Search results for: instructional decisions
1299 Using Emerging Hot Spot Analysis to Analyze Overall Effectiveness of Policing Policy and Strategy in Chicago
Authors: Tyler Gill, Sophia Daniels
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The paper examines how accessing the spatial-temporal constrains of data will help inform policymakers and law enforcement officials. The authors utilize Chicago crime data from 2006-2016 to demonstrate how the Emerging Hot Spot Tool is an ideal hot spot clustering approach to analyze crime data. Traditional approaches include density maps or creating a spatial weights matrix to include the spatial-temporal constrains. This new approach utilizes a space-time implementation of the Getis-Ord Gi* statistic to visualize the data more quickly to make better decisions. The research will help complement socio-cultural research to find key patterns to help frame future policies and evaluate the implementation of prior strategies. Through this analysis, homicide trends and patterns are found more effectively and recommendations for use by non-traditional users of GIS are offered for real life implementation.Keywords: crime mapping, emerging hot spot analysis, Getis-Ord Gi*, spatial-temporal analysis
Procedia PDF Downloads 2441298 Design and Implementation of Neural Network Based Controller for Self-Driven Vehicle
Authors: Hassam Muazzam
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This paper devises an autonomous self-driven vehicle that is capable of taking a disabled person to his/her desired location using three different power sources (gasoline, solar, electric) without any control from the user, avoiding the obstacles in the way. The GPS co-ordinates of the desired location are sent to the main processing board via a GSM module. After the GPS co-ordinates are sent, the path to be followed by the vehicle is devised by Pythagoras theorem. The distance and angle between the present location and the desired location is calculated and then the vehicle starts moving in the desired direction. Meanwhile real-time data from ultrasonic sensors is fed to the board for obstacle avoidance mechanism. Ultrasonic sensors are used to quantify the distance of the vehicle from the object. The distance and position of the object is then used to make decisions regarding the direction of vehicle in order to avoid the obstacles using artificial neural network which is implemented using ATmega1280. Also the vehicle provides the feedback location at remote location.Keywords: autonomous self-driven vehicle, obstacle avoidance, desired location, pythagoras theorem, neural network, remote location
Procedia PDF Downloads 4091297 Improving Road Infrastructure Safety Management Through Statistical Analysis of Road Accident Data. Case Study: Streets in Bucharest
Authors: Dimitriu Corneliu-Ioan, Gheorghe FrațIlă
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Romania has one of the highest rates of road deaths among European Union Member States, and there is a concern that the country will not meet its goal of "zero deaths" by 2050. The European Union also aims to halve the number of people seriously injured in road accidents by 2030. Therefore, there is a need to improve road infrastructure safety management in Romania. The aim of this study is to analyze road accident data through statistical methods to assess the current state of road infrastructure safety in Bucharest. The study also aims to identify trends and make forecasts regarding serious road accidents and their consequences. The objective is to provide insights that can help prioritize measures to increase road safety, particularly in urban areas. The research utilizes statistical analysis methods, including exploratory analysis and descriptive statistics. Databases from the Traffic Police and the Romanian Road Authority are analyzed using Excel. Road risks are compared with the main causes of road accidents to identify correlations. The study emphasizes the need for better quality and more diverse collection of road accident data for effective analysis in the field of road infrastructure engineering. The research findings highlight the importance of prioritizing measures to improve road safety in urban areas, where serious accidents and their consequences are more frequent. There is a correlation between the measures ordered by road safety auditors and the main causes of serious accidents in Bucharest. The study also reveals the significant social costs of road accidents, amounting to approximately 3% of GDP, emphasizing the need for collaboration between local and central administrations in allocating resources for road safety. This research contributes to a clearer understanding of the current road infrastructure safety situation in Romania. The findings provide critical insights that can aid decision-makers in allocating resources efficiently and institutionally cooperating to achieve sustainable road safety. The data used for this study are collected from the Traffic Police and the Romanian Road Authority. The data processing involves exploratory analysis and descriptive statistics using the Excel tool. The analysis allows for a better understanding of the factors contributing to the current road safety situation and helps inform managerial decisions to eliminate or reduce road risks. The study addresses the state of road infrastructure safety in Bucharest and analyzes the trends and forecasts regarding serious road accidents and their consequences. It studies the correlation between road safety measures and the main causes of serious accidents. To improve road safety, cooperation between local and central administrations towards joint financial efforts is important. This research highlights the need for statistical data processing methods to substantiate managerial decisions in road infrastructure management. It emphasizes the importance of improving the quality and diversity of road accident data collection. The research findings provide a critical perspective on the current road safety situation in Romania and offer insights to identify appropriate solutions to reduce the number of serious road accidents in the future.Keywords: road death rate, strategic objective, serious road accidents, road safety, statistical analysis
Procedia PDF Downloads 841296 The SHIFT of Consumer Behavior from Fast Fashion to Slow Fashion: A Review and Research Agenda
Authors: Priya Nangia, Sanchita Bansal
