Research and Development (R&D) v/s Research and Publications (R&P)

The University of Mauritius has a rigorous system of peer-review when it comes to assessing applications from academic staff for promotion purposes. The promotion criteria are divided into three distinct categories namely teaching, research and service. Most staff is promoted to higher grades based on their research marks. A quantitative marking system allocates marks for publications and the conduct of funded research projects. Every year academic staffs of the university are promoted from lecturer to senior lecturer to associate professor until they reach the grade of professor. This gives an indication that the performance of the university in terms of research is a healthy one. On the other hand when we look at the recent quality audit report we find that one of the faculties has had more than a hundred research publications over one or two years. However, the report including the recent visitor’s report highlight the main weakness of the university to be research. Some have phrased it as meaningful research. Others have highlighted the need for research in areas of national interests etc.

Where is the problem then?

We are very often confronted with the term R&D when the theme of research is brought up either in the industrial sector or in academia.  Research is basically a process of ‘free’ inquiry into areas or elements about which we want to find logical answers to the questions that we have. We might want to explain why something is the way it is, or what is the best solution to a specific problem that we encounter, or how can we keep on improving on things that are already working well. Research is a process that takes time. As the name implies, research is about search and search again and may be search until you find the answer or you give up. Hence the term, re-search. It is a process that involves a methodical and or methodological approach to inquiry and there is an outcome at the end. Whether it is about collecting data and making sense out of them or pushing your brains to its limits to reflect and try to explain things, research is about looking in some depth at elements of interest or concern to the researcher or the research community. 

In developed countries it is widely said and proven that research has been the driving force behind innovation that leads to the socio-economic developments of the countries through industrialisation, the design and development of new products and services to the global markets. This is how the term research and development has been coined, I believe. Research leads to the exploration of new ideas, which in turn are developed into products and services that can be commercially exploited or that can lead to significant improvement to the community (common good). Naturally speaking, research and development activities often span over years, even decades and in some cases more than that.

In contrast to the above, our promotion system looks at the number of research publications of academics hence I have coined the term research and publications. When people engage in a rat race of research and publications we often end up with little or no applications of the research. Researchers are driven by the mindset where after a paper is successfully published in a peer-reviewed journal, then they move on to undertake the next ‘research’ with a publishability prospect. The other route many will take to distort the value of research is to fit themselves into all possible situations where their name could figure out on a published work to earn some marks. Hence we find ourselves being a bit the jacks of all trades under the umbrella of ‘multidisciplinary research’.

Publications is a means to disseminate the research findings and to provide others with a benchmark or reference point on what is already available and what can be done. In the earlier days we had no choice than to have recourse to paper-based publishers and publishing and dissemination of one’s work was a tedious task. Only a ‘select’ category of persons could have access to those facilities. Nowadays with Web 2.0 where anyone can have his or her own site or blog dissemination of one’s work is much easier than before. Publications through publishers is not the only way to demonstrate scholarship as digital scholarship is gaining ground extra fast as advocated by Prof Martin Weller of the Open University of UK.....

Effectiveness of Personalised Learning Paths on Students Learning Experiences in an e-Learning Environment

Personalisation of e-learning environments is an interesting research area in which the learning experience of learners is generally believed to be improved when his or her personal learning preferences are taken into account. One such learning preference is the V-A-K instrument that classifies learners as visual, auditory or kinaesthetic. In this research, the outcomes of an experiment are described after students in the second year of university were exposed to a unit that was redesigned to fit in the V-A-K learning styles. It was found that the was no performance improvement when the students were exposed to that specific personalised learning environment and it was surprisingly noted from the statistical evidence that they underperformed in general both with respect to their previous performances and their performances in the same course but for a different unit that served as a control. The personalisation framework used an adaptive method to generate learning paths for each student and it was found that the method performed satisfactorily in its selection process. The findings of this research adds to the existing body of discourse and consolidates the belief that learning styles as determined by self-assessment instruments do not necessarily improve performances. On the other hand, it brings an interesting observation with respect to e-learning environments and the use of multimedia. A pedagogical method of instructional design that brings a sound balance in the use of different elements can indeed be of universal application and each and every learner will find his or her space in it. Indeed working towards more flexibility and adaptability of the environment might be a better approach rather than to work on the adaptivity of the environment.

