Feedback in Scholarly Peer Review Online Symposium
(24 and 25 January 2022)
Platform: Microsoft Teams (meeting link will be sent separately to registered participants)
24 January 2022 (Mon) (Day 1)
Time Title of talk Bio of speaker
9.00 – Plenary 1: Joanna Tai is Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for
10.30 am Contemporary Research in Assessment and Digital Learning (CRADLE) at
(GMT) approaches to feedback: Deakin University. Her research interests include student
do they occur in journal experiences of learning and assessment from university
peer review processes? to the workplace, peer learning, feedback and assessment
literacy, developing capacity for evaluative judgement,
and research synthesis. Joanna is a Senior Fellow of the
Higher Education Academy, co-convenor of the Australian
Association for Research in Education (AARE) Assessment
and Measurement SIG, and is Treasurer for the Australian
and New Zealand Association for Health Professions
Education. Her doctoral work won the Association for
Medical Education Europe (AMEE) inaugural PhD prize in
2016. She has a background in medicine and health
professions education.
10.45 - Invited Presentation 1: Dr Cornelia Tschichold is Senior lecturer in Applied
11.15 am Interpreting the review Linguistics at Swansea University and associate editor of
(GMT) process in applied ReCALL. Her research interests include the phraseology of
linguistics research English, Intelligent CALL (the use of NLP for CALL) and
replication studies in Applied Linguistics.
Alex Boulton is Professor of English and Applied
Linguistics at the University of Lorraine and director of
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Abstract
Feedback has been an increasing topic of research
interest. This has extended our understanding of effective
feedback beyond crafting good feedback messages, to
recognising that feedback processes take place between
people, and require those people to be able to draw on
personal capabilities and their environments to
successfully engage in feedback. These contemporary
approaches to feedback are now widely promoted for
learning and teaching within higher education. However,
have the same ideas filtered through to scholarly journal
peer review processes, which is one of the most common
settings for academics to be on the receiving end of
feedback? This presentation will outline contemporary
approaches to feedback, the ways in which journal peer
review processes are well aligned to these approaches,
and consider some of the dissonances across settings for
peer feedback, including the use of anonymity, and
opportunities for dialogue.
Academic publishing depends on peer reviewing, but the
system is creaking under the pressures of increased
numbers of submissions. Journal editors, reviewers and
authors face multiple challenges: finding qualified and
willing reviewers, the lack of preparation that PhD
students and early-career researchers receive for dealing
with reviewers’ comments, the almost total absence of
training for becoming a reviewer, and the poor return of
 the research group Analyse et Traitement Informatique
de la Langue Française (ATILF: CNRS & University of
Lorraine). Particular research interests focus on corpus
linguistics and potential uses for ‘ordinary’ teachers and
learners (data-driven learning), and research syntheses in
applied linguistics. He has published and edited books
and papers in these fields over the years, and is on
various boards and committees including as editor of
ReCALL.
Pascual Pérez-Paredes is a Professor in Applied Linguistics
and Linguistics, U. Murcia and former Lecturer in
Research in Second Language Education at the University
of Cambridge. His main research interests are the use of
corpora and digital resources in language education,
learner language variation and corpus-assisted discourse
analysis.
11.30 - Invited Presentation 2: Ayman Hefnawi is a mathematics lead teacher at the
12.00 pm The role of peer-review Ministry of Education, United Arab Emirates. Ayman has a
(GMT) in developing my dual master’s degree in educational leadership and
educator-researcher management from the University of Warwick. Currently,
identity he is a doctorate of education candidate at the University
of Bath. Ayman is a reviewer of some educational
journals.
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time investment that reviewing often seems to present to
academics.
In our research, we explore the feedback process in
ReCALL a journal on computer-assisted language learning,
published by Cambridge University Press. We analyse
seven years of reviewing, a corpus that is ripe for analysis
of repeated language patterns of politeness,
recommendations, etc.. It has been suggested that more
revisions of a manuscript lead to more citations of the
published paper. We therefore want to examine a
representative sample of papers that have undergone at
least three rounds of reviewing. In this way, we hope to
contribute to a better understanding of the types of
features that draw critical attention, and how reviewers
and authors engage with the feedback and comments
provided.
This presentation presents my reflection on my peer-
review experience and how this experience has
contributed to the development of my identity as a
researcher. I will highlight my background as a
practitioner and my passion to pursue a research career,
which led me to the peer-review experience. I will then
discuss the benefits, challenges and responsibilities of
reviewing academic manuscripts. The potential benefits
of peer review as I will clarify include developing one’s
ability to disseminate his research findings and reach
publication standards. The challenges relate to how to
effectively fulfil the academic role of peer-reviewing. The
responsibilities are mostly ethical considerations that I
have been learning since I started the review activity.
