Enago’s Author Workshop With NUC Addresses Challenges of Nigerian Researchers

New York, USA: Enago conducted a series of author workshops at four different locations in Nigeria—National Universities Commission (NUC), University of Lagos, University of Port-Harcourt, and Nnamdi Azikiwe University. These workshops, which were organized in collaboration with NUC, were organized as an initiative to address the fundamental issues of academic publishing of Nigerian researchers. For this series of workshops, the speaker was Mr. Duncan Nicholas, a publication and training consultant with Enago Academy. The sessions attracted a response from over 2000 researchers!

A large number of graduate students and early-stage researchers attended these sessions. The first session commenced with an introduction to the basic guidelines on preparing research articles, tips on appropriate structuring, as well as key steps for submission of manuscripts, which can affect the possibility of the manuscript being published in reputed journals. The second one discussed the important concepts related to journal selection such as aims and scope of journals, understanding journal quality, and avoiding predatory journals/publishers. Understanding these issues is important as they can have a significant impact on the visibility of published research and acceptance of manuscripts by journals. An interactive Q&A session helped the audience share their concerns with the speaker and resolve their queries.

“Enago’s workshops helped the academic community from Nigeria get clarity on the expectations of international peer-reviewed journals. Also, the session on journal selection definitely helped improve awareness of predatory journals/publishers among Nigerian researchers, some of whom have unknowingly selected them for publishing their research. Every researcher will have to be aware of these concepts and that’s exactly what we aimed to share through our workshops.” said Rajiv Shirke, Vice President, Global Operations, Enago.

Dr. Suleiman Ramon-Yusuf, Director-Research Innovation & Information Technology, National Universities Commission (NUC), Abuja mentioned, “For making a mark on the global research map, publishing in international high-impact journals is a key endeavor for many universities and research institutions. However, the challenge of understanding the various aspects of research communication and publication persists, especially for an early-career researcher. We collaborated with Enago to fix this issue and to provide our researchers with continuous support, and are extremely happy with the results of the workshops conducted. The topics presented were apt for our audience, and we would not be surprised if some of them insist on another set of workshops by Enago.”

Prof. Ndowa E. S. Lale, FAVH, FESN, FISCEST, Vice-Chancellor, University of Port Harcourt stated, “On behalf of Governing Council, Senate, Staff and the entire students of the University of Port-Harcourt, I wish to thank Enago for organizing these workshops for our researchers, faculty, and students. We received a lot of impressive feedback from the participants. We are happy that this event has also raised the overall level of awareness about the publication process. We will continue to interface with Enago for such knowledge initiatives with the aim of reducing the gap between research and publication.”

Prof. Wellington A. Oyibo, Director – Research and Innovation Office, University of Lagos mentioned “Thank you Enago for conducting the workshops here at UNILAG, Nigeria. The response was simply overwhelming! The Q&A sessions were enlightening for the attendees and the speaker’s connection to the audience was excellent. Throughout the sessions, the best practices and tips shared by Enago have given our academics an insight into improving their chances of getting published in high-impact journals. We are sure that acquiring such knowledge will expedite the global dissemination of research conducted in Africa.”

Prof. Charles Esimone, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academics), Nnamdi Azikiwe University added “It is important to note that research production in Nigeria has been increasing in recent years. In this vein, the workshops conducted by Enago helped the country’s researchers in expanding their knowledge, thereby helping them to publish their research results successfully. The two sessions allowed them to explore topics such as writing scientific manuscripts, use of publishing technological tools, open access publishing, and communication with journal editors, among other aspects. The workshop was handled by Enago’s speaker in an appropriate manner and met the expectations of the audience. This will undoubtedly help the participants to improve the dissemination of their research work at an international level.”