All things data: capacity building for Bangladeshi researchers

November 22, 2019

Boosting skills and building the confidence of young to mid-level researchers was the focus of a recent three-day workshop on data organising, analysing, interpreting and presenting supported by the Crawford Fund’s WA Committee in Khulna, Bangladesh.

Building the capacity of Bangladeshi researchers by developing their skills in statistical analysis and international paper writing was the aim of the short workshop. All the participants are, or have been, involved in ACIAR projects.

The workshop was led by Professor Richard Bell and Associate Professor Ed Barrett-Lennard, both from Murdoch University, who have many years’ experience in both Australia and Bangladesh. Dr Mohammad Mainuddin from CSIRO and Dr Miaomiao Cheng from Murdoch University joined them as tutors for the training.

The workshop was interactive focusing on how to organise and analysis data from the participants own experiments, and how to present and interpret results from different statistical tests. In addition, participants were trained to use JAMOVI software for statistical analysis with co-variates, and participants who had complicated datasets or experimental treatments were offered assistance. The workshop showed participants how to interpret and present results involving significant interactions among treatment factors.

Apart from listening to the lectures and presentations, participants were assigned to small groups, each with a tutor, where they presented their analysed data from field crop trials to gain critical feedback on their analysis and presentations. This approach enabled participants to successfully integrate learning from the lectures and obtain guidance from tutors and peer-to-peer learning to enhance their capabilities in data analysing and paper preparing.

A follow up course for the participants on writing articles for peer reviewed journals is planned for early 2020.