I and the rest of the associate editors had discussed that we will be accepting higher ed pieces that particularly pertain to professional development for K-12 online teachers, administer, and other educators for blended and online K-12 environments. So those would be acceptable but, anything that has to do with higher ed that doesn't have to do with K-12 online learning we typically look at and say, "Please select one of the other AACE journals that are more higher ed focused." We also just recently rejected one after review. After we looked at all of the three reviews that came back on it. And two are currently are still out for review. So, our current expectations for the journal, and of course since this is our first year of putting it out there, we haven't even gotten our inaugural issue out, which is due out in spring. We're looking at four to five articles per issue and three to four issues per year.
Now that is really, really dependent upon, obviously, the number of submissions that we have and the quality of those submissions. So that might change and if that ever does change, we will be in touch through the journal home page so you that know exactly what the expectations are in terms of how many issues will be coming out. So I know that was a really quick synopsis of what the Journal of Online Learning Research is all about. We're happy to field any and all questions. We really appreciate you guys being here and your interest in us. That's a great question, Kevin. So these are open access. It's open for all. You would not have to go through a university. It will be directly posted on the journal's website and we'll be sharing those out with our researchers list that you're currently on. Yes, they are peer reviewed. So, I see a question from Amy about, talking a little bit more about ideas for special issues. We're fairly open to what, you know, what you might propose as a special issue. As long as it pertains to K-12 online, blended learning. I know certain researches have different areas that they're focusing in like the role of online teachers, and so maybe that could be something that there's a special issue centered specifically around and the various roles of parents and teachers in an online environment. I think it could really, it really would be a good opportunity for anyone who's interested in a particular area to propose a special issue and really focus on that, but we're very open to ideas along those lines. I'm just going to mention, Susan's question's very important. We will accept higher ed pieces that have to do with teacher preparation for K-12. Yes. That's right. There was another question as well about the different types of genres that we would look at. Versus. Typical research articles versus those murky areas that you're trying to, kind of, work through. Those questions that are hard to answer especially when each of these contexts for each blended and online K-12 learning program are different from one to another.
These really difficult questions would be great to bring up in these types of articles. And those would typically be more of those think pieces. Really just putting out those really hard to answer questions to the field and say, "How are we supposed to look at this type of situation when the variables are not all of the same? It's not the same across the board. It's not a one-size-fits-all deal. How do we answer these questions?" So, we are very open to those types of think pieces as well and I want to make sure that that is emphasized in this presentation. That's a great question, Dawn. So, we are accepting to all of those types of submission. So, it is very open. We wanted to be open as possible to whatever you're working on. So yes, those position papers, those application pieces. All of those things are important because our audience mainly, when we put together this journal we wanted it to be also accessible to practitioners as well. And a lot of times when, you know, researchers publish in university or, you know, peer reviewed journals it goes directly into the databases that are paid for only and you can't get access to them. So, when we put together this proposal, we really had in mind that we wanted this to be an accessible journal for people in the field, on the ground, doing the work. So those application pieces are really important as well. Kevin, that's a great question. Yes, definitely. Teacher action research is really important. Again, it's that practitioner-based research on the ground, doing the work and you're asking those really difficult questions in your own context. And I think it is useful, especially if it has implications for the field at large and even a subset of the field that have that same type of context. I think those are really important pieces as well. I also want to mention that Kathryn and I will be attending both the Symposium, iNACOL Symposium, as well as the SITE, S-I-T-E, Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education, Conference in March.
And so that will be a great place for us to see some of the research that's out there and, hopefully, encourage those authors that we think have potential to develop a submission. So, we'll be recruiting and promoting the journal at both of those outlets. So if you happen to be there, please connect with us if you are interested in submitting something for the journal. Amy, I am going to follow up on your question, but it is similar to what Leanna was just talking about. We are going to be at iNACOL Symposium as well as SITE and AERA and we do often present at AECT as well. Anywhere that you can spread the word that you can spread the word about this publication. It's important. And, I know that, AACE is planning to do a push out, of a press release, for the start of the journal to its many, many members. I can't remember the exact number of members, they have, but they have a lot. And I wanted to read off Joe's information as well that he mentioned to Dawn, because often times we don't publish the chat. He mentioned that the journal can also be a vehicle to those on the ground to signal needs to the research community and trying to bring together the research community with those practicing K-12 online learning. Often times, I've heard of researchers not having that connection with those who are doing the work. And this is the best way to do it. It's to see what work is being done and to see what other questions these programs have and that needs to be explored. And thanks, too, for your comment about the Virtual Symposium, I think that's, we'll also attend not just the in-person conferences which require travel but also online webinars such as this. And other avenues and vehicles online so that we can promote the journal. Are there any further questions from anyone? Also, for those of you at universities just to be thinking about if, especially, for those of you who are at universities with a, a focus or certificate program focused on K-12 online teacher preparation.
This journal would be a great avenue for graduate student research and action research along those lines. So, kind of think about that in the back of your mind as you're working with masters and doctoral students as well. OK everyone, we will leave the chat window open for a little bit longer if you have any of those questions that you'd like to ask our presenters, please do so. And they can go ahead and probably reply within the chat window or you guys can feel free to reactivate your mics and answer any questions. It looks like we have a question from Leslie. Did someone want to field that one? Sure. Leslie, that's a great question. It will be searchable on the AACE's journals page. So if you go to, let me find the landing page, hold on, just a second. It's AACE.org/pubs/jolr, for the journal and I'm going to paste that in the chat box in just a second. But you'll be able to search all the oh, thank you, Kevin! All of the articles there as well as it will probably be in places like Academic Search for , I'm assuming. Great. Thank you, Kathryn. Just a reminder that our next webinar within, not necessarily this series, but our next webinar with be Tuesday, October 28th 3pm Eastern Time, which will be our Fall Collaborative. So, a gathering of online learning researchers to come and present maybe some of their work in progress and get some feedback from those in the field. This week we'll have, sorry, next week we'll have Beth Robelia and Elana Geiser Hogan who will be presenting on some of their research in progress and looking to get some of your feedback as well. And lastly, we just want to remind you guys that you are encouraged to follow us via email or contact us via email MVLRI@mivu.org, follow us on Facebook mvlriinstitute, Twitter MVLRI underscore MVU is our handle and on Linked In as well.
If you are interested in presenting in the webinar series, if you'd like to participate in one of our collaboratives and have something to share with us, or if you'd like general information about the work that we are doing at the Institute, please reach out to us. We are waiting eagerly to hear from you. With that, if anyone has any more questions, please feel free to use the chat window and I will go ahead and end the meeting fairly soon. Thanks everyone! Have a great day.