Editorial policy and management

The electronic journal Opuntia Brava, in its aim to become a platform for sharing scientific results among national and international researchers, uses a continuous publication model. In this way, in an annual volume, it publishes 4 issues, corresponding to the quarters January-March, April-June, July-September, and October-December. In compliance with the requirements established by the databases and this publication model, each issue opens in the first month of the quarter and closes in the last; this explains why, every January, April, July, and October, the journal begins to offer the academic community that follows it new analyses and proposed solutions to various social issues.

By decision of the editorial committee, special issues are published in alternate years, either to contribute to a particular topic or to support the progress of their extensive editorial backlog.

The community of researchers following the journal covers geographic areas beyond the national territory; it is visible and receives submissions from Ibero-America, Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and Asia. Mostly, they are Spanish-speaking countries, which is why the journal primarily publishes in Spanish; however, it also publishes in English, with each article presenting an English version of the abstract and keywords. Articles are published in English, as long as they are submitted.

Raising quality standards is a constant goal for Opuntia Brava magazine. In this regard, indexing in new national and international impact sites and databases is a way to achieve this. To accomplish this, it is necessary to meet their requirements, among which the structure of the articles and each of their parts is fundamental. Therefore, in 2024, the magazine will modify this aspect and eliminate the single template that had governed its operation, to propose two others, from which the scientific content of the article would be more objective. In this way, a template for review articles (review template) and a template for original articles (original template) is created; these are the types of articles accepted by the magazine, whose content must be 100% scientific.

Review articles:

• Their structure is based on introduction, development, and conclusions. • The introduction should clearly reflect a general approach to the topic, emphasising its importance, the most relevant and current background, and the problem that justifies the need for its research. The main objective of the article, which derives from research but is not the research itself, rather a part of it, is presented at the end. It should coincide with that stated in the abstract. The methods used for the selection of materials for the review and the collection of information, as well as the established criteria for them, are mentioned.

• The development presents a literature review characterised by in-depth analysis, with a systemic nature and a logical order, allowing an understanding of the evolution of the topic addressed, the similarities and differences in its treatment, the results, reflections and general proposals that are intended to be highlighted, resulting from the author's or authors' personal work, making their scientific standpoint evident. Therefore, it is necessary that these criteria are made clear; it is not a mere accumulation of bibliographic citations.
• The conclusions should be generalised about the content of the article and demonstrate the achievement of the objective stated in the abstract. Additionally, they should reflect the criteria adopted by the author or authors regarding the review topic, based on the analysis conducted, always with respect, ethics and constructive scientific criticism.
• The bibliographic references are as many as required by the review carried out. Therefore, only the works cited in the body of the article are included, of which 60% should be from the last 5 years. Self-citations should be avoided exceeding 30% of the total. They are arranged according to the APA bibliographic standard in its latest version, the seventh edition.

 Original articles:

•  Their structure is based on introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion and conclusions.
• The introduction should clearly reflect a general approach to the topic, emphasizing its importance, the most relevant and current background, and the issues that justify the need for its research. The main aim of the article, which arises from the research but is not the research itself, rather a part of it, is presented at the end. It should match the one stated in the abstract.
• The materials and methods describe general elements of the research carried out, based on which the objective of the article is achieved: type of study, location, date of implementation, population and study sample, inclusion and exclusion criteria of the sample, variables. It reports the main methods, techniques and procedures used for data collection, processing and analysis. They are presented clearly and with a high scientific level, as they are considered reproducible by other researchers who may need to use them in another context, to verify their effectiveness in addressing the problem in question.
• • The results presented are those that provide solutions to the stated problem and thereby allow the proposed objective to be achieved. The experimental details reported in the materials and methods section are not repeated. Evaluations or comments are not included; the focus is on description. The use of tables, charts, figures or maps is required to better illustrate the most representative data of the study. They are placed consecutively, with the title and source of information at the top for tables and at the bottom for other figures.
• The discussion is the interpretation of the results presented (not their repetition) that demonstrates their significance and practical application, which supports the achievement of the objective. Comparisons are made with results obtained by other researchers, highlighting achievements and possible limitations. This encourages reflection for future studies. The discussion should avoid becoming a review of the topic and repeating concepts that appeared in the introduction. The results of the work should also not be repeated. It includes a brief concluding summary on the scope, limitations and relevance of the research.
• The conclusions should be generalisations about the content of the article and demonstrate the fulfilment of the objective stated in the abstract.
• Bibliographic references are arranged according to the APA 7 bibliographic standard. It is suggested to use a maximum of 10 references. They should include only works cited in the body of the article and, in turn, 60% of these should be from the last 5 years. Self-citations should be kept below 30% of the total.

Both review articles and original articles are subjected to the peer review process under a double-blind model. This process is characterised by anonymity, meaning that neither the author knows which reviewers are evaluating their submission, nor do the reviewers know the author or authors of the document they are assessing. This ensures impartiality in the evaluation, so that only the scientific content is considered, not who creates it.

