Search results

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effect of financial education workshops (FEWs) on parent–adolescent communication about money by controlling for a parent's gender.

This study utilized a pre- and post-survey-based experimental research design for impact evaluation. Assuming that parents often claim that they frequently communicate with their children about money, the researcher asked children to rate their perception of their mothers' financial communication with them. Their mothers completed the pre-survey before agreeing to participate in FEWs. A follow-up survey was conducted for both study groups six months after completing the FEW series. The data consisted of 300 responses on 19 pairs of money communication items from both study groups. Neither the mothers nor the children were aware that data were collected from both the groups.

The results of the paired t-tests support the notion that financial education enhances monetary communication between mothers and adolescents.

This study is helpful to policymakers and financial educators not only to understand the need for “family-based financial education workshops” but also to design and implement such programs to open up the line of “money communication” between parents and children.

This important outcome provides a likely assumption that the enhancement in communication that had been previously constrained by factors such as a “parent's inability or unwillingness to discuss financial matters” is improved by empowering the parent on the subject of personal finance. Second, financial educators and policymakers need to understand that parents play a crucial role in the socialization process of their children. Parents' instructions and communications with their children not only impact the children's financial choices but also make them feel more competent about managing their finances. So, importance of financial socialization strategies should be included in the FEWs designed for the adults.

Existing research studies evaluated the FEW outcomes by reporting a positive change in various financial behaviors of the participants by considering only one unit of the household. This study extends the impact evaluation of FEWs to measure the behavioral outcomes at the household level by considering two units of the household, the mother parent and adolescent child by studying their communication about money.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the financial habits and experience of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants via a case study of first and second wave migrants from the Vietnamese community in Australia.

This paper utilises a qualitative approach through semi-structured interviews. A thematic analysis was adopted when coding the interview data which led to the emergence of identified themes related to financial habits and experience.

The findings reveal that first and second wave migrants shared similar views on seeking professional financial advice, but not on the use of community-based financial schemes. When asked about the potential benefits of attending financial education workshops to inform themselves of financial services, most were unwilling to attend.

Although the research targets first and second wave Vietnamese CALD migrants, no claims can be made regarding the representation of CALD migrants as a whole. The research has implications with respect to the perceived necessity of CALD migrants to utilise mainstream financial services. This paper provides recommendations for future research in this area.

The paper provides one of the few studies of an Australian CALD migrant cohort with respect to financial habits. The paper also provides an understanding of the cultural barriers and challenges facing this specific cohort of the Vietnamese community in Australia with respect to potentially accessing financial services.

The study aims to explore the savings behaviour of Indian farmers. An attempt is also made to inspect the effect of financial literacy (FL) and financial confidence (FC) on the savings behaviour of the farmers in India.

This study used secondary data on 10,263 Indian farmers from Financial Inclusion Insights, 2017 database. Relevant statistical techniques and ordered probit regression were used to unfold the effect of FL and FC on the savings behaviour of farmers.

The outcome of the study revealed that the majority of the Indian farmers exhibited poor levels of FL and FC. Of the total, 42.99% were found to save regularly. FL and FC were observed to play instrumental roles in steering the savings behaviour of the Indian farmers. Household size, financial shocks, gender, farm ownership, income, household financial decision-making process, religion and educational attainment have emerged to be significant predictors of the savings behaviour of Indian farmers.

The present study makes an original contribution to the extant literature by unfolding the savings behaviour of Indian farmers and the effect of FL and FC on such behaviour using a rich sample of 10,263 farmers for the first time.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a case study of a service learning project focusing on financial literacy. In response to the global financial crisis there has been increasing emphasis on improving financial literacy skills and education. In this paper, the author argues for service learning as a means of integrating the finance curricula with real-world applications.

Initially, the author surveys the growing importance of a financial literacy education as well as integrating service learning with a business education. The author then describes the implementation of a service-learning program at a private university that provides financial literacy workshops to community partners.

