Intervention

Intervention Reflective Report

Introduction

My intervention aims to support students prepare work for publication, especially non-native English speakers and those from lower socio-economic backgrounds. It sets up a peer editorial group where students work together to improve their writing, navigate the pressure to ‘sound English’ or ‘sound academic’.

I am a non-native English-speaking researcher and educator. My perspective is shaped by varied educational experiences within my own family: some of my relatives are highly educated, others left school after primary education. I followed the academic path, yet, I have observed the contrast in confidence between those with formal education and those without. This awareness informs my approach to issues of access, inclusion, and academic culture.

In my professional role, I work with students who are developing academic texts for publication. I am a peer reviewer and editorial assistant for academic journals, a facilitator of UAL’s Preparing for Publication peer group, and I lead writing workshops for the Doctoral School. I regularly see how language becomes a visible barrier at this stage, particularly for students less familiar with academic conventions or writing in a second (or third) language.

I want to change the assumption, often internalised by students, that high achievement in academic writing is reserved for native English speakers and for those who come from academically privileged or higher socio-economic backgrounds. 

Academic Support offers useful one-to-one sessions and resources, but tutors are not permitted to proofread or correct grammar. This intervention aims to fill that gap by offering collaborative, peer-led language feedback that builds confidence and supports inclusion.

Context

This intervention is designed to support postgraduate students at UAL in developing their academic writing for publication, particularly those who are non-native English speakers and/or from lower socio-economic backgrounds. It is often assumed that PhD supervisors will guide students through the publishing process. But, in practice, as Alison Green (Director of the Doctoral School) identified, this support is inconsistent and tends to favour those whose supervisors are themselves actively publishing (2024, personal communication). This creates uneven access to guidance and informal mentoring.

This intervention acknowledges that barriers to publishing are not just about language proficiency. Ken Hyland (2016) argues that academic publishing is not a neutral skill, but a “socially-situated practice”, and that success depends on many factors. This includes familiarity with the discipline’s discourse, peer review systems, and access to academic networks. He argues that language proficiency is not a barrier: native and non-native English speakers alike struggle with these challenges. Jim McKinley and Heath Rose (2023) defend that non-native English speakers face added structural and linguistic barriers, reinforced by journals that privilege native norms. They analysed author guidelines in over 200 top journals and found that most enforce rigid standards that equate “good” academic English with native-speaker norms (2019). 

Even academic journals like the Third Text, which advocates for a diversity of voices and is committed to challenging Eurocentric norms, advises non-native authors to seek proofreading by native English speakers to improve their chances of publication. And, like Third Text, most academic journals state this in their submission guidelines, reinforcing structural disadvantages.

McKinley and Rose argue that sticking to a fixed idea of “standard” academic English is not only outdated but also excludes people. Since language is always changing, what counts as acceptable should reflect how it is used around the world, not just by native speakers. Zare-ee (2021) takes this further, pointing out that English’s dominance in academia is not just about clarity or quality, but also a legacy of geopolitical power. This puts students from working-class or marginalised backgrounds at a disadvantage, especially if they do not have the same access to language support or academic networks.

Inclusivity

Inclusion is essential in academic publishing because access to publishing opportunities directly affects professional advancement and academic legitimacy. My intervention aims to address the inequality inherent to academic publishing that marginalise non-native speakers and students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. It draws on Lave and Wenger’s (1991) Communities of Practice theory, which views learning as social participation. In this context, students engage with one another and talk through their writing choices, instead of being ‘corrected’ by an editor. Even if the main aim is to support language development, there are other added advantages too: students gain a better sense of structure, argumentation, and even academic identity. For example, in a case documented by Lambent Productions (2005), a Turkish student began secondary school in the UK with limited English and little grasp of foundational academic concepts — even in his first language. With strategies like peer translation, bilingual assignments, and mentoring from older students within his community, he made substantial progress.

This intervention can be understood as a form of “Affirmative Action”. It promotes diversity, rethinks meritocracy, and addresses structural imbalances by providing targeted support. Banerjee (2023) emphasises that student engagement and belief in their academic future are critical for success. By offering inclusive, flexible peer-led spaces, this intervention could support students’ sense of belonging and could help them improve their texts for publication.

Reflection

In designing this intervention, I initially considered a broader decolonial approach, questioning who gets to publish and how academic publishing reinforces dominant epistemologies. Although this critique is vital, in discussion with my peers, we concluded that this route would not yield immediate impact for students currently facing barriers to academic writing. As a result, I focused on an intervention designed to offer practical, immediate assistance.

