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Carnegie Programme to Strengthen Research Management in African Universities
- Background with the ACU
- The 2007 Project
- The Current Project - 2009-2011
Background with the ACU
Under its international programme, since 1999, the Carnegie Corporation has focused on strengthening universities and academic communities in sub-Saharan Africa and Eurasia. It supports individual capacity-building programs and research, dissemination and outreach on the educational landscape in selected sub-Saharan African countries (South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Ghana and Nigeria).
Carnegie also plays a significant role in strengthening Research Management through a programme of development in its member universities, which is for the most part coordinated by the ACU. The Society of Research Administrators International (SRA) which has significant expertise in the area also works closely with the Corporation to deliver development programmes in member universities. Carnegie’s focus is its member institutions, however, best practice, reports and lessons learned (from Carnegie funded projects) are disseminated to the wider ACU membership via the activities of the ACU’s research management programme.
In 2001 the ACU ran a DFID-funded benchmarking seminar, held in Durban, to raise awareness and gauge the existing polices and structures to support research management in African universities. The establishment of the Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association (SARIMA) followed soon after, with the participant institutions from this seminar taking a leading role in its development.
By 2005, when the ACU and SARIMA ran a follow-up seminar in Cape Town, Carnegie had become an interested party, seeking to introduce lessons learned in Southern Africa to its member institutions based in East and West Africa. The Corporation provided funding for its member institutions to attend the 2005 seminar, which was aimed at those responsible for considering the strategic direction of research management within their institutions. The event also sought to identify what resources the institutions themselves had at their disposal to invest in the area, how they perceived the range of research support services available
The 2007 Project
Carnegie, recognising that external support would be vital in sustaining the work started at the above-mentioned events, funded the 2007 ACU/SRA initiative to strengthen research management in African universities. The cohort of institutions (all ACU members) included the Carnegie-member universities, MacArthur Foundation funded universities and a few other non- ‘donor-affiliated’ institutions. The two main features of this project were the benchmarking surveys, and the seminars – which were run next to other relevant research management events (at the same venue), thus introducing opportunities for sharing expertise, and the ability for them to set their expertise against a wider community of practice.
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At the seminars, delegates discussed best practice in a range of areas from Finding Funding Sources and Proposal Preparation, through Ethics and Responsible Conduct of Research, to Technology Transfer and Diffusion of Research Results. They also compared varying institutional models on structuring for Research Management, and levels of progress (as identified in the benchmarking surveys) and provided participants with an opportunity to articulate and agree their needs for the next stage of development. The project participants agreed that the establishment of workable structures at institutional level will be accomplished more easily and quickly in the context of an equally developed external culture and services. Thus participant institutions have made and continue to make major contributions to the development of their regional Associations. The success of the West African Research and Innovation Management Associatioin (WARIMA) - formally established in 2007 - for example, owes a great deal to the expertise, input and large numbers of individual memberships from the Carnegie project institutions, while the East African Carnegie institutions are taking a lead role in the establishment of a Research Management Association for the East Africa region |
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The Project participants from: University of Botswana, BOTSWANA; University of Education Winneba, GHANA; Ahmadu Bello University; Bayero University; Obafemi Awolowo University; University of Ibadan; University of Jos and University of Port Harcourt NIGERIA; University of Sierra Leone; SIERRA LEONE; Tshwane University of Technology, SOUTH AFRICA; University of Dar es salaam, TANZANIA and Makarere University, UGANDA
The Current Project - 2009-2011
Carnegie continues to support the strengthening of research management in African universities, and has recently awarded the ACU a grant to run a 3-year project for this purpose (this time, focusing on Carnegie institutions only). This project aims to assist institutions to convert their awareness of research management issues into robust, sustainable structures by: ensuring that such structures have the opportunity to gain support and recognition throughout the institution; developing appropriate professional standards within the newly established structures and; ensuring that the new structures are able to draw on, and form part of, appropriate communities of practice.
The smaller cohort of institutions will allow for a greater concentration of funding to be spent per institution. Provision will be made for a team of consultants to visit the participant institutions, to provide independent assessment of progress and to convene benchmarking and networking meetings. The participating institutions will also be partnered with established northern ‘mentor’ universities, who will guide the African partners in the development of their instructional structures and will also provide assistance on the development of a specific project initiative of their (African University) choice.
For further information, see the report of the first Carnegie Workshop or contact us at resman@acu.ac.uk.