The ScholarBridge Review · Volume 1, early 2027
A journal of pre-university research
Selective, edited, and free to read online, with no submission or publication fees for authors. The best essays and research we see from school-age students, given a serious place to live.
What the Review is
Students who do real intellectual work before university have almost nowhere serious to put it. School magazines are read by the school. Academic journals are, rightly, for academics. And the space between is crowded with services that will "publish" a teenager's paper for a fee, in venues that exist for exactly that transaction.
The ScholarBridge Review is our answer: an edited journal that publishes a small amount of genuinely strong pre-university work, selected by academics against standards anyone can read, with the author's consent and the author's copyright intact. Volume 1 arrives in early 2027, carrying the winning and commended essays from the Research Question Prize alongside completed Research Scholar work that passes editorial review.
It is deliberately small. A journal that publishes everything recommends nothing.
The rule that defines it
No submission or publication fees
Much of the "student journal" market is pay-to-publish: a submission charge, a processing fee, a paid fast track, and a certificate at the end. That model has a name, and it is not publishing. The ScholarBridge Review does not charge authors submission or publication fees, and acceptance cannot be bought, including by our own students. That is permanent policy.
- No submission fee
- No publication or "processing" fee
- No paid route to acceptance: a place in the Review cannot be bought
- The online Review is free to read, for anyone, without an account
Editorial standards
Student-authored, and checked
Everything published is the author's own thinking and prose, held to the same standard as the Research Question Prize: AI use limited to spelling and grammar and declared, sources cited, and work we do not believe to be the student's own not published. Our generative AI policy applies in full.
Selected on merit, published with consent
Work reaches the Review by earning a place, never by paying for one, and appears only with the author's consent, and a parent or guardian's where the author is under 18. Authors are credited by first name, year group, and country unless they ask otherwise. Copyright stays with the author throughout.
Read by academics, conflicts recused
Selection is made by the same panel that judges the Research Question Prize: ScholarBridge academic staff and mentors, reading blind wherever the format allows. Where a reader has any connection to an author, that reader does not judge the piece; a mentor never takes part in the decision on their own student's work.
Honest about what it is
The Review is an edited journal of pre-university work. It is not an indexed academic journal, it has no impact factor, and it claims none. Publication here means a piece of school-age work met a published standard, and nothing more. Anyone who tells you a publication credential gets a student into university is selling something.
These standards are published before the first issue on purpose, so they can be held against us. Our site-wide editorial standards, generative AI policy and safeguarding policy apply to the Review in full.
Two ways into Volume 1
Open submissions are planned for later issues and will be announced on this page. The first issue draws from these two routes, and neither carries any fee.
Route one
Enter the Research Question Prize
Free, worldwide, ages 14 to 18: explain a difficult question to a curious 12-year-old in no more than 1,000 words. Winning and Highly Commended entries from the November 2026 round are published in Volume 1, with each entrant's consent. Entries close 15 November 2026.
The prize, the criteria, and the entry form →Route two
Research Scholar work
Every Research Scholar may submit their completed research to the Review at no additional cost: mentor sign-off, the student's final revisions, then editorial review, with consent from the student and family before anything is published. Work that is not yet publication-ready receives a revision request rather than a place. Acceptance is editorial and never guaranteed, which is exactly what makes a published piece worth having.
The Research Scholar programme →Volume 1, early 2027
Be there when the first issue publishes
Leave an email and we will send you Volume 1 of The ScholarBridge Review when it is published. Useful for a student weighing an entry to the prize, a parent, or a teacher who wants to put the first issue in front of a class.
For teachers and librarians
The Review is free to read and free to be published in, which makes it safe to put in front of students: there is no purchase at the end of it. If you teach students aged 14 to 18, the practical step is the Research Question Prize, which is the open route into the first issue and carries its own certificates and cash prizes. Every entrant gets something honest to cite; the strongest get published.
If you would like the first issue for a school library or classroom when it publishes, leave an email above, or write to [email protected].
Frequently asked questions
Does it cost anything to be published in the Review?
No. The ScholarBridge Review does not charge authors submission or publication fees, and there is no paid route to acceptance; that is permanent policy, and it applies to ScholarBridge students exactly as it applies to everyone else. A journal that charges students to appear in it is a vanity press, whatever it calls itself. The online Review is free to read.
How does work get into Volume 1?
Two routes. The winning and Highly Commended essays from the November 2026 round of the Research Question Prize are published with each entrant's consent, and a parent or guardian's where the entrant is under 18. Alongside them, completed Research Scholar projects submitted at no additional cost that pass editorial review. Open submissions are planned for later issues and will be announced on this page.
Is publication guaranteed for ScholarBridge students?
No. Submitting is part of the Research Scholar programme; acceptance is not. Completed work goes through mentor sign-off, the student's own final revisions, and editorial review, and a piece that is not yet publication-ready receives a revision request rather than a place. The moment publication became automatic it would stop meaning anything, for the students published in it most of all.
Is this a peer-reviewed academic journal?
No, and we will never describe it as one. It is a selective, edited journal of pre-university work, read and chosen by academics against published standards. That is a real thing worth having, and it is not the same thing as an indexed scholarly journal. We state the difference plainly because plenty of services blur it on purpose.
Who owns the copyright?
The author, always. Publication in the Review is a licence to present the work, not a transfer of ownership. An author can ask for their piece to be removed at any time and we will take it out of the online Review and any future printing; copies already printed cannot be recalled.
When does Volume 1 come out?
Early 2027. The November 2026 round of the Research Question Prize closes on 15 November and results go to entrants by 10 December, after which consented winning and commended essays are prepared for the first issue. Leave an email above and we will send you the issue when it publishes.