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As fashion cycles become more rapid, some segments of the fashion industry have adopted increasingly unsustainable production processes to keep up with demand and enhance profit margins. The growing threat to environmental and social wellbeing posed by unethical fast fashion practices and the need to integrate the targets of SDGs into this industry necessitates a shift in the fashion industry's unsustainable nature, which can only be accomplished in the long run if consumers support sustainable fashion by purchasing it. Fast fashion is defined as low-cost, trendy apparel that takes inspiration from the catwalk or celebrity culture and rapidly transforms it into garments at high-street stores to meet consumer demand. Given the importance of identity formation to many consumers, the desire to be “fashionable” often outweighs the desire to be ethical or sustainable. This paradox exemplifies the tension between the human drive to consume and the will to do so in moderation. Previous research suggests that there is an attitude-behavior gap when it comes to determining consumer purchasing behavior, but to the best of our knowledge, no study has analysed how to encourage customers to shift from fast to slow fashion. Against this backdrop, the aim of this study is twofold: first, to identify and examine the factors that impact consumers' decisions to engage in sustainable fashion, and second, the authors develop a comprehensive framework for conceptualizing and encouraging researchers and practitioners to foster sustainable consumer behavior. This study used a systematic approach to collect data and analyse literature. The approach included three key steps: review planning, review execution, and findings reporting. Authors identified the keywords “sustainable consumption” and “sustainable fashion” and retrieved studies from the Web of Science (WoS) (126 records) and Scopus database (449 records). To make the study more specific, the authors refined the subject area to management, business, and economics in the second step, retrieving 265 records. In the third step, the authors removed the duplicate records and manually reviewed the articles to examine their relevance to the research issue. The final 96 research articles were used to develop this study's systematic scheme. The findings indicate that societal norms, demographics, positive emotions, self-efficacy, and awareness all have an effect on customers' decisions to purchase sustainable apparel. The authors propose a framework, denoted by the acronym SHIFT, in which consumers are more likely to engage in sustainable behaviors when the message or context leverages the following factors: (s)social influence, (h)habit formation, (i)individual self, (f)feelings, emotions, and cognition, and (t)tangibility. Furthermore, the authors identify five broad challenges that encourage sustainable consumer behavior and use them to develop novel propositions. Finally, the authors discuss how the SHIFT framework can be used in practice to drive sustainable consumer behaviors. This research sought to define the boundaries of existing research while also providing new perspectives on future research, with the goal of being useful for the development and discovery of new fields of study, thereby expanding knowledge.Keywords: consumer behavior, fast fashion, sustainable consumption, sustainable fashion, systematic literature review
Procedia PDF Downloads 901295 Proposal of a Model Supporting Decision-Making Based on Multi-Objective Optimization Analysis on Information Security Risk Treatment
Authors: Ritsuko Kawasaki (Aiba), Takeshi Hiromatsu
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Management is required to understand all information security risks within an organization, and to make decisions on which information security risks should be treated in what level by allocating how much amount of cost. However, such decision-making is not usually easy, because various measures for risk treatment must be selected with the suitable application levels. In addition, some measures may have objectives conflicting with each other. It also makes the selection difficult. Moreover, risks generally have trends and it also should be considered in risk treatment. Therefore, this paper provides the extension of the model proposed in the previous study. The original model supports the selection of measures by applying a combination of weighted average method and goal programming method for multi-objective analysis to find an optimal solution. The extended model includes the notion of weights to the risks, and the larger weight means the priority of the risk.Keywords: information security risk treatment, selection of risk measures, risk acceptance, multi-objective optimization
Procedia PDF Downloads 4611294 Adoption of Big Data by Global Chemical Industries
Authors: Ashiff Khan, A. Seetharaman, Abhijit Dasgupta
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The new era of big data (BD) is influencing chemical industries tremendously, providing several opportunities to reshape the way they operate and help them shift towards intelligent manufacturing. Given the availability of free software and the large amount of real-time data generated and stored in process plants, chemical industries are still in the early stages of big data adoption. The industry is just starting to realize the importance of the large amount of data it owns to make the right decisions and support its strategies. This article explores the importance of professional competencies and data science that influence BD in chemical industries to help it move towards intelligent manufacturing fast and reliable. This article utilizes a literature review and identifies potential applications in the chemical industry to move from conventional methods to a data-driven approach. The scope of this document is limited to the adoption of BD in chemical industries and the variables identified in this article. To achieve this objective, government, academia, and industry must work together to overcome all present and future challenges.Keywords: chemical engineering, big data analytics, industrial revolution, professional competence, data science
Procedia PDF Downloads 851293 Applying Hybrid Graph Drawing and Clustering Methods on Stock Investment Analysis
Authors: Mouataz Zreika, Maria Estela Varua
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Stock investment decisions are often made based on current events of the global economy and the analysis of historical data. Conversely, visual representation could assist investors’ gain deeper understanding and better insight on stock market trends more efficiently. The trend analysis is based on long-term data collection. The study adopts a hybrid method that combines the Clustering algorithm and Force-directed algorithm to overcome the scalability problem when visualizing large data. This method exemplifies the potential relationships between each stock, as well as determining the degree of strength and connectivity, which will provide investors another understanding of the stock relationship for reference. Information derived from visualization will also help them make an informed decision. The results of the experiments show that the proposed method is able to produced visualized data aesthetically by providing clearer views for connectivity and edge weights.Keywords: clustering, force-directed, graph drawing, stock investment analysis
