1. INTRODUCTION

Higher Education institutions are mandated to teaching learning, Research and Community services including University Industry Linkage & Technology transfer activities. Research is a systematic way of collecting and analyzing data for seeking solution to problems, discovering new technologies and paving ways to development of a country. It enables people in diverse circumstances to apply solution. Research provides us with new inventions (technological methods, products, etc.) and to generate new knowledge to tackle problems as well as utilize unexploited potentials. For counties like Ethiopia, much is expected from research to alleviate the economic problems, in reduction of poverty, attainment of food security, prevention and control problems of multifaceted nature, and in introducing new technology. Within its overall plan of alleviating widespread poverty, Ethiopia aims to become middle income country in the next 20 to 30 years; and the government has issued Higher Education proclamation No. 1152/2011 taking into account the pressing need for well-educated and skilled manpower in various disciplines. The Ethiopian government is also pursuing an ambitious plan to expand and reform higher education in the country. University of Gondar is currently classified in to Research intensive university due to its academic and research capacities and productivity. In its 10 years strategic plan, University of Gondar strives to achieve academic and research excellence. More specifically, the Research and Publication Office (RPO) of the University is striving towards enhancing research culture. Alongside the academic training, the RPO of the University is coordinating and promoting research works in and outside of the University. It also provides consultancy services, and disseminates research results on an ongoing and sustainable basis. Given the pressing need to strengthen the university research endeavor and enhancing the research productivity in line with the envisaged research excellence, this research and publication guideline revision was highly demanded. Thus, the basic consideration of the guideline revision was embodied on to the current differentiation of the University of Gondar in to research university and the expected research excellence contributing to both the teaching as well as social problem solving. To accomplish the aforementioned tasks, the Research and Publication Directorate office of University of Gondar has revised the research and publication guideline for effective and efficient Research Projects Implementation and Publication.

1.1. General Provisions

Short title

This document can be cited as the University of Gondar Research and Publication Guideline..

Gender references

Where the context requires otherwise, the provisions of this Guideline set out in the masculine gender shall also apply to the feminine gender.

Definition of terms

In this guideline, unless the context requires otherwise:

‘Academic staff’ means a member of a higher education institution employed in the capacity of teaching, research, community services and technology transfer activities of the institution, and includes any other professional of the institution who shall be recognized so by the institution’s internal legislation;
‘Academic unit’ refers to colleges, faculties, schools, institutes, departments or programs;
‘Activities’ means actions taken or tasks performed from proposal development up to dissemination of outputs through which inputs such as funds, technical assistance and other types of resources are mobilized;
‘Applied Research’ means an original investigation undertaken in order to acquire new knowledge which is directed primarily toward specific practical aims or objectives;
‘Author’ means a writer, designer or originator of an article, book or any other scholarly work who makes a substantial participation in the conception and design, or analysis and interpretation of data, drafting the scholarly work or revising it critically for enhancing its intellectual content and in the final approval of the version to be published. There can be a more than one author of a single scholarly work;
‘Basic Research’ means an original investigation with the primary aim of developing more complete knowledge or understanding of the subject under study;
‘Center-led Research’ means a research project that is in line with the aims and priority areas of the research center. The funding and implantation are being managed by the respective research centers.
‘Co-Investigator/s’ shall mean member/s of a research team who participate in the research undertakings with specified responsibilities other than the Principal Investigator;
‘Collaborative Research’ or ‘Joint Research’ means a scientific investigation or research and development project undertaken jointly by a higher education institution, industry or other governmental and non-governmental organizations based on a research partnership agreement;
‘College Review and Ethics Committee(CREC) means a group of academic staff selected based on their research and publication profile to review, mentor and evaluate the College’s research activities;
‘Completed Research’ means Research projects that use the planned time and budget;
‘Conflict-of-interest’ means a divergence between an individual’s private interests and his professional obligations to the higher education institution such that an independent observer might reasonably question whether the individual’s professional actions or decisions are determined by considerations of personal gain, financial or otherwise;
‘Copyright’ means a protection provided by the laws of Ethiopia to its owners;
‘Dean and Director’ refers to the dean of a college or a faculty and the director of an institute/directorate or a school respectively;
‘Discontinued Research Projects’ means the research projects that terminated before the planned time due to poor performance or uncontrollable problems or research misconducts
‘Extended Research Projects’ means conducting research projects with permitted duration extension due to justifiable reasons;
‘Higher Education Institution’ or ‘Institution’ means a university, university college or college as defined by Higher Education Proclamation No. 650/2009;
‘Intellectual Property’ is a term often used to refer generically to property rights created through intellectual and/or discovery efforts of a creator that are generally protectable under patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret or other law/s;
‘Regular Staff Research means a research project that aims to solve societal problems and/or build knowledge
Ongoing Research’ means an active researcher project with the planned duration;
‘Patent’ means a title that confers to its owner the rights recognized by the intellectual property laws of Ethiopia;
‘Person’ means natural or juridical person;
‘Plagiarism’ means claiming or insinuating ownership of another person’s intellectual and/or academic contribution, which includes;
Word-for-word copying or paraphrasing of sentences or whole paragraphs from one or more sources without clearly indicating their origin or source,
Using of another person’s ideas, work or research data without acknowledgement,
Copying computer files, algorithms or computer codes without clearly indicating their origin,
Submitting work which has been derived, in whole or in part, from another person’s work, or
Submitting work which has been derived, in whole or in part, from another person’s work by a process of mechanical, digital or other transformation.
‘Principal Investigator’ means an individual designated by a higher education institution or a funding organization to direct the project or program being supported by the fund;
‘Research’ is a systematized investigation to create new knowledge or technology and/or to use existing knowledge or technology in a new and creative way so as to generate new concepts, methodologies, understandings, and to solve new or existing problems;
‘Research Center/Institute’ refers to research focused centers or institutes established by the university;
‘Research Grant’ means a financial contribution by an industry or foundation or governmental or non-governmental organization to a scientific research project conducted by a higher education institution;
‘Research Staff’ means an academic staff who is required to devote 75% on research, community service, UIL and technology transfer activities and 25% on teaching;
‘Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award(PReS-Award) means large scale research that is led by a researcher which aims to solve societal problems and/or build knowledge which involve postgraduate students (with their own thesis) and junior researchers;
‘Special Call’ means a research project which aims to solve timely prioritized emerging issues, and cross-cutting. The funding and implantation are being managed by the RPDO.
‘Stakeholders’ means governmental and/or non-governmental organizations, industries and person that take part with the university;
‘Student Research’ means research by students of higher education institutions designed and undertaken in line with the research thematic areas of the institutions for the purpose of partial fulfillment of the requirements of master’s or PhD degrees, supervised and/or co-supervised by academic staff member, regardless of the source of funding .
‘Teaching staff’ means an academic staff who is required to devote 75% on teaching and 25% on research, community service, UIL and technology transfer activities;
‘University’ means University of Gondar
‘University Research Advisory Council’ means senior academic staffs representing the respective colleges/institutes and schools organized to advise the research and publication endeavors of University of Gondar.;
‘University Research Council’ means team consisting from research and community service V/P (Research, CS, &TT)

2. RESEARCH GUIDELINE

As a research intensive university, all academic staffs are expected to be engaged in research works for knowledge generation and dissemination using internal and external research funding. The available internal research funding shall be handled in a competitive base for the priority thematic areas.

