The SRA Symposium - College of Medicine

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Figure 1: Total UB Internal and External Research Funding, 1999 - 2004
Views from Academic Staff at UB
Questionnaires were distributed to academic staff attending a funding workshop organized by the
ORD in February 2005. It was also sent to all academic staff at the University via electronic mail.
Follow-ups with staff were made via email and then by personal visits between March and April
2005. Self-reported responses representing 13% of the population of academic staff were received.
The profile of respondents is shown in Table 2. About 64% were males and over 50% were at the
lecturer level. The nationality of academic staff at UB showed 58% were from Botswana, 32% from
other African countries, and 5.3% each were from European and Asian countries. Although all
faculties were represented, the Faculty of Business had the least responses (only 5%). About 80% of
the staff had PhD’s and the remainder had Masters degrees.
Academic staff views regarding the research funding opportunities provided by the ORD are
shown in Figures 2 and 3. It indicates that to a large extent, the University researchers relied significantly
on the ORD, although they also used their own contacts and the funding databases such
as the Community of Science and ResearchResearch to which the University subscribes (Figure 2).
Over 70% felt that the quantity of alerts distributed were just right (Figure 3A) and were satisfied
with the current electronic medium that is used (Figure 3B). A small percentage would prefer to
receive hardcopies of the alerts and also for it to be posted on the ORD website (Figure 3C). Only
a minority of researchers had been recipients of ORD or other funding opportunities (Table 3).
Over 60% of the researchers felt that the funding opportunities distributed were relevant to their
work either some or all of the time. Twenty six percent felt that it was either not usually or not at
all relevant to their work (Table 3).
134 2005 Symposium Proceedings Book