Procedia PDF Downloads 3021292 Assessing the Citizens' Adoption of E-Government Platforms in the North West Province Local Governments, South Africa
Authors: Matsobane Mosetja, Nehemiah Mavetera, Ernest Mnkandla
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Local governments in South Africa are responsible for the provision of basic services. There are countless benefits that come with e-Government platforms if they are properly implemented to help local governments deliver these basic services to citizens. This study investigates factors influencing the adoption and use of e-Government platforms by citizens in the North West Province, South. The study is set against a background of significant change in South Africa where government services are electronically delivered. The outcome of the study revealed that: 1) decisions on the development of e-Government platforms are made based on a series of consultative forums; 2) the municipalities are open to constructive criticism on their online platform; 3) the municipalities have room for dialogue on how best to improve service delivery; 4) the municipalities are accessible to the citizens all the time; 5) the municipalities are making means and ways to empower them to be part of the collective and lastly e-Government provides room for online discussion.Keywords: e-government, e-government platforms, user acceptance, local government
Procedia PDF Downloads 3931291 Teacher Education: Teacher Development and Support
Authors: Khadem Hichem
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With the new technology challenges, dynamics and challenges of the contemporary world, most teachers are struggling to maintain effective and successful teaching /learning environment for learners. Teachers as a key to the success of reforms in the educational setting, they must improve their competencies to teach effectively. Many researchers emphasis on the ongoing professional development of the teacher by enhancing their experiences and encouraging their responsibility for learning, and thus promoting self-reliance, collaboration, and reflection. In short, teachers are considered as learners and they need to learn together. The educational system must support, both conceptually and financially, the teachers’ development as lifelong learners Teachers need opportunities to grow in language proficiency and in knowledge. Changing nature of language and culture in the world, all teachers must have opportunities to update their knowledge and practices. Many researchers in the field of foreign or additional languages indicate that teachers keep side by side of effective instructional practices and they need special support with the challenging task of developing and administering proficiency tests to their students. For significant change to occur, each individual teacher’s needs must be addressed. The teacher must be involved experientially in the process of development, since, by itself, knowledge of how to change does not mean change will be initiated. For improvement to occur, new skills have to be guided, practiced, and reflected upon in collaboration with colleagues. Clearly, teachers are at different places developmentally; therefore, allowances for various entry levels and individual differences need to be built into the professional development structure. Objectives must be meaningful to the participant and teacher improvement must be stated terms of student knowledge, student performance, and motivation. The most successful professional development process acknowledges the student-centered nature of good teaching. This paper highlights the importance of teacher professional development process and institutional supports as way to enhance good teaching and learning environment.Keywords: teacher professional development, teacher competencies, institutional support, teacher education
Procedia PDF Downloads 3541290 Indigenous Pre-Service Teacher Education: Developing, Facilitating, and Maintaining Opportunities for Retention and Graduation
Authors: Karen Trimmer, Raelene Ward, Linda Wondunna-Foley
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Within Australian tertiary institutions, the subject of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education has been a major concern for many years. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers are significantly under-represented in Australian schools and universities. High attrition rates in teacher education and in the teaching industry have contributed to a minimal growth rate in the numbers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers in previous years. There was an increase of 500 Indigenous teachers between 2001 and 2008 but these numbers still only account for one percent of teaching staff in government schools who identified as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians (Ministerial Council for Education, Early Childhood Development and Youth Affairs 2010). Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers are paramount in fostering student engagement and improving educational outcomes for Indigenous students. Increasing the numbers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers is also a key factor in enabling all students to develop understanding of and respect for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures, and language. An ambitious reform agenda to improve the recruitment and retention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers will be effective only through national collaborative action and co-investment by schools and school authorities, university schools of education, professional associations, and Indigenous leaders and community networks. Whilst the University of Southern Queensland currently attracts Indigenous students to its teacher education programs (61 students in 2013 with an average of 48 enrollments each year since 2010) there is significant attrition during pre-service training. The annual rate of exiting before graduation remains high at 22% in 2012 and was 39% for the previous two years. These participation and retention rates are consistent with other universities across Australia. Whilst aspirations for a growing number of Indigenous people to be trained as teachers is present, there is a significant loss of students during their pre-service training and within the first five years of employment as a teacher. These trends also reflect the situation where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander teachers are significantly under-represented, making up less than 1% of teachers in schools across Australia. Through a project conducted as part the nationally funded More Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Teachers Initiative (MATSITI) we aim to gain an insight into the reasons that impact Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student’s decisions to exit their program. Through the conduct of focus groups and interviews with two graduating cohorts of self-identified Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, rich data has been gathered to gain an understanding of the barriers and enhancers to the completion of pre-service qualification and transition to teaching. Having a greater understanding of these reasons then allows the development of collaborative processes and procedures to increase retention and completion rates of new Indigenous teachers. Analysis of factors impacting on exit decisions and transitions has provided evidence to support change of practice, redesign and enhancement of relevant courses and development of policy/procedures to address identified issues.Keywords: graduation, indigenous, pre-service teacher education, retention
