Academic Staff Engagement in Research and Its Relation to Classroom Teaching in Public Universities in Amhara Regional State,Ethiopia

Background of the Study

A nation’s capacity for advancement is determined by the extent of its knowledge generation, assimilation, and application. In this regard, universities have long been seen as places where new information, ideas, and technology are created (Abraham, 2016; Khan & Anwar, 2013). Universities, according to Gibbs (2010), have four main objectives: developing human capital through teaching; building knowledge bases through research and knowledge development; sharing and applying knowledge through interactions with knowledge users; and preserving knowledge through intergenerational storage and transmission of knowledge. To this end, universities are anticipated to be essential in bringing about social and economic change. Therefore, it is essential for nations to build foundations for research that are globally competitive, promote information dissemination for societal benefit, and increase their capability for high-level employment.

In Ethiopia as elsewhere in the world, universities are expected to achieve three essential goals through teaching, research, and community services as follows:

to produce competent graduates who have appropriate knowledge, skills and attitudes in diverse fields of study; to produce research which promotes knowledge and technology transfer based on national development and community needs; and to ensure that education and research promote the principles of freedom in exchange of views and opinions based on reason, democratic and multicultural values (ESDP V, 2015, p, 102).

In a nutshell, the three main activities such as teaching, research, and community service are significantly anticipated of academic staff members at Ethiopian universities in order to properly complete the aforementioned important objectives. While all three of the aforementioned pillars must be represented in universities, this study focuses on the two pillars, research and teaching.

Research is the primary function of higher education institutions. It is crucial for teachers in higher education institutions to engage in research not only to provide students with the most recent advancements and original information in the field but also to foster in students a research-oriented mindset that will aid them in their career (Gupta, 2017; Le, 2016). In today’s age of globalization, research in higher education institutions is crucial and essential for the survival and growth of the institution. It is also essential to have innovation-based, knowledge-driven growth (Das, 2017). Therefore, faculty members should not only be aware of it but also must actively involve in the process of knowledge generation. Indeed, it is one of the most important lenses through which academic staff members view their line of work. Therefore, it is imperative to connect academic staff members’ involvement in research with their classroom teaching.

However, the academicians in higher education institutions appear to be facing an impending challenge: how to comprehend and contribute to high-quality research in their particular field of study. There is a significant difference in research activity and output across the nation, both in terms of quality and quantity, because academics do not properly understand the need for or awareness of high-quality research. It is widely believed that the academicians and faculty members in many reputable higher education institutions both nationally and internationally do not justify the role of researchers and that many of them do not adhere to the global academic standards of research (Cabral & Huet, 2014) and even the emphasis placed to research is very low. For instance, in Ethiopia, universities are treating research as a secondary responsibility, despite the fact that the country desperately needs reliable research to address the myriad issues facing the country. According to the recent Road Map study by ministry of education, the majority of universities in Ethiopia have focused on teaching rather than actively engaging in research, community service, or other national development initiatives as one might expect They have neglected the fields of research and scholarly interactions among scientists, technology/knowledge generation and transfer, university-industry links, and community service in favor of teaching, placing research and, more importantly, community service on the back burner as a secondary task (MoE, 2017).

In addition, it was noted in the same survey that research accomplishments are well below what the nation as a whole aspires to. In Ethiopia, the majority of academic staff members are not involved in research, despite being required to spend 75% of their time on teaching and 25% on research and community service. Active engagement of faculty in research is mainly hampered by limited research time and incentives, limited numbers of personnel available to conduct high quality research, limited financial resource, and higher education research is conducted predominantly by postgraduate students (ESDP V, 2015). In addition, poor research infrastructure, poor integration of teaching and research, poor linkage of research findings to the community, low potential of universities to solve problems of industries, poor university-industry linkage, poor oversight of research applicability, scarcity of knowledge frontiers, and inefficient and corrupt financial and procurement services at university level were among problems associated with academic staff engagement in research (MoE, 2017).

Generally speaking, in Ethiopia, despite the fact that the time of academic staff engagement should be fairly distributed in line with the very mission of higher education institutions(teaching, research, and community services), less attention has been and is given to research activity. It suffices to note how little emphasis is placed on research in Ethiopian by looking at the funding allotted to this fundamental goal. That’s how easy it is. For instance, in 2011/2012, all institutions’ budgets for research accounted for just 1% of their overall spending, indicating that the level of financial support for research is quite low (ESDP V, 2015). It is quite challenging to conduct legitimate research projects that can actually aid in addressing the problem with this level of funding in Ethiopia. Therefore, is crystal clear to say that research has received less priority in Ethiopia.