The paper concludes with a discussion of the effectiveness of the financial literacy workshops and reflections of the service-learning experience.

It is an opportunity for learning among culturally diverse groups and has also helped international students become more culturally involved on campus.

The undergraduate service-learning program is placed in an intermediate finance class. It is also an opportunity for cultural and financial institutional learning among international students.

Given the diversity of community service partners in this project, the service-learning experience has become an opportunity to teach all students on international cultural differences and social justice themes.

This is one of the few pedagogical examples in financial literacy with an international dimension.

This study aims to propose a comprehensive education model to enhance Islamic financial literacy to elevate the prominence of Islamic finance.

The study conceptualized a framework of Islamic finance education using Prochaska and DiClemente’s transtheoretical model (TTM) of change aided by a review of the essential literature on Islamic financial literacy. The study also includes critical reflection based on the real firsthand experiences of delivering 16 voluntary non-formal community-based Islamic finance workshops for Indonesian diaspora in the UK and the Republic of Ireland from December 2014 to July 2016.

This study provides an inclusive conceptualization of an Islamic finance education approach to creating awareness in communities of applying Islamic financial principles in daily life. It also elaborates stage-appropriate strategies that cover the pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action and maintenance stages that vary by upon individuals based on their readiness to adopt Islamic finance principles.

This study is not merely based on a conceptual examination of literature but also incorporates critical reflection on a series of community-based Islamic finance workshops conducted by the authors. It therefore offers the potential to present an under-researched model used to enhance Islamic finance literacy as one of the pillars in supporting the development of the Islamic economic and financial sector.

This study provides guidelines and various practical ideas that scholars and any concerned parties can use to offer community-based Islamic finance educational activities aimed at supporting the future organic growth of Islamic finance.

The study expands the use of Prochaska and DiClemente’s TTM (which has been widely cited in health-related behavioral research) and brings a unique theoretical lens, notably within the Islamic finance literature. The use of the TTM was established in psychology and health-related behavioral science, particularly in relation to elucidating how people cease unhealthy behaviors (e.g. alcohol and smoking addictions) and how they develop healthy behaviors. This paper brings the TTM into another context on how to stimulate individuals, particularly Muslims, to shift from “riba addiction” and develop sharia-compliant financial behaviors.

The purpose of this paper is to determine if and how role models presented in entrepreneurship education can influence students’ entrepreneurial activity given that the lack of financial and material means render most role models unattainable.

Data were collected in three stages from an entrepreneurship workshop programme held in Lagos, Nigeria. Nigerian and European undergraduate and graduate business students worked together to develop sustainable business ideas for the European and African market. In this exploratory paper, the emphasis for analysis is on the Nigerian students.

Based on the research results, the authors identified four types of role models and gained insight into how and why they could inspire students at different stages of entrepreneurship education.

This research is highly contextual with an emphasis on Europe and Africa. Given the relatively small sample of the European students in this study, this paper only presents findings from the Nigerian students. In view of time and sample size constraints, it would be useful to do a longitudinal international study to compare the approaches taken by European and African higher education institutions to develop an understanding of role models in entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial activity. Further study is needed to explore whether role models are the way forward to address the processes of student entrepreneurial learning in the context of entrepreneurship education in Nigeria. Further work could also uncover deeper convictions, the attitudes of students with regard to race and gender, and consider implications for practice between university and industry.

The paper contributes to the development of entrepreneurship education in the context of Nigeria’s emerging economy and makes suggestions on how to stimulate entrepreneurial activity through the targeted use of role models.

In view of financial, material or societal constraints to attain role models, the result of this study can be applied in other African contexts or emerging economies to develop the understanding of the relationship between role models in the industry, higher education practices and government policy. The findings of this study show that the highest impact gained is from “real-life” exchanges between students and entrepreneurs.

