Lifelong Education Administration and Policy

Adult Education

Graduate Handbook

Guide to Ph.D. Article Requirement

Rationale: Writing for publication is an essential activity of academic life. Consequently, before being admitted to doctoral candidacy, Ph.D. students must demonstrate their scholarly abilities by preparing and submitting a manuscript for review by a refereed journal.

About the Article:

The topic must be related to the field of adult education.
The substance of the manuscript must be scholarly in nature (e.g., empirical research, critical essays).
The manuscript must be prepared under the supervision of an adult education faculty member during a student's graduate studies in the department.
The topic must be approved by a review panel of three adult education faculty members.

Process for Completing the Requirement:

The student meets with her or his major professor to develop a timeline and plan for fulfilling the article requirement. It is possible to complete this requirement under the supervision of a faculty member other than the major professor, but the major professor should be involved in that decision. Only adult education graduate faculty members may supervise manuscript preparation for this requirement.
Working with the supervising faculty member, the student prepares a one-page Ph.D. Article Proposal which contains the following information:
- Title
- Author(s)
- Two- paragraph summary of the manuscript
- Journal to which manuscript will be submitted and the rationale for the selection of that journal.
At that same meeting, the student will select two members of the adult education faculty who, together with the supervising faculty member, will serve as a manuscript review panel.
A Proposal Cover Sheet is attached to the one-page proposal, which is then circulated among the review panel for approval. Faculty desiring clarification of the topic will contact the student or the major professor. All three members of the review panel must approve the proposal before the student can move forward.
After the topic is approved, the supervising faculty member will work with the student in the preparation and submission of the manuscript.
The manuscript is to be written primarily by the student, who must be listed as first or sole author on the submitted manuscript.
After approval by the supervising faculty member, the student is to submit the manuscript to be published in the refereed journal.
As a final step, two documents will be placed into the student file:
- the signed proposal cover sheet approving the topic, and
- the cover letter to the editor when the manuscript is being submitted.