Guidelines for CHED Journal Incentive Program (JIP)

October 3, 2016

CHED MEMORANDUM ORDER NO. 053-16

 

In accordance with the pertinent provisions of Republic Act (R.A.) No. 7722, otherwise known as the "Higher Education Act of 1994," for the purpose of promoting and enhancing the research productivity of higher education institutions (HEIs), and pursuant to CEB Resolution No. 790-2016, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) hereby issues the Guidelines for the CHED Journal Incentive Program.

I. Rationale

Journals have always played a conventional and central role in stimulating research and scholarship in Philippine Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). They are channels for communicating new information, theories, methodologies and findings, validating the quality of research and scholarship, recognizing merit, and reinforcing scholarly communities. The inclusion of scholarly and scientific writings in high-quality journals is often viewed as a mark of achievement, and, in the academic world, a key criterion for tenure and promotion and other scholarly recognitions.

In 2015, there were only 28 Philippine scientific journals out of 777 Philippine scholarly journals that were able to penetrate Web of Science (WoS) core collection of Thomson Reuters or/and the database of Elsevier's Scopus. Nineteen out of the 28 Scopus/WoS-index journals (67%) still have zero (0) impact factor while the rest have not even exceeded an impact factor of 1. 1 With the apparent lackluster state of science publishing in the country and given that a large majority (87%) of the 777 Philippine scientific and academic journals are from HEIs, CHED shall develop a strategic funding portfolio to enable editors of Philippine scholarly journals to design and implement ethical measures to improve the international standing of local scholarly journals and to enable research outputs from HEIs to be more accessible to both local and international academic communities.

CHED supports initiatives of Philippine HEIs, public and private, as well as scholarly and scientific organizations, acting singly or jointly, to produce high-quality journals as veritable and respectable platforms for building a collective knowledge base in a given scholarly or scientific field.

The Journal Incentive Program, which supersedes the Journal Accreditation Service (JAS) created by CMO No. 5, series of 2012, aims to sustain these initiatives to pursue quality, research integrity, and honesty, and ensure adherence to international standards.

There are two (2) categories of grants under the Journal Incentive Program: Journal Challenge (JC) and Journal Incubator (JI). JC caters to Scopus/WoS-indexed journals and aims to support activities that will lead to an increase in scientific citation (excluding self-citation) and promote social media presence and public engagement profiles of scholarly articles in the journal. On the other hand, JI will support promising Philippine journals towards the path to meet the minimum generally accepted standards for Scopus/WoS-indexability. In so doing, CHED helps raise the recognition and credibility of Filipino scholars and scientists and contributes to the creation of a research ecosystem characterized by merit, productive and critical discourses, and collegiality.

II. Procedure and Requirements

1. Philippine HEIs and scholarly and scientific organizations that seek to apply for review, recognition and support under the Journal Incentive Program shall be required to submit the following:

Journal Challenge (JC)

a) Two (2) distinct latest soft-copies of the research journals and application form (Annex 1 Journal Incentive Program Application Form);

b) Curriculum vitae of the members of the Editorial Board, including a list of publications for the last five years, H-index and citation count (Annex 2 CV Format);

a) n   Citation data on the article published in the last two (2) issues of the journal based on Google-scholar search;

c) Proof that the journal is indexed in WoS (Thomson Reuters) and/or Scopus (Elsevier) databases;

d) Scimago Journal & Country Rank (SJR) or Impact Factor (IF);

e) Certified copy of the ISSN Certificate/Registration;

f) Information on publication and refereeing history for the past two (2) years for every article submitted to the journal (i.e., number of times the journal was late for publication; refereeing lag time or the length of time referees return their evaluations to the editor; length of time from author submission to editorial decision of acceptance or rejection of the article, and submission-to-publication time (electronics and/or print);

g) URL of the journal website and other relevant links (Facebook page of the journal, etc.);

h) Data on public engagement and influence of articles for the past two (years) or number of the following: 1) references in public policy documents, 2) commentary from experts and practitioners, 3-5) mentions in print, radio and TV discussing or citing the published study in the journal, 6) presence of a dedicated social media page of the journal (blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.), and 7) citations from online media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blog, etc.). Attach proof of public engagement (e.g., URLs, photos, etc.);

i) Sustainability plans to maintain open access publishing.

