The Research Cell of VVM’s Shree Damodar College of Commerce & Economics organized a session on ‘How to Frame a Minor Research Proposal’ on 18th August 2018 at 11.00 a.m. The Resource Person for the session was Ms. Sulochana Pednekar, Asst. Prof. at the Dept. of Women’s Studies, Goa University. The session was attended by 29 faculty members of the College.
Ms. Pednekar began the session by asking the participants about their expectation from the session. Faculty had various queries regarding identification of the area of research, funding, procedure for application, framing of objectives, identifying the problem, outline of research proposal, time management, sampling, budgeting and so on.
Ms. Pednekar systematically explained the contents of a minor research proposal. It includes:
Discipline – of the researcher
Title –which may be decided after finalisation of the objectives
Aim – provides justification to the funding agency
Statement of the problem – is the crux of the project proposal. It includes:
Problem identification – which involves a needs assessment survey
Problem analysis – analysis of core problems to identify contributory factors and their relationship with the problems. Factors may be political, socio-cultural and service provision.
Problem statement – should include: brief description of the socio-economic & cultural context in which the problem occurs, description of the nature of the problem, major factors responsible with convincing argument that available knowledge or action is insufficient to solve it, descriptions of solutions tried in the past and its results, type of new knowledge/ action / intervention needed and its relationships in solving the problem.
Problem formulation: action / intervention / research is required when there exists a discrepancy between what should be and what is, and a question about why the discrepancy exists.
The criteria for selecting a project for Minor Research were discussed as follows:
relevance – how large or severe is the problem and who is affected.
Avoidance of duplication
Feasibility
Political acceptability
Socio-cultural acceptability
Applicability of possible results and recommendations
Urgency of the actions / interventions / results
Ethical acceptability.
Ms. Pednekar also discussed about the Overview of Literature, Research Methodology, Implications, Duration of the project, Personnel, Budget and Topics that are generally accepted such as health, gender and environment.
The session ended with the vote of thanks by Dr. Lira Gama, Convener of the Research Cell.
