Are Research Methodology Lectures Half Preparing Students?
By:Kandjengo kaMkwaanyoka
For the past two years, the government, through the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA), has had the national census postponed. In my view, this is one of the issues that is supposed to cause an uproar from the public.
In a literally sense, we should stand up and demand half a billion Nam dollars that NSA wanted to complete the census process from politicians who together with treasury did not see the need to do.
But I have finally pieced things together about why the public and many institutions or even companies did not stand up to demand government fund the census – the private sector even offered donations to NSA, so I understand. I will give and dwell on one reason that I have observed for the past five years why the public did not mind if the country does the census or not.
In my free time, I do assist final-year students with their research proposals and in completing the whole paper if needed. From the observations I made and the experience of interacting with various students, first-degree students, and masters – the conclusion is the same. One of the two, between the student and the lecture, is doing the bare minimum. Just to add, I have dealt with students from all big tertiary institutions in the country, so my conclusion is the same.
I want to point out that Research Methodology lectures are doing the bare minimum to prepare the students – this mainly emanated from the fact that most of the students do not even understand the value of doing research. They all just want to get done with it; they just view it as a stumbling block on their way to getting their degrees. Now with this mindset, what research paper do you expect from these students?Secondly, how do you expect them to value consistent and timely production of data in the country?
As I said, I anecdotally arrived at the conclusion of why Namibians did not give a fuss about whether the country does a census or not. They have minimal understanding of why it should be done and its value to national planning and efficient allocation of public resources. This is where now I come for the lecturers and the academic world that prepare these students for research. What are they instilling in these kids or students to hate doing research/thesis and how are they delivering research methodology that many are failing to comprehend?
Many will say they are working and they do not have time to do the paper. I understand. But, at least, have the basics even to write your problem statement. At least provide an outline of what your proposal and your study should be. To make it worse, most of the students just come to understand the value of data and its methodologies at the proposal stage.
The majority just opt to go for shallow qualitative studies and utilise questionnaires to get information – even the economics and science students who have been exposed to some statistical and econometrics tools. Qualitative is supposed to be the hardest, but locally we seem to use it more often in our studies.
There is something wrong with how the academic world is preparing students in statistics, econometrics, and research methodology that gets students not to be interested, not wanting or valuing research at all. With no accountability from the side of the university on the quality of students, they supply to the market. When I complain or confess that my practical econometrics is quite weak, people tell me to go on YouTube and learn.But do we ever hold the lecturers accountable?
The students pay their money for the course, materials and transport every day, and rent apartments just to come to school for a certain stock of knowledge to be attained.This includes appreciating the value of research in the economy.
We aspire to take advantage of the 4IR but the majority of us cannot do research. Innovation commands a high level of research and market scrutiny to come up with solutions. Furthermore, students and universities around the world are leading in such innovation, with thesis papers providing breakout solutions in various fields. Now if our students are not prepared to undertake proper research to solve economic and social issues, we will ever wait and beg other countries for assistance in things that can be solved locally.
I know many lecturers do not want questioned by a layman with no master’s or doctorate. But their products are here, they cannot even understand random sampling. I have tried to toughen up on those I assist. My rule is:”I cannot do your proposal for you, either we do it together or go find someone else”.
This approach has revealed so much to me, I decided to point a finger at Research Methodology lecturers who are preparing these students. Two things have emerged; the students are not interested or even know why it is important to do the research beyond it being required to pass. Secondly, the students just lack the basics of how to do a proposal and the study itself. And before you refer them to YouTube, we should address the bare minimum factor from lecturers and accept that students choose the university route, not YouTube. They invest funds. After graduating we struggled to get jobs that we thought we are even over-qualified for. We do not realise that the quality of our degrees contributes to the rejections, while our counterparts from South Africa get scooped after graduation.
Research is quite critical, the country needs to build its own body of literature rather than listening to others constantly. Universities should lead in innovations by allowing students to explore research wildly. Lecturers just need to prepare them well beyond recommending textbooks and YouTube videos. Otherwise, the full-time mode should be restructured because at this point, students are teaching themselves and they aren’t doing great.
There are so many aspects to look at when it comes to the Namibian education system – from primary, secondary to tertiary level. If we do not produce better researchers nobody will go investigate these issues. Moreover, a few will value the outcomes of the studies being done and implement the recommendation.
We should be careful with the half-prepared labour products/graduates we are sending to the market; they are your future doctors and finance ministers. Email: gerastus16@gmail.com