Search results

The common approaches to quality assurance (QA), as practiced by most post‐secondary education institutions for internal quality monitoring and most QA authorities for external quality monitoring (EQM), have been considered by many researchers as having largely failed to address the essence of educational quality. The purpose of this paper, although not meant to be exhaustive, is to review some of these approaches.

The paper reviews the relevant issues concerning total quality management, performance indicators and EQM, the three common approaches to the QA of post‐secondary education have been reviewed.

While from a pragmatic perspective these approaches have their respective reasons for existence, they can all be criticized as lacking rigorous theoretical foundations and being mainly driven by demands of satisfying external agendas (e.g. to enforce institutional accountability or compliance) instead of academic considerations (e.g. to facilitate student learning). As a result, a mismatch between the rhetoric and reality of educational quality has become a common experience of most practitioners, not only in western contexts from which these approaches were originated, but also in other cultural contexts that have adopted them uncritically. It is undeniable that the overall quality culture within most post‐secondary education systems worldwide, as currently manifested, tends to favor the institutional aspects rather than the student aspects of the quality issues, and tends to lean more on the accountability‐led view rather than the improvement‐led view of quality assurance.

The paper sheds some light on the quality debate in post‐secondary education.

A major focus of the recent research into the quality of post‐secondary education is the centrality of the student experience. The purpose of this paper is to review the literature on studies addressing such a focus to shed light on how quality assurance (QA) practices can be improved.

The paper reviews some of the approaches to addressing the quality issues from the viewpoints of students' evaluations of teaching effectiveness, students' programme experiences, students' total experiences, student satisfaction and service quality, and some of the quantitative instruments that have been developed for measuring the respective constructs.

The employment of student surveys using self‐report inventories/questionnaires with established reliability, validity and diagnostic power has the potential to transform both the external and internal quality‐monitoring mechanisms now being practiced in post‐secondary education, and help shift the focus of QA activities more to the enhancement‐led views.

To cope with the complexity of the education system and to get quality into it, this paper promotes the practice of conducting student surveys by taking reference from the relevant research literature and adopting a rigorous approach to developing and improving data‐collection instruments to tap into the students' experiences, so that the QA activities of educational institutions are research informed, evidence based and enhancement led.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.

From 1953 to 1961, the South Korean economy grew slowly; the average per capita GNP growth was a mere percent, amounting to less than $100 in 1961. Few people, therefore, look for the sources of later dynamism in this period. As Kyung Cho Chung (1956:225) wrote in the mid‐1950s: “[South Korea] faces grave economic difficulties. The limitations imposed by the Japanese have been succeeded by the division of the country, the general destruction incurred by the Korean War, and the attendant dislocation of the population, which has further disorganized the economy” (see also McCune 1956:191–192). T.R. Fehrenbach (1963:37), in his widely read book on the Korean War, prognosticated: “By themselves, the two halves [of Korea] might possibly build a viable economy by the year 2000, certainly not sooner.”

This paper gives a bibliographical review of the finite element and boundary element parallel processing techniques from the theoretical and application points of view. Topics include: theory – domain decomposition/partitioning, load balancing, parallel solvers/algorithms, parallel mesh generation, adaptive methods, and visualization/graphics; applications – structural mechanics problems, dynamic problems, material/geometrical non‐linear problems, contact problems, fracture mechanics, field problems, coupled problems, sensitivity and optimization, and other problems; hardware and software environments – hardware environments, programming techniques, and software development and presentations. The bibliography at the end of this paper contains 850 references to papers, conference proceedings and theses/dissertations dealing with presented subjects that were published between 1996 and 2002.

Fumes, grit, dust, dirt—all have long been recognized as occupational hazards, their seriousness depending on their nature and how they assail the human body, by ingestion, absorption, inhalation, the last being considered the most likely to cause permanent damage. It would not be an exaggeration to state that National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) provisions, now contained in the Social Security Act, 1975, with all the regulations made to implement the law, had their birth in compensating victims of lung disease from inhalation of dust. Over the years, the range of recognized dust disease, prescribed under regulations, has grown, but there are other recognized risks to human life and health from dusts of various kinds, produced not from the manufacturing, mining and quarrying, &c. industries; but from a number of areas where it can contaminate and constitute a hazard to vulnerable products and persons. An early intervention by legislation concerned exposed foods, e.g. uncovered meat on open shop fronts, to dust and in narrow streets, mud splashed from road surfaces. The composition of dust varies with its sources—external, atmospheric, seasonal or interior sources, uses and occupations, comings and goings, and in particular, the standards of cleaning and, where necessary, precautions to prevent dust accumulation. One area for long under constant scrutiny and a subject of considerable research is the interior of hospital wards, treatment rooms and operating theatres.

An aerothermodynamic design code for axisymmetric projectiles has been developed using a viscous‐inviscid interaction scheme. Separate solution procedures for the inviscid and the viscous (boundary layer) fluid dynamic equations are coupled by an iterative solution procedure. Non‐equilibrium, equilibrium and perfect gas boundary layer equations are included. The non‐equilibrium gas boundary layer equations assume a binary mixture (two species; atoms and molecules) of chemically reacting perfect gases. Conservation equations for each species include finite reaction rates applicable to high temperature air. The equilibrium gas boundary layer equations assume infinite rate reactions, while the perfect gas equations assume no chemical reactions. Projectile near‐wall and surface flow profiles (velocity, pressure, density, temperature and heat transfer) representing converged solutions to both the inviscid and viscous equations can be obtained in less than two minutes on minicomputers. A technique for computing local reverse flow regions is included. Computations for yawed projectiles are accomplished using a coordinate system transformation technique that is valid for small angle‐of‐attack. Computed surface pressure, heat transfer rates and aerodynamic forces and moments for 1.25 &le Mach No. &le 10.5 are compared to wind tunnel and free flight measurements on flat plate, blunt‐cone, and projectile geometries such as a cone‐cylinder‐flare.