Keywords: Personalisation, Learning Objects, Learning Styles, Online Learning, Adaptation, Multimedia Learning, VAK Instrument

European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning

Learning Design Implementation for Distance e-Learning: Blending Rapid e-Learning Techniques with Activity-based Pedagogies to Design and Implement a Socio-constructivist Environment

This paper discusses how modern technologies are changing the teacher-student-content relationships from the conception to the delivery of so-called ‘distance’ education courses. The concept of Distance Education has greatly evolved in the digital era of 21st Century. With the widespread use and access to the Internet, exponential growth has been experienced in the field of multimedia and web technologies. These developments have greatly reduced the significance of the term ‘distance’ in Distance Education.

Consequently, the term distance stands as a paradox in the globalised networked environments. As a result with new communication and collaboration tools, and possibilities to disseminate high quality audio, video and interactive materials over the information superhighway, the educational design process of distance education materials has new perspectives to explore in order to improve and even re-engineer the overall ‘distance’ teaching and learning concept.

This paper looks at how the educational design process changes with technology and provides a few examples of how modern tools and techniques are being used and implemented to design high quality (socio)-constructivist learning environments. It proposes an integrated model for learning design supported by implemented case-studies in the context of learning transformation processes that are ongoing at the University of Mauritius. The aim is to demonstrate how the blending of innovative technologies and pedagogies can result in high quality constructive learning experiences that eliminate the ‘distance’ paradox in so-called distance learning environments.

European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning

The VCILT: Why is it the pioneer in e-education in Mauritius?

About us

The VCILT was setup in 2001,with the aim to modernize the distance education concept by fully utilizing the possibilities offered by IT-enabled networked systems and the Internet.The VCILT started with the vision of being a service centre to assist academics in developing e-learning courses and to use ICT as a tool to enhance the teaching and learning process. This methodological approach did not really work as it emerged that the major stakeholders (students, teachers, academics, government) were not psychologically nor technically ready to embrace such innovative concepts.

In 2004 after three years of struggle with only a few academics trying out the e-learning approach, the VCILT realigned its strategy taking into account the national priorities and introduced a teaching, research and development arm within the Centre. The first online programme of studies the Masters in Computer-Mediated Communication and Pedagogies was launched targeted at school educators and university academics to build capacity in the educational technology field.

In 2008, the VCILT worked on the integration of text-to-speech technology in e-learning courses, a technique which turned into a rapid e-learning development methodology. This technique is currently being disseminated both in Mauritius and in Africa through conferences and funding from COL and Microsoft.

In 2009, the VCILT launched a top-up degree in Educational Technology which provided to so far more than 150 school teachers with an innovative route to upgrade their qualifications. This course is transforming the educational practices in schools as it is equipping teachers with the competencies to transform the Mauritian classroom in a digital classroom. The VCILT has also introduced a general education module on Educational Technology to first year students and 1000 first-year students enrol yearly on the course. This is a grass-root activity aimed at inculcating a digital education culture in aspiring educators. 

In 2010, the VCILT received the COL Excellence Awards in Education. In 2012, in a traditional public university of a developing small-island state with economic constraints, the VCILT has introduced 5 Online Programmes, with 8 parallel cohorts constituting a total of 300 enrolled students and more than 5000 users university-wide of its e-learning platform. It has emerged as one of the leaders in education technology in the African Region and which has become nearly self-sustainable economically.

Educational Transformation

 

The major barrier towards educational transformation in the ICT era is resistance to change. The transformative approach is 3-fold(1):inculcate new educational culture in aspiring educators from their first year of University education itself, (2) provide a route for in-service educators to upgrade their qualifications (better income, and promotion prospects) through an innovative degree in education technology by transforming them into digital migrants, and (3) influence policy makers by demonstrating that technology has increased access to education and has transformed traditional practices.

