Founded in 1990 and published by the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities, Metropolitan Universities journal disseminates scholarship and research relevant to urban and metropolitan universities. Articles amplify the mission of CUMU by reinforcing the value of place-based institutions and illuminating our collective work of supporting the changing needs of our students, institutions, and cities. The Journal is a peer-reviewed, open access publication—which means that it employs traditional methods of evaluating manuscripts while ensuring that those accepted for publication are freely available to anyone interested in the issues and themes covered.

Aims and Scope

Metropolitan Universities presents critical, evidence-based studies and perspectives relevant to urban and metropolitan universities, including:

• Centering anti-racism in our urban mission agendas and initiatives
• Student success including pipeline programs, access, retention, first-generation students, etc.
• Urban university role in addressing disparities in public health, income, safety, education, etc.
• Use of technology in learning, teaching, assessment
• Impacts of cross-sector partnerships (e.g. K-12 systems, industry, nonprofits)
• Innovations in faculty recruitment, retention, and governance
• Proven approaches to impact measurement on students, faculty, and community
• Utilization of data to inform policy and practice
• Curriculum and delivery innovations
• Emerging local, regional, and national policy issues

Prospective authors are encouraged to review recent issues of the Journal and themes for the CUMU Annual Conference in order to understand the range of our core readership’s substantive interests.

Metropolitan Universities prioritizes manuscripts describing work at an institutional, system or regional level. Preference is given to those manuscripts that demonstrate innovation and impact, and include perspectives across multiple institutions.

We ask that authors, in a reasoned and rigorous fashion, challenge readers to reexamine traditional definitions, concepts, policies, and procedures. Ideally, authors will report efforts that have been in place long enough to show both positive and/or negative results as measured through data collection, research and/or evaluation processes. To allow readers to apply ideas and strategies in other settings, authors should provide a clear description of the challenges and lessons learned.

Papers that offer descriptions of initiatives without research or evaluation elements will not be accepted.

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

Our publication ethics and publication malpractice statement is primarily based on the Code of Conduct and Best-Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors (Committee on Publication Ethics, 2011).

VIEW METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITIES’ STATEMENT (PDF)

Peer Review Policy

All research articles in Metropolitan Universities journal undergo peer review by substantive experts and scholars. Manuscripts are first subject to editor screening to assess fit with the Journal’s Aims and Scope, and readiness for review. Each manuscript is then evaluated by at least two reviewers using a double-blind peer review process, as well as the guest editor, as applicable. The executive editor is responsible for making the final determination on all submissions.

Toward the goal of impartiality, Metropolitan Universities uses a double-blind peer review process, in which authors’ and reviewers’ identities are concealed from each other during the review. Reviewer identities are never shared. For information about our peer review ethical recommendations, please see below. For more resources on providing quality peer reviews, please see American Psychological Association’s resources on reviewing a manuscript.

Ethical Guidelines for Reviewers

1. Reviews should be objective evaluations. If you cannot judge a submission impartially, you should not accept it for review or you should notify the editor immediately.
2. As a reviewer, you should inform the editor if you believe that you are not qualified to evaluate a part or all of the submission.
3. Reviews should be constructive and courteous, and the reviewer should respect the intellectual independence of the author. Metropolitan Universities reserves the right to withhold reviewer comments that may hinder constructive discussion of a manuscript among reviewers or with the author.
4. Like all authors, you seek prompt evaluations of your own work. Please return your review in the timeframe indicated when you are invited to serve as a reviewer. Inform the editor as soon as you are aware that your review may be delayed.
5. The review process is conducted anonymously; Metropolitan Universities never reveals the identity of reviewers to authors, and reviewers should not reveal their identity as a reviewer on a specific paper to anyone outside of the editorial team. In support of this, please do not identify yourself in the review. Please also remember to remove any identifying information from the file properties of your review document (word processing file). The review itself will be shared with the authors and editorial team, and possibly with other reviewers and our editorial board.
6. The submitted manuscript is a privileged communication and must be treated as a confidential document. Please destroy all copies of the manuscript after review. Please do not share the manuscript with any colleagues without the explicit permission of the editor. Reviewers may not make personal or professional use of the data or interpretations before publication without the authors’ specific permission.

Indexes & Abstracts

Articles in Metropolitan Universities journal are indexed by EBSCO, ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), DOAJ, Google Scholar, ProQuest, Ovid, and Taylor & Francis.

Archival Policy

Metropolitan Universities is digitally preserved using the PKP Private LOCKSS Network (PLN). For more information about the PKP PLN, see https://pkp.sfu.ca/pkp-lockss/.

Article Processing/Submission Charges

Metropolitan Universities does not use article processing charges (APCs) or other submission charges.

Copyright & Reuse

All content is published under Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 licensing, which enables authors to retain copyright while allowing others to copy, distribute, and make some uses of their work, provided full credit is given to them as originators. Authors selected for publication will sign an agreement with Metropolitan Universities journal acknowledging this and other acceptable uses of their work.

Diversity

Metropolitan Universities believes in the power and value of diversity in scholarly communications. MUJ is an adopting organization of the Coalition for Diversity & Inclusion in Scholarly Communication (C4DISC) Joint Statement of Principles. Adopting the Joint Statement of Principles demonstrates our support for improving diversity and inclusion in our industry.

Material disclaimer

The opinions expressed in Metropolitan Universities journal are those of the authors and contributors, and do not necessarily reflect those of the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities, the editors, the editorial board, or the organization to which the authors are affiliated.

Frequently Asked Questions