It was also questionable whether the research being done in our universities is accomplishing its goals in addition to the aforementioned problems. It is apparent that expanding the frontier of knowledge and addressing societal issues are the two very important goals of research. However, based on my own observations and informal conversations with my coworkers, the true objective of research seems to be disregarded and faculty members only engage in research for rewards (money reward and promotion). In this regard, the road map study stated that research topics in Ethiopian universities are determined by the interests of scholars and benefactors, with little or no direct connections to the predominate social issues. As a result, policymakers frequently dispute study findings, dismissing them as academic or unfit for addressing the nation’s socio-economic issues (MoE, 2017). These have had a detrimental effect on education quality in that most university teaching has remained mostly textbook-based with little infusion of local practical knowledge and experiences.

Another issue of concern in this study was about the relationship between academic staff engagement in research and classroom teaching. In this regard, previous empirical research often contains contradictory research findings. According to one line of evidence, doing research has positive implications on how students are taught (e.g. knowledge currency, knowledge currency, credibility, and competence in supervision and enthusiasm; Lindsay et al., 2002). Literature also suggests that the linkage between research and teaching enhances students’ critical thinking and problem-solving abilities as well as their subject-matter knowledge (Hensel, 2012; Walkington, 2015). Kinkead (2011) adds to the discussion by underlining the notion that students gain a lot by working with other professors and/or their own coworkers.

The opposing view contends that engaging in research has detrimental effects on teaching, including competition with teaching for time and resources, curriculum distortion, and diminished availability (Lindsay et al., 2002). In a similar vein, Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman (2004) pointed out that professors only have so much time, energy, and dedication to devote to both teaching and research. Students suffer as a result of academics typically placing more emphasis on research than teaching and dramatically increasing demands on staff time, particularly during academic semesters. Further, according to Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman (2004), it is unusual for the same person to possess the opposing personality traits that are needed for both teaching and research. For instance, there may be an adverse relationship between intellectuality, a trait associated with research success, and gregariousness, a trait associated with teaching success. This suggests that the two factors are independent, which means that even if instructors and researchers are supposed to work together in one position, there may be a problem with the way these two different skill sets are combined.

With the aforementioned discourses in mind, the very purpose of this study was to investigate the existing context of academic staff engagement in research and it relation to classroom teaching in universities located in the Amahra national regional state.

Objectives of the Study

This study’s primary goal was to investigate the current context of academic staff engagement in research activities and it relation to classroom teaching at higher education institutions located in the Amahra national regional state. It was specifically intended to: (a) assess the current level of academic staff engagement in research activities, (b) identify underlying reasons for academic staff engagement in research activities, and (c) examine the nature of the relationship between academic staff engagements in research and classroom teaching.

Study Variables and Conceptual Framework of the Study

Academic staff engagement in research and classroom teaching are the two main variables in this study.

Academic Staff Engagement in Research

An independent variable in this study was academic staff members’ engagement in research. Shuck and Wollard (2010) describe engagement as the mental, emotional, and behavioral state of an employee with the goal of achieving desired organizational outcomes. In light of the definitions provided above, academic staff engagement in research is about the reputation of academic staff participation in research activities. In this regard, faculty research performance was described by Cadez et al. (2017) as faculty-led scientific advances that are mostly reported in scholarly journals. According to a widely acknowledged norm, the most significant research accomplishments are published in the most esteemed scientific journals and have a high impact, whereas less significant accomplishments are published in journals with a lesser reputation and have a lower impact (Harvey et al., 2010). However, it is noteworthy to take into account performance indicators (such as research outputs, publications, citations, number of monographs, journal articles, conference presentations, research grants, doctoral student supervisions, masters student supervisions, and student textbooks written) when defining academic staff engagement in research. These indicators can be meaningfully applied at the organizational and individual levels (Cadez et al., 2017). Therefore, for the purposes of this study, academic staff engagement in research is about the reputation of the academic staff in research activities. It takes into consideration of performance indicators such as research outputs, publications, citations, grants won, number of monographs, journal articles, conference presentations, citations, research grants, professional articles, proceedings, doctoral student supervisions, masters student supervisions, student textbooks written, and student assessments that can be usefully applied at an individual level. The researcher sought to analyze the engagement of academic employees in research activities using these lenses.