Traditional entrepreneurship education fails because the learner’s process of integrating and applying behaviours of entrepreneurial examples and programmes is opaque. Research on role models suggests that where they have a positive impact is where they are perceived as self-relevant and attainable. This idea is explored in the particular context of entrepreneurship education in Nigeria in West Africa, which is characterised by highly limited and fluctuating resources despite Nigeria’s relative wealth. The authors conclude with suggestions for the use of role models in entrepreneurship education, especially in the Nigerian higher education context. This paper, therefore, contributes to research on entrepreneurship role model education in emerging economies.

This paper aims to present recently published resources on information literacy and library instruction providing an introductory overview and a selected annotated bibliography of publications covering all library types.

This paper introduces and annotates English-language periodical articles, monographs, dissertations and other materials on library instruction and information literacy published in 2016.

The paper provides information about each source, describes the characteristics of current scholarship and highlights sources that contain unique or significant scholarly contributions.

The information may be used by librarians and interested parties as a quick reference to literature on library instruction and information literacy.

The purpose of this paper is to report the training of college librarians, academic and management staff, IT managers and students on how to organise, manage and use a user-friendly library. In Uganda, as in many countries, the problem is that school and/or college libraries are managed by librarians who may have good cataloguing and management skills, but who do not have the pedagogic skills and knowledge of the school curricula that are necessary for librarians to be able to guide and mentor both teachers and students or organise curriculum-related activities or facilitate research. The development of user-friendly libraries contributes in improving education quality through nurturing the interest of students and teachers in literacy activities and active search for knowledge. Under the stewardship of the Belgium Technical Cooperation and the Ministry of Education in Uganda, library stakeholders were trained on how to put users – rather than themselves – in the centre of the library’s operations and introduced to active teaching and learning methodologies and activities with emphasis on getting engaged in transforming spaces, services, outreach to users and collections. Several measures, short and long term were taken to address the gaps limiting the performance of the librarians. Given the disparities in the trainees’ education level and work experience, the training was delivered in seven modules divided into three units for over eight months in 2015. By the end of the training, trainees developed unique library strategic plan, library policies and procedures, capacity to use library systems, physical design and maintenance systems, partnerships, library structure and staff job descriptions.

To effectively engage the participants each topic was conducted using active teaching and learning (ATL) methodologies, including: lecture with slides and hands-on practice – each topic was introduced in a lecture form with slides and hands-on exercises. The main goal was to introduce the participants to the concepts discussed, offer opportunities to explore alternative approaches, as well define boundaries for discussion through brainstorming. The question-answer approach kept the participants alert and to start thinking critically on the topic discussed – brainstorming sessions allowed thinking beyond the presentation room, drawing from personal experiences to provide alternatives to anticipated challenges. The goal here was for the participants to provide individual choices and approaches for real life problems; group discussions: case study/ scenario and participant presentations – participants were provided with a scenario and asked to provide alternative approaches that could solve the problem based on their personal experience at their colleges. By the end of the group discussion, participants presented a draft of the deliverable as per the topic under discussion. More so, group discussions were an excellent approach to test participant’s teamwork skills and ability to compromise, as well as respecting team decisions. It was an opportunity to see how librarians will work with the library committees. Group discussions further initiated and cemented the much-needed librarian–academic staff – college management relationship. During the group discussion, librarians, teaching staff, ICT staff and college management staff, specifically the Principals and Deputy Principals interacted freely thus starting and cultivating a new era of work relationship between them. Individual presentation: prior to the workshop, participants were sent instructions to prepare a presentation on a topic. For example, participants were asked to provide their views of what a “user-friendly library” would look like or what would constitute a “user-friendly library”; the college library of HTC-Mulago was asked to talk about their experience working with book reserves, challenges faced and plans they have to address the challenges, while the college librarian from NTC-Kaliro was asked to describe a situation where they were able to assist a patron, the limitations they faced and how they addressed them. Doing so did not only assist to emotionally prepare the participants for the training but also helped to make them start thinking about the training in relation to their libraries and work. Take-home assignment: at the end of each session, participants were given home assignments to not only revise the training material but also prepare for the next day training. Further the take-home assignments provided time for the participants to discuss with their colleagues outside of the training room so as to have a common ground/ understanding on some of the very sensitive issues. Most interesting assignment was when participants were asked to review an article and to make a presentation in relation to their library experiences. Participant reports: participant reports resulted from the take-home assignments and participants were asked to make submission on a given topic. For example, participants were asked to review IFLA section on library management and write a two-page report on how such information provided supported their own work, as well as a participant report came from their own observation after a library visit. Invited talks with library expert: two invited talks by library experts from Consortium of Uganda University Libraries and Uganda Library and Information Science Association with the goal to share their experience, motivate the participants to strive higher and achieve great things for their libraries. Library visitation: there were two library visits conducted on three separate days – International Hospital Kampala (IHK) Library, Makerere University Library and Aga Khan University Hospital Library. Each of these library visits provided unique opportunities for the participants to explore best practices and implement similar practices in their libraries. Visual aids – videos, building plans and still photos: these were visual learning aids to supplement text during the lectures because they carried lot of information while initiating different thoughts best on the participants’ past experience and expertise. The training advocated for the use of ATL methodologies and likewise similar methodologies were used to encourage participants do so in their classrooms.

