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◇ New journal · diamond open-access · in design

Critical Learner Partnerships

A planned diamond open-access journal — free to read, free to publish — for critical scholarship on co-creation, partnership and power in higher education.

Born from NTLSN. Name, editorial board and publishing partner still to be confirmed — we're designing it in the open, with the people it's for.

What sets it apart

Students recognised for their partnership — not thanked, recognised.

Every other partnership journal stops at acknowledgement. We make it formal: students are named, credited and recognised as partners in the scholarship itself — carrying portable recognition for the contribution they actually made. That's the missing link, made explicit.

The medium is the message

A journal about partnership can't be written about students from a tower. So congruence runs through everything:

✍️
Developed with students

Student and staff co-editors share editorial authority — not advisory seats, real decision-making.

🤝
Reviewed with students

Paired review: one academic, one student, each with a defined and equal domain of expertise.

📖
Published with students

Work is co-authored, and each contribution is visible — including the student's, by name.

Paired, developmental peer review

Review here is scaffolding, not gatekeeping — designed to develop authors, and to give the student reviewer's voice equal weight.

The inaugural call (indicative)

Volume 1 · Issue 1

Power, Pedagogy & Co-Creation

We'll invite work that moves past celebratory partnership narratives to the structural and critical realities of co-creation:

Formats: empirical articles · conceptual papers · partnership reflections (co-authored by staff & students). No article processing charges, ever.

Abstracts · indicative Aug 2026Manuscripts · Nov 2026Inaugural issue · 2027

Help found it

We're recruiting founding editors — including students as absolute equals. No prior publishing experience needed; we'll mentor you in.

Student Co-Editor-in-Chief
shared 50/50 leadership

Equal executive authority with an academic co-EIC — strategy, final decisions, representing the journal.

Student Associate Editors
active handling editors

Guide manuscripts through the pipeline, match paired reviewers, facilitate dialogic synthesis.

Academic Co-Editors
staff partners

Hold methodological and literature rigour while sharing power, genuinely, with student leadership.

Founding Reviewers
staff & students

Join the paired-review pool and help set what constructive, developmental feedback looks like.

Register your interest → Back to NTLSN
This is a journal in design, not yet accepting submissions. Dates, scope and formats above are indicative and will be set with the founding editorial board. The name, board and publishing partner are still to be confirmed. What is fixed is the principle: free to read, free to publish, and students recognised for their partnership.

◇ AI field guide — yes, the em-dashes (—). A journal about critical reading may as well begin with the machine’s favourite tell.

A planned open initiative from NTLSN.com · diamond open-access · developed, reviewed and published with students.

Join the founding circle

The journal and its conference are being designed in the open. If you want to help shape them — on the editorial circle, as a reviewer, as an author, or as a student partner — leave your details. Every role is co-designed; students are partners here too, not add-ons.

Submitting sends these details to our moderated intake (Netlify Forms) — used only to contact you about Critical Learner Partnerships, never shared or sold.

Coming with it · 2027

International Conference of Critical Student Partnerships

A new critical forum for students-as-partners scholarship, convened alongside the journal — peer-reviewed contributions earn a permanent, citable home. Call for papers opens with the 2027 site; register interest above and you’ll hear first.

Read the call for abstracts →

For students: record your partnership contribution →

In design. Submission & review will run on proven open-source infrastructure (OJS for the journal; pretalx-class tooling for the conference) — open scholarship on open plumbing, never a platform that owns your work.