Passing the Torch
Life is a series of transitions - comings and goings, hellos and good-byes. It is now time for me turn the journal's editing over to a younger scholar, to open the doors of this publication to more new ideas and to maintain its continuity. Ten years have passed since I accepted the responsibility of editing Canadian Social Studies. During this time I have had the pleasure of dealing with some of the most outstanding scholars and writers in this nation, and have guided the journal through three publishers and into the Internet as an independent publication. It certainly hasn't been dull. As a matter of fact, it was enjoyable, especially since I had always wanted to edit a premiere journal of this nature - Canada's only journal devoted to social studies. With the journal now on the Internet and self-owned we are in a relatively strong and stable condition.
Yes, I did institute changes. First, changing the main name to Canadian Social Studies to reflect the journal's broader national mandate. Second to institute refereeing so that we had a venue recognized by university promotions committees and could publish Canadian social studies manuscripts in Canada. Until, then to publish in the "social studies" for academic credit required scholars in Canada to send their manuscripts out of the country. Third, to make this journal a lively and interesting one, and one that was recognized elsewhere for its excellence. Part of this was to institute regular columns and features in addition to articles. In this latter regard, I look back to those earlier days with great pleasure about a note sent to me by Salvatore Natoli when he was editor of Social Education, remarking that he "envied" our Fall, 1992 issue on technology.
But the credit for the excellence of this journal is a shared one. Over the last ten years our wonderful columnists, feature editors, and former cartoonist Andy Phillpotts, have contributed to the best of this journal.
Our high scholarly standards have been maintained by our Referee Coordinators currently Bob Fowler and Alan Sears, and in our earlier years Bryant Griffith, Roberta McKay and Ken Osborne. They assisted me in the selection of articles by mustering the needed scholars to blind review manuscripts sent to the journal from around the world and digest the essence of the referees' reports. This was no small feat. There is no way that I could have done this alone. And I am very grateful to them and all the referees whom we have listed in every fall issue of the journal.
A debt of gratitude is also due to the Faculty of Education of the University of Alberta for initial financial support and providing an Internet location to keep us going. Dean Larry Beauchamp, and Dr. Gene Romaniuk, respectively, are to be thanked for this.
This past year, George Richardson became our associate editor and has done an outstanding job, including editing two theme issues. George is an assistant professor with the Department of Secondary Education here at the University of Alberta. It is my pleasure to announce that George will take over as editor as of July 1 - Canada Day. It is a double pleasure since George is dedicated to the high academic quality of the journal, is an excellent writer, a fine scholar, and has superior management skills. Rest assured that with George at the helm, our journal will continue to grow from strength to strength.