A former Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission (NUC) and Council Chairman, National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), Prof. Peter Okebukola, has declared that a good ranking of universities is not by accident but by intentional effort and clearly defined research drive, among others.
Okebukola made the declaration in a paper he presented recently as the special guest speaker during a colloquium organised by Babcock University (BU), Ilisan, Remo, Ogun State.
Professor Okebukola, who is a professor of Science Education, Lagos State University, and Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council of the Samuel Adegboye University, Ogwa, Edo State, said while many struggle to do solo research, collaboration and joint approach holds the key to the top ranking.
He listed four critical points which he described as “magic bullets” to achieving the desired results in creating visibility: Citation of colleagues in research and implementation of 30% minimum references in student projects and theses.
He listed other critical points to include staff enrolment on Google scholar, Scopus and possession of Open Researcher and Contributor IDentifier (ORCID) as well as uploading all undergraduate and postgraduate student research work on the University website.
“Too often, African researchers eagerly cite Western researchers while hardly citing any of theirs. This is counter-productive as it gives credit to others. They will never quote you in their research work,” he said.
Prof. Okebukola explained that citation is one of the key performance indicators among the big five areas like Teaching, Research, Citations, International Outlook and Industry Income.
“Other key factors are the use of partnerships to build strong visibility and invitation of faculty from renowned universities to come as visiting professors.”
The special guest speaker at the BU colloquium charged university researchers to beware of predatory journals and ensure publishing in high impact journals for greater visibility.
He added, “Nigerian universities, especially Babcock should fear no giants. Relatively young universities are overtaking the giants.”