Procedia PDF Downloads 4681289 Current Status of Industry 4.0 in Material Handling Automation and In-house Logistics
Authors: Orestis Κ. Efthymiou, Stavros T. Ponis
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In the last decade, a new industrial revolution seems to be emerging, supported -once again- by the rapid advancements of Information Technology in the areas of Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communication permitting large numbers of intelligent devices, e.g. sensors to communicate with each other and take decisions without any or minimum indirect human intervention. The advent of these technologies have triggered the emergence of a new category of hybrid (cyber-physical) manufacturing systems, combining advanced manufacturing techniques with innovative M2M applications based on the Internet of Things (IoT), under the umbrella term Industry 4.0. Even though the topic of Industry 4.0 has attracted much attention during the last few years, the attempts of providing a systematic literature review of the subject are scarce. In this paper, we present the authors’ initial study of the field with a special focus on the use and applications of Industry 4.0 principles in material handling automations and in-house logistics. Research shows that despite the vivid discussion and attractiveness of the subject, there are still many challenges and issues that have to be addressed before Industry 4.0 becomes standardized and widely applicable.Keywords: Industry 4.0, internet of things, manufacturing systems, material handling, logistics
Procedia PDF Downloads 1271288 Business Intelligence Dashboard Solutions for Improving Decision Making Process: A Focus on Prostate Cancer
Authors: Mona Isazad Mashinchi, Davood Roshan Sangachin, Francis J. Sullivan, Dietrich Rebholz-Schuhmann
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Background: Decision-making processes are nowadays driven by data, data analytics and Business Intelligence (BI). BI as a software platform can provide a wide variety of capabilities such as organization memory, information integration, insight creation and presentation capabilities. Visualizing data through dashboards is one of the BI solutions (for a variety of areas) which helps managers in the decision making processes to expose the most informative information at a glance. In the healthcare domain to date, dashboard presentations are more frequently used to track performance related metrics and less frequently used to monitor those quality parameters which relate directly to patient outcomes. Providing effective and timely care for patients and improving the health outcome are highly dependent on presenting and visualizing data and information. Objective: In this research, the focus is on the presentation capabilities of BI to design a dashboard for prostate cancer (PC) data that allows better decision making for the patients, the hospital and the healthcare system related to a cancer dataset. The aim of this research is to customize a retrospective PC dataset in a dashboard interface to give a better understanding of data in the categories (risk factors, treatment approaches, disease control and side effects) which matter most to patients as well as other stakeholders. By presenting the outcome in the dashboard we address one of the major targets of a value-based health care (VBHC) delivery model which is measuring the value and presenting the outcome to different actors in HC industry (such as patients and doctors) for a better decision making. Method: For visualizing the stored data to users, three interactive dashboards based on the PC dataset have been developed (using the Tableau Software) to provide better views to the risk factors, treatment approaches, and side effects. Results: Many benefits derived from interactive graphs and tables in dashboards which helped to easily visualize and see the patients at risk, better understanding the relationship between patient's status after treatment and their initial status before treatment, or to choose better decision about treatments with fewer side effects regarding patient status and etc. Conclusions: Building a well-designed and informative dashboard is related to three important factors including; the users, goals and the data types. Dashboard's hierarchies, drilling, and graphical features can guide doctors to better navigate through information. The features of the interactive PC dashboard not only let doctors ask specific questions and filter the results based on the key performance indicators (KPI) such as: Gleason Grade, Patient's Age and Status, but may also help patients to better understand different treatment outcomes, such as side effects during the time, and have an active role in their treatment decisions. Currently, we are extending the results to the real-time interactive dashboard that users (either patients and doctors) can easily explore the data by choosing preferred attribute and data to make better near real-time decisions.Keywords: business intelligence, dashboard, decision making, healthcare, prostate cancer, value-based healthcare
Procedia PDF Downloads 1401287 Beyond the Travel: The Impact of Public Transport on Quality of Life
Authors: Shadab Bahreini
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Public transportation is one of the most important aspects of cities, which impacts various factors of the Quality of Life (QoL) of citizens. A passenger's experience is influenced by a variety of indicators in addition to the cost and safety of the trip. This article intends to investigate how QoL is affected by public transport in an urban environment by introducing a literature review of QoL and Quality of Urban Life (QoUL), investigating the intersection of QoL and public transport, and reviewing the background theory for Transport Quality of Life (TQoL). The article proposes a Public Transport Quality of Life (PTQoL) framework comprised of a set of indicators that measure how public transport impacts QoL across personal (physical and mental), socioeconomic, and environmental dimensions. The study proposes using the framework to evaluate objective or subjective factors affecting a person's QoL regarding public transport. Finally, it concludes that public transport is a key component in shaping QoL in urban environments and that policymakers and urban planners should use the PTQoL framework to make evidence-based decisions to improve public transport systems and their impact on QoL.Keywords: public transport, quality of life, subjective and objective indicators, urban environment