Addressing Key Concerns: Several measures, both long and short term, were taken to address the gaps limiting the performance of the librarians. The measures taken included: selected representative sample of participants including all college stakeholders as discussed above; active teaching and learning methodologies applied in the training and blended in the content of the training materials; initiated and formulated approaches to collaborations, networks and partnerships; visited different libraries to benchmark library practices and encourage future job shadowing opportunities; and encouraged participants to relate freely, understand and value each other’s work to change their mindsets. College librarians were encouraged to ensure library priorities remain on the agenda through advocacy campaigns. Short-term measures: The UFL training was designed as a practical and hands-on training blended with individual and group tasks, discussions, take-home assignments and presentations by participants. This allowed participates to engage with the material and take responsibility for their own work. Further, the training material was prepared with a view that librarians support the academic life of teaching staff and students. Participants were tasked to develop and later fine-tune materials designed to support their work. For example, developing a subject bibliography and posting it on the library website designed using open source tools such as Google website, Wikis, blogs. The developed library manual includes user-friendly policies and procedures referred to as “dos and don’ts in the library” that promote equitable open access to information; drafting book selection memos; new book arrivals lists; subscribing to open access journals; current awareness services and selective dissemination of information service displays and electronic bulletins. Based on their library needs and semester calendar, participants developed action points and timelines to implement tasks in their libraries at the end of each unit training. Librarians were encouraged to share their experiences through library websites, Facebook page, group e-mail/listserv and Instagram; however, they were challenged with intimate internet access. College libraries were rewarded for their extraordinary job. Given their pivotal role in the management and administration of financial and material resources, on top of librarians, the participants in this training were college administrators/ management, teaching and ICT staff, researchers and student leadership. Participants were selected to address the current and future needs of the college library. These are individuals that are perceived to have a great impact towards furthering the college library agenda. The practical nature of this training warranted conducting the workshops from developed but similar library spaces, for example, Aga Khan University Library and Kampala Capital City, Makerere University Library, International Hospital Kampala Library and Uganda Christian University Library. Participants observed orientation sessions, reference desk management and interviews, collection management practices, preservation and conservation, secretarial bureau management, etc. Long-term measures: Changing the mindset of librarians, college administrators and teaching staff is a long-term commitment which continues to demand for innovative interventions. For example: job shadowing allowed college librarian short-term attachments to Makerere University Library, Uganda Christian University Library, Aga Khan Hospital University Library and International Hospital Kampala Library – these libraries were selected because of their comparable practices and size. The mentorship programme lasted between two-three weeks; on-spot supervision and follow-up visits to assess progress with the action plan by the librarians and college administration and college library committee; ensuring that all library documents – library strategic plan, library manual, library organogram, etc are approved by the College Governing Council and are part of the college wide governing documents; and establishing the library committee with a job description for each member – this has strengthened the library most especially as an advocacy tool, planning and budgeting mechanism, awareness channel for library practices, while bringing the library to the agenda – reemphasizing the library’s agenda. To bridge the widened gap between librarians and the rest of the stakeholders, i.e. teaching staff, ICT staff, college administration and students, a college library committee structure and its mandate were established comprising: Library Committee Chairperson – member of the teaching staff; Library Committee Secretary – College Librarian; Student Representative – must be a member of the student Guild with library work experience; and Representative from each college academic department. A library consortium was formed involving all the four project supported colleges to participate in resource sharing practices, shared work practices like shared cataloguing, information literacy training, reference interview and referral services as well a platform for sharing experiences. A library consortium further demanded for automating library functions to facilitate collaboration and shared work. Plans are in place to install Koha integrated library system that will cultivate a strong working relationship between librarians and students, academic staff, college administration and IT managers. This was achieved by ensuring that librarians innovatively implement library practices and skills acquired from the workshop as well as show their relevance to the academic life of the academic staff. Cultivating relationships takes a great deal of time, thus college librarians were coached on: creating inclusive library committees, timely response to user needs, design library programmes that address user needs, keeping with changing technology to suite changing user needs, seeking customer feedback and collecting user statistics to support their requests, strengthening the library’s financial based by starting a secretarial bureau and conducting user surveys to understand users’ information-seeking behaviour. To improve the awareness of new developments in the library world, college librarians were introduced to library networks at national, regional and international levels, as a result they participated in conferences, workshops, seminars at local, regional and international level. For example, for the first time and with funding from Belgium Technical Cooperation, college librarians attended 81st IFLA World Library and Information Congress in South African in 2015. College libraries are now members of the Consortium of Uganda University Libraries and Uganda Library and Information Science Association and have attended meetings of these two very important library organisations in Uganda’s LIS profession. The college librarians have attended meetings and workshops organized by these two organisations.

