Head of the University of Guyana’s recently established Institute of Research, Innovation and Entrepreneurship (UGIRIE) Professor Pat Francis says that the institution can play a novel role in creating a nexus between academia and the realization of initiatives that make ‘real life’ contributions to Guyana’s development.
According to Professor Francis the genesis of UGIRIE goes back more than a decade, arising out of the ‘mountain’ of papers and proposals, the academic efforts of students and staff, left lying on shelves and in cabinets, unexamined in terms of their likely practical relevance. These academic ideas, Professor Francis says, may well have meant that many of the country’s ‘best and brightest’ had been languishing in a condition of underachievement or might, otherwise, opted for migration.