The Journal of Adolescent Health's Editor-in-Chief's Annual Reflection: A Year of Endurance and Looking Toward the Future.

Now in its third year, the COVID pandemic continues to impact people of all ages in all countries of the world. Fortunately, COVID vaccines have provided hope and allowed us to look toward the future with optimism. The Journal of Adolescent Health (JAH) remains committed to publishing high-quality science that can be used to improve the health and well-being of adolescents and young adults aged 10–25 years. Recently, that commitment has led us to focus our efforts on better understanding the impact of the pandemic on young people and strategies to increase COVID vaccination rates in this population. Many recent articles examine mental health and substance use among young people as they face challenges that have emerged with the COVID pandemic, and some document inspiring adolescent and young adult resilience [[1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], [38], [39]]. Scientific articles as well as commentaries and editorials have contributed to the important ongoing discussions about COVID vaccination among this age group [[40], [41], [42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49], [50], [51]]. COVID-focused publications can be found on the JAH COVID-landing page (https://www.jahonline.org/action/doSearch?text1=COVID-19&field1=AbstractTitleKeywordFilterField).

To complement JAH's scientific articles, the JAH Intersection Committee, under the leadership of Dr. Sheila Quinn, selected the theme of COVID9TEEN for its annual contest, with the goal of contributing context to the COVID pandemic via personal narratives and photography [52]. Three winners were announced at the recent Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine Annual Meeting. The winners are receiving prizes sponsored by our publisher (Elsevier) and were honored with the publication of their art in the June 2022 issue of JAH. First prize was awarded to Andile Dube from Zimbabwe for a stunning drawing titled “A Helping Hand” [53]. Second prize was shared between Ellie Rose Matoon for a personal narrative titled, “Thoughts From a Life in Limbo,” and Caryn Coyle for a poem describing poignant experiences of a nurse practitioner working within juvenile detention centers during the COVID pandemic titled, “Imprisoned: Quarantine in Juvenile Detention [54,55].” The work of contest semifinalists will also be published in JAH over the course of the upcoming year, along with accepted JAH Intersection submissions unrelated to the annual contest theme. The full JAH Intersection collection can be found at https://www.jahonline.org/intersectioncollection.

Our focus on COVID did not diminish work directed toward other priorities. We continued our efforts to increase the impact of JAH through innovation. We presented for the second year in a row the JAH Distinguished Dozen [56]. With the goal of identifying and amplifying articles that made distinguished contributions to the field, JAH Associate Editors and I reviewed candidate articles nominated by peer reviewers, and we selected 12 articles as the 2021 Distinguished Dozen. These articles, as well as several thoughtful accompanying editorials, were highlighted in our April 2022 issue [56]. I encourage you to review and disseminate this important science to your colleagues and trainees.

Our ongoing collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) has allowed us to publish a growing number of infographics summarizing recent results from important national and international data sources [[57], [58], [59], [60]]. JAH's sponsored supplements remain a key component of our mission, allowing us to explore specific topics in greater depth. The last 12 months have seen a particularly close examination of child, early, and forced marriages and unions, with discrete supplements published in both December 2021 and March 2022 [61,62]. A supplement published in July 2021, our second focused on the Global Early Adolescent Survey, gave us a similarly deep look at gender norms [63].

A fourth supplement remains an exciting work in progress. We are very pleased to be collaborating with UNICEF on a series of between 16 and 19 articles on its Measurement of Mental Health Among Adolescents at the Population Level initiative. In order to present data supporting the initiative on a timely basis, we are publishing the articles online first as they clear peer review. We published the first articles in the series in August 2021 [64]. You can find articles in the series on our website here: https://www.jahonline.org/meas_supplement. We are hoping to publish the complete series in a bound issue later this year.

As a new initiative, we have convened the JAH International Working Group (IWG), composed of volunteer members of the JAH Editorial Board. In 2021, Associate Editor Dr. David Ross and I led IWG meetings and robust discussions about the strategies for JAH to consider that might increase the publication of high-quality research on global adolescent and young adult health and better support international authors. Initial efforts have been dedicated to improving JAH's metrics in this domain, increasing collaboration with international members of our Editorial Board, and collecting resources for international colleagues. A summary of our JAH Global Author Resources can be found in our author guidelines on our website. Elsevier's Webshop offers a range of author services—including language editing and translation—all designed to assist authors with publication and increase the impact of research: https://webshop.elsevier.com/. Researchers from low-income countries should be aware of Hinari (Research for Health), the WHO's program to provide public institutions in eligible countries with access to peer-reviewed journals and books: https://portal.research4life.org/. Of note, many of the IWG’s discussions resonated with broader themes highlighting the importance of diversity, equity, and inclusion. In 2022, Associate Editor Dr. Cherrie Boyer will colead efforts to identify strategies to increase JAH's support for diversity, equity, inclusion, and antiracism.

We still find ourselves carefully navigating a complex and evolving landscape with regard to open access publishing [65]. In January 2021, JAH was designated a “transformative” journal, indicating that our current subscription/hybrid access model journal fulfills the criteria set out by cOAlition S, the open access advocacy organization [66]. Our status as a transformative journal tells authors who are supported by cOAlition S funders that we are an approved venue for their open access work. This arrangement allows us to participate in the open access publishing framework while still protecting other authors' ability to publish their work in JAH under the traditional publishing model at no cost. In 2022, JAH again met the criteria to be designated a transformative journal.

The production of JAH takes an extraordinary amount of teamwork, and it has been gratifying to work with a talented team who has demonstrated grace during a year that required more pandemic-related endurance than anyone had originally predicted. In 2021, we received nearly 2,000 manuscript submissions. Though a slight reduction from our record COVID surge high in 2020, our 2021 submissions were still 338 higher than in 2019. This journal continues to thrive because of the hard work and commitment of our Associate Editors Cherrie B. Boyer, Ph.D., Carolyn T. Halpern, Ph.D., Debra K. Katzman, M.D., and David A. Ross, BMBCh, Ph.D.; Supplements Editor Charles E Irwin Jr., M.D.; JAH Intersection Editor Sheila Quinn, D.O.; Managing Editor Tor Berg; Editorial Analyst Teresa Dal Santo, Ph.D.; JAH's Editorial Board; Elsevier's Publishing Team led by Mr. Luke Verrillo; contributing authors; and the many professionals who very generously contributed their time providing peer review [67]. Together we have ensured that JAH is fulfilling its commitment to publishing high-quality science that can be used to improve the health and well-being of all adolescents and young adults.