By Agabus Pwanagba
The Director, Office of Research and Development (ORD), University of Jos, Prof. Musa Gaiya, has stated that for any university to have visibility, such institution must conduct and publish research.
He also said that without research, teaching will be handicapped.
Gaiya stated this while presenting a paper titled: Office of Research Development (ORD); Mandate, Activities, Challenges and the way forward; during a similar organized by ASUU University Jos Branch, held at its Secretariat in Jos.
He said, “There are three things that a lecturer is suppose to do; the first is to teach, the other one is to do community service, but the very important one is to do research.
“Without research, even the teaching will be handicapped, so you need do research to be able to teach well, so teaching depends on research.
“When a lecturer does not do research his teaching suffers and the students lag behind.”
He maintained that universities are visible, only when they conduct and publish research.
Gaiya acknowledged that one of the major challenge hindering research is funding.
The Director however said if institutions can make applied researches which would be sold or have patent rights, they get donors and funding would be available for more research.
Also speaking on the topic: The PhD and Masters Process: How to Circumvent Bottlenecks and Graduate on Time; Prof. Jane Ande of the Department of Accounting University of Jos, said, “The major problem is the student himself, if the student does not know why he/she is carrying out that research, especially for a PhD, that student will not graduate.
“No matter how you have a good supervisor, no matter the environment, even if everything is available, the student is the main bottleneck for himself, until you get to that point you know this is your work, and you need to take it headlong, you find by God’s grace, people will corporate with you; your department and your supervisors.”
On a situation whereby a supervisor is demanding for something from the student before doing his job, she said “ASUU has the ethics and grievances committee you can report such case to ASUU.
“It’s wrong for any supervisor to make demands from any student, and it is also wrong for the student to be making presentation of gifts to a supervisor while he/she is being supervised; wait when your through with your program, if you wish you can now appreciate your supervisor.
On student being victimized if he/she reports, Ande said, “If the student is victimized the better for him/her, then a change will occur; the supervisor will be changed and call to order.
“But before even reporting to ASUU, the student has to start the process from the departmental level, that could have been handled.
“I’m happy also that you don’t charge students these days, because the practice has been to charge students certain levies, they keep paying one thing the other outside their school fees, I think is wrong, so the University should be able to take care of the logistics during the seminar presentations, except they want to support on their own, they are not compelled,” she explained.