Procedia PDF Downloads 1471286 A Value-Oriented Metamodel for Small and Medium Enterprises’ Decision Making
Authors: Romain Ben Taleb, Aurélie Montarnal, Matthieu Lauras, Mathieu Dahan, Romain Miclo
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To be competitive and sustainable, any company has to maximize its value. However, unlike listed companies that can assess their values based on market shares, most Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) which are non-listed cannot have direct and live access to this critical information. Traditional accounting reports only give limited insights to SME decision-makers about the real impact of their day-to-day decisions on the company’s performance and value. Most of the time, an SME’s financial valuation is made one time a year as the associated process is time and resource-consuming, requiring several months and external expertise to be completed. To solve this issue, we propose in this paper a value-oriented metamodel that enables real-time and dynamic assessment of the SME’s value based on the large definition of their assets. These assets cover a wider scope of resources of the company and better account for immaterial assets. The proposal, which is illustrated in a case study, discusses the benefits of incorporating assets in the SME valuation.Keywords: SME, metamodel, decision support system, financial valuation, assets
Procedia PDF Downloads 921285 Clean Energy and Free Trade: Redefining 'Like Products' to Account for Climate Change
Authors: M. Barsa
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This paper argues that current jurisprudence under the Dormant Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution and the WTO should be altered to allow states to more freely foster clean energy production. In particular, free trade regimes typically prevent states from discriminating against 'like' products, and whether these products are considered 'like' is typically measured by how they appear to the consumer. This makes it challenging for states to discriminate in favor of clean energy, such as low-carbon fuels. However, this paper points out that certain courts in the US—and decisions of the WTO—have already begun taking into account how a product is manufactured in order to determine whether a state may discriminate against it. There are also compelling reasons for states to discriminate against energy sources with high carbon footprints in order to allow those states to protect themselves against climate change. In other words, fuel sources with high and low carbon footprints are not, in fact, 'like' products, and courts should more freely recognize this in order to foster clean energy production.Keywords: clean energy, climate change, discrimination, free trade
Procedia PDF Downloads 1211284 Adopt and Apply Research-Supported Standards and Practices to Ensure Quality for Online Education and Digital Learning at Course, Program, and Institutional Levels
Authors: Yaping Gao
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With the increasing globalization of education and the continued momentum and wider adoption of online education and digital learning all over the world, post pandemic, it is crucial that best practices and extensive experience and knowledge gained from the higher education community over the past few decades be adopted and adapted to benefit the broader international communities, which can be vastly different culturally and pedagogically. Schools and institutions worldwide should consider to adopt, adapt and apply these proven practices to develop strategic plans for digital transformation at institutional levels, and to improve or develop quality online or digital learning environments at course and program levels to help all students succeed. The presenter will introduce the primary components of the US-based quality assurance process, including: 1) five sets of research-supported standards to guide the design, development and review of online and hybrid courses; 2) professional development offerings and pathways for administrators, faculty and instructional support staff; 3) a peer-review process for course/program reviews resulting in constructive recommendations for continuous improvement, certification of quality and international recognition; and 4) implementation of the quality assurance process on a continuum to program excellence, achievement of institutional goals, and facilitation of accreditation process and success. Regardless language, culture, pedagogical practices, or technological infrastructure, the core elements of quality teaching and learning remain the same across all delivery formats. What is unique is how to ensure quality of teaching and learning in online education and digital learning. No one knows all the answers to everything but no one needs to reinvent the wheel either. Together the international education community can support and learn from each other to achieve institutional goals and ensure all students succeed in the digital learning environments.Keywords: online education, digital learning, quality standards, best practices, online teaching and learning
Procedia PDF Downloads 261283 The Technological Problem of Simulation of the Logistics Center
Authors: Juraj Camaj, Anna Dolinayova, Jana Lalinska, Miroslav Bariak
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Planning of infrastructure and processes in logistic center within the frame of various kinds of logistic hubs and technological activities in them represent quite complex problem. The main goal is to design appropriate layout, which enables to realize expected operation on the desired levels. The simulation software represents progressive contemporary experimental technique, which can support complex processes of infrastructure planning and all of activities on it. It means that simulation experiments, reflecting various planned infrastructure variants, investigate and verify their eligibilities in relation with corresponding expected operation. The inducted approach enables to make qualified decisions about infrastructure investments or measures, which derive benefit from simulation-based verifications. The paper represents simulation software for simulation infrastructural layout and technological activities in marshalling yard, intermodal terminal, warehouse and combination between them as the parts of logistic center.Keywords: marshalling yard, intermodal terminal, warehouse, transport technology, simulation
