Daily Academic Activities Research Articles

The Role of University Academic Innovations in Agriculture and ICT to the Country’s Economic Transformation (A Case of Kapasa Makasa University)

In the recent past, Zambia has seen an increase in the number of institutions of higher learning and Kapasa Makasa University is one such Institution. Kapasa Makasa University (KMU) being the only public university in Muchinga province has put research and innovation at the helm of its daily academic activities. As a result the institution has between 2019 and 2021 developed a number of innovations, which if fully exploited by the government and private sector can have the potential to contribute significantly to the economic transformation of the country. In trying to actualize the implementation of these innovations, Management engaged various stakeholders in the industry to determine whether or not they can help to commercialize these innovations. As its motto state “Learn to Innovate”, KMU has put so much emphasis on innovations in the areas of ICTs and Agriculture which if well enhanced can help to contribute significantly to the economic transformation of the nation. Against this background the current study seek to investigate the role of university academic innovations in to the country’s economic transformation. To this effect a descriptive survey was conducted on the university population involving members of academic staff and students to determine the evolving role of university academic innovations on the country’s economic transformation. The results established that lack of deliberate academic policies aimed at commercializing innovations, inadequate stakeholder’s engagement (government and private sector), and lack of proper communication of innovation successes across internal and external audiences as well as limited financial resources are the main factors that hinder the innovations in universities from contributing to the country’s economic transformation. Based on the findings the study recommends that there is need to create strong partnership between the university, government and the industry in order to further develop and commercialize the innovations in university. In addition, the university authorities need to create academic policies that are aimed at commercializing innovations as well as deriving a proper and well-coordinated mechanisms to communicate the innovations to both internal and external audiences. Finally the study also concludes that university management need to adequately fund innovations in the institutions if they are to make a positive impact to the economic transformation of the country.

Prevalence of dysmenorrhea and associated factors and its effect on daily academic activities among female undergraduate students of Hawassa University College of Medicine and Health Sciences, Hawassa, Ethiopia.

Dysmenorrhea is pain during menstrual flow and is the most common gynecologic complaint in reproductive-age girls. The severity of dysmenorrhea ranges from mild to severe pain during menstruation, which affects their academic activities. To assess the prevalence and associated risk factors of dysmenorrhea and its effects on academic activities among Hawassa University students from April 1-30/2021. A cross-sectional study was conducted and a systematic random sampling technique was used to select 348 study participants. Standardized self-administered questionnaires were used to obtain relevant data. The severity of pain was assessed using a verbal multidimensional scoring system and Numerical Pain Rating Scale (NPRS) methods. The collected data was entered into Epi info version 7 and exported to SPSS version 21 for analysis and then descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis were performed. The prevalence of dysmenorrhea was 80% (277). Of those affected by dysmenorrhea, using the verbal multidimensional scoring system, 47.6% (132) were found to have mild pain, 39.7% (110) had moderate pain, and 12.6% (35) had severe pain. However, using the Numeric Pain Rating Scale (NPRS), 21.7% (60) were found to have mild pain, 33.2% (92) had moderate pain, 37.5% (104) had severe pain, and 7.6% (21) had very severe pain. It was found to have a negative effect on academic activity, such as loss of concentration in class (p = 0.00), disruption of study time (p = 0.00), sleep disturbances (p = 0.00), issues in personal relationships (p = 0.00), and absenteeism (p = 0.00). Associated factors included being sexually active, having a family history of dysmenorrhea, and the presence of depression. Dysmenorrhea is prevalent in this study and has a significant impact on academic activities. Family history of dysmenorrhea, being sexually active, and the presence of depression are associated factors.

