Characteristics of Post Graduate Education Research Mentoring in Universities in Nigeria: Curricular Enhancement Strategies

Abstract

Globally, the post graduate education landscape simultaneously undergoes rapid and tremendous changes with emphasis on research through equipping students with the necessary skills and knowledge to foster the growth of independent, creative and lifelong researchers. Among the resources to facilitate this aim, mentoring plays a vital role. This paper investigated the characteristics of research mentoring provided to postgraduate students in universities in Southern Nigeria. Two research questions were used. Proportionate stratified sampling technique was used to select 180 post graduate students for the study. A 27-item questionnaire was used to collect data which was analysed using frequencies and percentages. Findings indicate that research mentoring across institutions was characterized by supervisor's criticisms without providing insights, setting of unrealistic deadlines and expectations, and erosion of students' self-esteem. Focus on improving technical research skills, communicating high expectations, self-monitoring processes, encouraging active knowledge construction process, widening networks for research improvements, and supervisor-supervisee brainstorming were almost lacking. The observed characteristics would not in any way serve as catalysts for research as they are most unlikely to promote quality post graduate research. Recommendations were made to propose curricular enhancement strategies to reinvigorate research mentoring for quality postgraduate research.