As part of this review method (double-blind), the documents are processed as follows:

Example 1:

Article to be evaluated that the reviewer receives

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 The process of professional formation in connection with the administration of the knowledge

El proceso de formación profesional en relación con la gestión del conocimiento

Summary

The objective of this work is conceived as presenting the importance of information management and its relationship with the professional training process for students in training, as well as the essential elements of a didactic strategy applied to the first year of the Primary Education degree at the Municipal University Branch, which contributed to the development of the professional skill of managing information. The use of different methods at the theoretical and empirical level revealed the need for its systematic development in the training process, as the student promotes a work culture based on knowledge and the use of technological support that aids the processes of…

Note: Please note that it does not contain the authors' details. 

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Example 2

Opinion received by the author once their article has been evaluated

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                                          Electronic magazine Opuntia Brava

Report

Academic Pair: 039

Article title: Ethics in Social Networks Dear reviewer, below are the indicators for the evaluation of the article. You should give an individual rating to each one on a scale from very low to very high; to do this, you should mark an X in the provided box. The overall conclusion will depend on the value you assign to each indicator.

Nro	Indicators	Very Low	Under Medium		High	Very High
1.	Relationship of the title with the problem, objective and content.			X
2.	Evaluation of the summary (informative 1 or indicative 2). Adjustment to its characteristics.			X

Note: It should be noted that it does not have the reviewer's details, only their code

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Each reviewer has a code or number in the journal's database, which is placed at the beginning in the academic pair; this is known to the director and editor who manage the evaluation process.

Once the report is received, it is converted to PDF format and sent to the author in this form to prevent alterations to the original document; it is also archived in this format. If the reviewer also attaches a copy of the article with recommendations directly on it, it is checked to ensure it does not contain the reviewer's name and if it does, this element is corrected to maintain anonymity.

Each report received from an article is processed in this way; likewise, each article with the reviewer's recommendations is attached to the report.

Alongside the double-blind approach, the editorial process of the electronic journal Opuntia Brava is distinguished by the responsibility, seriousness and sense of belonging of reviewers, authors and the editorial committee. The process is carried out transparently at each of its stages:

Stage 1 Article receipt

The reception of articles at Opuntia Brava occurs constantly, that is, article submissions are not limited to calls for papers, except in the case of a special issue. It is open to receiving new contributions online throughout the year. The academic community that follows the journal has been advised to submit their articles through the journal's platform (https://opuntiabrava.ult.edu.cu), from which submissions are downloaded weekly and placed in the journal's general database (in Excel). However, sometimes authors are unable to submit their work successfully or cannot access the journal, so an alternative submission method has been enabled via email (revistaopuntiabrava@gmail.com).

At this stage, the webmaster, academic director, editor-in-chief, editorial committee and principal author of the article are directly involved. Through both described channels, the articles are received by the webmaster and handed over to the academic director. He carries out the initial filtering or review, as part of which the article must:

1. Adhere to one of the templates provided by the magazine
2. Fulfil the essential general elements requested in the selected template
3. Submit a contribution relevant to the area of knowledge to which its topic refers, serving as a reference for other studies and research
4. Obtain an initial plagiarism evaluation of less than 30%

If the article meets these elements, it is handed over by the academic director to the editor-in-chief, who includes it in the processing database and then distributes it among the editors. If the article does not meet any essential element, the director sends it back to the main author for the necessary amendments and resubmission. The author has 30 working days for this, after which they are contacted again, and if there is no response within the next 72 hours, the submission is rejected.

Stage 2 Peer review of the article, double-blind

Once the article is included in the journal's processing database and distributed among the editors, the peer review process begins. At this stage, the editor, academic peers (reviewers), authors, and the editor-in-chief are directly involved.

The editor selects two reviewers from the pool available to the journal, based on the thematic area of the article to be evaluated; they must be external to the author's affiliated institution, one national and one international. He then prepares a copy of the article without the authors' details and sends it, along with the review form, to the selected reviewers (if both are available, it is sent at once; if one is busy, the first is sent and the second later).

The editor records the date the article is sent to reviewers and waits 30 working days, which is the time they have to carry out the evaluation. Once this period has passed, if the review report has not been received, the reviewers are contacted again and the report must be received within the following 72 hours. If that reviewer does not respond, the process is restarted and a new reviewer is assigned, who will have the same 30-day period to evaluate.

As a result of this process, the following opinions will be analysed and compared:

1. Articles with two favourable opinions (considering for this the first three options offered by the general Conclusion of the opinion model in its second table, at the end) are sent to the authors to make the indicated corrections.
2. Articles with one favourable and one unfavourable opinion (option 4 or 5 offered by the model report's general conclusion in its second table, at the end) will be assigned to a third reviewer.
3. Articles with two opposing opinions will be rejected.