2.1. Research Call Types

Based on their scope- breadth and expected outcomes, the University of Gondar shall solicit research projects with the following four basic categories.

2.1.1. Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award(PReS-Award)

It is a research call led by an Associate professor (with PhD) and above and includes Post-docs (PhD holders with <5 years’ service after their PhD), PhD students and Masters students working on large scale research project with the inclusion of students’ dissertation research work within the project themes as a component. It is designed to promote the postgraduate programs at the University of Gondar through granting academic staff that are supervising or are qualified to supervise doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers. Based on productivity and set of criteria those projects winning the grant will also be upgraded to research centers. Eligibility

The PI shall be main supervisor of the PhD students under consideration and shall have an academic rank of a PhD with an Associate Professor position and above.
The team of applicants other than the PI and the students shall be Ph.D. holders; if they are clinicians, they shall have a specialty/subspecialty with an associate professorial position.
The research team should include at least the PI, Co-PI, atleast two 2 PhD advisees /subspecialties that can do their research in that specific budget year in the University of Gondar and 2 post-docs or recent PhD and 2 masters students. If there is no post –doc and PhD graduates in the Department or College, the number of PhD advisees should be at least three and at least three young staff (Assistant professors) should be included. Besides, In this case, engaging at least 2 Masters students is mandatory.

The PhD students should finish course work and ready to start working on their research proposal .
- The project should have at least five Ph.D. level research themes or areas and at least two Masters level research themes.

The PI shall have at least five articles MoSHE recognized (at least three of them are published in journals indexed in SCOPUS, Web of science, and/or PubMed and two can be from locally MOSHE recognized journals). The PI should be the first author in at least two articles or first author in one article and corresponding author in another article. The budget amount will be determined proportional to the number of active post-doc, PhD and MA/MSc students. For those departments who cannot manage to hire a Post-doc, the budget amount shall be determined by the number PhD and Masters students.

The Post-doc and PhD research areas should be clearly described in the research area and the budget will be released when the student get recruited. Specific amounts of the funding will be calculated based on active PhD students each year depending on the number of objectives they will accomplish that year.
This is not a fixed term funding, the funding will be renewed each year based on performance in terms of achievement of milestones (publication, patent, and postgraduate education).
There shall be clear agreement between the team members and the PhD students articulating property right or authorship should be submitted with the application or prior to funding announcement.
For the topics assigned to the student, the first author of the article should be the student and the other ordering of authorship should be determined based on the approval of the project PI, following a scientific authorship standard.
Field of specialty of the PI should be in line with the project main objectives
Recruitment of the PhD students and postdoctoral researchers shall be done in the first 18 months of the project period.
The PI and Co-PI should create a separate joint “AND” bank account to manage the budget.
Budget proposal should be divided in a yearly basis.
Financial liquidation and research report should also be accomplished every year .

Roles and responsibility Colleges/Departments

Furnished working space (computers, tables, chairs, printer, ICT support, and other relevant materials and equipment).
Support, monitor and evaluate the project

College research and publication coordination office Support and monitor the project. The Principal Investigator (PI)

Initiate research idea and submit the project proposal
Organize the research group
Lead the research project
Recruit doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers
Report the progress to the college post graduate and research and publication coordination office
Liquidate all financial issues

Submission review process: The Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award (PReS-Award) projects shall be evaluated by a committee established by the RTTVP and three peer reviewers

2.1.2 Regular Staff Research

A research project that aims to solve societal problems and/or build knowledge. The duration of the project would be 1 year. Ongoing projects shall be evaluated by the CRECs before funding in the coming year. The budget will be updated and reviewed accordingly.

2.1.3. Special call

A research project which aims to solve timely prioritized emerging issues, and cross-cutting. if it is multi-disciplanry issue, the funding and implantation shall be managed by the RPDO. If the issue is college based, the financial management shall be managed by the respective colleges.

2.1.4. Center-led research

A research project that is in line with the aims and priority areas of the research center. The funding and implantation shall be managed by the respective research centers.

2.2. Research Proposals

It is an important to note that in all categories research funding shall be handled in a competitive manner and based on the merits of the research proposals. The research proposal should be a detailed plan of study that indicates a specific course of action to be followed. It shall be prepared in a standard format with the contents outlined in this guideline. In the efforts made so far, we will have two types of research proposal submission formats: anonymous and non-anonymous. Non-Anonymous format will comprise the whole components of research proposal starting from the title page to annexes, whereby anonymous format will contain the whole elements of the proposal except the title page, role and responsibilities, and CVs (all identifiers of authors) starting from abstract with title to annexes.

2.2.1. Initiation of research proposal ideas

The following guiding principles shall be used for initiation of research ideas:

All research ideas shall originate from the existing thematic areas;
Multidisciplinary research is appreciated;
In multidisciplinary research proposals, the contribution and use of research funds may be agreed upon by each side during the planning stage;
In multidisciplinary research proposals, there shall have 3-4 themes. The number of researchers in any research project shall be from 5-8. For merged researches, the number of researchers should not exceed 12.
In the Research proposal initiation, female and persons with disabilities should be included taking in to account their real contribution in the project. In case there are no females and persons with disabilities with real contribution in the issue, the proposal should be considered with sound justification.
In the research proposal initiation, one stakeholder should be included in a project and the stakeholder should have a credible written evidence to be included;
At the submission stage, a staff shall not be involved in more than four multidisciplinary researches as co-investigator or three co investigators and one PI in one year.
Research projects shall be prepared, reviewed and made ready in the previous fiscal year;
In the research proposals the role and responsibility of each investigators should be clearly indicated or included so as to avoid duplication of efforts or resources;
The team of researchers should choose one of the researchers in the list as the principal investigator with consensus, or other ways, and the rest as co-investigators;
Contents of the research proposal shall follow the research proposal format in the guideline.
All proposals involving human and animal subjects should be submitted to the Institutional Review Board Office using the ethics formats for review.
A student and a stakeholder cannot be a principal investigator for research projects. However, students who submitted their final thesis/dissertation and fully reinstated are allowed to be PI;
Previously submitted proposals may be resubmitted only with the consent of the team

2.2.2. Call for research proposal

Calls will be announced annually for regular research projects and when necessary for the emerging issues. The call for project proposals shall be in consideration of the university thematic areas.

2.2.3. Proposal review process

All eligible research proposals to be funded and implemented by the university shall pass through a review process to ensure their qualities as well as managing the available research funding in a competitive basis. Proposals shall pass through different levels by a wide range of experts.

Special call research: Muntidssciplinary Speciall call projects shall be evaluated by centrally nominated ad-hoc reviewers committee . But college based special call research projetcts shall be evaluated by twopeer reviewers and the CRECs.
Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award(PReS-Award): This shall be evaluated by a committee established by RTTVP and three peer reviewers.
Regular Staff Research : This shall be evaluated by the college review and ethics committee and two peer reviewers.
Center-led research: This shall be evaluated by college review and ethics committee and two peer reviewers..