Classroom Teaching

Classroom teaching was a dependent variable in this study. The quality of education supplied in the delivery of the courses that are taught in a classroom is related to the performance of individual instructors and teachers as teachers. There is a proverb that states that the quality of education can never exceed the quality of teaching and teachers (Andreas Schleicher, 2016). But what specific knowledge, abilities, and personal traits will make instructors successful? Obviously, there does not seem to be much consensus regarding the type and number of factors that best describe teaching effectiveness. For instance, Biggs (2003) believes that the key to good quality teaching is to make sure that our goals, our methods of instruction, and our methods of evaluation are all in line with one another in a system. As a result, the students are caught in a web of consistency that maximizes their likelihood of participating in the right learning activities while paradoxically allowing them to freely create knowledge in their own way.

Effective teaching is additionally described by Cadez et al. (2017) in terms of eight dimensions, including the following: (1) interest and comprehensibility; (2) cooperation with students; (3) punctuality and availability; (4) selection of literature and course materials; (5) overall effective teaching; (6) appropriateness of student evaluation methods; (7) objectivity in student marking; and (8) feedback to students after marking. Others also use teacher professional competencies as a benchmark to assess the effectiveness of teaching; in this case, professional competencies refer to the teachers’ professional knowledge, skills, practices, and engagement in carrying out teaching tasks in schools in accordance with the necessary or established standard levels (MOE, 2012). Thus, classroom teaching is discussed in this article in terms of academic staff performance, which calls for professional competencies in teaching that include professional knowledge, practices, and academic staff engagement in order to carry out teaching responsibilities to the highest quality standard. Professional knowledge refers to teachers’ in-depth and current subject knowledge of the curriculum and good understanding of classroom pedagogy. Professional practices refer to teachers’ pedagogical skills in planning and implementing effective teaching and learning practices, creating and maintaining supportive and safe learning environments, and assessing, providing feedback, and reporting on student learning. The term professional engagement also refers to instructors’ desire and practice in identifying their own learning requirements as well as in analyzing, evaluating, and expanding their professional development on both a group and an individual basis.

Regarding the nature of the relationship between research and classroom teaching, prior evidence suggests that research activity has both positive (such as knowledge currency, credibility, competence in supervision, and enthusiasm) and negative (such as decreased time, decreased availability competition with teaching, and curriculum distortion) implications for teaching (Lindsay et al., 2002). Similar to this, Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman (2004) identified the positive, negative, and null viewpoints on the relationship between research and teaching that have been extensively studied in the context of higher education. The first body of evidence shows that research aids in imparting current expert knowledge to students. It is crucial for students in some academic settings and fields to have firsthand familiarity with the leading edge of their field. In this relationship, the pleasure of participating in the expansion of the discipline’s body of knowledge itself supports student learning. A collection of arguments in support of a conflict between research and teaching quality is presented in the second piece of evidence. In this sense, it is asserted that faculty members only have a finite amount of time, energy and dedication to devote to both teaching and research. Students suffer because academics typically prioritize research above teaching and because there are enormous time pressures on staff, especially during academic semesters. The third argument is that there is no relationship between teaching and research because they are two distinct endeavors, research is rarely motivated by curricular issues, and teachers and researchers are two different species who require different sets of skills. The fact that there is theoretical backing for the many views of the relationship is therefore not surprising.

Research Methodology

Results

The fundamental research questions posed in this study were used as the fundamental themes for the collection, arrangement, and analysis of the data in this part. There were 251 people that took part in the poll in total. Among them, 88% of the academic staff members were men and only 12% were women. This suggests that there were significantly fewer female participants in the study than there were male participants. In terms of academic staff rank, 62% of respondents had the title of lecturer, while 32.4% had the title of assistant professor. This suggests that a significant portion of the participants held the academic status of lecturer, which may have implications for their participation in research activities. When it comes to the number of years academic staff members have been teaching, those who have worked 5 or less years, 6 to 10, 11 to 15, and 16 to 20 years account for 36.4%, 29.2%, 23.2%, and 9.2% in that order. This shows that the majority of the academic staff that took part in the study had five or fewer years of teaching experience.

The Current Context of Academic Staff Engagement in Research

Examining the existing situation of academic staff engagement in research activities in the sample public institutions located in the Amahra national regional state was one of the study’s main research objectives. The current level of academic staff engagement in research activities was assessed using the mean score and one sample t-test and the results are shown in the tables below.

