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Wednesday, September 28, 2016

African Universities’ Research Approaches (AURA) Programme Open Educational Framework: Course Packs, Debates & Publications

The African Universities’ Research Approaches (AURA) Programme is pleased to announce the availability of open educational resources aimed at academic and professional staff responsible for strengthening research and teaching practices. The educational framework, research debates and publications are available to download through a creative commons license. The educational framework comprises of the following open educational resources:

Three research courses:
·         Orientation to Different Research Approaches: AURA Research Course 1 (R1)
·         Orientation to Researcher-led Approaches to Research: AURA Research Course 2 (R2)
·         Orientation to Research Communications in Social Media: AURA Research Course 4 (R4)

Two teaching courses:
·         Introduction to Learning Theories: AURA Teaching Course 1 (T1)
·         Introduction to Technology-enhanced learning: AURA Teaching Course 3 (T3)

The course packs were co-developed with the AURA Programme’s learning partners and are aimed at higher education institutions across Africa and other parts of the world. The educational framework proposes a blended learning approach (mixing online and face to face interventions) to strengthening research and teaching practices and can be re-used, adapted, or remixed (where indicated by the license) with full attribution. 

Download the course packs, research debates and related learning publications from: The AURA Programme Collection on IDS Open Docs (https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/handle/123456789/8992)

The African Universities’ Research Approaches (AURA) Programme was a two-year programme, funded by UK AID, which ran from November 2014 to September 2016.  The programme was led by the Institute of Development Studies in partnership with the Information Training and Outreach Centre for Africa and Loughborough University. In addition, the AURA Programme worked with four East African Universities: Jimma University, Kenyatta University, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS) and Strathmore University. The programme was aimed at academics working in health, business and other academic disciplines.

For more information about the project visit the AURA Programme web-page: (http://www.ids.ac.uk/project/african-universities-research-approaches-aura-capacity-development-programme). and also (http://aura.muhas.ac.tz)

Fostering competencies in interactive online teaching and learning assessment at MUHAS

About seven faculty members from the Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS), attended a two day workshop on teaching and learning assessment at Strathmore University from 25th to 26th July 2016. This workshop was immediately followed by another workshop on strategic planning from 27th to 28th July, 2016. The workshops were organized by the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) and drew on the work of the African Universities' Research Approaches (AURA) programme.
 
Both workshops were very useful to participants because participants were exposed to various issues related to e-learning, including: learning assessment approaches, how to use technology for assessment, technology based learning and pedagogical theories that could be applied in a technology-based environment. Furthermore, participants were taught about how to operationalize what they learnt when they go back to their institutions by developing Operational Strategic Plans.  
 
 


Professor Lwoga holds a PhD in information studies from the University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. She teaches and supervises both undergraduate and postgraduate students. She has facilitated a number of workshops and short courses.  She has published widely and has presented over 30 research papers in both international and local conferences.  Professor Lwoga currently coordinates the African Universities' Research Approaches (AURA) programme at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS), Tanzania, together with an additional four projects working with international partners in Sweden, South Africa and USA.


Dr. Doreen Mloka is a Medical Microbiologist/Molecular biologist. She is a Medical Education Fellow and the Director of Continuing Education and Professional Development at Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences (MUHAS), Tanzania. She currently coordinates two medical education projects and several microbiology projects.

 

Thursday, September 22, 2016

TEEAL Initiatives at MUHAS Library

By Dr. Mboni A. Ruzegea
Head Periodicals and E-Resources

Defining TEEAL
TEEAL stands for The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL). It  is a searchable, offline, digital library which gives access to thousands of peer reviewed journals in agriculture and life related sciences. TEEAL is a project of Cornell University's Albert R. Mann Library in cooperation with over eighty major publishers, societies and index providers. The project is administered through Mann Library's Collection and Service Department in collaboration with Information Training and Outreach Center for Africa (ITOCA) in Centurion, South Africa to  conduct awareness and training missions in Africa. 

