An Investigation of Research Database Management Approach and Appropriateness in Implementation: A Case Study of Mahidol University International College

Abstract

          Research Promotion and Management Section is responsible for managing the Mahidol University International College’s research database, which is one of important elements in the university’s internal education quality assurance, the College’s strategic planning, and the faculty members’ evaluation. Given the importance of the research database system management, Mahidol University has developed the Mahidol University Electronic Research Information System or MU eRIS in order to encourage all faculties to adopt this system to their research database management. This research aims at investigating a comparison between MU eRIS and the College’s research database management approach as well as analyzing the appropriateness in implementation. The retrospective method was applied in this study in order to extract the research information including researchers, research grants, source of funding, research projects, and research products from the Science Division during 2013 – 2014. The experimental study was applied by testing the research data record into both systems. The researchers compared the working process in the data preparation, recorder’s knowledge, data entry time, data access time, budget, and reporting. The appropriateness in MU eRIS implementation was analyzed. This study finds that MU eRIS required more time on the data preparation and data entry than the College’s research database due to its higher requirements. However, it spends less time on data access and reporting processes. Considering the appropriateness in MU eRIS implementation, researches find that MU eRIS lacks some necessary data for the College’s research database management, especially in the faculty members’ evaluation dimension. Moreover, from the above research outputs, a survey questionnaire was developed in order to investigate the in-depth information from concerned executives and staff members, which will be used in the research database management and policy in the future.