IJARE - Six Years On: An Editor's Report

Abstract

In September 2012, I had the wonderful opportunity to attend for the second time another delightful session of the Irish Lifesaving Foundation’s annual conference on drowning prevention. John Connolly, the honorary executive director, had invited me to present a report on the drowning prevention articles we have published in the International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education (IJARE) throughout our six volumes. While I was preparing that presentation, it dawned on me that I really ought to summarize a number of variables associated with IJARE’s first six years for you loyal subscribers and regular readers. It seems to me that such a summary might identify some useful, or at least interesting, trends in topics, authors, and other pertinent variables to guide Human Kinetics, our Editorial Board, and myself in making decisions about future directions that IJARE might take. My hope is that you will find at least some of these data to be mildly interesting and even informative. And, here’s to success for IJARE’s next six years and volumes! To produce this report, I acknowledge the diligence and hard work of my two collaborators and co-authors, Robert Turick and Chelsea Kaunert, Masters students in Bowling Green State University’s graduate Kinesiology program. Robert and Chelsea were in charge of compiling information about all the articles we have published in the 24 issues of the first six volumes and placing the data in a spreadsheet from which I could parse the information. Without them, this report would not have been possible. I take responsibility for any errors in calculation, tabulation, or interpretation. I must pay due credit to Kevin Moran from whom I borrowed the phrasing for the title of this editorial based on the catchy title of his article, “Rock-Based Fisher Safety Promotion: Five Years On,” published one and a half years ago (2011, 5(2), pp. 164-173). I was intrigued by its wording. I felt similar phrasing might capture what I hoped to accomplish in describing the status and progress of IJARE over its first six years of publication. Thanks for the loan of the phrase, Kev!