Procedia PDF Downloads 5211282 Conduits of Political Corruption and Patronage in South African Government
Authors: Sandiso Mahlala, Fulufhelo Netswera
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Anecdotes of corruption and clear-cut lines of patronage in political parties and the government are frequently featured in South African newspapers and news media. Such graft and favouritism have institutionalised themselves more and more, resulting in the phenomenon of governmental capture and the diversion of Covid-19 relief monies. In order to further their own interests, political elites and those working in the public and private sectors influenced government decisions in this way. This paper presents examples of state capture, Covid-19 corruption, and patronage, as well as how these have a negative impact on broader governance and society at large. The fact that such corruption and patronage are occurring at a time when the South African economy is stagnating is particularly troubling since it implies that more people are getting less and raises concerns about the country's future political stability. This article further examines how party patronage as one method by which political parties exploit the state. The conceptual nature of the study is supported by a survey of the relevant literature from a range of sources, such as government regulations, media excepts, and scholarly works.Keywords: political corruption, political patronage, patronage, state capture, COVID-19, corruption, South Africa
Procedia PDF Downloads 721281 Stock Characteristics and Herding Formation: Evidence from the United States Equity Market
Authors: Chih-Hsiang Chang, Fang-Jyun Su
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This paper explores whether stock characteristics influence the herding formation among investors in the US equity market. To extend the research scope of the existing literature, this paper further examines the role that stock risk characteristics play in the US equity market, and the way they influence investors’ decision-making. First, empirical results show that whether general stocks or high-risk stocks, there are no herding behaviors among the investors in the US equity market during the whole research period or during four great events. Moreover, stock characteristics have great influence on investors’ trading decisions. Finally, there is a bidirectional lead-lag relationship of the herding formation between high-risk stocks and low-risk stocks, but the influence of high-risk stocks on the low-risk stocks is stronger than that of low-risk stocks on the high-risk stocks.Keywords: stock characteristics, herding formation, investment decision, US equity market, lead-lag relationship
Procedia PDF Downloads 2751280 Multi-Criteria Decision Support System for Modeling of Civic Facilities Using GIS Applications: A Case Study of F-11, Islamabad
Authors: Asma Shaheen Hashmi, Omer Riaz, Khalid Mahmood, Fahad Ullah, Tanveer Ahmad
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The urban landscapes are being change with the population growth and advancements in new technologies. The urban sprawl pattern and utilizes are related to the local socioeconomic and physical condition. Urban policy decisions are executed mostly through spatial planning. A decision support system (DSS) is very powerful tool which provides flexible knowledge base method for urban planning. An application was developed using geographical information system (GIS) for urban planning. A scenario based DSS was developed to integrate the hierarchical muti-criteria data of different aspects of urban landscape. These were physical environment, the dumping site, spatial distribution of road network, gas and water supply lines, and urban watershed management, selection criteria for new residential, recreational, commercial and industrial sites. The model provided a framework to incorporate the sustainable future development. The data can be entered dynamically by planners according to the appropriate criteria for the management of urban landscapes.Keywords: urban, GIS, spatial, criteria
Procedia PDF Downloads 6371279 Machine Learning for Feature Selection and Classification of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus
Authors: H. Zidoum, A. AlShareedah, S. Al Sawafi, A. Al-Ansari, B. Al Lawati
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Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with genetic and environmental components. SLE is characterized by a wide variability of clinical manifestations and a course frequently subject to unpredictable flares. Despite recent progress in classification tools, the early diagnosis of SLE is still an unmet need for many patients. This study proposes an interpretable disease classification model that combines the high and efficient predictive performance of CatBoost and the model-agnostic interpretation tools of Shapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP). The CatBoost model was trained on a local cohort of 219 Omani patients with SLE as well as other control diseases. Furthermore, the SHAP library was used to generate individual explanations of the model's decisions as well as rank clinical features by contribution. Overall, we achieved an AUC score of 0.945, F1-score of 0.92 and identified four clinical features (alopecia, renal disorders, cutaneous lupus, and hemolytic anemia) along with the patient's age that was shown to have the greatest contribution on the prediction.Keywords: feature selection, classification, systemic lupus erythematosus, model interpretation, SHAP, Catboost
Procedia PDF Downloads 831278 Impact of Strategic Leadership on Corporate Performance
Authors: Adesina Nathaniel Olanrewaju
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The motivation behind this study is the need to see strategic leadership as one of the key driving forces for improving corporate performance. Strategic leadership is seen as a potent source of management development and sustained competitive advantage for both employee and organizational performance. There is currently a charge on leaders as a major cause of organizational failure. Stakeholders give what they can afford, not necessarily what the organization needs and impose operational and financial decisions on the leaders, 200 respondents were fit for the analysis from the six geo-political regions in Nigeria. The selection was done equally among various parastatals through random sampling technique from the south-south, south-east, south-west, north-east, north-west and north-central. A descriptive research of the survey was employed. The data were subjected to t-test analysis and correlation and regression were used for the analysis. The findings revealed that there is a strong relationship and impact between a strategic leader and corporate performance. Recommendations were made based on the findings that strategic leaders should be given the blueprint, company’s policy and the stakeholders’ expectation within a time frame the work is to be carried out.Keywords: time, strategic, organization, stakeholder, leader, performance
