General Policies

Editorial Policy

The Journal of Statistics Education disseminates knowledge for the improvement of statistics education at all levels, including elementary, secondary, post-secondary, post-graduate, continuing, and workplace education. It is distributed electronically and, in accord with its broad focus, publishes articles that enhance the exchange of a diversity of interesting and useful information among educators, practitioners, and researchers around the world. The intended audience includes anyone who teaches statistics, as well as those interested in research on statistical and probabilistic reasoning. All submissions are rigorously refereed using a double-blind peer review process.

Manuscripts submitted to the journal should be relevant to the mission of JSE. Possible topics for manuscripts include, but are not restricted to: curricular reform in statistics, the use of cooperative learning and projects, innovative methods of instruction, assessment, and research (including case studies) on students' understanding of probability and statistics, research on the teaching of statistics, attitudes and beliefs about statistics, creative and tested ideas (including experiments and demonstrations) for teaching probability and statistics topics, the use of computers and other media in teaching, statistical literacy, and distance education. Articles that provide a scholarly overview of the literature on a particular topic are also of interest. Reviews of software, books, and other teaching materials will also be considered, provided these reviews describe actual experiences using the materials.

Submissions

Authors submitting papers for publication in JSE warrant that their papers are not currently under consideration by any other publication and that the material contained within the work is not subject to any other copyright, unless required consents have been obtained.

The refereeing process is most efficient when papers are submitted electronically in Microsoft Word, LaTeX (using the "article" document style), or ASCII text format. Submissions in html are also welcome.

New submissions and revisions of manuscripts that have been previously reviewed should be submitted via electronic mail to the Editor, Thomas H. Short, at tshort@iup.edu.

Alternately, new submissions may be submitted on diskette to the Editor at the following address:

Thomas H. Short
Editor, Journal of Statistics Education
Mathematics Department
Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Indiana, PA 15705
USA

For authors unable to submit articles electronically, we will accept submissions on paper. These manuscripts will require more handling and may experience slower turnaround than articles submitted electronically. Paper manuscripts should be submitted in quadruplicate.

Technical questions may be addressed to the Editor at tshort@iup.edu.

Refereeing Process

Articles submitted to JSE are peer-reviewed by referees who are chosen from the JSE Editorial Board and a pool of referees. The refereeing process is double-blind; authors and referees are anonymous to each other.

Before sending a submission to the referees, we remove the author's name and affiliation from the beginning of the paper and the contact information from the end of the paper. Authors are responsible for removing any references or clues to their identity in the body of the paper or in supplements such as software programs, datasets, and graphics files.

Style Guidelines

Except for the conventions noted in these instructions, manuscripts should be prepared in accordance with the American Statistical Association Style Guide, published in the February 1986 issue of The American Statistician. Contact the Editor with any style or format questions that are not covered by these instructions.

Preparation of Manuscripts

General Guidelines

Manuscripts should be submitted in English. Insert blank lines between paragraphs, between headings and text, and between references. Do not hyphenate words across lines. Hyphens may be used in words that normally contain them. Type all material flush left, including headings. Please do not number the paragraphs of the paper.

Because italics, bold-facing, and other text-formatting features are not available in ASCII text, JSE uses the following conventions:
_italics_
*boldfacing*

Use underscore characters to identify titles within the text, for example, _Journal of Statistics Education_. Authors submitting manuscripts in Microsoft Word or LaTeX may omit the underscore characters.

Title, Author Information, and Key Words

The title of the manuscript should appear at the beginning of the paper. Leave a blank line and then list each author's name and institutional affiliation. Leave one blank line between each author's name and affiliation.

Leave a blank line, type "KEY WORDS:" and list three to six key words or phrases (separated by semicolons) that may be used to index the manuscript. Do not repeat words or strings of words from the title.

Abstracts

Each manuscript should be accompanied by an abstract. The abstract should appear between the key words and the beginning of the manuscript text.

Headings

Major headings within the text should be flush left and numbered using arabic numerals followed by a period (e.g., 1. Introduction, 2. Example).

Subheadings should be flush with the left margin and numbered in the following style: 1.1 Review of the Literature, 1.2 New Methods, etc.

When three levels of headings are required, use 5-space indented paragraph headings, followed by a period.

(Authors using the LaTeX commands `\section' and `\subsection' need not number sections and subsections; the appropriate numbering will be generated automatically.)

Mathematical Material

JSE has adopted the syntax of LaTeX (Lamport 1986) for mathematical material. These notes are based on Section 3.3, "Mathematical Formulas."

Subscripts and superscripts are indicated by `_' and `^', respectively: X_n, y = ax^2 + bx + c. Sub- or superscripts of more than one character must be enclosed in braces: a_{i,j} = r^{|i-j|}.

Fractions may be represented in-line in the usual way: 1/2, x/y. In displayed material, they are written using the `\frac' command, with the numerator preceding the denominator: \frac{a + bx}{c + dx}.

Greek letters are produced by \sigma or \Sigma, for example.

Mathematical symbols on the standard keyboard are typed: ( ) - + = | / . Many others are also available, as commands with reasonable names: \times, \div, \cap, \cup, \leq, \geq, \equiv (like = but with 3 lines), \in (element of), \rightarrow, \forall, \exists, \infty. Summation and integral signs are `\sum' and `\int', and limits are indicated by subscripts and superscripts: \sum_{i=1}^{n}, \int_0^1.

Tables

Tables should appear within the text itself, as close as possible to their first mention in the manuscript. Skip two lines before and after the presentation of the table. Tables should be numbered with arabic numerals and must have titles.

If possible, use Microsoft Word to generate tables. As an alternative, use the LaTeX conventions for indicating the layout of data in a table. A simple example is the following table of regression parameter estimates:

\begin{tabular}{lcc}
Parameter & Estimate & Standard error \\
Intercept & 7.63 & 1.35 \\
Height & 1.05 & 0.73 \\
Weight & 4.40 & 1.84
\end{tabular}

The argument string `lcc' indicates that there are three columns (with the first left-justified and the remainder centered; `r' for right-justified is the third possibility). Items in the same row are separated by `&', and rows are separated by `\\'. Empty cells are permissible; if a row ends with one or more empty cells, the trailing `&'s may be omitted.

Figures

The preferred format for submitting graphs and figures is Graphic Interchange Format, i.e., GIF file format. Figures may be sent by e-mail as encoded files or by postal mail on diskette. Alternatively, authors may provide a Web address where figures can be found. Figures should be numbered with arabic numerals and must have titles.

References

All references should appear in a reference list at the end of the manuscript. Follow the American Statistical Association Style Guide for the format of reference citations and the reference list. Insert blank lines between items in the reference list.

Contact Information

Include with your submission the following information:

1. First author's name
2. First author's address
3. First author's E-mail address
4. First author's phone number and fax number (if available)
5. Other authors' names and addresses
6. Acknowledgments and relevant information about the history of the manuscript (thesis/dissertation, presented at conferences, etc.)

References

Lamport, L. (1986), LaTeX: A Document Preparation System, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.