Why that PhD does not turn one into qualified researcher

Having been a panellist at a recent USIU-hosted round table on the future of universities, today I return to the topic focusing on our PhDs and their relationship with local research.

USIU’s recently installed vice chancellor, Prof Tiyambe Zaleza, noted that the stimulation of research and innovation is one of the key challenges faced by our universities. And this in the context of Africa accounting for a mere 1.3 per cent of the world’s R&D expenditure, compared to 42.2 per cent from Asia, 23 per cent from Europe and 29 per cent from America. No wonder that less than 2 per cent of scientific publications emanate from Africa.

Then Commission for University Education Deputy Secretary Dr Juma Mukhwana revealed some telling statistics. Of the 536,000 students attending universities in Kenya 473,000 are undergraduates, 54,000 are studying for their Masters and only 6,735 – a mere 1.25 per cent – are undertaking PhD programmes. es. 12,000 are ostensibly full-time staff and 4,000 are part-time. (Of course many aren’t actually full-time, moving from campus to campus.)

Our universities employ over 16,000 academic staff, of whom 30 per cent are PhDs, and a further 50 per cent or so have Masters Degrees. 12,000 are ostensibly full-time staff and 4,000 are part-time. (Of course many aren’t actually full-time, moving from campus to campus.)

There are 10,000 PhDs in Kenya, and in 2015 only 369 joined their ranks. Sadly too the dropout rate among those undertaking such programmes is over 50 per cent, with less than 20 per cent finishing within the prescribed time of three years.

Only 10 per cent graduate in any year, meaning the average time taken is 10 years. A big challenge is the absence of supervisory skills, and generally the capacity to support PhD students.

To put it bluntly, universities are not ready to produce the number of PhDs required to deliver on Vision 2030’s knowledge-based economy. With many faculty collecting payment from up to four universities it’s also very hard to fill professorial positions or faculty chairs.

Our research output is also therefore very low: while South Africans publishes 20,000 papers a year, Kenyans only manage 2,000. And as for patents, 80 per cent of those registered in Kenya derive from industry and the informal sector – with some universities having managed none in the last 10 years.

Research

And what of the research that is undertaken? Is it practical? Is it useful to society? We need many more practitioners to come and share their knowledge with both students and faculty, and we need more collaboration between universities, including for joint PhD programmes.

Dr Alex Ezeh, the CEO of the Africa Population and Health Research Centre (APHRC) confessed that for a long time they couldn’t recruit PhDs from African universities, as they did poorly when interviewed. They were 5-10 years behind in their knowledge, and could not defend their intellectual positions.

So over the last six years APHRC has partnered with universities to work with doctoral candidates. The African Doctoral Dissertation Research Fellowships funded by IDRC have overcome financial obstacles for over 180 people, and through the Consortium for Advanced Research Training in Africa 140 faculty have undergone training in transferable skills for research, helping to get students to think and to challenge.

IDRC’s Director for sub-Sahara Africa Simon Carter told us his organisation is helping to take research in Africa to the next level, including through its Foundations for Innovation programme that supports science-granting councils and research chairs.

IDRC is also encouraging public-private partnerships, sourcing endowments from the private sector – as happens in countries such as Canada and South Africa and is beginning here. Such endowments also ensure that the research is focused on solving practical problems.

Dr Ezeh was worried about the glorification of teaching at the expense of research – where there are also no financial incentives. After all, why forsake the opportunity to multiply your take home pay through teaching at several universities? Research must be valued and rewarded, he said.

Universities must seek research grants, and faculty must be given time off from teaching, plus their salaries should be topped up. We must also break the steel wall between universities on the one hand and government and research institutions on the other.

Why, he asked, do academics get lost when they join government at senior levels? Why don’t more return to academia, not necessarily full-time, when they leave government? (Former PS James ole Kiyapi, now on the faculty at Eldoret University, is one who defies this norm.)

Obtaining one’s PhD is insufficient for being a fully-fledged professional researcher, Dr Ezeh pointed out: it’s just the bottom rung of the academic/research ladder. The question is how to mainstream the further progression of PhDs, including as professors and department chairs. He said lifestyle of professors do not inspire the brightest and the best to emulate them. They’d rather go into fields such as banking or ICT.

Dr Rugutt, the Director General of the National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation, told us that the overwhelming proportion of government-funded budgets allocated to its research institutions are for operating expenses, with hardly anything left for the research itself.

As a result this tends to be funded by donors, who inevitably impose their own agendas. He also said universities must open their own patent offices.

Prof Ayiro head of quality assurance at Moi University, noted that actually much research is taking place in universities around Africa, with many collaborations.

The challenge is doing it with constrained resource availability, but given this factor he felt a good effort is being made.

In my contribution, I laid into the wording of the recent advertisements for chairs of councils of our public universities, in which the only requirement stated was that they should hold PhDs – noting that this would make me ineligible! Our keynote speaker at the round table, Dr Manu Chandaria might have qualified. Good for him.
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