Procedia PDF Downloads 3051277 The Duty of Application and Connection Providers Regarding the Supply of Internet Protocol by Court Order in Brazil to Determine Authorship of Acts Practiced on the Internet
Authors: João Pedro Albino, Ana Cláudia Pires Ferreira de Lima
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Humanity has undergone a transformation from the physical to the virtual world, generating an enormous amount of data on the world wide web, known as big data. Many facts that occur in the physical world or in the digital world are proven through records made on the internet, such as digital photographs, posts on social media, contract acceptances by digital platforms, email, banking, and messaging applications, among others. These data recorded on the internet have been used as evidence in judicial proceedings. The identification of internet users is essential for the security of legal relationships. This research was carried out on scientific articles and materials from courses and lectures, with an analysis of Brazilian legislation and some judicial decisions on the request of static data from logs and Internet Protocols (IPs) from application and connection providers. In this article, we will address the determination of authorship of data processing on the internet by obtaining the IP address and the appropriate judicial procedure for this purpose under Brazilian law.Keywords: IP address, digital forensics, big data, data analytics, information and communication technology
Procedia PDF Downloads 1241276 Effective Teaching Pyramid and Its Impact on Enhancing the Participation of Students in Swimming Classes
Authors: Salam M. H. Kareem
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Instructional or teaching procedures and their proper sequence are essential for high-quality learning outcomes. These actions are the path that the teacher takes during the learning process after setting the learning objectives. Teachers and specialists in the education field should include teaching procedures with putting in place an effective mechanism for the procedure’s implementation to achieve a logical sequence with the desired output of overall education process. Determining the sequence of these actions may be a strategic process outlined by a strategic educational plan or drawn by teachers with a high level of experience, enabling them to determine those logical procedures. While specific actions may be necessary for a specific form, many Physical Education (PE) teachers can work out on various sports disciplines. This study was conducted to investigate the impact of using the teaching sequence of the teaching pyramid in raising the level of enjoyment in swimming classes. Four months later of teaching swimming skills to the control and experimental groups of the study, we figured that using the tools shown in the teaching pyramid with the experimental group led to statistically significant differences in the positive tendencies of students to participate in the swimming classes by using the traditional procedures of teaching and using of successive procedures in the teaching pyramid, and in favor of the teaching pyramid, The students are influenced by enhancing their tendency to participate in swimming classes when the teaching procedures followed are sensitive to individual differences and are based on the element of pleasure in learning, and less positive levels of the tendency of students when using traditional teaching procedures, by getting the level of skills' requirements higher and more difficult to perform. The level of positive tendencies of students when using successive procedures in the teaching pyramid was increased, by getting the level of skills' requirements higher and more difficult to perform, because of the high level of motivation and the desire to challenge the self-provided by the teaching pyramid.Keywords: physical education, swimming classes, teaching process, teaching pyramid
Procedia PDF Downloads 1461275 The Sustainable Cultural Tourism of Nakhon Si Thammarat Province in Thailand
Authors: Narong Anurak
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The objectives of the study were to determine the factors influencing tourists’ destination decision making for cultural tourism in the southern provinces, to examine the potential for developing cultural tourism and to guideline for marketing strategy for cultural tourism in Nakhon Si Thammarat. Both quantitative and qualitative data were applied in this study. The samples of 400 cases for quantitative analysis were tourists who were interested in cultural tourism in the southern provinces, and traveled to cultural sites in Nakhon Si Thammarat, Surat Thani, and Phuket, and 14 representatives from provincial tourism committee of Nakhon Si Thammarat. The study found that Thai and foreign tourists are influenced by different important marketing mix factors (7Ps) when making decisions for cultural tourism in southern provinces. The important factors for Thai respondents were physical evidence, price, people, and place at high importance level, whereas, product, process, and promotion were moderate importance level as well.Keywords: marketing mix factors, Nakhon Si Thammarat province, sustainable cultural tourism, tourists decision making
Procedia PDF Downloads 2741274 The Contemporary Dynamics of Board Composition and Executive Compensation for R&D Spending
Authors: Farheen Akram
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Research and Development (R&D) is the most crucial element of the firm’s survival in a competitive business environment. R&D is a long-term investment; therefore, executives having the power to make the investment decisions may be pessimistic when their compensation is closely linked with short-term firm performance. Thus, the current study investigates the impact of board composition and executives’ compensation (cash or short-term benefits and LTIs) on R&D spending using a sample of 85 S&P/100 firms listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) in 2017. SmartPLS (v.3.2.7) was used to evaluate the proposed model of current research. The empirical findings of this study indicate that board composition has a significant and positive effect on R&D spending. While, as expected, executive cash compensation has negative and Long-Term-Incentives (LTIs) has a positive impact on R&D spending. Based on current findings, the study suggested that myopic behavior of CEOs and top management towards long-term value creation investment like R&D can be controlled by using long-term compensation rewards.Keywords: cash compensation, LTIs, board composition, R&D spending