The Use of Social Media for Students' Academic Life: Experience from Buhare Community Development Training Institute, Musoma, Tanzania

The study assessed the usage of social media networks in seeking information by college students: with reference to Buhare Community Development Training Institute (CDTI), Musoma-Mara region, Tanzania. Data were collected from two hundred seventy-three (273) study participants using questionnaires. The sample of the study was representative. The results from the analysis showed that Buhare CDTI students were familiar with social media while performance and efficiency was the highly cited factor influencing the choice of social media. Study findings further showed that social media sites were a reliable source of information for academic purposes and the majority of the participants noted that the reason for use of social media was academic and information-sharing purposes. Additionally, the majority of the participants revealed that there was a strong relationship between the extent of their use of social media and their academic performance. The study further established that the high cost of Internet bandwidth, identifying the author of materials retrieved from social media sites due to information overload, and failure to discover reliable information to be used on academic references due to the flood of information from social media were the critical challenges faced by students. Conclusively, it was clear from the current study that social media platforms are reliable sources of information to be used by college students in their daily academic life. The study suggests that academic institutions should promote and motivate students to use social media in their daily academic activities. Also, tutors and all academic stakeholders have to train students so that they may have the skills and knowledge to use IT devices.

The extent of self-reported impact of COVID-19 on daily academic activities and incomes among university students in Kumasi, Ghana

Students at universities are becoming recognized as a vulnerable populace, with much greater rates of depression and workload/activities than the overall population amidst COVID-19. As such, the present research intends to document the extent of self-reported impact on university students' everyday accademic lives and incomes. In August of 2021, a cross-sectional, self-administered internet-based poll was conducted among Ghanaian university students in Kumasi. The data was retrieved from the internet using Microsoft Excel and then analyzed using STATA software version 14. Both univariate and logistic regression analysis were performed, with a p-value<0.05 regarded statistically significant (*). The study included 430 participants, majority of whom were single (98.6%), young adults (89.8%), and Christians (90.7%). This survey found that 52.1% said the COVID-19 epidemic has a highly significant impact on their daily activities and income. Among other risk factors considered by the study, only students with a perceived risk of COVID-19 infection are approximately three times more likely to be affected by the pandemic in their daily academic activities and incomes than those who were not (Adj. OR = 2.516, 95CI% = 1.551–4.081, p < 0.001). The knowledge advanced by this study will educate stakeholders and aid policy-makers in higher education in improving public educational provisions. The results of this study may be used to predict the future effects of the pandemic. The novelty of this research also lies in its self-reported approach to analyzing the effect of the pandemic on the income and everyday academic activities of university students in Kumasi.

Teachers’ awareness and practices on school ergonomics in Karachi, Pakistan

Students spend most of the quality hours of the entire day in a school environment. Therefore, their safety and security are priorities of school administration and teachers to keep them secure from injuries and other health issues. Students mostly rely on teachers for their daily academic activities within a classroom environment. Therefore, it is essential to find out teachers’ perceptions and awareness about ergonomics risk factors and their practices to reduce these factors for the safety of the children within the classroom environment. A qualitative case study was conducted in a private school of Pakistan, to investigate teachers’ perceptions about school ergonomics and their practices which directly or indirectly influence school ergonomics. Five school teachers of primary class 3 were interviewed through a self-developed semi-structured interview protocol. The result indicated that ergonomics is highly valued in school education for students’ safety and health. Teachers introduce appropriate physical exercise in the classroom to keep children healthy and active during school hours and provide postural awareness for developing proper body posture. Counselling parents on ergonomics risk factors was suggested, along with ergonomically designed furniture in the classroom and the use of light material backpacks are also recommended.

Influence of Technostress on Academic Performance of University Medicine Students in Peru during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The current study aims to validate and apply an instrument to assess the relationship between communication overload, social overload, technostress, exhaustion and academic performance. We performed a cross-sectional, analytical study of 2286 university medical students to assess the influence of technostress as a mediator of social media overload, communication overload and mental exhaustion and its detrimental effect on the academic performance of university students in Peru during the COVID-19 pandemic. The research model was validated using partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to establish the influence of variables on the model. Communication and social overload were found to positively influence technostress by correlations of 0.284 and 0.557, respectively. Technostress positively influenced exhaustion by 0.898, while exhaustion negatively influenced academic performance by -0.439. Bootstrapping demonstrated that the path coefficients of the research model were statistically significant. The research outcomes may help university managers understand students’ technostress and develop strategies to improve the balanced use of technology for their daily academic activities.