Some of my peers were exploring interventions that were targeting similar language barriers. We discussed how we could compensate student-mentors: whether through academic credit, pay, or professional recognition.

Some ethical considerations involved authorship and editorial roles: how much support counts as co-authorship? Like a book editor, peer feedback can be significant but should be acknowledged without overshadowing student ownership.

Finally, there are risks: peer support needs to be framed carefully to avoid reinforcing stigmas or stereotypes. As Crosby, Iyer, and Sincharoen, in Understanding Affirmative Action, point out, if students feel that they did not write their work entirely on their own, it can lead to self-doubt or the belief that they did not earn their success fairly.

Action

This intervention operates as a peer-based editorial support network for students preparing materials for academic publication. It will involve two groups: those seeking support with their writing and those interested in providing peer review. Participation will be open to all, with calls for expressions of interest circulated via email. Based on this, I will match participants according to interests and experience. A preliminary meeting with students will help understand needs, set expectations, and adapt the structure. Support will be ongoing, with flexibility to accommodate demand and availability.

This initiative will help my understanding of students’ challenges with academic writing and allow me to engage with them in a more collaborative way. It challenges assumptions around merit and authorship in academic publishing. It also raises important questions about academic integrity, gatekeeping, and linguistic bias, which, I hope, would eventually lead to recognising diverse voices as academically valid.

Evaluation

Through this process, I have come to see that inclusion in academic writing is not just about improving skills, it is about rethinking who gets to write, who feels supported, and what is considered legitimate work and the barriers associated with it.

Success for this intervention would be manifested in two ways. First, in how students are engaging with academic language: are their texts developing, becoming clearer, more precise, and more aligned with academic norms? Are they learning how to revise and improve them independently? Second, success would mean students feel more confident and motivated to share their work. Do they see themselves as part of the academic conversation? Do they feel a sense of belonging and shared responsibility in knowledge creation? Like the Creative Connections model (Henrickson, Jennings and Bewick, 2024), success is not just writing better, it is creating inclusive, empowering academic relationships where students see themselves as contributors, not just learners.

Drawing from Frania Hall’s emphasis on student voice, I would focus less on data and more on student reflections, using pre and post intervention surveys and informal focus groups.

Conclusion

Although my intervention targets language to help students learn and feel confident submitting texts for publication, the deeper issue lies within academic publishing culture itself. It is not just students who need to adapt, it is the systems that determine academic legitimacy. My positionality as both facilitator and academic allows me to challenge these norms from within.

Looking ahead, developments in AI are beginning to shift how we think about language, access, and authorship. While not central to this project, AI raises important questions for future reflection around inclusivity and the democratisation of academic writing.

References

Banerjee, P. (2023) Connecting the dots: A systematic review of explanatory factors linking contextual indicators, institutional culture and degree awarding gaps. Advance HE.

Barthakur, A., Donaldson, S. and Lipsey, M. (2022) ‘Challenges in measuring qualitative impact in social interventions’, Journal of Evaluation Studies, 11(2), pp. 101–118.

Crosby, F.J., Iyer, A. and Sincharoen, S. (2006) Understanding Affirmative Action. Available at: https://diversity.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/understanding_affrirmative_action.pdf [Accessed 10 Jul. 2025].

Florian, L. (2015) ‘Inclusive pedagogy: A transformative approach to individual differences – but can it help reduce educational inequalities?’, Scottish Educational Review, 47(1), pp. 5–14. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/360271550_Inclusive_Pedagogy_A_transformative_approach_to_individual_differences_but_can_it_help_reduce_educational_inequalities [Accessed 12 Jul. 2025].

Green, A. (2024) Personal communication, 5 May.

Hall, F. (n.d.) Evaluation – A Survey of the Literature. Media School, LCC, UAL. Available at: https://ualresearchonline.arts.ac.uk/id/eprint/22772/3/EVALUATION%20-%20A%20Survey%20of%20the%20Literature%20Frania%20Hall.pdf [Accessed 10 Jul. 2025].

Henrickson, L., Jennings, G. and Bewick, B.M. (2024) ‘Belonging through Creative Connections: a feasibility study of an arts-based intervention to facilitate social connections between university students’, Cogent Education, 11(1). Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/2331186x.2024.2373181. [Accessed 11 Jul. 2025].

Hyland, K. (2016) ‘Academic publishing and the myth of linguistic injustice’, Journal of Second Language Writing, 31, pp. 58–69. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jslw.2016.01.005. [Accessed 8 Jul. 2025].