At the end of the three units training, participants were able to develop: a strategic plan for their libraries; an organogram with staffing needs and job description matching staff functions; a Library Committee for each library and with a structure unifying all the four project-support Colleges; a library action plan with due dates including deliverables and responsibilities for implementation; workflow plan and organisation of key sections of the library such as reserved and public spaces; furniture and equipment inventory (assets); a library manual and collection development policy; partnerships with KCCA Library and Consortium of Uganda University Libraries; skills to use Koha ILMS for performing library functions including: cataloguing, circulation, acquisitions, serials management, reporting and statistics; skills in searching library databases and information literacy skills; skills in designing simple and intuitive websites using Google Sites tools; and improved working relationship between the stakeholders was visible. To further the user-friendly libraries principle of putting users in the centre of the library’s operations, support ATL methodologies and activities with emphasis on getting engaged in transforming spaces, services, outreach to users and collections the following initiatives are currently implemented in the colleges: getting approval of all library policy documents by College Governing Council, initiating job shadowing opportunities, conducting on-spot supervision, guide libraries to set up college library committees and their job description, design library websites, develop dissemination sessions for all library policies, incorporate user-friendly language in all library documents, initiate income generation activities for libraries, set terms of reference for library staff and staffing as per college organogram, procurement of library tools like DDC and library of congress subject headings (LCSH), encourage attendance to webinars and space planning for the new libraries.

The purpose of the study is to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education regarding distance learning system in Pakistan.