The Development of i-TACwim for Academic Calender Management in Polytechnic

The need for automated and intelligent technology is a need nowadays. Even in the academic system, these technologies such as mobile apps and intelligent web system is essential for effective communication. However, the method of dissemination of information regarding academic calendar in Polytechnic is conducted conventionally thru hardcopy or downloaded document from institutional portal. The conventional method was found less practical in use which the lecturers often faced problems in their daily academic activities. Thus, namely as i-TACwim aims to design and develop an intelligent academic calendar that able to distribute real-time information regarding academic activities. The application also serves to send notifications to users according to important dates related to the International Standards Organization (ISO) procedures. This project applies repetitive development process adapted from agile Model consists of six phases. The development of this project is using YII2 Framework PHP of the system and interface, MySQL Server for the database and Firebase as the technology used for push notification. As a result, the i-TACwim application is a need and consider as an alternative to manual academic calendar to be used as the polytechnic intelligent academic calendar among the polytechnic community. User acceptance pilot testing will be conducted via questionnaire to form in order to show the capability and deliverables of this project.

Academic Stress in Postgraduate Student from a Private Peruvian University in the COVID-19 Context

The present research of descriptive scope with transectional design, is framed in the quantitative route, had like objective to measure the level of academic stress to which the students of postgraduate of the University Cesar Vallejo of Peru are put under, in the context COVID-19. The methodology highlights the application of an authorized instrument called SISCO Inventory for the measurement of academic stress, which was applied to 406 students of the masters and doctoral programs of the mentioned institution. The main results show the presence of academic stress in 93.3% of the students, with a high intensity that is explained by the fact that 83.3% are in levels 3, 4 and 5 of the scale, considering that 5 is the level of high stress. Finally, the main stressors found were the overload of daily academic activities, reactions to anxiety, anguish or desperation, and as the main coping strategy to recover the systemic balance, the analysis of the positive and negative arguments of the solutions designed to remedy the situations that generate the stress.

Overloaded Curriculum, Excessive Daily Academic Activities and Students’ Learning Effectiveness

This paper examined the relationship between overloaded curriculum, excessive daily academic activities and the learning effectiveness of Junior secondary school students (JSS). The researchers used the ex-post facto research design to carry out the study. The study sought to determine the relationship that exist between overloaded curriculum, excessive daily academic activities and the learning effectiveness of JSS 3 students in public secondary schools in Uyo Education Zone. A sample of 220 JSS 3 students was randomly selected from the 36 public secondary schools in Uyo Education Zone. Data were collected using a researcher-designed instrument titled “Overloaded Curriculum Questionnaire, OCQ” and an adapted version of Kirkpatrick’s Learning Effectiveness Scale. Cronbach alpha technique was used in calculating the reliability of the instruments. Reliability scores of .79 and .87 were yielded for the OCQ and KLES respectively. Data collected were analysed using Pearson Product Moment Correlation, PPMC. The findings of the study indicated that duplication of learning contents and academic overload have significant relationship with learning effectiveness of young learners. The recommendations made based on the findings include that curriculum planners should use curriculum mapping to reduce redundancies inherent in our overloaded curriculum.

Ambient intelligence-based smart classroom model

ABSTRACT This paper introduces the smart classroom learning model based on the concept of ambient intelligence. By analyzing a smart classroom, the ambient intelligence system detects a student and determines their level of fatigue based on the data about their previous daily academic activities. This information is then used to assign the student the appropriate learning strategy. The paper describes relevant factors for developing the model. The model was tested on a sample of 80 students. By analyzing the information available through ambient intelligence, it was possible to utilize the smart classroom to provide students with the adequate learning strategy in accordance with the criteria compatible with the expected leaning outcomes. The research results have shown positive effects of the application of the ambient intelligence-based smart classroom model on learning results.

The information technology and the university: use of educational applications by students

This research aimed to identify what are the factors that lead university students to the intention of using applications offered by educational institutions, through a study of students who already have the educational application installed. The applications offer facilities such as the search of collections, reservations and loans in the library, access to class schedule, among other options. A survey was performed with 133 students who used the educational application studied and the analysis was developed by structural equation models. The results show that the aid in the daily academic activities, the provided hedonic motivations and the habit positively influence the intention of use. The technical part involved in this procedure (download, installation and search for information) and the influence of other people did not influence use. The study broadens the understanding of the aspects related to educational applications, thus enabling the use of its results to make decisions on the provision and development of apps for this purpose.

