| Abstrakt: |
The South African government has increased its support to historically disadvantaged universities in recent years. One of the major foci of this support is to increase research output. Despite these efforts, there is growing evidence to suggest that research output in rural based universities is still low. Ironically, the factors hindering research progress in these universities not clearly understood. Based on this notion, this paper focused on exploring the factors inhibiting progress of research students at the University of Venda, which is one of the Rural-based higher learning institutions in South Africa. A mixed research approach involving case study and survey designs was followed. Respondents were selected using a stratified sampling technique. Data were collected using semi-structured interview guides and questionnaires. Qualitative data were analyzed using Atlas ti version 8 software techniques such as networks and primary document tables. While the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS, IBM) 25 was utilized to analyze quantitative data. Results reflected numerous issues categorized into 3 major factors. Lack innovation and motivation, self-management, confidence, research skills, and peer influence were students' related factors that deter progress. Poor research background, lack of supervisory skills, conflicting opinions, poor incentives, poor communication skills, work load, and ignorance were supervisory related factors that immerged, while lack of students funding for research, limited workshops and conferences, poor facilities, rigid policies guiding claims of research funds, poor supervisory rewards were among the structural factors that affects academic research students. The study recommends a review of the existing pedagogy, and periodic workshop on research skills training. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
