“The students do not have research skills although we are trying to imbibe it through term papers, minor projects, major projects, capstone projects, etc. As stated, the quality of graduates in India is not up to the mark. We could probably say that our curriculum and instructional pedagogies are not focused towards imbibing such skills. Hence, the skills remain superficial and rudimentary. The faculty primarily focus on imparting subject knowledge and ensure that the students pass the examinations but fail to understand the importance of research skills and do not focus on inculcating those skills.”

This reflection from a tutor in a higher education institution in India was our starting point. We wanted to find out the extent of understanding of research skills by students in India, and what their views were about the importance and place of research skills in their curriculum.

This document reports our findings, from students of engineering in the Delhi National Capital Region of India. So far, these findings support the view expressed by the tutor in the statement above. We argue that there is an urgent need to reconsider the position of research skills in the curriculum.

We offer some initial recommendations, and outline the next stages of our research, which will bring forward more fundamental understanding of this important topic.