THE Vice Chancellor, Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka, Anambra state, Prof Joseph Eberendu Ahaneku has stressed the dire need for lecturers of the institution to conduct researches and investigations that will address critical societal issues.The Vice-Chancellor gave the charge at the 2018 Post Graduate Research Workshop with the theme ‘Deepening Research Competence For Effective Scholarship.’
Addressing participants at the university auditorium on Tuesday, Ahaneku said those mentoring the younger generation of scholars should ensure best practices as well as conduct researches capable of solving problems, especially in their own country.
He maintained that it was not enough to have publications in all sorts of journals but the bottom line was that people should have the discipline for writing for research grants. He emphasized that one cannot be a PhD holder yet not independent in conducting researches.
The Vice Chancellor also stressed that scholars were expected to update and upgrade themselves with current trends in research investigations especially as the emphasis was on information, communication technology compliance.
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He said there was the need to properly mentor as well as groom younger researchers in order to launch them into the 21st-century research competence, adding that scholars from diverse academic endeavours were invited to the workshop to discuss various areas in research.
The host and Dean School of Postgraduate Studies Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Prof Ike Odimegwu, said the programme was organized because of the need to address complaints about poor quality of academic research conduct and output of lecturers and students in the universities.
He, however, described the workshop as an action to rectify as well as ameliorate the situation, adding that the low quality of research necessitated the workshop to improve the quality.
Odimegwu, who explained that the brainstorming session on improving quality of research was an annual event, also disclosed that they were prevailing on government to retrain all academic staff in the universities to keep them abreast with emerging trends in academia even as he pointed out that government should endeavour to fund development of research competence in order to engender qualitative output for the development of industries and the economy of the country at large.
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