Douglas i BC TEAL Journal Volume 4 Number 1 (2019): i–iii Retrieved from https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 Editorial Scholar-Practitioners Contributing to the English as an Additional Language Teaching and Learning Community’s Knowledge Resources Scott Roy Douglas University of British Columbia (Okanagan Campus) Abstract This editorial explores the underlying reason for the journal and articulates a stance that promotes scholarship as a shared endeavour of everyone in the field of English as an additional language teaching and learning. It further offers a definition of a scholar-practitioner that underscores professional growth, content and pedagogical knowledge, articulated language, and connections between teaching and research. The six articles in the current issue are summarized in three groups related to higher education and English for academic purposes, English language proficiency testing and student success, and TESOL certificate and graduate student experiences. From the Editor The BC TEAL Journal exists to promote scholarship related English as an additional language (EAL) teaching and learning, with a particular emphasis on British Columbia. The journal takes a stance that promotes scholarship as a shared endeavour of everyone in the field, with the roles of teachers, theorists, and researchers understood as interchangeable and shared. Teachers engage in research and build theory, theorists test theory through teaching and research, and researchers put findings into practice and develop principles to guide that practice. Thus, scholarship and practice become intertwined, with the BC TEAL Journal providing an outlet to share that scholarship and build the community’s knowledge resources. With the intertwining of scholarship and practice, the authors, peer reviewers, editors, and readers of the BC TEAL Journal can be conceptualized as scholar-practitioners. Macintyre Latta et al. (2017) have identified four aspects that help define what it means to be a scholar- practitioner. First of all, being a scholar-practitioner entails a deep commitment to continuous professional growth, with scholar-practitioners seeing themselves as students of learning throughout their careers. Next, scholar-practitioners understand that knowing how to teach is just as important as knowing what to teach. This pedagogical and content knowledge comes from the teaching and learning community, and as scholar-practitioners draw from that community, they also commit to sharing with the community to guide and support other educators. Third of all, scholar-practitioners develop a language for articulating how they teach as well as why they teach the way they teach to strengthen education both at home and farther afield. Finally, scholar-practitioners read the literature in their field to find connections between teaching and research while growing their abilities to understand this literature with a critical mind and, when applicable, use or adapt it for their own teaching and learning contexts. The current issue of the BC TEAL Journal presents the work of nine scholar-practitioners in six articles. Two of the articles in the current issue focus on higher education and English for https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 Douglas ii BC TEAL Journal Volume 4 Number 1 (2019): i–iii Retrieved from https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 academic purposes (EAP). The first article in this issue identified the importance of teaching independent study skills in an EAP setting. Time management, reflective skills, and focus strategies were key elements that benefitted students (Landry, 2019). Jabeen, Wang, and Cheng (2019) also looked at EAP and higher education. They reviewed the literature related to academic engagement, social integration, and academic socialization for students using EAL in post-secondary settings. Their review underscored the importance of supporting students using EAL as they engage with a possibly unfamiliar academic culture. Two more articles in this issue are also concerned with EAL in post-secondary settings, but focus more on English language proficiency testing. Devos (2019) investigated the English language proficiency of students in their first term of studies at a post-secondary polytechnic institute, and then compared the differences based on language and educational backgrounds, with the goal of creating locally developed testing instruments to support students. Also in a post-secondary setting, Stigger (2019) carried out a review of the literature related to international student success and performance on the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) examination. She found positive and negative correlations between success and IELTS scores as well as a theme related to language ability and social adaptation. Finally, the current issue has two articles exploring the experiences of certificate and graduate students in the field of teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL). Wu (2019) asked what factors contributed to graduates from a TESOL certificate program finding TESOL- related jobs. She found a wide range of employment outcomes that depended on the forms of capital they held in the TESOL profession. At the graduate student level, Anderson and Okuda (2019) wrote about their experiences completing their manuscript-style doctoral dissertations, outlining elements specific to writing this type of dissertation and providing guidance to graduate students and their supervisors. With the completion of the 2019 issue of the BC TEAL Journal, six articles that underwent mutually anonymous peer review, in which the identities of the authors and the reviewers were kept confidential from each other, have now been published. Many thanks go out to all of the volunteer reviewers and editors who contributed their time and effort to making this issue a success. As the scholarly journal of the Association of British Columbia Teachers of English as an Additional Language (BC TEAL), the journal continues to contribute to the organization’s mission to raise awareness, provide professional development, and share expertise in the field of English as an additional language teaching and learning. References Anderson, T., & Okuda, T. (2019). Writing a manuscript-style dissertation in TESOL/applied linguistics. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 33–52. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/334 Devos, N. (2019). Comparing first-term students’ English language proficiency at a Canadian polytechnic institute. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 53–83. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/335 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/334 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/334 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/335 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/335 Douglas iii BC TEAL Journal Volume 4 Number 1 (2019): i–iii Retrieved from https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 Jabeen, R., Wang, P., & Cheng, L. (2019). Academic engagement, social integration, and academic socialization: English as an additional language in higher education. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 95–107. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/337 Landry, M. (2019). The efficacy of teaching independent study skills within English for academic purposes programs. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 1–12. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/316 Macintyre Latta, M., Cherkowski, S., Crichton, S., Klassen, W., & Ragoonaden, K. (2017). Investing in communities of scholar-practitioners. Teacher Learning and Professional Development, 2(1), 32–47. Retrieved from http://journals.sfu.ca/tlpd/index.php/tlpd/article/view/31 Stigger, E. (2019). The correlation between IELTS scores and international students’ academic success: A literature review. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 84–94. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/339 Wu, Z. V. (2019). Factors contributing to TESOL employment: A graduate perspective. BC TEAL Journal, 4(1), 13–32. Retrieved from https://ojs- o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/336 The BC TEAL Journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Copyright rests with the authors. https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/346 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/337 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/337 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/316 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/316 http://journals.sfu.ca/tlpd/index.php/tlpd/article/view/31 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/339 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/339 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/336 https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/336 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/