These considerations relate to the purpose and quality of
the feedback you provide to authors. The presentation
concludes by providing some practical tips to early career
researchers (ECRs) on how to develop as an independent

12.15 - Invited Presentation 3: Thomas M. Geary is a Professor of English at Tidewater
12.45 pm Demystifying publication Community College. Geary earned his PhD from the
(GMT) through a collaborative University of Maryland, and he has published on online
peer review process writing instruction, compassionate pedagogy,
soundwriting, and design thinking. He serves as the editor
of Inquiry, the peer-reviewed journal for faculty, staff,
and administrators in Virginia’s 23 community colleges,
and is the founding editor of Exigence, a journal for
student research in Virginia's two-year institutions.
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researcher.
With heavy workloads and limited time and resources,
many two-year college faculty struggle to commit to
active research agendas. To publish and thrive as
scholars, they need to trust in an encouraging,
empathetic process that is supportive and collaborative
rather than enter a daunting, emotional publication game
of acceptances and rejections (Gravett, et al., 2019).
As the editor of Inquiry, the peer-reviewed online journal
for faculty, staff, and administrators in Virginia’s 23
community colleges, I transformed our scholarly
publication from a double-blind model to an alternative
approach that works closely with authors to make their
work publishable. After years of rejecting potential
authors’ manuscript submissions for failing to meet our
aims and scope, sometimes with divergent comments by
reviewers or feedback that focused mostly on deficits, we
opted to remodel our journal’s peer review process to
collaborative peer review that is focused on a dialogic
process of “respect and appreciation” (Chong, 2021).
In this presentation, I will elaborate on the decision to
revamp the journal’s mission, the affordances and
challenges of the collaborative publication process, how
quality is maintained in this new peer-focused rather
than paper-focused model, and the impact on reviewer
feedback literacy.
 25 January 2022 (Tue) (Day 2)
Time Title of talk Bio of speaker Abstract
9.00 – Plenary 2: Improving Pippa Smart is an independent publishing consultant Although the principle of Academic peer review of
10.30 am peer review using working under the name of PSP Consulting. She has scholarly articles is well understood, some of the nuances
(GMT) experience and research worked in scholarly publishing for over 30 years in a that make review a successful process are often not so
variety of roles, and now specialises in providing strategic well comprehended. This talk will use recent research to
development support and training for editorial groups discuss what is known about positive and productive peer
and publishers. She is Editor-in-Chief of Learned review, and how what is known can be applied to what is
Publishing, the journal of the Association of Learned and done.
Professional Scholarly Publishers (ALPSP) and also writes
the ALPSP monthly member newsletter. She is Past
President of the European Association of Science Editors
(EASE) and a Director of the World Association of Medical
Editors (WAME)
10.45 - Invited Presentation 4: Jessica To is a Research Scientist at National Institute of Feedback literacy is a prerequisite for productive
11.15 am Developing early career Education, Nanyang Technological University. Her feedback uptake and an essential skill for continuous
(GMT) researcher feedback research interests lie in learner-centred feedback designs, improvement in professional practices. While
literacy: Reflective dialogic use of exemplars, peer and self-assessment. Her
learning as catalyst works were published in Assessment and Evaluation in
research into student feedback literacy has
Higher Education, Higher Education Research and proliferated recently, the advancement of early
Development and other international, peer-refereed career researcher (ECR) feedback literacy is under-
journals. explored. Drawing on an ECR’s real-life experiences
in handling journal reviewers’ feedback, this
presentation discusses how reflective learning aids
the development of ECR feedback literacy. It will first
set the framework for interpreting ECR feedback
literacy. It will then outline three key stages in the
ECR’s feedback literacy development and explain
how some reflective learning components (inner
discomfort, openness to new information and
identification of concerns) have come into play in
her developmental trajectory. Implications on how
senior researchers could help to nurture ECR
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 feedback literacy will be outlined.