The overall perceived view of academic staff members engagement in research was determined to be M = 1.63, as illustrated in Table 1. This result shows that academic staff participation in research activities in the study area was generally considered to be poor. This data is consistent with the Ethiopian Road Map Study, which shows that the majority of academic staff at public higher education institutions in Ethiopia is not involved in research (MoE, 2017). Similar to this, a one-sample t-test was used to determine whether the mean score on the overall status of academic staff engagement in research activities differed significantly from the expected mean score (which is 3.00) on the scale for academic staff engagement in research, which ranges from 1 to 5. There was a significant discrepancy between the expected and observed mean score of respondents at the .05 alpha level, as shown by one sample t-value (t = −42.75; df = 250; p = .001). The negative t value shows that academic staff members’ overall participation in research activities is significantly below the expected mean.

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Table 1.

Status of Academic Staff Engagement in Research.

Variables	N	M	SD	SEM	t-Value	df	Sig. (two-tailed)
Academic staff engagement in research	251	1.63	0.505	0.03	−42.75	250	.000

It was essential to carry out a thorough analysis of academic staff engagement in research activities in addition to looking at the general status of such engagement. For each indicator of academic staff engagement in research, the mean and t-test was calculated. The data shown in Table 2 above demonstrates that academic staff members’ real mean score for each indicator of their involvement in research were determined to be extremely low. These results show that academic employees underperformed in terms of research performance. A one-sample t-test was also employed to determine whether the mean score for each indicator of academic staff research participation differed substantially from the expected mean score. As a result, the findings showed that there were substantial statistical disparities between the anticipated and observed mean scores. The negative t value shows that academic staff members’ participation in each indicator of their engagement in research is significantly below the expected mean at .05 alpha levels.

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Table 2.

Mean Perceptions and t-Test Results for Each Measure of Academic Staff Engagement in Research.

No	Items	N	M	SD	SEM	t-Value	df	Sig. (two-tailed)
1	Research articles published in a highly reputable journals (e.g., Scopus indexed)	251	1.67	0.921	0.058	−22.968	250	.000
2	Research articles published in non-reputable/predator journals	251	1.46	0.614	0.039	−39.651	250	.000
3	Citations received to one’s published works	251	1.82	1.377	0.087	−13.519	250	.000
4	Published review works	251	1.25	0.543	0.034	−50.925	250	.000
5	Published book chapters	251	1.15	0.436	0.028	−67.302	250	.000
6	Research proceedings	251	1.36	0.551	0.035	−47.048	250	.000
7	Unpublished research outputs	251	1.75	0.591	0.037	−33.561	250	.000
8	Participation in different research conferences	251	1.70	0.782	0.049	−26.385	250	.000
9	Doctoral students supervised	251	1.16	0.442	0.028	−66.051	250	.000
10	Masters students supervised	251	1.77	1.203	0.076	−16.155	250	.000
11	First degree students supervised	251	2.56	1.644	0.104	−4.223	250	.000
12	Dissertations/thesis/senior essays examined	251	1.97	1.297	0.082	−12.552	250	.000

The motivations or causes underlying academic staff members’ engagement in research were also examined. In order to determine the perceived causes, the mean values were computed. As shown in Table 3, the average mean perception was discovered to be higher than the expected mean (M = 3) for each reason, with M = 4.27 for knowledge contribution being the greatest. Institutional reputation received the least opinion (3.74). A one-sample t-test was also employed to see whether the average score for each factor influencing academic staff participation in research differed significantly from what was expected. The observed mean scores were much higher than the expected mean, as shown by the results, which showed significant statistical differences between the expected and observed mean scores at .05 alpha levels.

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Table 3.

Mean Perceptions and T-Test Results on Reasons for Academic Staff Engagement in Research.

No	Variables	N	M	SD	SEM	t-Value	df	Sig. (two-tailed)
1	For problem solving	251	3.8008	0.84600	0.05340	14.996	250	.000
2	For knowledge contribution	251	4.2749	0.65669	0.04145	30.758	250	.000
3	For personal promotion/reward	251	3.9064	0.68717	0.04337	20.897	250	.000
4	For institutional reputation	251	3.7424	0.82464	0.05205	14.262	250	.000

Academic Staff Engagement in Research and Classroom Teaching

Examining the extent to which academic staff research engagement could be related to classroom teaching was the second main research question. In line with this, the mean, standard deviation, and Pearson correlations were calculated. According to Table 4 Pearson’s correlation results, there is no evidence of a significant positive relationship between academic staff members’ participation in research and their classroom teaching (r = −.110, p > .01). Even the correlation result demonstrates how weak the relationship was.

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Table 4.

Mean, Standard Deviation, and Relationship Between Academic Staff Engagement in Research and Classroom Teaching.

