Research ethics have become a major concern in education, and no study can be conducted properly if ethics are not taken into consideration. To oversee and authorise research ethics procedures, regulatory authorities and regulatory frameworks have been put in place. Therefore, only once ethical clearance has been requested, granted, and a certificate of ethical clearance provided can data collection for an educational research project start. Applications for ethical clearance are handled and processed by specific institutional organisations for the majority of research carried out in higher education. Given that research ethics are a major concern in educational research, this article will provide a summary of the fundamental information that guides moral behaviour as well as the main concerns that should be taken into account when doing research. In the context of working with people, ethics entails accepting moral dilemmas and is strongly related to morality. Nowadays, ethics encompasses concerns that go beyond people, such as environmental preservation and respect. Ethics can also be found in discussions of democracy and human rights. Regarding the latter, society has grown aware of the need to defend everyone's rights, especially those of the weaker members of society

MAJOR  ETHICAL ISSUES AND THE WAY FORWARD?

Research sponsorship, research relations, informed permission, and data release are the four ethical conundrums that are pertinent to educational research. These are still important ethical conundrums and issues that researchers or final year students getting ready for their research project should take into account.

Educational Research sponsorship:  Any individual or organisation that provides funding for study or grants researchers access to data is considered a sponsor. Governments, national funding agencies, the corporate sector, private groups or people, and universities are a few examples of sponsors. The involvement of sponsors in research endeavours is referred to as research sponsorship. It relates to the degree to which sponsors have an impact on many facets of the research process, including the study questions and findings. In a gatekeeping position, funders might only contribute to a research project if it satisfies their own standards. They might also assert control over data and stop results from being published. In educational research, there haven't been many scandals, or at least not many that have been made public. One recorded instance, nevertheless, was noteworthy. Written agreements between sponsors and researchers can typically help to resolve ethical quandaries, but their wording needs to be carefully chosen to ensure that research subjects are not harmed and academic freedom is not unnecessarily restricted.

Study relations : This has to do with how the researcher and the researched interact. Access, power, harm, deceit, secrecy, and confidentiality are all issues that research relations addresses, and the researcher should take these into account and find solutions. When dealing with vulnerable groups in society, such as women, children, and people marginalised due to their race, religion, sexual orientation, and other factors, there is a power imbalance because the majority of educational researchers are affiliated with institutions. Therefore, it is crucial that researchers be careful not to take advantage of the vulnerable populations they are studying and that they stay aware of the potential impact that their roles as university-based researchers may have on the. Additionally, researchers should become acquainted with the customs of groups, including indigenous and religious communities, while negotiating access to places. Collaboration in participatory approaches to research, which allow communities to participate in many elements of the study process and negotiate advantages for both research participants and the researcher, could help resolve ethical quandaries pertaining to research relations.

Informed consent: A crucial position in research ethics is held by informed consent, which refers to a person's voluntarily given permission to take part in research. In order to get consent, researchers must first make sure that participants are aware of the procedure they are participating in, the purpose of their involvement, the intended audience for the research findings, and the reporting guidelines. Additionally, the researcher should let participants know that they can stop taking part in the study at any time without giving a reason. Researchers/ final year students as the case maybe must take into consideration societies that use a collective approach to consent. Provincial departments of education  in universities must grant approval for research conducted in public schools, and parents' or guardians' consent is necessary for research involving minors. By making informed consent a requirement for receiving ethical clearance, universities make sure that the principle is upheld. Applying this idea is ultimately the researcher's responsibility. Getting crucial information from research participants in casual talks without obtaining their agreement is one area that can be difficult.

Data dissemination: A number of ethical issues, including confidentiality, the extent to which data can be reported back, and the extent to which research reports can be used by policymakers and in educational practice, are also important when it comes to data sharing. Unless the participants or their guardians have waived this right, researchers should make sure that they grant participants the right to secrecy and anonymity when sharing data. When employed in qualitative research, member-checking has the benefit of allowing research participants to provide feedback on interview transcripts and interpretations.. This lessens the chance that researchers will mislead participants. As part of the ethical clearance procedure, university ethics committees typically take data security and the ethics surrounding data sharing into account.

Conclusion

An essential part of any research process is research ethics. Without ethical clearance, no research can be conducted. In order to explain why research ethics are essential to any research process, this article aimed to offer some theoretical insights into the subject. Some ethical conundrums that researchers have encountered were discussed in article along with recommendations for how to approach them. Research frequently involves ethical quandaries that arise during the collection, organisation, and analysis of data, as well as during the writing of research reports and the dissemination of the findings. It would be necessary to speak with specialists and supervisors in cases where there are no clear standards on how to handle certain ethical quandaries. Institutions may have different procedures for applying for ethical clearance. Researchers and final-year students are therefore advised to think about ethical issues outside of the parameters and time frame of the study endeavour because they may have hidden ramifications.