Journal Incubation (JI)

b) n Two (2) distinct latest soft-copies of the research journals and application form (Annex 1 Journal Incentive Program Application Form);

c) Curriculum vitae of the members of the Editorial Board including list of publications for the last five years, H-index and citation count (Annex 2 CV Format);

d) Brief description of the peer-review or refereeing system;

e) Publication ethics and scientific malpractice statements, if any, or a draft of the aforementioned which shall be adopted by the Editorial Board, signed by the Editor-in-Chief;

f) List of external reviewers/referees per article published in the last two (2) issues of the journal and a list of their publications in Scopus/WoS-indexed journals;

g) Publication schedule and history for the past two (2) years showing the dates when the journal was printed and/or when its content was posted online;

h) Reviewer(s) comments and recommendations on article each published in the last two (2) issues of the journal (proof of proper evaluation);

i) Citation data on the article published in the last two (2) issues of the journal based on Google-scholar search;

j) Certified copy of the ISSN Certificate/Registration;

k) Information on publication and refereeing history for the past two (2) years for every article submitted to the journal (i.e., number of times the journal was late for publication; refereeing lag time or the length of time referees return their evaluations to the editor; length of time from author submission to editorial decision of acceptance or rejection of the article, and submission-to-publication time) (electronics and/or print);

l) Data on public engagement and influence of articles for the past two (years) or number of the following: 1) references in public policy documents, 2) commentary from experts and practitioners, 3-5) mentions in print, radio and TV discussing or citing the published study in the journal, 6) presence of a dedicated social media page of the journal (blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.). and 7) citations from online media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blog, etc.). Attach proof of public engagement (e.g., URLs, photos, audio file, etc.)

m) Certification signed by the President/head of the Philippine HEI or the scholarly and scientific organization that publishes the journal indicating:

1. Intended publication schedule of the journal (e.g., annually, in December of every year; or twice a year in March and September of every year);

2. Actual month(s) of publication of the issues in the last five (5) years submitted for evaluation;

3. Number of copies (printed or published online) per issue;

4. Intent to apply for inclusion in Scopus/WoS databases within three (3) years after grant approval.

Only submissions in soft copies with complete requirements shall be entertained by the TWG. Application for review, recognition and support under the Journal Incentive Program is voluntary.

2. Proposal applications for the Journal Challenge Grant shall be submitted by the Editor-in-Chief of journals indexed by Scopus/WoS coming from HEIs/scholarly and scientific organizations. The project proposal shall have the objectives of improving the impact factor (IF) and/or Scimago Journal & Country Rank (SJR) of the journal and the extent of public engagement or influence associated with the articles published therein.

Measures of public engagement/influence include, but not limited to the following:

a) references in public policy documents;

b) commentary from experts and practitioners;

c) print, radio and TV features discussing or citing the published study in the journal;

d) a dedicated social media page of the journal (a blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.); and

e) citations from online media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blog, etc.).

3. Proposals for JC and JI are reviewed and assessed for merit based on the following: Indexing in WoS and/or Scopus databases; qualifications and diversity of the editorial board, peer reviewers/external referees; quality of content; and other requirements to meet current scientific publication standards. Proposals will be reviewed by the Research Management Division (RMD)-Journal Incentive Program Technical Working Group (TWG).

4. The individual scores of the panel of reviewers will be averaged to generate a Journal Review Score. Journals with scores ranging from 70-100 (JC) and 50-100 (JI) shall be short-listed for the grant (Annex 3 Criteria for Journal Evaluation).

5. Both JC and JI are competitive publication grants.

6. The panel, thru OPRKM, submits the results of the review, to the Commission En Banc (CEB) for approval. The review and eventual results of the publications submitted for the CHED Journal Incentive Program have no bearing with any accrediting body. The accrediting body may authorize the use of the CHED Journal Incentive Program findings, which in its discretion, may be necessary for dissemination purposes of aforementioned recognition to the journal.

7. All Philippine HEIs/scholarly and scientific organizations with CHED Journal Incentive Program are required to submit subsequent electronic copies of issues during the three (3) years of the grant.

8. Grantees are required to acquire Turnitin or any equivalent software for plagiarism screening.

9. HEIs/scholarly and scientific organizations can apply their journals only once, either for the JC and JI Grants. Recipients of the JI grant who have their journals successfully included in Scopus/WoS database can apply for the JC grant after the end of the contract. Journals that are originally indexed in Scopus/WoS but later delisted cannot apply for the JI grant.

