11613 research outputs found
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Enhancing skills acquisition in electrical infrastructure construction studies
No full textDissertation (M.Ed.(Curriculum Studies))--University of the Free State, 2023This study was a qualitative study with the aim to contribute towards the enhancement of skills acquisition in electrical infrastructure construction (EIC) among youth with the purpose of providing them competences that have the potential of heightening chances of their employability. The study achieved the identified aim by responding to the research question: How can youths’ acquisition of skills in EIC be strengthened to empower them to be self-employed and employable?
The problem in this study was that a significant percentage of the South African workforce, which includes technical and vocational education and training (TVET) students who are accessing higher education, lack specific technical skills and this results in poor employability prospects. The delivery of quality TVET courses and content is dependent on the competences of the lecturers for enhancing skills acquisition in EIC studies. The framework guiding this study was critical emancipatory research for it is transformative and emancipatory. Youth participatory action research was used as method of data collection with critical discourse analysis to analyse the data according to discursive, textual and social settings. The findings of the study may empower TVET colleges to prepare students with skills for the EIC industry and contribute to socio-economic development of the economy of South Africa. The workforce needed comprises engineers, technicians and the tradesmen from South African universities and TVET colleges
The STEAM vs STEM educational approach: the significance of the application of the arts in science teaching for learners' attitude change
No full textThis article critically examines existing literature on the importance of incorporating the arts into the teaching and learning of science subjects in schools. It explores the significance of the STEAM educational approach as an option in science teaching and learning that might provide a range of benefits to STEM learners. STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics while STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics. The argument in the article is focused on why leveraging such skills as creativity, problem-solving, critical thinking, communications, self-direction, initiative, and collaboration, which are inherent in the arts, to strengthen the effective teaching and learning of science within the STEAM educational context is important for STEM learners. The STEM educational approach to science teaching and learning employs an interdisciplinary approach to problem-solving aimed at equipping learners with 21st century skills such as critical thinking, creativity, problem-solving, self-direction, initiative, collaboration, effective communication, and morals. It also aims at providing them with the opportunity to apply these skills through the practices, contexts, and processes of hands-on activities. These are targeted at understanding science and viewing science differently, which might enable them to participate in a STEM-career pathway. However, the framework for STEM does not fully support an understanding that creativity can exist in science and that science can be taught in multiple ways, including application of the arts. STEAM, on the other hand, is grounded in a transdisciplinary approach to science teaching and learning. It explores the application of the arts in science teaching and learning. This is aimed at improving the confidence, attitudes, and interests of learners in science through new approaches to problem-solving which might strengthen positive attitudes towards science. This approach incorporates the common processes of science and arts, which includes discovery, observation, experimentation, description, interpretation, analysis, evaluation, wondering, visualising, exploring, and communication.Publisher's versio
Authorship in copyright law: a critique in the context of the fourth industrial revolution
No full textDissertation(LL.M.(Mercantile Law))--University of the Free State, 2023This dissertation critically examines the demands for an amendment of the South African Copyright Act 98 of 1978 to bring it in line with modern times. It investigates authorship in copyright law from the perspective of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This dissertation focuses specifically on artificial intelligence (AI) and its ability to generate copyrightable works under the Act. The growing use of AI technology inversely leads to the growing production of works generated by AI. These mechanically produced works share the same traits as those that, according to South African law, are entitled to copyright protection. As a result, there is currently uncertainty over who the author of such works is, because AI machines do not qualify as authors under the South African Copyright Act.
This dissertation examines the definition of an author in the existing Copyright Act, as well as the requirements for authorship and copyright protection, in order to determine if this section of the Act needs to be amended to reflect the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
To accomplish this, the dissertation investigates prominent South African intellectual property law textbooks as well as international sources that have conducted extensive research on the subject. The dissertation reveals the excessive use of artificial intelligence machinery and its products in the country and around the world. It demonstrates the growing need for legislation to govern such machinery in the country, as well as rules to regulate the usage of such technology and the copyrightable works it produces.
The dissertation studies the nature of copyright in a work made by AI equipment nationwide and internationally, as well as how these machines will affect different areas in the country. An analysis of the requirements for copyright is provided, and it is argued that the present requirements for copyright cater to works generated by artificial intelligence even though these machines do not qualify as authors under the Act. Furthermore, the dissertation demonstrates how a lack of regulations in this regard will have a negative impact on specific areas, such as the country's education system. It indicates that South African legislation has not advanced sufficiently in comparison to other countries.