Kneale, P., et al. (2016) Evaluating Teaching Development Toolkit. York: Higher Education Academy. Available at: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/assets.creode.advancehe-document-manager/documents/hea/private/evaluating_teaching_development_in_he_-_literature_review1_1_1568037347.pdf [Accessed 3 Jul. 2025].

Lambent Productions (2005) Strategies Around the Clock [Video/DVD]. Teachers TV/UK Department of Education. Available at: https://video.alexanderstreet.com/watch/strategies-around-the-clock [Accessed 6 Jul. 2025].

Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Available at: http://wendynorris.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Lave-Wenger-1991-Legitimate-Peripheral-Participation.pdf [Accessed 11 Jul. 2025].

McKinley, J. and Rose, H. (2018) ‘Conceptualizations of language errors, standards, norms and nativeness in English for research publication purposes: An analysis of journal submission guidelines’, Journal of Second Language Writing, 42, pp. 1–11. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jslw.2018.07.003. [Accessed 8 Jul. 2025].

McKinley, J. and Rose, H. (2019) ‘Standards of English in academic writing: The authors respond’, Journal of Second Language Writing, 44, pp. 114–116. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jslw.2019.04.004. [Accessed 8 Jul. 2025].

McKinley, J. and Rose, H. (2023) The Routledge Handbook of English as a Lingua Franca in Academic Publishing. London: Routledge.

O’donovan *, B., Price, M. and Rust, C. (2004) ‘Know what I mean? Enhancing student understanding of assessment standards and criteria’, Teaching in Higher Education, 9(3), pp. 325–335. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1356251042000216642.

Saha, A. and van Lente, S. (2020) Rethinking ‘Diversity’ in Publishing. London: Goldsmiths, University of London and Spread the Word. Available at: https://www.spreadtheword.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Rethinking_diversity_in-publishing_WEB.pdf [Accessed 2 Jul. 2025].

Third Text (n.d.) Submission guidelines. Available at: http://www.thirdtext.org/submissions [Accessed 10 Jul. 2025].

Wenger, E. (n.d.) Communities of Practice: A brief introduction. Available at: https://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/ [Accessed 10 Jul. 2025].

Zare-ee, A. (2010). Sustained effects of socioeconomic status on proficiency and academic writing in English as a foreign language. TELL, 4(2), 117-140. Available at: https://www.teljournal.org/article_66109_85c526124faf5bde548ad8bf65cf9eb3.pdf [Accessed 7 Jul. 2025].

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Intervention summary proposal

What aspects of diversity do you want to consider and why? 

This intervention proposes a focused support mechanism for students whose first language is not English, specifically in the context of writing for publication. UAL academic support only addresses structural aspects of writing and tutors are not allowed to edit or proofread students’ texts. Assessment criteria at undergraduate and postgraduate levels do not penalise texts that sound written by non-native english speakers. [Not quite sure about this – I need to ask my colleagues.] However, the linguistic and stylistic demands of academic publishing are far more rigorous. These include not only clarity and grammatical accuracy, but also a highly specific, idiomatic register of English that often reflects a monolingual, monocultural norm shaped by a particular editorial culture.

The intervention aims to support students navigating this normative ideal of ‘sounding English’. (And, maybe in the future, to challenge the broader implications of linguistic hegemony in academic publishing.) 

I recognise that many students face difficulties with academic writing, however, this intervention centres on non-native English speakers, whose challenges involve difficulty in dominating stylistic conventions of Anglophone scholarly writing. 

This intervention draws directly from my own position as:

• A non-native English researcher and lecturer;
• A peer reviewer and editorial assistant for academic journals;
• A facilitator of the Preparing for Publication peer review group at UAL, which supports postgraduate students across disciplines;
• A workshop leader at UAL Doctoral School’s writing retreats.

Through these experiences, I have encountered cases where students are told to ‘polish their English’ or hire professional editors. For example, one PhD student I worked with paid over £800 for language editing, and had her paper rejected by an academic journal.

What I want to implement:

The issue is complex, and I do not intend to overhaul the entire culture of academic writing. Instead, my intervention aims to offer practical support to students who need help with writing now. Possible approaches might include a peer editorial support group focused on helping students refine and adapt their language for academic publication; toolkit of how to use AI tools to support the process of ‘Englishing’ and ‘academicising’ their texts (if AI can actually help); workshops/discussions with journal editors to understand their expectations and biases in relation to academic writing.