Journal setting: Setting target number of reviewers for a manuscript
Imagine that you had a world-class, personal assistant who would sort through all of the submissions you're managing on your behalf and notify you of the ones that need your attention. At Scholastica, we offer a configuration option that offers a similar experience to help you easily identify manuscripts that may need your attention (e.g. to invite more reviewers or make a decision).
Often journals set a target number of reviews they aim to receive before making a publication decision on a given manuscript. For example, a journal may set a target of 3 reviews, meaning they plan to receive at least 3 reviews before making a decision. Setting a target helps ensure all articles receive sufficient feedback before making a final publication decision.
Activating configuration option
To easily identify which manuscripts that have fewer than your "target" number of reviewers and manuscripts that are ready for a decision because they have the correct number of submitted reviews, you'll follow these steps:
- Log into Scholastica and navigate to
My Journals
>Settings
>Journal Settings
>Configuration Options
- Scroll down to the 'Journal Workflow Options' header
- Toggle on the configuration option shown below and titled "I want to receive at least __ reviews before making a decision"
Weekly email notification
Once you've turned on this configuration option, the assigned editor for that manuscript will receive an email once a week that looks similar to this:
The email includes sections (when applicable) for manuscripts that have fewer than the target number of active review invitations, manuscripts that have met the target number of reviews submitted and are still waiting on a decision, and manuscripts that have had no reviewers invited yet at all.
Additional manuscript filtering and alerts
With this configuration option turned on, you'll also be able to more easily pull up the manuscripts that are ready for next steps.
The two filter options pull up the manuscripts that have fewer than the target number of active reviewers or the manuscripts that have the target number of reviews submitted and are still waiting on a final decision (i.e. they are still listed as 'Under Review' in Scholastica).
We've also removed a few 'clicks' from the process of checking a manuscript's review status with a pop-up box that you can access right on the manuscript table.
Just click the grey circle with a question mark in the 'Rating' column to pull up the full reviewer status details for that manuscript.
Review sub-statuses
Help your journal run more efficiently and reduce the risk of manuscripts slipping through the cracks! If you have any questions, please email us at support@scholasticahq.com .