10. Members of the TWG may be tapped to conduct data quality check and verification, and monitoring of print and online journal web pages, in order to ensure high quality, relevant and accurate implementation of the grants.

11. Each journal shall be evaluated by at least three (3) members of the TWG and concurred in by the Chair or Co-Chair.

12. Journals that have been reviewed but have not qualified for the Journal Incentive Program can be submitted for another review when the recommendations made by the TWG have been addressed, and new journal volumes/issues are submitted for review.

13. All Philippine HEIs and scholarly and scientific organizations wishing to avail of the Journal Incentive Program are required to strictly observe the three (3) years track record;

14. JC/JI grants, once awarded, will be coursed through the recipient HEI, or scholarly/scientific organization. It is assumed that the attendant costs of administration by the recipient organization are included in the project proposal.

15. CHED reserves the right to discontinue any JC and JI grant at any time for violation of this CMO. With prior consultation with the RMD Monitoring Team and CHED-JIP TWG, has the authority to terminate any JC and JI grant when key findings and deliverables are not met. The Editor-in-Chief will be notified at least thirty (30) days before the date of termination.

For HEIs/scholarly and scientific organizations who may not qualify for JC/JI grants are encouraged to publish in a journals with SJRs/IFs greater than 2.5 to receive a cash incentive in the amount of Php10,000.00 per article or publish in a JI grant-supported journals to receive a cash incentive in the amount of Php10,000.00 per article.

III. Call for Journal Incentive Program

The Journal Incentive Program (JIP) begins on December 2016 and ends on January 2020. For the initial implementation of JIP, submission schedules are as follows:

Schedule of	Submission	Evaluation
Submission	Deadline	Schedule	Release of Results
1st Submission	December 29	January 31	February 28
2nd Submission	May 31	June 30	July 31

See attached Annex 1(JIP Application Form)

IV. CHED Journal Incentive Program

1. Philippine HEIs, or scholarly/scientific organizations with journals accepted under Journal Incentive Program shall receive the following incentives:

Category	Incentives	Deliverables/Targets
Journal Challenge Grant	1. CHED-JIP cash award in the amount of Php 500,000.00 per year for a period of three (3) years; 2. Technical support by CHED in providing the digital platform "Portal for Academic Knowledge (PAK)" for online article submission, refereeing and manuscript tracking and CHED endorsement for library subscription. 3. Automatic nomination for the CHED REPUBLICA: Journal of the Year (JC) Category.	1) Proof of improvement of IF or SJR within 3 years; 2) Shorter submission-to-publication time; 3) Greater journal influence and public engagement; 4) Greater proportion of editors, referees and authors coming from institutions outside the Philippines; 5) Improved quality of journal web page; 6) Online access to articles.
Journal Incubation Grant	1. CHED-JIP cash award in the amount of Php400,000.00 per year for a period of three (3) years; 2. Technical support by CHED in providing the digital platform "Portal for Academic Knowledge (PAK)" for online article submission, refereeing and manuscript tracking and CHED endorsement for library subscription. 3. Automatic nomination for the CHED REPUBLICA: Journal of the Year (JI) Category.	1) Proof of application and acceptance to the WoS/Scopus database; 2) Journal web page; 3) Shorter submission-to-publication time; 4) Increase in article citation; 5) Evidence on journal influence and publication engagement; 6) Greater proportion of editors, referees and authors coming from institutions outside the Philippines; 7) Online access to articles.

V. Validity

The status accorded to a journal under the CHED Journal Incentive Program shall be valid for three (3) years. Upon expiration of the status, Philippine HEIs or scholarly and scientific organizations that seek to apply for recognition and support for their journal/s under the Journal Incentive Program after the expiration of three (3) years grant shall undergo the same procedure.

VI. Effectivity

This CMO supersedes CMO No. 5, s. 2012 and CMO No. 42, s. 2009. It shall take effect immediately, and remain in force until otherwise revoked.

Quezon City, Philippines October 3, 2016.

(SGD.) PATRICIA B. LICUANAN, Ph.D.

Chairperson

Footnotes

1. Evelyn Mae Tecson-Mendoza (2015) Scientific and Academic Journals in the Philippines: Status and Challenges. 2(2): 73-78 (Available at http://dx.doi.org/10.6087/kcse.47).

n Note from the Publisher: Copied verbatim from the official copy. Irregular numerical sequence.

n Note from the Publisher: Copied verbatim from the official copy. Missing Item a.