Beginning with the October 2026 issue, English Leadership Quarterly introduces “Professional Reflections,” a new section designed to broaden participation and amplify diverse voices in the field. This space welcomes brief reflections of 100–200 words that share insights, practical ideas, lessons learned, or responses to previously published articles.

“Professional Reflections” provides a low-barrier entry point for emerging authors while also offering experienced authors a platform to share timely observations and wisdom gained through practice. Whether you’re reflecting on a leadership challenge, celebrating a classroom innovation, or describing how an ELQ article has shaped your work, this section creates space for the authentic, practitioner-centered voices that drive our field forward.

Submissions undergo editorial review rather than full peer review, making this an accessible opportunity for those new to academic publishing as well as seasoned contributors seeking a venue for shorter, more immediate contributions.

Submissions for “Professional Reflections” are accepted on an ongoing basis through:  ELQeditors@gmail.com

This inaugural issue under new editor Dr. Hiawatha Smith examines the evolution and future trajectory of English Leadership Quarterly. By centering the voices that have shaped and continue to shape ELQ, this issue creates a dialogue across time—honoring the journal’s legacy while charting its path forward.

Featured contributions include interviews and manuscripts from the incoming ELQ editor, the most recent editor, and a former editor, alongside parallel perspectives from current and past Chairs of the Conference on English Leadership (CEL). Through these voices, readers will gain insight into the journal’s foundational values, its responses to shifting educational landscapes, and the interconnected visions guiding both ELQ and CEL as they move forward together in supporting English and literacy leaders.

This issue will not accept open submissions. Contributions are by invitation only.

Just as the free space in a game of bingo offers everyone a better chance to win, this unthemed issue provides an opportunity for all to participate. “Free Space” creates room for English education voices whose work does not align with existing themes, fostering more inclusive opportunities to share diverse, innovative ideas that might otherwise go unheard.

This unthemed issue (which will occur once per year) continues the conversation around current developments in English education and provides a flexible publishing space for timely, relevant work. What topics, concerns, or issues do you think are important to today’s readers of English Leadership Quarterly? “Free Space” invites you to share the scholarship, innovations, and insights that matter most to you and your community. Manuscripts co-written by English teachers and other educators, broadly and inclusively defined, are highly encouraged for this issue.

Deadline for submissions: April 1, 2026

This issue accepts open submissions on any topic relevant to readers.

English and literacy learning happen everywhere, not just during official class time. As schools and communities seek to rebuild connections and engage students in authentic literacy experiences,  from student publications and drama clubs to community partnerships and youth-led digital spaces, meaningful literacy work extends far beyond the traditional curriculum. This issue explores literacy initiatives in co-curricular, extra-curricular, and community settings, asking: What can English leaders learn from literacy work within these spaces? Manuscripts that highlight innovative approaches happening outside the official curriculum, whether in school hallways, community centers, libraries, or online spaces that offer fresh insights and practical applications for English teachers and leaders are excellent for submission. 

Submissions for this theme may answer/address any of the following questions:

• How do co-curricular and community-based literacy initiatives challenge or complement traditional classroom practices?
• What models exist for sustainable partnerships between schools and community literacy organizations?
• How can English leaders support literacy work happening in informal spaces?
• What creative literacy initiatives expand definitions of literacy beyond the general curriculum?
• How do alternative literacy spaces (zine-making, podcasting, spoken word, digital storytelling, etc.) reimagine what counts as literacy work?

All submissions should provide clear implications for English leaders and practitioners.

Manuscripts co-written by teachers, students, community partners, and program leaders are especially encouraged.

In his 2024 book What Is My Value Instructionally to the Teachers I Supervise?, Principal Kafele states, “Every day matters, and to get the most of each day, it is critically important that teachers are ‘coached up’ equitably, as every teacher in the building doesn’t need the same thing. . . .” As English teaching faces increased scrutiny and teachers and leaders navigate complex literacy demands, instructional coaching has become essential, yet it often remains underexplored in English contexts. This special theme issue seeks to highlight practices, strategies, and research centered on instructional coaching in English classrooms and departments, offering practical insights for readers. 

Submissions for this theme may answer/address any of the following questions:

• How can instructional coaching support equitable teaching practices in English classrooms?
• What coaching models or approaches are most effective for English leaders working with diverse faculty and student populations?
• What can English leaders learn from the coaching experiences of teachers and leaders?
• How do English department chairs and/or literacy coaches balance support with accountability?
• What does effective coaching look like for early-career English teachers? For veteran teachers?
• How can coaching address the specific literacy and instructional challenges of English education (writing instruction, diverse texts, assessment practices, etc.)?
• What coaching practices help teachers navigate current controversies around curriculum, book challenges, or literacy instruction?

References
Kafele, B. K. (2024). What is my value instructionally to the teachers I supervise? ASCD. 

All submissions should provide clear implications and actionable strategies for English leaders engaged in coaching work.

February 2026: Special Issue | What Is Your story? Stories Matter: A Compilation of Stories Highlighting the Important Work of English Teachers and English Leaders

No longer accepting submissions.

A story communicates fear, hope, and anxiety, and because we can feel it, we get the moral not just as a concept, but as a teaching of our hearts. That’s the power of story.

