World over, the role of a university has been expanding from teaching to research, innovation and outreach activities owing to the need for the contribution of Universities towards national and global development agenda. In Uganda, university graduate students have played a significant role in generating research outputs to drive national development. Despite the high enrolment of graduate students at Makerere University, completion rates have remained unsatisfactory. 

Unlike the undergraduates, the graduate students seemed to receive less attention in terms of activity financing and supervision. This leaves the graduate students to face a lonely, more challenging and longtime and frustrating study journey.

The Directorate of Research and Graduate Training (DRGT) in conjunction with the PhD Forum at Makerere University (PF@MAK) together with the Association of Ugandan-German Alumni (AUGA), with support from the DAAD Regional Office for Africa has organized a 2-day workshop on “Enhancing graduate completion rates and relevant research output at Makerere University. The first workshop had over 50 Ph.D. students participating.

The workshop is running from Thursday 5th to Friday 6th March 2020 at the Senate Conference Hall. This workshop is targeting current graduate scholars. The workshop is designed to contribute to capacity building of graduate students and create enhanced completion rates through sharing the knowledge and skills; create capacity to provide peer support to graduates students; create network and collaboration of researchers for peer support, and cultivate the culture of supervision and mentorship in research development and dissemination. 

At the opening ceremony, the Director of Research and Graduate Training Prof. Mukadasi Buyinza decried the low completion rates despite the increasing doctoral enrollment. Prof. Buyinza reiterated that the situation has been compounded by the low motivation of staff, limited research facilities, and students based self-help projects.

These workshops will enable the PhD students to reflect on their PhD journey, learn from their peers, and engage with the supervisors and programme administrators. It is expected that upon completion of the workshops, DRGT shall be in position to map out the enablers/drivers of fast completion and the limiting factors as we strive to improve the Doctoral training landscape at Makerere.

About AUGA

There are about 1,400 DAAD Alumni in Uganda who were funded either in Germany or the Africa region who today successfully serve in the academic, business and political spheres. Many of them are ideal contacts for anyone interested in pursuing higher education studies or research in Germany. The Alumni have joined together to form the “Association of Ugandan-German Alumni” (AUGA).

About PF@MAk

The PhD scholars at Makerere University have a forum that brings together PhD fellows to actively provide each other with mutual academic support, producing timely high-quality research through networking, peer-reviewing, sharing funding opportunities and timely study completion. There are currently about 400 PhD students