In its hope to increase the research publications of the college, the Aurora State College of Technology through the initiative of the Institutional Development and Innovation Grant (IDIG) headed by its Project Leader and Team Members in collaboration with the Research and Development Services of the college attended a two-day training entitled “Training on Research Publication in Refereed, ISI, Scopus, and High Impact Journals Vis-à-vis Increasing the Number of Citations and Research Output Utilization” last November 5-7, 2019 with the assistance of the Central Luzon Agriculture, Aquatic And Resources Research Development Consortium (CLAARRDEC) at Central Luzon State University, Science City of Muñoz, Nueva Ecija. It was participated by thirty-three (33) faculty and staff of ASCOT from different departments and units. The two-day training was organized and moderated by CLAARRDEC.

The said training is one of IDIG’s activities that aimed to encourage ASCOT faculty and staff researchers to take part in increasing and maintaining number of research publications which are Refereed, ISI, Scopus and high impact journals.

Dr. Rowel G. Olila, IDIG Project leader, gave an overview of the project and its activities. He also gave the specific objectives of the said training and provided points to level off the expectations of the participants. He reiterated that one of the goals in conducting the training is to encourage the participants to publish researches in high impact journals being a requirement for professional accreditation and that the number of research publications also determines the quality of the college/university offering.

Various lecture presentations and writeshops were also provided and facilitated by reputable speakers. Dr. Emmanuel M. Vera Cruz, Director, Freshwater Aquaculture Center of CLSU, gave a lecture on Why Publish? Targeting High Impact Journals. Dr. Vera Cruz reminded the researchers to always be mindful of some predatory journals. He also emphasized the importance of publishing a research paper.

The lecture presentation regarding on the Tips in Writing Technical/Scholarly Paper was given by Dr. Rich Milton R. Dulay, Instructor and In-Charge, CLSU Mushroom Center. He provided a step-to-step discussion on the writing process and he some examples on how to write scholarly papers using his own published research papers. He also said that collaboration between various universities and institutionalization of various incentive systems helps encourage researchers to publish researches in reputable journals.

Towards the end of the writeshop, four (4) faculty members volunteered to present their papers which were critiqued by Dr. Dulay and Dr. Fe L. Porciuncula, Vice President for Research, Extension and Training, CLSU and Director, CLAARRDEC. The presenters were: Ms. Maria Cristina Cañada, Director, Research and Development Services; Assessment of Sea Cucumber Fishery in Aurora, Philippines; Mr. RB J. Gallego, Director, Graduate Studies; Ms. Maribelle A. Soriano, Instructor, Department of Agriculture and Aquatic Sciences; and Mr. Edeneil Jerome P. Valete, Instructor, Department of Arts and Sciences; Identification of Ferns Pteridophytes in Sitio Dipanamianan.