—Marshall Ganz

This special issue of English Leadership Quarterly is guest edited by Dr. Hiawatha Smith and Dr. Tiffany A. Flowers. It seeks to highlight the leadership stories of both teachers and leaders in English education spaces. Stories present familiar information (Negrete & Lartigue, 2004), allowing listeners (and readers) to connect with, learn from, and build on the information shared. Stories allow authors to share their unique lived experiences, from challenges to successes. In this guest-edited issue, we want educators to discuss leadership in English education in non-traditional and traditional forms. We believe that leadership takes many forms. Leadership can include the teachers who volunteer to take on important committee work and the scholars who lead university departments in English education.

Our goal through this guest-edited issue is to elevate the voices of behind-the-scenes leaders and front-facing leaders working through some of the most tumultuous politics and celebrate their achievements, lessons learned, and wisdom. The editors of this guest issue want to amplify the voices of leaders doing everyday community work. Through this special issue, we wish to amplify the powerful and dynamic stories of various English teachers and leaders. We envision receiving solo-authored essays of approximately 1,000-2,000 words from teachers, academics, administrators, activists, and community organizers working in English Education.

We encourage authors to be creative in sharing their narrative stories. Authors should use the following guiding questions when creating their submission to the journal: Who are you as a leader, and how did you become the leader you are today? What opportunity prepared you for this experience in English spaces? How did you enter leadership? In what capacity do you lead? What has been a challenge you have experienced during your career?  How did it impact your career?  What has been a success you have experienced during your career?  How did it impact your career?  What is an untold, hidden piece of your English leadership?  What are often overlooked experiences of leadership?

References

Ganz, M. (2009). Why stories matter. Sojourners, 38(3), 16.

Negrete, A., & Lartigue, C. (2004). Learning from education to communicate science as a good story. Endeavour, 28(3), 120–124.

Email a copy of your manuscript to both guest editors by November 25, 2025: Dr. Hiawatha Smith hiawatha.smith@uwrf.edu and Dr. Tiffany A. Flowers, tflowers@gsu.edu.

August 2025: Special Issue | Learning from Participants of the Conference on English Leadership’s Emerging Leaders Fellowship Program

No longer accepting submissions.

This special issue focuses on the leadership lessons we can learn from members who have participated in the Conference on English Leadership’s Emerging Leaders Fellowship (ELF) program. The ELF program was created, according to NCTE’s CEL, to provide “leadership support, mentoring, and networking opportunities for early career leaders of English language arts programs at the Kindergarten through university levels.” Beginning leaders are invited to collaborate with a mentor from a community of highly experienced English language arts leaders and scholars whose own work can be enriched through engagement with new ideas and school contexts. Current and past participants are encouraged to share their stories including what brought them to the ELF program, what they have gained from participating, and how they have applied their learning within their literacy leadership context. This issue will not take general submissions. Any ELF mentor or fellow (or previous participant) is invited to submit for this issue.

Possible prompts to guide submissions:

• How is leadership mentoring valuable to new leaders?
• What have you learned from serving as a leadership mentor?
• What elements of the ELF program have impacted you?
• What supports do new leaders need most?

Suggested length of submissions: 700–1000 words

To submit articles for consideration, please email jenelle.williams@oakland.k12.mi.us and lizlietz@gmail.com and attach your article as a Word document with appropriate APA 7 formatting.

April 2025: Special Issue | The Role of Educational Leaders in Countering Fat Phobia and Hate in PreK–12 Schools and Teacher Education

No longer accepting submissions.

Recent issues of Language Arts and English Teaching: Practice and Critique focused on the intersections of anti-Black racism and anti-fat hate being promoted and exacerbated or challenged and countered in preK–12 English and literacy education. Additionally, NCTE sponsored a three-part webinar series throughout the spring of 2024 titled (a) Introduction to Anti-Fat Phobia and Anti-Blackness in K–12 Classrooms and Teacher Education, (b) Countering Racism and Anti-Fat Phobia, and (c) Radical Black Love to (Re)Imagine Fat in the ELA Classroom, respectively. While classroom teachers and teacher educators may be building the insights and abilities to address these issues, real change will be difficult to enact without the knowledge, support, and convictions of educational leaders.

Toward that end, this special issue of Education Leadership Quarterly seeks manuscripts that will address questions such as:  How can educational leaders support district, school, and classroom shifts towards love and affirmation for the fat body, recognizing its importance in fostering self-esteem and dismantling harmful stereotypes? How can leaders help transform educational institutions (childcare settings, K–12 schools, university programs) into sanctuary spaces for fat individuals navigating the complex intersections of race, gender, sexualities, abilities, languages, and religions? What strategies and approaches have been successful in addressing fatphobia in classrooms, schools, and districts? What role can texts, fiction and nonfiction, play in countering fatphobia and fostering love for the fat body?

For this issue, we seek perspectives that acknowledge the responsibility of educational leaders in addressing, resisting, and dismantling fat phobia. We consider preK–12 school principals, literacy coaches, district coordinators, state superintendents of education, community leaders, and college of education deans and department chairs as educational leaders. We are especially interested in work that employs a critical intersectional lens to analyze the underlying power dynamics at play, with a specific focus on size discrimination, as it pertains to issues of self-love, body image and body acceptance and then addresses the role of leaders in countering power dynamics that maintain fat-hate/bias.

Email a copy of your manuscript to both guest editors by November 4, 2024: Dr. Dywanna Smith, dysmith@claflin.edu, and Dr. Kenesha Johnson, kenejohnson@claflin.edu