The impact on society is that more students are able to secure a place (a virtual seat) at the University where undergraduate education is free; teachers are able to maximise on the use of technology in the classroom thereby diminishing the divide between the poor and the digital native and the policy makers are convinced of investing more on innovative learning technologies for the common good.  

 

Innovation, inclusion and diversity

 

The VCILT's nature of  activities in a traditional university is considered as innovative in practice. Educational Change agents are formed since the first year of University itself. The Online Top-Up degree in Educational and Instructional Technology is a first in Mauritius where their existing teacher qualications and experience count as the main eligibility criteria for admission.Teachers no longer have to embark on completely new disciplines if they want a degree and they do not need to wait for years to upgrade their teaching qualifications based on senority criteria.

On the other hand the courses are conceived on activity-based learning that focus on technology-based competency-building rather than content mastery. Course contents on a majority of the modules are OERs that have been repurposed. This is a novel practice as the project  succeeded in getting the concept of OERs to be an accepted practice in a university where traditional quality assurance processes are key.   

 

The online programmes of the VCILT target school leavers who do not secure a conventional place in university, and in-service educators. Undergraduate free education means the needy and those with average results can secure a place in the University on an online programme. Teachers have the opportunity to access University education, a right which was kind of denied to them in the past unless they possessed satisfactory secondary education and embarked on a discipline afresh.

Empowering teachers of public schools in the digital age means greater social justice to needy students who do not have access to technology at home as they will benefit from the optimal technology use and facilities in schools. The free and open learning resources created and disseminated online contributes further towards increasing access to informal learning which will benefit the public at large, and external institutions in particular and deprived African regions on a global basis. 

The role of Research Assistants in Research and Development Activities

Following a recent discussion among university academics one person emitted the view that academics should do the research themselves and should refrain from hiring research assistants. Research assistants are believed to eat up to 80% of the costs for research projects and instead the view that was emitted was to rather use funds earmarked for research to purchase equipment and to revamp the university labs.

Let us now open the debate and the discussion around the key questions here:

• Should academics refrain from taking research assistants and instead should do the ''research'' themselves
• Do academics have a well-balanced workload model that allow them enough them to plunge themselves in real research and development activities?
• Is the mass purchase of equipment a more productive and efficient approach than a good supervision and guidance of a research assistant towards the pursuit of new knowledge?
• Are research assistants only suitable to be hired to do surveys and data collection activities only?
• How will a small country like Mauritius build capacity if we get rid of research assistants taking into account that most post-secondary institutions in Mauritius are teaching-intensive institutions?

We keep talking of the human capital and its importance for the progress of the country. Is it not a paradox if we stop having recourse to research assistants on research and development projects?

Some facts from personal experience:

1. I, myself joined the University as a research assistant in 2001 at the VCILT. Ten years later I am a senior lecturer in education technology and heading the unit since 2009. A few strategic achievements include the center being a finalist in the WISE 2009 awards, the recipient of the COL award of Excellence in 2010. We have actively published in peer-reviewed journals, presented in conferences and invited as guest speakers on a few occasions.
2. 2009-2011 we were working on a EU-ACP funded project SIDECAP and we recruited a part-time research assistant on the project. The outcomes: a YouTube Channel disseminating video lectures on a number of educational topics, repurposing of open-educational resources that are used in our online diploma and BSc programmes, conduct of capacity-building workshops with educators on the innovative use of ICT in education.
3. In 2009-2010 a research assistant worked on the research project on the integration of text-to-speech systems in the development of self-learning video lectures. A small project where the funding 2000 USD out of the 2500USD earmarked for the project was used to pay a research assistant led to the formalisation of a rapid e-learning development methodology that brought us so far about 40000USD worth of consultancy projects.

From my own experience, the only lesson I can retain here is that although we need the right tools to do the work, the best investment you can make is in the human capital. The equipment have a very short lifespan and get obsolete in no time, while the human capital and knowledge generated remain for a much longer time. Not investing in human resources and only investing in technology and equipment is a wrong approach and recruiting people without giving them the appropriate tools is also not a wise idea. This brings us back to the old golden rule of thumb: Keep a balance of both.