The dissertation finds that the current Copyright Act is outdated and needs to be amended to account for AI generated works as well as AI authorship. Furthermore, legislation to oversee AI technology in the country should also be considered
Improving customer satisfaction at MS Fabrications and Engineering
No full textDissertation (MBA (Business Administration))--University of the Free State, 2023Customer satisfaction for companies and institutions of any size is an important marker of how they connect with their clientele. In some cases it could be the difference between success and failure in business. This study sought to determine how to improve customer satisfaction at MS Fabrications and Engineering (MSFE). It is a mechanical engineering company operating from the capital city, Maseru, Lesotho. In the past few years, the company experienced stagnation in terms of growth across its strategic objectives. Logically, customer engagement and subsequent customer satisfaction became the primary research objective. The study employed a qualitative research design, together with non-probability sampling, and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. Three categories of participants were purposively selected. The first group comprised a mixture of both high and low performing customers of MSFE. Meaning companies who do repeat business, places orders with MSFE regularly. While low performing customers give orders occasionally. The second group of participants were employees of MSFE at managerial level. The last group comprised experts on customer issues from a variety of companies and institutions.
The major findings of the study show that it is possible to achieve customer satisfaction but fail to realise economic gains, particularly when the customer base is not big enough. The other key finding is that all the customer groups were satisfied with the service that MSFE was offering. However, the need for MSFE to diversify its offering and consider expanding to new markets were also revealed. The study concludes that the management of the company needs to ensure the expansion of their customer base through marketing, venturing into new markets, diversifying offering and expanding services to the existing customer base
Examining the components of pedagogical content knowledge and the construction of physics teachers’ classroom practices
No full textThesis (Ph.D.(Education Studies))--University of the Free State, 2023Research considers teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) as knowledge that differentiates a teacher from a subject specialist. PCK is needed to help the teacher transform the knowledge of content to be teachable to students. Research has shown that when the PCK of teachers is not well established, classroom practice is jeopardized. The quality of teaching Science is a concern in many countries including Lesotho. There have been inconsistent findings on the large-scale studies to relate PCK and classroom instructional practices, thus the call for more studies that explore the relation of PCK and classroom practices so as to understand the role of PCK in teachers’ classroom actions. This study investigated the components of PCK that Physics teachers in Lesotho possess and how they draw on the components of PCK to construct their classroom practices in a variety of secondary school contexts. The PCK components were examined across Physics teaching as domain PCK while the manifestations of PCK were explored in the teaching of a specific topic in Physics, “the effects of force”. The Consensus Model of PCK was used as a conceptual framework guiding this study. This Model was adapted to incorporate the Model of Magnussonet al. (1999) to explore the PCK components and to portray the manifestations of PCK in classroom practices. The Consensus Model consists of five knowledge bases termed PCK components in this study being: assessment knowledge (AK), pedagogical knowledge (PK), content knowledge (CK), knowledge of students (KS) and curricular knowledge (CuK). This model allowed the researcher to explore both the knowledge on-action and the knowledge in-action, which are helpful in differentiating what the teacher knows about teaching Physics and how the teacher actually teaches Physics in the classroom. This study followed an explanatory sequential mixed method design where data were collected in two phases. In Phase one, a quantitative part, a paper-and pencil PCK test was administered to 87 qualified Physics teachers teaching the last two years of secondary education. The responses were scored using a rubric that was in line with the five PCK components, which were rated on a four point scale from 1 to 4, where 1 indicated undeveloped PCK and 4 indicated developed PCK. Data were analysed using the Extended Rasch Model and SPSS. Phase two, the qualitative part, involved four case teachers selected among the 87 teachers. These were purposively selected teachers with the highest and lowest scores from the PCK test. The qualitative data were collected through different methods. The audio-recorded pre-observation interviews, the video recorded classroom observations and the audio-recorded post-observation interviews. Data were analysed by presenting the narratives of the four case teachers. The findings revealed that the Physics teachers’ PCK was rather low since the person measures ranked in the interval −1.37<<+0.95 with the PCK components of CK and KS being the least developed. It was also found that the PCK components measured through the PCK test did not show the same level of development as the components manifested in classroom practices and this study argues that contextual factors shape classroom practices construction more than pedagogical content knowledge of the teacher. This study recommends the involvement of Physics teachers in regular refresher workshops that are meant to engage teachers in reflection on what they know about the topics they teach, focusing on different PCK components