2.3. Roles and responsibilities of reviewers

University research council

The University Research Council that involves the RCSVP, directors, officers, coordinators in consultation with the college research councils shall accomplish the following tasks.

Determining date of call for proposal submission
Checking financial settlement and pending research outputs.
Leading the research budget allocation and transfer to colleges
Monitoring and evaluation from inception to end of the research process.
Settling appeals not settled at college level.
Checking researchers involved in more than allowed number of projects.
Filtering similar and previous projects across college.

University research advisory council

Consulting reviewer selection for special call.
Determine the share of budget for each research type.

College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) The College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC)is expected to carry out the following duties and responsibilities.

Screen and review proposals (both document and oral)
Select and assign peer reviewers
Rank proposals
Ensure if comments are incorporated
Allocate budget to proposals for college proposals.
Follow-up and monitor research work performance and budget utilization
Ensure research code of conduct
The CRECs shall organize the oral defense together with respective coordinator and discipline.
The CRECS shall rate the proposals during the evaluation time.
The CREC shall report the progress of every research in the respective colleges.

Peer Reviewers The peer reviewers are expected to evaluate the technical or subject matter aspect of the proposal. Some of the roles and responsibilities include:

Evaluate and score the proposal based on the given criteria (both the document and oral defense)
Check any academic malpractice including plagiarism.

2.4. Selection of reviewers

Ad hoc reviewers committee: it works for center led researches and special calls. Members of the committee shall be selected by RD office in consultation with Deans.

College Review and Ethics committee selection: The College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC)will be selected and approved by respective college AUC to serve for two years. The number of CREC members shall be as follows.

· Colleges with less than 6 departments, will have 5 CREC members,

Colleges with 6-10 departments will have 6 CREC members,
Colleges with 11-15 departments will have 7 CREC members
Colleges with more than 15 departments will have 8 CREC

In the selection of College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC), the proportion of discipline representation shall be in consideration to cluster and related disciplines. Coordinators shall be member of the council without decision voice to facilitate the activity as it is part of their office duty. The coordinators shall be secretaries for respective proposals. College level research directors / V/Deans shall provide continuous supervision and they will manage complains. Note: The postgraduate coordinator shall be a member of the the review member in the Postgraduate strengthening research program. The AUC shall consider the following criteria to select CRECs.

Hold MA/MSc and above.
Who have more publication in MoSHE recognized journals and patent.
Has good review track and research performance evaluation by the college.
It is encouraged to involve females and persons with disabilities.
More consideration shall be given to those who fetched external.

Peer reviewers selection The peer reviewers should be selected from the same field of specialization and/or related fields. If it is very relevant, it is encouraged to select one of the peer reviewers from other colleges in the university. The peer reviewers are selected by the College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) based on the following criteria.

Hold MA/MSc and above
Has good review track and research performance evaluation by the college.
Shall have at least equivalent academic rank with the PI of the project to be reviewed. If persons with equivalent rank are not available, it can be reviewed by a person with lower academic rank.
More considerations shall be given to those who fulfill the above criteria, and won external grant & reviewed articles in indexed journals (SCOPUS, Web of science, and PubMed).

2.5. Research project pre-screening criteria

The College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC)is responsible to conduct pre-screening before proposals pass for peer review. Based on the following criteria, the College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) rejects a proposal if:

Not in line with the university’s identified thematic areas and priorities
Failure to follow the research proposal submission guideline
Lacks duplication/ repetition with previous works
Failure to involve a stakeholder when the research demands.
Plagiarism
Inadequate number of experts and inappropriate team composition (in terms of expertise and experience: unnecessarily inclusion and exclusion of professional).
Not feasible in terms of resources (not available in local market), technical feasibility and time.
Failure to submit terminal report and manuscript for completed previous projects based on the format.
Failure to publish at least one article in MoSHE recognized national journals, scopus, WOS and PubMed indexed journals or /Patent /utility model/technology package from University funded project after one year of completion. Those who cannot publish in one year should report evidence of the review process track (at least two correspondences) in reputable indexed journals after one year of completion. But, all University funded projects should be published or changed into patent /utility model/technology package with in a maximum of two years after completion..
For similar projects, if the teams are not willing to merge, each project shall be evaluated and the project with high score shall be considered for further grant
A researcher will be excluded if she and he engages in more than any four projects as Co-Investigator in the year ( TT, CS and Research)..
A researcher will be excluded if he /she engages in three projects as a Co-PI and one project as PI in the year( TT, CS and Research).
A researcher will be excluded if he /she engages in two projects as a Co-PI and two ac a Co- PI in the year ( TT, CS and Research).
If he/she engages as a PI in more than any two projects( TT, CS and Research). Note that the RTTVP may decide the number of project a staff can engage when the demand arises.
If a research project involves any of the members without their involvement and consent.

2.6. Research projects evaluation

This is the fact that each proposal documents of special call, Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award (PReS-Award), regular staff research, and center-led researches shall be evaluated. To make clear more, the proposal document evaluation criteria are appended at the back of this guideline.

2.7. Review weight

The review weight given to reviewers varies according to the type of research call. Special call weight: The centrally nominated ad-hoc committee evaluates both the oral (40%) and document (60 %). Postgraduate Research Strengthening Award(PReS-Award): This shall be evaluated by three peer reviewers ( 70%)out which 60 % for document evaluation and 10 % oral evaluation ) and a committee established by RTTVP( 30% ) of which 20 % document evaluation and 10 % oral evaluation. Regular Staff Research and center-led researches: The weight given to College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) evaluation is 60 % (20% oral and 40 % document) and 40 % by peer reviewers (10% oral and 30 % document).

The document review results and comments should be submitted before oral defense.
The scores given to the proposal shall correspond with the number and depth of comments.
All the comments and suggestions raised by the reviewers should be incorporated for consideration for funding.

2.8.Complain Handling Process

Regular staff Research

Any complain on college level researches shall be reported to coordination offices.
If the issue is not solved by the coordination office, it shall be applied to the dean office. The college dean shall present complains to college AUC. If necessary, the AUC shall establish a committee for further investigations to solve the problem.
If the issue is not solved by AUC, If the applicant is not satisfied by the AUC decision, he/she may apply to RPD (RPD shall either solve complains by itself or establish a committee to solve it) and it may be also reported to VPRTT for final decision.
Out of the 40 % peer reviewer score, if the difference between the two peer reviews’ score is greater than or equal to 10, the CREC score will be converted into 40. Then after conversion, the CREC result will be compared with the two peer reviewers’ results and the average will be done with the score close to CREC result.
If both of the two peer reviewers inflate or deflate the scores in such a way that their average is deviating by 10 points from the CREC results (after converted to 40%), there shall be a discussion with the CRECs to reduce the biased score. If the peer reviewers are not willing to do so, the score of peer reviewers will be canceled and the CREC’s document evaluation will be converted into 100%.Note that the AUC may render decision on biased reviewers and prohibit them from any review tasks for up to two years.

Special Call and Center Led Researches

Any complain on University based Special Call shall be reported to VPRTT for final decision..
RPD/ Center coordinator shall either solve complain by itself or establish a committee to solve it.