Accessibility
TEEAL is offline. You can discover access and download full-text articles and abstracts without the use of the Internet.  It contains a growing number of prestigious full-text journals (all in PDF ) from leading publishers such as Elsevier and Taylor & Francis. You can access a wealth of information in the following subjects:
Agricultural economics, Agricultural engineering, Agroforestry, Biotechnology, Nutrition and Food Sciences, Crop Science, Aquaculture, Entomology, Genetics and genomics, Horticulture, Microbiology, Natural Resources, Phytopathology, Plant Breeding, Pest control, Soil Science, Veterinary Medicine and Environment.

Ongoing TEEAL initiatives at MUHAS Library
TEEAL project in Tanzania is under MUHAS Library. The project runs Training of Trainers (TOT) workshops to create understanding about TEEAL resources and build capacity of Tanzanian researchers, academicians, information professionals, librarians and students to discover access, utilize and promote TEEAL to improve their research works and academic activities. The main objective is to equip trainees with skills and knowledge in order to increase the quality and effectiveness of research  and academic output within their institutions.


Opening of TEEAL Workshop Training by Dr Omari Mponda (on black), Director at ARI Naliendele, Mtwara.
MUHAS Library has been conducting a number of TEEAL workshops since 2012 .  TEEAL trainers present TEEAL resources alongside other Research4Life programs such as AGORA (Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture), ARDi (Access to Research for Development and Innovation), OARE (Online Access to Research in the Environment) and the AgriKnowldge. They also assist TEEAL beneficiaries (the institutions that acquired TEEAL) to install the TEEAL set. To achieve cascading effect, the MUHAS library TEEAL trainers ensure the conducting of TEEAL follow-up workshops at all TEEAL institutions in the country and offer their help when necessary. In this year 2016 so far, up to date, 6 TEEAL institutions were involved in the trainings between January and August 2016, and more than 100 participants were trained from those institutions namely Muhimbili University (MUHAS), University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), Mikocheni Agricultural institute (MARI), and the Ministry of Agriculture DRD in Dar es Salaam; Naliendele Agricultural institute in Mtwara; Makutupora Agricultural Institute in Dodoma. Other institutions to be reached before the end of this year include Ukiriguru Agricultural Research Institute in Mwanza, Mwalimu Nyerere University and ARDHI University both in Dar es Salaam.

ARI Naleindele Workshop Participants


TEEAL Updates and Ownership
New journals are sent to beneficiary institutions every year so that they are updated and get in touched with new developments and new contents with small amount of annual subscription fees. However, if for some reasons the institution cannot afford, they can still keep TEEAL contents as an asset for themselves with issues going all the way back to 1997. TEEAL offers ownership not just access! Unlike the case of online journals where when you are disconnected to the Internet you can no longer get ownership of the journal contents.  Moreover, TEEAL is proved to be of beneficial value to many researchers, academicians, students and librarians particularly those residing in remote areas (away from cities) where the Internet is not fast.

TEEAL and Fair Use Policy

The issue of “fair use” in TEEAL is related to intellectual property that is owned by publishers. Therefore, when using TEEAL resources we must be vigilant of issues of ‘fair use’ or ‘fair dealing’. TEEAL users are encouraged to always make use of fair use of contents that is available in TEEAL. As a rule of thumb, a user is required to use 15% of the journal issue and not to download the whole issue either for repackaging, resell or commercial profit. You can use TEEAL contents for educational purposes such as making lecture notes or writing thesis (citations) and the like.

To access TEEAL click the link: http://teeal.muhas.ac.tz. Do not forget to sign up by using your MUHAS email to be able to access the database and download full text-PDF articles.

REFERENCES:

The Fair Use/Fair Dealing Handbook. 
http://infojustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/band-and-     gerafi-     2013.pdf
Stim, R. (2013). Getting Permission  How to License & Clear Copyrighted Materials Online & Off.   5th Edition.  http://www.nolo.com/products/getting-permission-riper.html