Reinvigorating research excellence in doctoral training in Uganda universities: Gaps and challenges

Abstract

Research is a cornerstone for innovative doctoral training given its central role ecosystem of quality knowledge production. The implication is that research excellence produces well loaded and undoubted knowledge. Moreover, there is a growing demand manifested in three overlapping categories: that is 1) increased employability skills training; 2) the development of industry- and end-user engaged programs; and 3) flexible pathways to the PhD. The Uganda’s growing economy will thrive through research and innovations that is widely acknowledged in both policy and scholarly discourse. However, in Uganda, there is shortage of a critical mass of doctorates to train innovative researchers and undertake translatable research. Doctoral education, is the engine for producing researchers, but in Uganda it is still largely traditional, essentially theoretical and academically oriented in Ugandan universities. The aim of the study was to examine the processes necessary to invigorate research excellence through innovative doctoral education in Ugandan universities underscoring the need to: to examine national structures, policies and frameworks guiding research excellence; and to examine institutional structures, policies, processes and practices supporting research excellence. Through a Participatory Action Research (PAR), we worked together with policy makers at the national and institutional level, and policy and programme implementers at the institutional level collecting data through documents review, interviewing and Focus Group Discussions (FDG). Findings revealed that whereas institutional documents defined a doctoral degree that demanded research excellence in terms of rigour and relevance, there was misalignment between institutional aspirations to attain research excellence expressed in the documents and the actual practice at the units offering doctoral education and training in Uganda. Most common doctoral programmes offered were PhDs by research only. Doctoral students were required to undertake cross-cutting courses to widen their knowledge base but the mono-disciplinary focus of the traditional PhD has come under criticism for limiting opportunities for cross-fertilization. The recommendations are that there is need to develop a research agenda for the curriculum of doctoral education, diversification of training programs which deal with formal, informal and the hidden curriculum, and to acknowledge that not all disciplines/fields require the same reforms in the design of doctoral programmes. Also research excellence should be based on the differentiated nature of forms of doctoral education from disciplinary perspectives.