2.9.Research Granting

The fund release for proposed research projects shall be done based on the following guidelines:

The College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC), the respective AUCs, Center Coordinators, and RD shall approve budget, the research progress, and final accomplishment. The hard and soft copies (final copies) of funded projects shall be copied to the concerned bodies.
All projects scoring an average less than 50 shall not be granted.
Fund release for approved research proposals is authorized by the RCSVPO in situations whereby funds are centrally administered or by Deans of respective Academic Units when the budget allocated is decentralized;
A research contract shall be signed between the researchers and the University as well as the funding agency when the project has been approved irrespective of the source of funding;
When there is an interest of joint ownership of research results, the contract shall be between the researcher as one party and joint financiers as the other party and the University;
Funds are released for approved research proposals in two installments in two options for researches to be completed in one fiscal year. The first option is that 75% of the budget is released in the first installment and 25% of the budget is released in the second installment. The second option is that 50 % of the budget is released in the first installment and 50 % of the budget is released in the second installment. The College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) decides either of the installment options based on the milestone in the proposal.
Second installment shall be released up on submission of sufficient and sound of both physical and financial progress report to the Research and publication director or Research and Publication Coordinator, and expenses from the previous installment payment shall be settled in accordance with the relevant financial procedures of the university;
Before the release of second phase of the budget, the progress report shall be presented to the college staff which shall be facilitated by the Research and Publication Coordinator and the respective Dean. The progress report is presented only if more than half the researcher members area available and should be evaluated by college review and ethic committee. The council may use checklist based on the milestone. The next installment will be released based on a satisfactory evaluation of the first installment work.
If a research project is conducted for more than a year, the budget allocation shall be only for each year, based on the budget breakdown in the proposal and the next year’s budget shall be released based on the performance of the previous year which is justified by the open presentation.
Special bank account shall be created by the PI and one or more team members nominated by the research team

2.10.Budget allocation to research projects

After ranking the proposals, the College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) shall allocate budget to research proposals by considering the following points.

Recommendation of peer reviewers
Number of relevant and related themes
Geographical location and importance
Sample size
Number and appropriateness of data collection tools
Research material requested (e. g., lab, re-agent)
- General key issues for consideration:
Promoting problem-solving and innovative than basic research,
Scaling up problem-solving research findings,
Focusing on thematic areas so far identified or that could be potentially identified,
Ensuring the relevance of research proposals and projects to the university’s vision, mission, goals and strategic plan,
Ensuring the relevance of research proposals and projects to priority issues of national and regional development policies,
Linking the research focus with Regional, National, and International Research and Development Institutions,
Contributing to the university’s endeavor for qualified human resource and building research facility capacity,
Contributing for a wider participation of the university’s staff and students in research,
Ensuring that postgraduate students’ theses are in line with the strategic objectives of the university,
Contributing for regional and national capacity building and development endeavors,
Contributing to the national and regional self-reliance through the application of knowledge and technology,
Promoting collaboration among national, continental and international organizations in education, research and publication,
Ensuring the participation of stakeholders in all research projects
Promoting research ethics in the university.

2.11. Research Extension

The Research team can request to RPD or the Dean office to extend the research undertaking but this will be accepted if the research activities are not completed within the planned period and if there is concrete and convincing reasons for this such as the conditions are beyond the control of the researchers. The researcher is entitled to request extension for reasonable period of time.

2.12. Grant Administration

The research activities in the university shall be administered based on the following guidelines:

The progress of each research activity shall be reported by the Principal Investigator (PI) after getting signatures from all researchers at the regular biannual reports and submitted to the Research and Publication Coordinator and the Research and Publication Director with minutes;
Both the Progress report and the terminal reports with manuscripts based on the agreements shall be presented to College/Faculty/university’s community and evaluated by the CRECs.
Progress reports shall be prepared following the format prepared by the University
If the monitoring and evaluation indicates that a project has not been going as planned or if there exists some fraud, the Research and Publication Director or the College/Faculty Dean or Research Directors may enforce the return of previously taken budget, and if necessary, pursuit legal suit.
The financial administration of research funds shall be governed by the existing financial policy and procedures of the University and such other relevant guidelines as may be issued by the RCSVPO upon approval by the Senate;
Researchers of other organizations working with the university staff shall not be assigned as Principal Investigators; they shall not withdraw research budget or shall not request ownership of intellectual property rights arising from the research output, unless clearly stated initially;
The university teaching staff, studying their graduate program in the same university, shall be involved in research projects only in topics related to their thesis/dissertation and the student should be involved only in one project.
Academic staff with accepted research proposal shall inform the department head to get the stipulated exemption of classes in a given semester and adjust teaching loads;
Completed research report shall be submitted to the Research coordinator and the final approval shall be made by CRECs and submitted to the Research and Publication Director.
For special call and university based center led research projects, the completed research report shall be submitted to Research and Publication Director and RCSVPO.
The Deans shall facilitate the Research activities, support the Research and Publication office and incorporate Research and Publication activities in the main report.
Research results shall be communicated to responsible community members and implementers or other concerned stakeholders;
If a research project is discontinued due to justified reasons, or if the work is not properly carried out within the planned time table, the researcher should return the unutilized money to the university;
All projects funded by the university shall produce at least one publication (MOSHE recognized national journal, Scopus, Web of Science, and PubMed indexed journals) or /Patent/utility model/technology package after one year of completion Once a research project is approved and budget is secured, the researcher cannot change the approved location, the work plan, methodology or objective of the study without informing and getting permission from the Research and Publication Director and the Dean.
When a Principal Investigator (PI) leaves the university, without completing a research work, the research members shall delegate a person from the co-investigators or other professionally relevant researcher and approved by the AUC.
A researcher who has received research fund either from the university or other funding agencies which have agreement with the university is obliged to submit a hard and soft copies of the final result and settle financial matters. Unless these are proven, the individual shall not receive another university grant; shall be denied clearance when leaving the University in any manner (scholarship, transfer, pension, etc…).

2.13. Monitoring and Evaluation

Within each project and management system, monitoring and evaluation (M &E) are essential for two reasons. They provide information on how the project is functioning to report to supervisors and executes but also to illustrate the lessons learned in a project. Often one function is stressed above the other, but both are equally important and need to be given the appropriate level of importance. Monitoring and evaluation are key instruments to encourage ongoing learning for the improvement interventions. The benefits of conducting good M & E include improvement in management and performance in terms of effectiveness, efficiency and value for money and an increased accountability and transparency. The ultimate aim of monitoring and evaluation is to learn what has worked and what has not. Hence, monitoring and evaluation of research in the university shall be made based on the following guidelines:

Proper implementation/execution of each project is the responsibility of those involved in the research;
The Research and Publication Coordinator or the Dean office or RC Director or the Research and Publication Director shall ensure the steady implementation of research proposals on a regular basis;
Submitting regular progress reports to Research and Publication Coordinator or RC Directors or Research and Publication Director is mandatory;
The researcher shall submit progress report using the format to the Research and Publication Coordinator or RC Director or Research and publication Director twice or as required; using software application
Any concerned body in the University shall supervise research activities in the field and/or laboratory at any time for appropriate utilization of fund, correct use of methods, location, etc.; therefore, the researchers should submit updated schedule of the file work to the coordination office.
The results of each project should be presented as progress report in seminars, conferences and eventually every effort shall be made to publish it in peer-reviewed reputable MoSHE recognized or indexed journals
Successfully completed and verified results shall be transferred to end users through training, demonstration, community Service and Technology Transfer Projects, communication using various media, etc. This shall be decided by a joint discussion by the researcher, Research and Publication Coordinator or the Research and Publication Director in consultation with the UIL-TT Director and Community Service Director.
Written feedback shall be provided for reports presented on the progress of researches by the Research and Publication Coordinator Any good and bad practices and challenges of research activities will be documented and communicated for future use;
Researchers shall present their terminal report to the University community before submission
The Research and Publication Coordinator or Research Center Directors or Research and Publication Director or the Respective Dean shall regularly assess/evaluate the planned research activities based on the outcomes of the evaluation
For completed researches, forums/conferences shall be organized at AU or RC or university level to select potential research works which are competent enough to be presented at national or international conferences organized by the university.
All research project winners should submit their data to the University’s research Directorate data bank to be stored with confidentiality. After five year the data will be available to the university staff for further academic and research purpose
At least one article should be published in MoSHE recognized national journals, scopus, WOS and PubMed indexed journals or /Patent /utility model/technology package from University funded project after one year of completion. Those who cannot publish in one year should report evidence of the review process track in reputable indexed journals after one year of completion. All University funded projects should be published or changed into patent /utility model/technology package with in a maximum of two years after completion..

2.14.Output, Outcome and Impact Assessment of the Research Result

The University shall use the following two alternative approaches to monitor and evaluate the effect of its research activities:

Tracking forwards: from the completed research to see where and how it is communicated, and to what effect. Tracking forwards, the university will decide where to look for effects and use the under listed five categories to capture the multi-dimensional nature of its research output.
Knowledge production (e.g. peer-reviewed papers, proceedings, abstracts, patent, modules, teaching materials)
Research capacity building (e.g. ca reer development, working papers, methodological guidelines )
Policy recommendations and product development (e.g. policy brief and product )
Sector benefits (e.g. impacts on specific client groups)
Wider societal wellbeing (e.g. socio-cultural, institutional, economic, environmental, political, health , and productivity benefits)
Tracking background: examining policy choices, organizational management and professional practice to explore how research is sought out and used in these areas, and to what effect. For tracking backgrounds, the university may undertake interviews with research end users by deploying different mechanisms.

2.15. Postgraduate Student Research Management Process

The Department Graduate Council shall check and approve the appropriateness of the research title to their disciplines. and the selected titles shall be in line with the University of Gondar research mandate areas if students are recipient of grant from the university.
The Department Graduate Council shall assign advisor appropriate to the selected titles
The department head shall follow up students’ progress and advisors’ support
Advisors shall seriously follow up the data collection process by any means
Researches shall get advisors approval for submission for defense
The Department Graduate Council shall approve the thesis/dissertation which is free from plagiarism before final defense.
The evaluation of thesis/dissertation shall be based on the post graduate guideline
Students shall submit one manuscript to the department together with the final research report based on the manuscript submission guideline.
Authors of the articles shall only be the student himself/herself and the thesis advisors.
All graduate students’ research involving human and animal subjects should get approval from IRB. MA level proposals shall be reviewed by CREC at the college and the PhD proposals shall be reviewed by the central IRB.

2.16. Research Audit

A research audit shall be conducted by RCSVPO twice in every five years to assess how well the theme and the college/faculty/school, research centers/institutes met the university’s research vision and mission. The areas which the audit should focus on include:

The scope and extent of the research activity
The strengths and weaknesses of research activity
The effectiveness of the training provided to the emerging/ junior researchers
A financial report on revenue and expenditure. The report should also include the names of major sponsors, clients and stakeholders
The focus and future direction of the research activity
The quality and quantity of outcomes of the research outputs
Linkages/ relations to other clusters of the university and other research institutes/stakeholders.
On the basis of the findings, a strategy to improve their research performance is drawn up. The audit report and strategy are submitted to the senate for approval.

2.17. Credit Calculation

When the university staffs are engaged in research activities, the credit calculation for the research task shall be as follows:

Credit calculation shall be based on MOSHE directives.
Credits are counted every semester throughout the life of the project,
Credit benefits shall be considered only when the Research and Publication Coordinator or the Dean or director receives sufficient confirmation that the research activity is carried out as originally planned.
For suspended or delayed researches with justifiable reasons the credit benefit shall be offered when the work resumed.
Credit benefits shall not be considered for terminated, suspended, delayed or improperly executed research proposals.

2.18. Benefits

Peer reviewer benefit: The peers reviewers shall receive the payment for reviewing proposals as per MOSHE/MOF directives
College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC): the benefit shall be decided by MOSHE directives and University guideline which will be approved by University Administration Council.

2.19. Ethical and Environmental Considerations

In the development of strong research culture, the university and academic staff should observe the ethical and environmental considerations in research undertakings. Hence, the ethical and environmental considerations of research in the university shall be governed by the University of Gondar Research Ethics, National Ethics committee, National and international standards, procedures, conventions and treaties shall be respected to minimize/avoid negative impacts of research on the environment. College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) shall be established in each college and the scope and the papers referred to the research ethics committee shall be determined by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of the University.

2.20.The Institutional Review Board (IRB)

The IRB is accountable to the RCSVP;
The IRB shall consist of representative from various disciplines such as: Health, Social Science, Science, Law, Agriculture and Environment and also concerned community representatives;
The IRB members should not consist entirely of men or entirely of women;
The Board can also nominate other members or consult other bodies for specific reviews;
The RCSVP assigns chairperson and the secretary of the IRB
Quorum: the quorum will consist of 5 of the 9 members including the Reasearch and Publication Director and the Vice President for Research and Technology Transfer. In the absence of the Chairperson, the secretary acts on his behalf. Moreover Professional qualifications of the quorum requirements should consist of: At least one member whose primary area of expertise is in a non-scientific area, one medical scientist and at least one member who is independent of the institution/research site;
Meeting: The committee meets once in a month. The chairperson, however, will call an extra ordinary meeting at any time as deemed necessary;
Ethical clearance procedures follow international laws such as the Declaration of Helsinki and the Ethical Clearance Guideline developed by the Ethiopian Science and Technology Agency;
Deadline for ethical clearance: The Committee shall declare project proposals cleared in less than 1month period;
Ethics of the IRB: All documents that reach the IRB shall be strictly confidential;
The RCSVP represents the IRB in the Senate meeting.

Mandates of the IRB

Organize and deliver research ethics training to researchers in the region or the institutions.
Develop SOPs that govern the IRB’s research review procedures.
Submit progress report of the IRB’s functions annually to the NRERC.
Inform the NRERC on occurrence of frequent, unexpected severe adverse effects (SAEs) related to research reviewed and approved by the IRB,
Review and approve research protocols similar to the NRERC except:

Genetic research, stem cell research

Research involving human biological material transfer outside of Ethiopia provided that the IRB notifies the NRERC Multicenter international collaborative research of experimental nature
Investigation of new devices, drugs or vaccines not registered for use in Ethiopia
Review of trials that are funded by manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies
Solicit funds to build its own capacity
Inform and assist the investigators and advisors on ethical and procedural standards related to the use of human participants in research, to facilitate compliance with this guidelines, Ethiopian law, and international regulations.
Ensure that research studies conducted under its jurisdiction are designed and conducted in a manner that protects the rights, welfare and privacy of research participants.
Approve, require modification in, or disapprove all research activities that fall within its jurisdiction.
Conduct continuing review as it deems necessary to protect the rights, welfare, and privacy of research participants, including requiring progress reports from investigators.
Suspend and terminate approval of a study not being conducted in accordance with the NRERC and IRB’s requirements or that has been associated with unexpected serious harm to participants or others.
observe or have a third party observe the informed consent process and/or audit the progress of any study in its jurisdiction as it deems necessary to protect the rights and welfare of human participants.
IRB may place restrictions on a study.