If the article receives option 3 Forward for review, once the author completes the correction process, for which they have 30 working days, and sends it to the editor, the editor must forward it to that academic peer to verify compliance with their recommendations and provide a final opinion. For this, the reviewer also has 30 working days. If the reviewer, once the deadline has passed, does not carry out the re-evaluation or respond, the editor proposes to the academic director that the case be analysed in the editorial committee to determine whether it is approved or not. This will depend on the extent of the recommendations made by the evaluator and the level of compliance with them by the author.

The article will be considered accepted for publication once it has received two favourable reviews. This process may take up to four months, so authors are notified that once the time limit has passed without reaching a conclusion, they may withdraw the article, after notifying the editors, and submit it to another journal.Una vez que cada revisor concluye su evaluación, se emitirá un reconocimiento en soporte pdf, que acredita y enaltece su labor.

Stage 3 Article correction, according to the assessments of academic peers

 In this stage, the editor and the authors are directly involved.

The editor sends the author all the reviews received for their article so that they can make the corrections they deem appropriate. If the author does not agree with any recommendation, they must explain in the technical consultation with the editor or in a note if it is via digital means why they disagree and provide evidence to support their position. This will be analysed by the editorial committee, who will seek a way to resolve the conflict from the perspective of the article's adherence to the journal's guidelines.

This correction process will last 30 working days. The editor will contact the author at the end of this period if they have not submitted their amended proposal, and the author must respond within the next 72 hours; failure to do so will result in the article being rejected.

Stage 4 Final Edition

At this stage, the editor, the authors and the copy editor are directly involved. It begins once the editor has the reformulated article, based on the reports received from the peers. The final editing involves the following elements:

1. Check the fit to the selected template in detail.
2. Evaluate the grammar, writing, spelling, and scientific style of the text.
3. Review the correct placement of illustrations or tables in the text with their labels and the uniformity of the text.
4. Check detailed compliance with the APA7 standard.

As the conclusion of this edition, the editor conducts a technical consultation with the author to inform them how their article has turned out; if further corrections are needed, the author will have 30 days to make them and resubmit the amended article (if it is not submitted within that period, the editor will contact them and they must respond within the next 72 hours, otherwise, the article will be rejected).

After this, the style correction process is carried out. As part of it, the proofreader checks in detail the compliance with all the mandatory elements that the article must have and adds the header with the corresponding editorial data. For this, the collaboration of the editor and the editor-in-chief will be needed, in order to verify the reception and approval dates of the article, which are included in said header. Once completed, the proofreader delivers the article ready to the editor, who in turn delivers it to the editor-in-chief.

Stage 5 Scheduling of numbers to be published

At this stage, the editor-in-chief and the academic director are directly connected to schedule the publication of the articles. As the editor-in-chief notifies the academic director of a ready article, it is then handed over to the webmaster for immediate publication, unless a special issue has been planned and it is advisable to reserve it for that purpose.

At this stage, the academic director ensures compliance with the following requirements:
1. Verify that all articles have passed the double-blind review process, comply with the journal's general guidelines, adhere to the templates with their mandatory requirements, have complete header information, as well as declarations of conflicts of interest and authorship.
2. Have the figure defined by numbers (30 articles)

3. Verify the existence of review articles (the quantity will depend on the articles available) and original articles (the quantity will depend on the articles available).
4. Check compliance with the percentage of in-house, external, and extramural articles (according to the requirements established for this by the databases in which the journal is indexed).
The translator is responsible for translating the abstracts and keywords of each article, as well as preparing them for the English version.

Stage 6 Layout, assembly and publication

At this stage, the technical team (webmaster, designer, and programmer) and the academic director are primarily involved. Once the article is ready, the academic director hands it over to the technical team for layout and assembly. This process involves:
1. Conducting a plagiarism analysis, with results required to be below 30%.
2. Reviewing each author's ORCID codes on the official website.
3. Converting the article into PDF, EPUB, and HTML formats.
4. Uploading the article to the OJS platform.
5. Preparing the publication certificate and uploading it to the platform.
6. Designing the issue cover and uploading it to the platform.
7. Publishing the article.
8. Sending notification emails to the main authors.
9. Correcting errors.
10. Updating the issue in the databases that require it (DOAJ, HeinOnLine), once each quarter ends.

Once the article is assembled, in the preview stage, the academic director conducts a detailed review to correct any errors and be able to authorize the publication. By decision of the editorial committee, the technical team places the publication certificate alongside the article in the PDF, EPUB, and HTML formats. This allows the author to download it once they receive a notification via email that their publication is online and access it for visibility. This particular feature ensures the author has constant access to their work and publication certificate without needing to submit a request to the editorial committee.

In this way, the editorial process of the electronic journal Opuntia Brava concludes, which lasts between 20-30 weeks and is free of charge, as no fees are charged to authors for submitting and/or processing articles. The journal is funded by the University of Las Tunas, where it is based, and it is the institution that covers all financial needs of the editorial body for its operation.