A mixed-method research design was used in this study. The population of the study was all the previous students of research work and all the teachers of these students working at MPhil and PhD level in AIOU in Pakistan. Stratified random sampling technique was used in this study. This study used the questionnaire and interview technique to collect data. Data of questionnaire was in numbers and data of interview was narrative. So it was the need of the study that a mixed-method approach, i.e. both quantitative and qualitative techniques should be used in this study.

The findings of the study show that AIOU has also strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education related to distance education like all the formal and distance universities of Pakistan and World. This study reflected that AIOU is a great blessing for those who cannot acquire their education regularly because of financial/family problems or they are job holders. But this study also described that at higher level students are facing a lot of problems especially there is a delay in research process and provision of no scholarships to students. The teachers have a low salary package than the other public universities of Pakistan and a lot of responsibilities to attend meetings, seminars, conferences and workshops. So they have less time for research work. And AIOU provides them fewer opportunities to go abroad for further studies or to attend conferences/seminars. This study recommended that there should be adopted such policies in AIOU that students could get their study materials, assignments duration, workshops schedule and degrees in time, the teachers of the concerned departments should allow to take more in numbers the students under their supervision, the pay package for the teachers working at MPhil and PhD level should be raised and the opportunities for the faculty members to go.

This study is limited to analyze the higher education system especially the distance learning system in Pakistan.

This study has indicated the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in higher education which the AIOU is facing recently and the policymakers can develop plans/strategies to make better the distance learning system especially at higher level in Pakistan. This study can be helpful for the stakeholders who are interested in distance learning system. This study was conducted at higher level in the distance learning system but it can open the ways for the other researchers to conduct research in other disciplines related to distance education, i.e. at matric level, F.A/F.SC, B.Sc programs, Master level and M.Sc programs at AIOU.

Through this study, it can be acknowledged how the AIOU is providing the opportunity of education to a large number of people in the society who cannot study regularly in the formal institutions especially those who are job holders, some financial problems and women who have some family problems and above one million people are benefitting from AIOU in Pakistan and world.

This study is original in this respect because the data has been collected from the participants, i.e. students and teachers of AIOU. And it has also great value because this is the first SWOT analysis which has been conducted in this university to examine the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing AIOU at present time. This study can also become a base for the stakeholders', i.e. policymakers, administration and higher education depart. of Pakistan in developing strategies to improve and amend the distance learning system of Pakistan especially at higher level in AIOU.

Recent years saw a paradigm shift from ex post (reactive) to ex ante (proactive) approaches (e.g. insurance) to disaster risk financing for building resilience of communities in developing countries. To facilitate adoption, the approaches should be adapted so that they can be technically feasible and culturally desirable to the local context. This paper aims to report an exploratory study to elaborate the existing arrangements to deal with the impacts of disaster and the potential to shift to a more proactive disaster risk financing in Indonesia.

A series of stakeholder engagement activities in Semarang and Solo, Indonesia was conducted to ascertain the existing arrangements for disaster risk financing at local government level, the challenges/barriers to the adoption of insurance, education and policies to facilitate the transformation from reactive to proactive process. Thematic analysis was applied to transcribed conversations during interviews, focus groups and workshops. Identification of emerging issues/themes was also guided by the researchers’ notes during the events, and facilitated by qualitative analysis software, Atlas Ti®. This was complemented by an analysis of regulations and documents provided by the local stakeholders.

The local governments heavily rely on contingency fund, which is not enough and often significantly delayed to fund recovery and reconstruction of public infrastructure. The use of insurance is limited in both public and private sectors, particularly in the majority of low-income communities. Various barriers and challenges were identified under several categories, namely, institutional, cultural, affordability, lack of awareness and knowledge, insurance arrangement process and lack of trust. The findings also suggest that improving insurance education should involve multiple stakeholders, and both formal and informal routes should be pursued.

The research fills the gap of knowledge in disaster risk financing in the context of developing countries, specifically in local governments and communities in Indonesia. The findings may be replicable for other developing countries with low adoption of ex ante financial instruments for dealing with the impacts of disaster.