Membership requirements for IRB

New members shall be nominated by members of IRB and approved by RCSVP;
The RCSVPO is responsible for handling the appointment of committee members proposed by the ethical committee;
Members are selected in their personal capacities, based on their interest, ethical and/or scientific training, knowledge and expertise, as well as on their commitment and willingness to volunteer the necessary time and effort for the IRB work;
Members must disclose in writing any interest or involvement-financial, professional or otherwise – in a project or proposal under consideration;
The IRB will decide the extent to which members that might have a conflict of interest may participate in bringing out an advice/decision, refer to SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) of the university-Confidentiality/Conflict of Interest Agreement;
Members shall be required to sign a confidentiality agreement at the start of their term;
The confidentiality agreement protects the privacy and confidentiality of all parties whose information may be disclosed to the IRB in the course of its work;
Members are appointed for a period of 3 years;
Their appointments may be renewed by the RCSVP for up to two consecutive terms;
The Ethical Committee will include some rotation after a period of three-years for up to two consecutive terms, but it will also strive to ensure continuity within the university IRB by staggering replacement of members.

Resignation, Disqualification and Replacement of Members

Members may resign their positions by submitting a letter of resignation to the Chairperson;
Members may also be disqualified from continuance. The Chairperson should provide written arguments to the (other) members and there should be unanimous agreement;
Members that have resigned or have been disqualified may be replaced by selection and appointment of new members proposed by the ethical committee.

Duties and Responsibilities of Institutional Review Board (IRB)

The Institutional Review Board (IRB) shall:

Administer and execute the Ethical Clearance aspects of the research projects at the University and requested local clearance funded by other agents;
Facilitate the establishment of representative pools of eligible College Review and Ethics Committee(CREC)
Support and guide the College Review and Ethics Committee(CREC);
Consider author (s) appeal in case of discontent with the rejection of paper by the CERC;
Consults experts in relation to Ethical aspects and updates on national and international standards;
Develop working ethical guideline (directives);
Facilitate capacity building trainings for members of IRB, CRRC, staff members and other relevant stakeholders;
Refer research proposals to the College Review and Ethics Committee.

Duties and Responsibilities of College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) The CREC shall be established in relevant College. It is accountable to the IRB. The committee shall;

Be responsible for reviewing the ethical issues of research projects.
Be responsible to implement directives prepared by the IRB based on national and international standards;
Assess whether or not the research project is within the procedural and ethical standards of the IRB directives;
Review research proposals of ethical concern, issue clearance certificate and copy for IRB,
Monitor each project for its ethical implementation in consultation with the IRB, Research and Publication Coordinator and the Dean or Research Center directors;
Protecting the participants from harm related to research, and ensuring that individual/community benefits and fairness
Organize and deliver research ethics training for researchers .
Review and approve post graduate student proposals(MSc, PhD, post Doc ) at the college level.
Review and approve university funded research proposals.
Collect progress report from the investigators.
Refer proposal to IRB when its beyond its scope.

N.B. The payments to IRB and College Review and Ethics Committee (CREC) shall be based the MOSHE/MOF directives.

3. PUBLICATION

The man purpose of publication is to disseminate research output to the scientific community, career/ professional development of staff, and then to increase the university’s national and international visibility. It should be a culture for full-time academic staff at University to conduct researches and publish article in peer reviewed reputable journals (MoSHE recognized indexed journals). But, as mentioned earlier, University funded researches should be disseminated through publication, patent. Each publication should be reported to the research and publication coordinator within one month based on the publication reporting format .Otherwise, the staff will not claim any associated rights and incentives.

Responsibilities

The researchers should publish their research findings from funded projects (University and external funded projects).
Any published articles should not violate scientific integrity and ethical principles.
All University of Gondar staff should properly indicate their affiliation (department, College/ Institute/ School and University of Gondar).
All published articles from UoG funding should mention project code and funding acknowledgement as “ ….this research was financed by University of Gondar in the framework of (write project title here) and (write the code here )”

Note: Any publication that does not meet the above provisions will not be considered for academic promotion and claims associated to the publication.

3.1. University Journals

The major objectives of establishing journals, bulletins, working papers and proceedings in the university are:

To encourage, stimulate and promote research among members of the academic community,
To provide scientific and technological information for the staff of the University at national and international level,
To disseminate research results to the scientific community and other end users,
To arrange a forum to share observations, experiences and ideas,
To serve as a platform for researchers active involvement in various development fields,
To introduce the various academic and scientific activities of the University to academic and other organizations,
To nurture the research culture among academic staff at the University.

3.2 Journals in the University

Procedures of establishment

Establishing a journal can be initiated by departments/ schools/institutes/ colleges.
The AUC and the RCSVP office examine the relevance and proceed with detail need assessment and journal guideline preparation.
Workshop will be conducted to review the journal guideline by internal and external reviewers.
The AUC endorse the journal establishment guideline and approved by the Senate of the University.

Editorial Board

Each journal published in the University shall have its own Editorial Board, Advisory Board, Editor-in-chief, Associate Editor (s), Managing Editor and policies that go in line with the overall University’s rules and regulations;
Individual publications (journals) established in different AUs shall report to the Office of Research and Publication Directorate and shall be deposited in the institutional repository system;
The minimum number of manuscript per issue for a journal publication is ten full length articles.
The journals may announce a special call for addressing a chosen topic which be published in a special issue
The journals shall receive manuscripts based their aims and scopes throughout the year.
A journal shall publish a minimum of two issues (one volume) per year; unless otherwise special permission is obtained
Online publication of journals should be encouraged;
Publications shall be peer-reviewed original articles, review articles, brief communications, case reports, book reviews and letters;
Affiliation of the Author or Authors shall be written properly as “the University of Gondar”

Election of the Editorial Board (EB) Members

Editorial board (EB) members include the Editor-in-chief, Associate Editors and Managing Editor (optional). The minimum requirement to be elected for EB member is a master’s degree and publication of at least 3 articles in MoSHE recognized indexed journal or PhD with publication of minimum 2 articles in MoSHE recognized indexed journal. The election of the Editorial Board members shall be based on the following guidelines:

The Dean or the Director of Research shall invite or nominate its potential faculty staff members to apply for Editor-in-Chief Election.
AUC shall select the Editor-in-Chief based on their research experience as PI, external

grant, publication, experience as journal article reviewer and editor in indexed journals.