Variables	M	SD	N	1	2
Research engagement	1.6355	0.50560	251	1	−0.110
Classroom teaching	4.0942	0.52324	251	−0.110	1

Discussion

In reference to preceding research and relevant literature, the study’s key findings that were reported in the earlier parts are explored. Examining the current context of academic staff engagement in research activities was one of the study’s main priorities. As mentioned earlier in the methodology section, the researcher adapted Cadez et al. (2017) research performance measures in order to examine the current state of academic staff engagement in research activities. In this regard, the present results show that there has been a low level of academic staff participation in research activities in the studied area. This result is consistent with the findings of the Ethiopian Road Map study, which show that few academic staff members in Ethiopia’s higher education institutions are conducting original research (MoE, 2017). The same study also revealed that universities have neglected the fields of research and intellectual connections among scientists, technology/knowledge development and transfer, university-industry links, and community service in favor of teaching and have placed secondary importance on research (MoE, 2017). All of this indicates that Ethiopian public educational institutions’ research achievements fall far short of the nation’s objectives, despite the fact that the country is in critical need of reputable research studies to address the various social concerns and issues it is currently experiencing.

In the current study, the underlying motives for academic staff members’ participation in research activities were another significant area of concern. It is apparent that expanding the frontier of knowledge and addressing societal issues are the two very important purposes of research. Cognizant of these two reasons, the underlining reasons for academic staff research engagement items were developed based on consultation of related literature in the field. The sub scale of underlining reasons for academic staff research engagement were: research for problem solving, research for knowledge contribution, research for personal promotion, and research for institutional reputations. In this context, the present study has revealed knowledge contribution, personal promotion, problem solving, and institutional reputation as the underlying reasons for academic staff engagement in research in the same order. This finding is consistent with prior study (e.g., ESDP V, 2015), which shows that the majority of academic staff members conduct research to contribute to knowledge, address current issues, advance their own careers and enhance their institutions’ reputation. As opposed to this, some earlier research findings indicate that research topics in Ethiopian higher institutions are mostly decided by the interests of professors and sponsors, with little to no meaningful connections to the country’s dominant societal issues. As a result, research findings either lack practical relevance or are too academic to solve the socioeconomic problems facing the country (MoE, 2017).

The nature of the relationship between academic staff members’ participation in research and classroom teaching was also a matter of concern in this study. In this regard, the present findings portrayed the very weak but negative relationship between academic staff engagement in research and classroom teaching which is on par with previous results (e.g., Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman, 2004; Lindsay et al., 2002), which indicted that that time, energy, and commitment on teaching and research is negatively correlated. Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman (2004) further stated that, despite the fact that researchers and teachers are supposed to do tasks that appear to have little in common, the integration of two distinct skill sets into a single position is at the root of the issue in that that researchers and teachers are different types of people which requires different set of skills. On the other hand, the current findings are at odds with several earlier studies (for instance, Hensel, 2012; Russell Group, 2014; Walkington, 2015; Mohammad Qamar uz Zaman, 2004; Stack 2003), which suggest a substantial positive association between research and teaching. Previous literature underscored that teachers’ engagement in research is important not only to provide students with the most recent advancements and original information in the field, but also to foster in students a research-oriented mindset that will aid them in their career (Gupta, 2017; Le, 2016). Furthermore, in addition to helping teachers in the classroom, teacher research can also help with programmatic and policy issues (Mohr et al., 2004; Stock, 2005). Teachers’ involvement in their own research initiatives can influence how students understand the work of university researchers and create chances for school and university researchers to collaborate and learn from one another (Freedman et al., 2005). These contradictory findings generally show the need for further in depth investigations.

Conclusion and Implications

What is the nature of academic staff members’ engagement in research and how does it relate to what they teach in the classroom? This was the query that sparked the idea for this investigation. The conclusion that the academic staff engagement in research is very low in the sample public universities was made, even if this article does not fully address all of the issues raised by the aforementioned question. The results also contributed to the conclusion that there is a very weak but negative association between academic staff engagement in research and classroom teaching. These findings indicate the necessity of promoting or enhancing academic staff members’ engagement in research. One way of enhancing academic staff engagement in research is by improving the culture of research project management. This can be achieved through establishing and updating better-quality research policies, guidelines, directives, and incentive packages. The second strategy can be by enhancing research capacity of academic staff through various training interventions on research projects. In addition, in order to gain a complete understanding of the nature of their relationship, it is crucial to do additional thorough study on the relationship between academic staff members’ participation in research and their classroom teaching using mixed method research methods. Furthermore, to comprehend the bearing of demographic variables on academic staff engagement in research, it is also necessary to compare the level of academic staff engagement in research across various demographic variables.