About the Journal

Aims and scope

The Eureka Journal centres on the teaching and popularization of science (REurEDC). It has a dual function: on the one hand, it aims to contribute to the development of knowledge within the sphere of experimental sciences, from the point of view of theory and practice. On the other hand, our intention is to provide some guidance - in regard to science teaching and education - for teachers as well as for non-formal educators.

The works included within this journal cover a wide spectrum within the education system, ranging from children’s education to university level. We also focus on science teaching methods for informal teaching environments or those outside of academia.

Some multi-disciplinary and cross-disciplinary topics are of course welcome in our journal, such as: sustainability education, health education, consumerism education, understanding of the environment in early stages of education, or teacher training. Yet they must be unequivocally written as a contribution from the point of view of or intended for experimental science education. Thus, general or cross-disciplinary education topics should be avoided, namely when the content pertaining to science or its teaching is secondary or anecdotal (for instance, when it is used as an excuse to broach other subjects not linked to science education), when being taught in conjunction with other disciplines which differ from experimental sciences (social science education, engineering, mathematics, etc.).

The two main aims of REurEDC are: a) To contribute to the research and scientific rationale previously described, b) To promote the improvement of education by providing enriching, stimulating and substantiated teachings, so that through these the interest in and love of sciences may be fostered.

For this reason, REurEDC is structured into seven sections:

Foundations and lines of work. This section is aimed at propagating or synthesizing the fundamentals of science education and its social dissemination; or with the objective of presenting results of research carried out to better understand the processes involved in the teaching-learning and dissemination of science.
Science: past and present. This section is dedicated to the analysis of the historic evolution of scientific knowledge from an academic point of view, as well as to the clarification of complex notions related to different sciences, always within the context of science education.
Experiences, resources and other works. A section which focuses on the dissemination and exchange of innovative experiences within the field of science education, intended for formal or non-formal education. It also accepts articles whose objective is to describe, analyse and/or evaluate specific educational resources which may be of special interest for science education and its social dissemination (analogies, similarities, interesting problems, paradoxes, teaching games, cognitive experiments, practical exercises, etc.).
Science education today. This section’s objective is to soundly analyse current science education topics, those issues that require a detailed analysis because they are an educational phenomenon, and that contribute to science, such as: scientific events, professional problems identified by teachers and/or researchers, the role that science plays within educational systems, etc.
Science education and sustainability. A section within which articles linked to sustainability education and environmental education are welcome. Nonetheless, all articles submitted to this section must be directly linked to teaching science.
Fun science. Dedicated to stimulating and curious experiments that can be attempted with everyday inexpensive materials, as well as original practical activities that can help teachers in everyday teaching.
Science teacher training. In this section, theoretical, research and strategic perspectives and/or resources will be offered for the training of science teachers for any level of education.
Design-Based research. The purpose of this section is to show the development of research based on the design of Teaching-Learning Sequences.

The articles submitted to REurEDC will have to be directed towards one of these sections. However, the REurEDC editorial team will assess and decide to which of these sections the article is best suited.

About gender equality

An important aspect to consider is that the articles are written using inclusive and non-sexist language.

On the other hand, it is recommended to the authors that in the cases in which their papers take into account the variable gender, they inform about possible influences of the same in the results and conclusions obtained.

Peer Review Process

The Eureka Journal centres on the teaching and popularization of science and only publishes original articles in Spanish. These must be about the teaching or dissemination of knowledge within the sphere of experimental sciences.

Any article received for publication will be analysed by the members of the Editorial Committee, who will determine whether the aforementioned article is suited to the journal, its originality in terms of content, if it is potentially interesting to the target readers and if it befits the publication’s rules. The articles that pass this first filter will be peer reviewed by at least two anonymous judges, who may or may not also be part of the advisory board of the journal. This journal carries out a double-blind review process. Authors must therefore omit their names and affiliations from the written article, yet must state them within the article’s meta data

Authorship of papers

REurEDC is a publication aimed at teachers and researchers in the field of science didactics, as well as science teachers and individuals engaged in scientific outreach. Therefore, potential authors of manuscripts submitted to this publication should also belong to these professional sectors.

In the case of authors who belong to the Editorial Board of the journal, the evaluation procedure is the same as for the rest of the authors, based on double-blind peer review procedures. In these cases, the papers are assigned to an editor who is different from any of the authors of the manuscript, and they follow the usual editorial process according to the same guidelines as the rest of the articles. It is worth noting an important fact in this regard, which is that the rate of inbreeding is quite low, as evidenced by the fact that, averaging the last five years, the rate of published papers whose author is a member of the Editorial Board is less than 5%.

Publication Frequency

This journal publishes three issues per year, which are released during the months of January (No. 1: January to March), April (No. 2: April to August) and September (No. 3: September to December).

The approximate closing dates for the issues are as follows: March 15th, June 15th, and November 15th. However, the journal tries to follow the continuous publication model, by immediately including accepted articles in the pre-printing

Open Access Policy

This journal provides open access to its contents, to respect the principle of offering public open access to research, and to foster global knowledge exchange.

Authors may retain their copyright by granting the journal the right to first publication. The journal will grant authors the right to non-commercial use of their work, including the right to add their file to free access repositories within institutions or personal websites that are accessible by the public. Additionally, they may include a final version of the accepted articles prior to publication.

This journal is under a Creative Commons Licence

Reconocimiento-NoComercial
CC BY-NC

Ethics and Good Publication Practices statement

REurEDC centres on the teaching and popularization of science (REurEDC) and is a publication aimed at teachers, disseminators and researchers interested in science education. The editorial team of REurEDC understands that every scientific journal must ensure that the dissemination and transfer of knowledge must be carried out whilst guaranteeing scientific rigour and quality, maintaining the highest ethical standards. Therefore, we respect the Code of Conduct for scientific journal editors set forth by the Ethics in Publications Committee (COPE: Committee on Publication Ethics).

Anti-plagiarism policy

In keeping with our code of ethics, plagiarism and self-plagiarism are deemed unacceptable. Therefore, the journal routinely checks the originality of submitted articles using the software TURNITIN. Every article submitted is analysed with this software. A match percentage higher than 20% (bibliographical references aside) will render the article unacceptable, thus all articles not respecting this rule will be rejected for this very reason. There are only two exceptions to this rule:

1) Where the matches correspond to works not intended for publication or unpublished academic works by the author: doctoral theses, dissertations, end of Masters degree projects, other works included within repositories not yet published, etc.

2) Where matches are derived from publications by the same author, in these instances, the match percentage increases to 30%. When this arises, we carry out a detailed analysis of the nature of said matches and the editor assigned to the articles is notified, so that during the evaluation process they may determine whether the new publication reiterates what the author/s has/have already published.

Publication charges

There are no submission fees, publication fees or page charges for this journal.

Statistics reports of the journal

REurEDC annually publishes its statistics regarding the percentage of accepted articles, the time elapsed between article submission and evaluation, the time span between article acceptance and publication, impact indicators, editorial quality, etc.

2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 , 2019, 2020, 2021 2022, 2023