The Editor-in-Chief shall invite and nominate potential Associate Editors based on their research experience as PI, external grant, publication, experience as journal article reviewer and editor in indexed journals. Volunteer International editors are highly encouraged.
The Editor-in-Chief and the dean shall decide the number of relevant Associate Editors; and the minimum number of Associate Editors should be five and the maximum shall be eight and possible to add international volunteer editors.
If the publication office becomes larger, a full time managing editor can be hired;
The number of associate editors shall be determined by the number of issues per year.
- For journal which publish 4 issues per year- 10 Associate editors
- For journal which publish 3 issues per year- 8 Associate editors
- For journal which publish 2 issues per year- 6 Associate editors
- For journal which publish 1 issue per year- 4 Associate editors and should upgrade to publish two issues within two years.

For those who publish more, it will be calculated proportionally with a factor of 2 for each issue. Additionally, all the journals each will have 1 language editor and 1 layout editor and webmaster who will be counted as associate editors to give all the needed support for the journals. Those language and layout editors will work not only on the journals, but they will support different activities as a pool of language and layout experts to support additional conference and publication editorials.

The term of office for the editorial board members shall be five consecutive years provided that the performance is satisfactory. However, an EB member could be elected for a second term.

Duties and Responsibilities of the Editorial Board (EB)

While the Editorial Board (EB) shall be accountable to the dean/director of the Academic Unit, Research Centers, or Research and Publication Director it shall have the following duties and responsibilities:

Approves layout of the journal;
Reviews and/or edits all received manuscripts that would be published as original articles or short communication;
Decides on whether a manuscript should be rejected or be reviewed as an original article or short communication;
Chooses two or more reviewers;
The EB shall assign an Associate Editor-in-Chief from Associate Editors;
The EB may select topics for review articles and invites experts in the field to prepare a review manuscript;
Works to improve the quality and regularity of the journal;
Designs ways of improving the dissemination or circulation of the journal;
Searches financial support for the journal.

Duties and Responsibilities of the Editor-in-Chief

The Editor-in-Chief of a journal in the University shall have the following duties and responsibilities:

Calls and chairs EB meetings
Develops draft formats of the journal to be approved by the EB;
Receives and registers all manuscripts;
Reviews the manuscript’s conformity and its scope, then decides rejection or sends to an associate editor for review process;
Responsible for communications with the corresponding author;
Maintains the quality and regularity of the journal, and its availability online and in printing;
Responsible for all communications regarding the journal;

Reports the journal’s publication activities to the Editorial Board or deans, directors of Research Centers or Research and Publication Director;
Sends reminders to corresponding author/s;
Sends manuscripts to Associate Editors for reviewers;
He/she shall be paid as per the Guidelines of MoSHE.

Note: The chief editor shall not hold any office position

Duties and Responsibilities of Associate Editor(s)

The Associate Editor (s) of a journal shall have the following duties and responsibilities:

The Associate Editors shall carry the functions of the editor-in-chief in his/her absence;
Associate editors shall secure potential reviewers;
Once reviewers are selected by the Editorial Board (EB), the associate editor in his/her respective discipline shall communicate (send manuscripts and receive comments) with reviewers;
The associate editor sends reminders to reviewers;
The Associate Editor receives manuscripts from the Editor-in-Chief and sends comments of reviewers to the Editor-in-Chief;

Advisory Board Members

Experts living in Ethiopia or abroad shall be selected (based on national and international experience in research) by the EB as editorial consultants after they agree to work in that capacity. They shall have the following duties and responsibilities:

The Advisory Board evaluates the quality of the journal and assess whether it meets acceptable standards;
The Advisory Board gives feedback to the editorial board on ways of improving the standard of the journal;
Board members shall popularize the journal in their own and other institutions.

Note:the editorial board of the journal shall be paid as per the guideline of MoSHE.

Manuscript Review Procedures

When manuscripts are submitted for journal editors, they shall pass through the following rigorous review procedures:

The Editor-in-Chief acknowledges the receipt of a manuscript within one week;
Review form shall be prepared which the reviewers fill and return along with the articles;
The EB shall have three options of decisions: ‘accept manuscripts for external review’, ‘return it to author for revision’, or ‘reject it’;
The EB also decides on whether a manuscript is to be accepted as original article, brief communication, case report or review article etc…;
Once accepted for external review, the associate editor in the respective discipline identifies one reviewer (for brief communications /case reports etc…) and at least two reviewers (for original articles) with appropriate expertise;
Reviewers will be requested to review and return the manuscript within four weeks of their receipt;
Reviewers shall report their decisions based on the evaluation form as to ‘accept as it is’, ‘accept with minor revision’, ‘accept with major revision’, or ‘reject’;
If a manuscript is accepted with modifications, it will be returned to the author for revision;
Rejected manuscripts will be returned to the author(s);
Manuscripts accepted without modification and with minor revision, revised by the authors to the best satisfaction of the editorial board shall be accepted for publication;
Manuscripts accepted with ‘major revision’ revised by authors shall be sent to previous reviewers for proper incorporation of comments. If approved by reviewers and the EB, the manuscript shall be accepted for publication;
For incorporation of comments for ‘minor revision’ a maximum of two weeks will be given;
In the review process the authors’ and reviewer’s anonymity is preserved (double blind process);
Manuscripts accepted by both reviewers with or without minor editorial revision shall be edited by one EB member and then presented to the Editor-in-Chief;
Manuscripts accepted with major revision by one or more reviewers will be sent to the author (s) for revision. Authors should re-submit the revised manuscript in four weeks’ time;
If a manuscript is rejected by one of the reviewer but accepted (with minor or major revision) by the other reviewer, the final decision shall be made by EB;
A manuscript rejected by two reviewers shall be rejected, and rejected manuscripts will be returned to authors;
Galley proofs will be sent to the corresponding author. They should be checked and returned to the Editorial Office as soon as possible within two weeks after receipt. Delay in returning corrected proofs may result in the paper being held over to the next issue. At this stage, corrections must be limited only to essential and editorial mistakes;
The priority of articles for publication shall be decided by the EB based on the order of submission of the manuscripts to the Editor-in-Chief;
Volumes and issue number may be posted online as well as printed in paper;
Electronic copies of the published paper will be sent to the author(s);

Reputability of Journals Published in the University

Journals published in the university shall be given the status of reputability based on the following guidelines:

Reputability of a journal published in the University shall be officially declared by the University Senate
An Academic Unit or Research Center, after publishing its second volume consequently or above, can request reputability status for the journal it administers;
The request for journal reputability shall be presented to the RCSVPO;
The RCSVPO shall rate the journal against the criteria stated in MOSHE guideline for evaluation of Journals published in Ethiopia (Guideline no Research 01/2019).
The RCSVPO shall reveal the list and status of all reputable journals published in the University;
An Academic Unit or Research Center shall present a request to the RCSVPO for the renewal of reputability of its journal before three months of its due date of conditional acceptance expires;

4. Capacity Building

4.1. Facilities

In order to create a strong research culture that would help the university to realize its vision, the necessary research facilities should be put in place. Hence, the university shall:

Facilitate the availability of important research resources such as laboratories, equipment, consumables and fieldwork logistics such as vehicles and boats;
Facilitate the availability of experimental or demonstration sites (for agriculture, aquaculture, tissue culture etc…);
Facilitate the availability of better offices, computers and internet access for researchers;
Facilitate the subscription of some important publications;
Facilitate the establishment of museums to keep safely the collections brought during some research works/expeditions;
Establish research village for its Research Centers as deemed necessary;
Establish linkage with other regional, national and international research institutions.