The United Kingdom Parents and Teachers Associations: A Lesson for Benin Parents Associations

Parents play an important role in their children’s education. Their implication in the daily academic activities of their children can positively impact their results at the end of the year. The well-functioning of pedagogical activities could be more effective if parents and teachers join hands. So, parents must get involved in their children’s school community by actively taking part in the Parents Associations (APEs). This paper examines the traditional roles of APEs in Benin and the main problems they are facing. These include inadequate funds raising policies, the absence of solid cooperation with school teachers and the mismanagement of the existing. The paper therefore makes some recommendations on how APEs can be reorganized to better serve school communities using good examples from PTAs of United Kingdom.

Menstrual discomfort and its influence on daily academic activities and psychosocial relationship among undergraduate female students in Nigeria

Menstrual disorder is a common health problem among females in their reproductive years. It has psychosocial effects on the sufferer and her interactions with others during such periods. In Nigeria, menstrual disorder has received little research attention especially in the public health agenda. This study combines quantitative and qualitative approaches in investigating the prevalence of dysmenorrhoea and menorrhagia and their psychosocial effects by focusing on the daily activities of female undergraduates at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. A multi-stage sampling technique was employed to select 415 female undergraduates at the University. A snowball sampling technique was used in selecting 37 informants for the in-depth interviews. Results showed a high prevalence of dysmenorrhoea (64%) among respondents within 3 months prior to this study. Dysmenorrhoea was significant among female students who reported dizziness, headache, depression and irritation; and those whose menstrual disorder ever called for medical attention (P < 0.05). Similarly, menorrhagia was less frequent-(21%) than dysmenorrhoea (64%), but occurred more significantly with dizziness, headache and depression, and those whose menstrual disorderliness ever called for medical attention or even surgical intervention (P<0.05). Menstrual disorder was experienced as an objective and subjective reality among those interviewed. Both dysmenorrhoea and menorrhagia were significant predictors of psychosocial relationship of the female students (P < 0.05). Those with dysmenorrhoea reported one and a half times of depression than those without. However, menorrhagia appeared as the principal factor affecting their daily school activities and relationship with colleagues. Menstrual disorders prevalence is high among young undergraduates and appropriate enlightenment and treatment should be made available to young females.

地理学のポリティクスと政治地理学

This paper explores ‘the politics of geography,’ or the nature and problematic aspects of daily activities of geographers by examining cases in Anglophone political geography. Particular attention is paid to the four ‘incidents’ that became controversial among (political) geographers and can be considered informative for such an exploration. These incidents do not only concern conflicts and debates in academic journals over scholarly activities but also created various ‘sociological’ reactions from even outside of geography. Subject matters in political geography tend to be controversial because they often reflect the authors’ own political preferences and positionality. Whereas overt expressions of such preferences in / through academic journals may conflict with the journals’ ‘neutrality’ or ‘fairness,’ the journals themselves may direct their publication policy toward particular ‘political’ purposes. Most of the incidents became accidentally known to the author through John O’Loughlin, who has been an editor of the journal Political Geography since its foundation. Drawing on the experiences of O’Loughlin and Political Geography and without concluding that ‘everything is political,’ this paper attempts to reveal where and how ‘the political’ played out in those incidents and to provide a clue to a self-reflection on the socio-political implications of our daily academic activities.

Study of Nursing Mothers

The participation of women in a higher education program depends on the extent to which the program takes into consideration the special needs of women—issues that have long plagued women’s participation in education programs. In this study, we found that issues like childcare have not received any special consideration in the delivery of part-time higher education programs. This paper argues that university administration should review its present arrangements with regard to the participation of nursing mothers, for example, in part-time academic work. Efforts should be made to make daily academic activities nursing-mother friendly—reviewing the timetable to provide baby time-out and allowing for fewer daily academic activities; providing adequate daycare for children; and providing special counseling to alleviate the childcare and learning stress faced by nursing mothers.