11.30 - Invited Presentation 5: Maxwell Peprah Opoku is currently an Assistant Developing countries are striving to follow the path
12.00 pm Perception of academics Professor in Special Education at the United Arab
(GMT in non-western countries Emirates University. He holds a PhD in Education from of advanced societies in research development and
towards paper University of Tasmania, Australia. Before Joining UAEU,
submissions/publishing in he worked as casual academic, teaching undergraduate
practices. Unfortunately, many times, the argument
international peer review and graduate courses at Faculty of Education, University
journals of Tasmania, Australia.
has been that little research is being conducted or
Dr. Mohammed Safi completed his doctorate degree at
Howard University – USA with Completed pre-doctoral produced in non-western societies compared to
research training in swallowing physiology at the
Laryngeal section in the National Institutes of Health their western counterparts. It is important to state
(NIH) and Swallowing Physiology Lab - Johns Hopkins
Hospital. Dr. Safi is a Speech Language Pathologist here that most academic journal and publishing
specializing in neurogenic communication disorders and
dysphagia. Currently, holding a dual academic companies are based in advanced societies. There is,
appointment as an Asst. Professor in the department of
Speech Language Pathology at the College of Medicine
therefore, the potential for such journals and
and Health Sciences as well as a graduate professor in the
department of Special Education at the College of
Education - UAEU. publishing companies to be in favor of scholarly

Dr William Nketsia joined Western Sydney University research from western countries. However, there is
(WSU) as a lecturer in Inclusive Education in January,
2018. He completed his Doctoral and Masters’ Degrees in no empirical data to support the conclusion that
Education in 2016 and 2011 respectively, from University
of Jyvaskyla, Finland. He also has Bachelors’ degree in journal publishers are interested in academic papers
Science Education from University of Cape Coast and
Teacher’s certificate in Basic Education from Akrokerri from advanced societies. This chapter presents the
College of Education, Ghana. Dr Nketsia has previously
worked in University of Jyvaskyla, Finland as a lecturer. Dr
Nketsia’s research interests include; special education
qualitative analysis of the views of 29 academics
and inclusive education, initial teacher preparation for
from non-western countries with respect to their
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 inclusive education, attitudes towards inclusive experiences publishing in international peer review
education, self-efficacy studies on inclusive education,
School-Based learning or teaching practice, action journals. Four thematic themes were identified
Research on inclusive education, inclusive pedagogical
practices in classrooms, mentoring, supervision and
which were as follows: experiences with western
professional development, professional development of
teacher educators for inclusive education, international
perspectives on inclusive education policy and practice, journals, perception about the peer review process,
cross-cultural implementation of inclusive education
policy and sustainable implementation of inclusive addressing/responding to reviewers’ feedback and
education and practice
handling of rejections. The chapter concludes with a
Amponteng Michael is a PhD Candidate at Western
Sydney University, Australia. He started his early call to journals, editors and reviewers to ensure
education at Asankrangwa and Sefwi Wiawso where he
obtained Teachers Cert A in 2002. After teaching at the transparency, equality and creating a conducive
Basic school for a while, he pursued his first degree in
Special education at University of Education, Winneba.
environment for all academics to disseminate their
After serving a year as Special Needs Education
Coordinator and tutor at college of Education, his interest
in disability influenced him to study Disability, scholarly research.
Rehabilitation and Development for his second degree
from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and
Technology. He was appointed as a Resource teacher
providing support for pupils with special needs at Sekyere
South District while pursuing his Master degree. He also
worked as tutor in special education at St Joseph College
of Education, Bechem, Ghana.
12.15 - Invited Presentation 6: Dr Mei Lin is a senior lecturer at the School of Education, Some early career researchers feel ill-equipped with the
12.45 pm Developing a toolkit for Communication and Language Sciences, Newcastle peer review process because they have limited exposure
(GMT) doctoral students to University, UK. She specialises in teaching pedagogy and to this activity whilst pursuing their PhD degree. Although
develop a sense of doing teacher education and worked in national and there have been some guidelines on the websites of
peer review international educational projects regarding integrating journals and publishers, limited guidelines are available
teaching thinking into the curriculum. She has trained for PhD students. This inhibits their feedback literacy in
teachers in China, UK, Ireland and Turkey. the role of early career peer reviewers. Drawn from both
the existing literature on the peer review process and our
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Thinh Ngoc Pham is a doctoral candidate researching
thinking skills and the internationalisation of higher
education at Newcastle University. He has been involved
in teaching at Newcastle University, INTO University of
East Anglia, and Ton Duc Thang University (Vietnam).
experiences as peer reviewers and authors, we propose a
toolkit for PhD students to practise peer review skills and
understand the peer review process in the fields of
Education and Applied Linguistics. The focus and desired
learning outcome of the toolkit are explicitly clarified for
each stage of a PhD degree. For the first-year PhD
students, the peer review process focuses on the
introduction and literature review parts. For the second-
year PhD students, the peer review practices emphasise
the evaluation of methodological design and data analytic
techniques. For third-year and writing-up students, the
toolkit aims to stimulate the peer review process for the
results, discussion and conclusion sections. This proposed
toolkit helps PhD students feel and sharpen a sense of
acting as novice peer reviewers.