Procedia PDF Downloads 1921273 A Review on the Impact of Institutional Setting on Land Use Conflicts in Coastal Areas
Authors: Roni Susman, Thomas Weith
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This article explores how institutional setting, mainly from institutionalism, could clearly explain the understanding of land use conflict analysis in coastal areas and has been used in current practices. Institutional setting appears as a guideline that is committed by the stakeholders who are involved directly or indirectly in land management process. This paper is aimed to identify the setting of institutional and to measure how the conflicts occur, how the actors act and influence the process, how is the condition to apply the appropriate framework for adequate solution of land use conflict in coastal area in order to enhance better decisions. To reflect the current practice and use of theories a qualitative review of 150 scientific peer-reviewed papers regarding the issue of land use conflicts in coastal areas as well as institutional process is included. The selection of peer-reviewed papers is obtained through a structured literature survey of the recently published database in a way to investigate the variances of institutional between theory and practices specifically in the case of coastal land management.Keywords: coastal areas, institutional settings, land use conflict, land governance, actors’ constellation, analytical framework
Procedia PDF Downloads 1891272 Developing a Systems Dynamics Model for Security Management
Authors: Kuan-Chou Chen
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This paper will demonstrate a simulation model of an information security system by using the systems dynamic approach. The relationships in the system model are designed to be simple and functional and do not necessarily represent any particular information security environments. The purpose of the paper aims to develop a generic system dynamic information security system model with implications on information security research. The interrelated and interdependent relationships of five primary sectors in the system dynamic model will be presented in this paper. The integrated information security systems model will include (1) information security characteristics, (2) users, (3) technology, (4) business functions, and (5) policy and management. Environments, attacks, government and social culture will be defined as the external sector. The interactions within each of these sectors will be depicted by system loop map as well. The proposed system dynamic model will not only provide a conceptual framework for information security analysts and designers but also allow information security managers to remove the incongruity between the management of risk incidents and the management of knowledge and further support information security managers and decision makers the foundation for managerial actions and policy decisions.Keywords: system thinking, information security systems, security management, simulation
Procedia PDF Downloads 4291271 Prep: Pause, Reset, Establish Expectations, and Proceed. A Practical Approach for Classroom Transitions
Authors: Shane-Anthony Smith
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Teachers across grade levels and content areas face a myriad of challenges in the classroom. From inconsistent attendance to disruptive behaviors, these challenges can have a dire impact on the educational space, untimely leading to a loss of instructional time and student disenfranchisement from learning. While these challenges are not new to the educational landscape, the post-COVID classroom has, in many instances, been more severely impacted by behaviors that are not conducive to learning. Despite the mounting challenges, the role of the teacher remains unchanged - that is, to create and maintain a safe environment that is conducive to learning and promotes successful learning outcomes. Accomplishing this feat is no easy task. Yet, there are steps teachers can - indeed, must - take to better set themselves and their students up for success. The key to achieving this success is effective classroom transitions. This paper presents a four-step approach for teachers to engage in successful classroom transitions to promote meaningful student engagement and active positive learning outcomes. The transition strategy I will explore is called PREP (Pause, Reset, Establish Expectations, and Proceed). I developed this strategy in my work as a Residency Director for my university’s teacher residency program. In this role, I am tasked with coaching emerging teachers and their in-service teaching mentors in the field, as well as providing mentorship to special education resident teachers pursuing teaching degrees in the program. As a teacher educator, being in Middle and High school classrooms provides an intricate and critical understanding of the challenges, opportunities, and possibilities in the classroom. For this paper, I will explore how teachers can optimize the opportunities PREP provides to keep students engaged and, thus, improve student achievement. I will describe the approach, explain its use, and provide case-study examples of its classroom application.Keywords: classroom management, teaching strategies, student engagement, classroom transition
Procedia PDF Downloads 791270 Over the Air Programming Method for Learning Wireless Sensor Networks
Authors: K. Sangeeth, P. Rekha, P. Preeja, P. Divya, R. Arya, R. Maneesha
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Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are small or tiny devices that consists of different sensors to sense physical parameters like air pressure, temperature, vibrations, movement etc., process these data and sends it to the central data center to take decisions. The WSN domain, has wide range of applications such as monitoring and detecting natural hazards like landslides, forest fire, avalanche, flood monitoring and also in healthcare applications. With such different applications, it is being taught in undergraduate/post graduate level in many universities under department of computer science. But the cost and infrastructure required to purchase WSN nodes for having the students getting hands on expertise on these devices is expensive. This paper gives overview about the remote triggered lab that consists of more than 100 WSN nodes that helps the students to remotely login from anywhere in the world using the World Wide Web, configure the nodes and learn the WSN concepts in intuitive way. It proposes new way called over the air programming (OTAP) and its internals that program the 100 nodes simultaneously and view the results without the nodes being physical connected to the computer system, thereby allowing for sparse deployment.Keywords: WSN, over the air programming, virtual lab, AT45DB
Procedia PDF Downloads 377