The International Journal of Educational and Life Transitions (IJELT) is an international peer reviewed journal which publishes articles and multimedia outputs of interest to researchers, practitioners and policy makers in the field of educational and life transitions across the world. The journal was set up in September 2021 to ensure the development of robust and impactful transitions research, which can lead to real positive change in policy and practice. It is sponsored by the University of Dundee and was created in partnership with Research Services – Library and Learning Centre (LLC), with the support of the Transformative Change: Education and Life Transitions (TCELT) research centre and its International Network of Transitions Researchers. IJELT provides immediate open access post-acceptance of a paper as we strongly believe in making our research freely available internationally. Further, the article processing charges (APCs) are funded by the University of Dundee due to its commitment to ensure that authors from across the world can publish excellent research without APCs becoming a hindrance.

To be able to undertake robust research and disseminate impactful research, it is crucial that we are clear about the conceptualisation and operationalisation of transitions. This is especially pertinent when we consider transitions literature, as there can be an absence of authors’ conceptualisations and a lack of shared understanding amongst researchers, professionals and policy makers (Jindal-Snape, Symonds. Hannah & Barlow, 2021). The way we conceptualise educational and life transitions has important implications for our research designs, results, conclusions and implications which are used to inform future research, policy and practice. Therefore, we ask all the journal article authors to clearly define what transitions mean in the context of their study, and where possible, what do transitions mean to their participants. As an international and interdisciplinary journal, we are excited to hear more about these conceptualisations that are likely to be different and will bring great depth of knowledge around the conceptualisations.

Further, in this journal we are keen to explore transitions research with an international, interdisciplinary and multi-sector lens. This can only be achieved through a range of different outputs, such as research studies (e.g., theoretical, conceptual, methodological and empirical), policy reviews, literature reviews, and multi-media and creative outputs (e.g., poetry, comics). To ensure that the articles are accessible to a range of stakeholders, we invite authors to be creative and embed multi-media in the articles. Figure 1 provides an example of a comic that was created to highlight multiple and multi-dimensional personal and professional transitions of school teachers and significant others due to COVID-19 (for the full comic, see Stones, Glazzard, Jindal-Snape, Murray & Laird, 2020).

Further, we are not only interested in understanding people’s transition experiences but also the reasons behind them and what strategies might work for different individuals in particular contexts and domains. We want to understand the resources available to people that can support their transitions and invite discussions about that.

We welcome IJELT articles focussed on a range of educational and life transitions. Some examples, to name a few, are educational transitions to and through primary school, to and through secondary school, post-school transitions, to and through higher education; and life transitions of professionals, parents, those with complex health needs and disabilities; ageing. We value different perspectives so that we can be a strong voice in setting the transitions agenda internationally. For this reason, we also have an international and interdisciplinary editorial board and peer review group which includes senior and early career academics, including doctoral students; practitioners and policy makers.

We are also interested in publishing special issues. If interested, please get in touch with us.