4.2.Knowledge and Skill Development

A thriving research culture can be developed in the university when the research capacity of the staff (knowledge and skills) is continuously improved. Hence, the university shall:

Organize short term and long term trainings on research methodology, research proposal writing, large grant writing, data analysis techniques and utilization of statistical software, skills of writing for publication, and computer skills for researchers;
Organize trainings on project management skills for researchers and grant winners;
Organize trainings on skills of writing manuscripts for publication and research ethics;
Organize workshops, seminars and conferences and encourage its staff to present their findings in these avenues;
Support its staff members to present their findings in national and international workshops/conferences;
Organize or assist short term study/research visit scholarships (locally and abroad) for the staff;
Assist, when requested by AUs/Research Centers, PhD students for short term study/research visit scholarships (locally and abroad) and when approved by the RCSVPO and the University President;
Facilitate networks among researchers in the university and outside through formation of institutional collaborations among various research institutions;
Encourage joint (multi institutional) grant proposal developments;
Organize training (for researchers) on Intellectual Property Right (IPR);

5. Inclusion

5.1. Involvement of Women and persons with disabilities in Research

In order to address the longstanding developmental problems of women and persos with disability and bring them onboard to the development arena, and maintain equity at all levels the university shall;

Duly consider gender and disability issue during the thematic area preparation;
Strongly encourage women and persons with disability staff involvement during project developments;

6.Academic and Research Discourse

In a university where the staff and students (mainly graduate students) are expected to be engaged in research activities, there should be different avenues (like seminars) for academic and research discourses. Hence academic and research discourses should follow the following guidelines so that such discourses will contribute for the development of thriving academic and research culture:

Seminar calendar shall be put in place as applicable (e.g. every week or 2 weeks) in all Academic Units and Research Centers;
Seminar participants shall include staff, students (especially postgraduate) and guest speakers;
The Research and Publication Coordinator shall encourage all academic staff and graduate students to submit presentation topics to the department or Academic Units;
The departments or AUs shall select presenters and the Research and Publication Coordinator shall then prepare a seminar calendar for a semester. The seminar calendar shall be posted online and on notice boards for all staff members and graduate students;
At least three days before each seminar, the department head or the Research and Publication Coordinator shall announce (remind) the presenters and their topics for presentation to all staff members and graduate students;
At each seminar day, one or more research outputs or other relevant issues for academic discourse shall be presented;
all full-time academic staff and PhD students shall present a seminar topic at least once a year;
All academic staff and postgraduate students shall attend regular seminars; department heads or the Research and Publication Coordinator or RC Directors are responsible to document the attendance;
All staff members and graduate students shall be free from classes on seminar days throughout the semester;
The Research and Publication Coordinator or RC Directors shall keep record of seminar presentations and collect staff attendance from the department heads and report to the Research and Publication Director of the University;
Postdoctoral/ PhD/ MSc/ MA/ returnees shall present their work in weekly seminars;
RCs shall conduct their own seminar sessions on a day other than the seminar day of the AU;
Each Academic Unit and Research Center shall have Research Week every year to review research proposals, evaluate research project progress or final reports or to make an exhibition of technology outputs.
The university shall organize annual international or national research conference/s

Conference paper presenters shall be paid as per MOSHE directives for staff from another institution provided that the presenters are willing to submit their full article before presentation so that it will be published in the proceeding of the conference OR the paper presented is already published in Science indexed Journals in the year of the conference or a year before. In addition, staff from another institution shall be given accommodation and transportation cost. If the conference organizers generate funds from sources other than the host university regular budget, they may decide on the payment amount; Key note speakers shall be paid as per MoSHE directives. In a conference, a maximum of two key note speakers shall be selected, one of which shall be the university staff. The conference organizing committee shall nominate key note speakers based on merit and appropriateness to the theme of the conference. The selection of key note speakers shall be approved by the Academic Commission of the respective AU and by the RCSVPO for research centers.

7. Sources of Finance for Research

Ethiopian Government/Ministry of Finance

The University receives research budget from the Federal Government of Ethiopia and it shall allocate annually a considerable amount of budget for research. This budget is utilized by staff, students (for thesis research) and for publications of journals, proceedings, and for administration of research. The source of these funds may be from Government treasury or from externally searched research and development grants. Other governmental organizations may also fund some of the projects according to agreements reached. Especially RCs are highly required to win externally funded projects for (in principle) the research grant from the university will gradually diminish and ultimately stop.

External Sources

Individual researchers also receive grants from different organizations and other partnership and linkage programs with sister universities overseas. The university should solicit funding organizations or encourage and facilitate researchers to compete for local, national and international funding calls. Depending on the nature of the project the university shall look for funding from external or international sources and encourage individual researchers to look for funding from external and international sources;

This shall apply to researches that are going to be financed by sources other than the University (may be in the country or abroad);
All research and development project proposals to be submitted to funding agencies for financial support other than the university may pass through the relevant Academic Unit (or Research Center) and the progress copied to RCSVPO of the University. This is important for legal conditions, follow up, documentation issues, information exchange, facilitation for request of authorities for the conduct of the research, ethical clearance, etc.;
After completion the results of such studies shall be communicated to the relevant bodies such as AUs, RCs, or RCSVPO;
The RCSVPO shall facilitate externally funded projects;
A reasonable rate of benefit may be authorized to researchers who secure research funds from external sources. The details shall be worked out based on the incentive policy of the University;
Detailed procedures outlined under ‘Administration of Research’ section of the Guideline shall be observed;
Once the research project is approved by the grant provider, the researcher(s) shall receive an official letter from the Academic Unit or Research Center through the RCSVPO, individually or in a group. The researcher(s) then will be able to get financial, personnel and procurement services from the University;
Unless the donor strictly forbids, the University will charge a maximum of 10% of the total project cost for project administration costs (overhead cost);
If the contractual agreement does not show the percentage of the overhead cost clearly, the RCSVPO shall decide the percentage of the overhead cost to be charged in consultation with project developers, donors and the University Legal Service;
Unless specified in the project contractual agreement document otherwise, the ownership of intellectual property rights for results of externally funded joint projects belongs entirely to the University.
Procedures Governing Misconduct in the Research and Publication Process

Research Misconducts

Each staff member of the University has a responsibility to foster an environment which promotes intellectual honesty and integrity and which does not tolerate misconduct in any aspect of research or scholarly endeavor. The following are considered to be research misconducts:

Failure to meet lines of accountabilities stated in this document
Failure to provide progress reports and open presentations for the respective office within agreed time;
Misuse of research fund and materials; Delaying of research projects without convincing reason(s);
Failure to complete research works within a scheduled time without convincing reason(s);
Failure to submit the final research documents in a required format;
Failure to disseminate his research findings to the target community;
Any form of plagiarism and mischief in research;
Any form of corruption and injustice in research and research administration;
Failure to respond to research administration instructions;
Any form of using forged, trimmed, tortured and cooked data;
Failure to work in collaboration with others when need arises; and

Research Guidelines