The impact of the intervention of NGOs and CBOs on Lesotho’s governance
No full textDissertation(M.A. (Governance and Political Transformation))--University of the Free State, 2023Lesotho is a small, mountainous landlocked country, it is land locked by South Africa. It has a population of almost 2.3 million and nominal gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of $1,045.9 in 2022 (World Bank 2023). Like other African countries in its pursuit to strengthen its democracy and reduce poverty, Lesotho became a member and signatory to several sub-regional, regional, and international convention. These organisations include the Southern African Development Communities (SADC), the Southern African Customs Union (SACU), the United Nations (UN), and the African Union (AU). As mechanisms to help in the fight against poverty and global development, many countries introduced Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and Community Based Organisations (CBOs) to their governance (processes/structures?) to fill gaps that the government either cannot or do not wish to fulfill. Loise (2017) notes that NGOs are one of the basic elements of democratic societies. It is incontestable that NGOs and CBOs have come to play a prominent role on the African continent, including Lesotho. They are regarded as one of the mechanisms used in poverty reduction initiatives and programmes. The roots of NGOs and CBOs in Africa are found in the arrival of missionaries on the continent who dispensed charity and engaged in the provision of education and health services (Manji and O’Coill 2007: 568). Matthews and Nqaba (2017: 5) argued that while the history of NGOs could be traced back to the colonial period, it was in the 1980s that they were increasingly recognised as important institutions in the broader development aid sectors in Africa, as well as the rest of the world. Khati (2018: iii) observed that the prevalence of NGOs and CBOs in most developing countries is linked to the availability of foreign aid and a modernisation agenda for developed countries to invest in the development of the Global South countries. Khati (2018) states that, for these reasons, the governments of developing countries have embraced the existence and importance of NGOs in the improvement of the livelihoods of poor people within their regions
Downscaling legacy soil information for hydrological soil mapping using multinomial logistic regression
No full textIn South Africa, there is a growing demand for large scale detailed hydrological soil maps for modelling and management purposes. However, imbalanced legacy soil information often impedes the accurate creation of such maps by not being representative of the environmental complexity of large-scale catchments and containing imbalanced soil class distributions, often resulting in the loss of minority soil classes, which are often of great hydrological importance (e.g., wetland and riparian soils). In this study, we proposed a new downscaling approach to handle spatially localised legacy soil data within a larger low resolution legacy soil dataset to create an accurate hydrological soil map of the macro-scale (5790 km2) Sabie-Sand catchment using multinomial logistic regression (MNLR). The spatially localised legacy data was downscaled using k-means clustering and added to the broader legacy dataset. Five levels of legacy soil data were analysed in their representation of environmental covariates using QQ-plots and a Welsh’s t-test and their mapping accuracy using confusion matrix’s and Kappa coefficient statistics. However, MNLR also requires balanced soil classes. The value of the best performing legacy soil dataset was also compared to using all available soil information after both had their soil class distributions fully balanced using Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique (SMOTE). The 500 ha/observation-SMOTE dataset resulted in the most accurate hydrological soil map with a validation point accuracy of 73% and a Kappa coefficient of 0.60, substantially outperforming the other downscaled soil maps as well as the SMOTE balanced dataset using all available soil information. This was due to the decreased variation between observations and catchment means, where the 500 ha/observation dataset yielded the least variation between soil observation and catchment datasets and well as reducing the class imbalance within the legacy soil data. Downscaling spatially localised legacy soil data for environmental representation is an effective tool to improve digital soil mapping accuracy using MNLR.Publisher's versio
Youth and social entrepreneurship: the case of Phuthaditjhaba, Free State
No full textDissertation (MDS (Development Studies))--University of the Free State, 2023As young people will determine the future of social entrepreneurship, gaining an in-depth understanding of their engagement is essential. The study aimed to explore the youths' awareness and insights of social entrepreneurship to be able to address Phuthaditjhaba's socio-economic difficulties. Through an adopted exploratory case study and purposive sampling, data was collected from 13 research participants, using a qualitative research method and thematic analysis was used to analyse data. The research discovered that the good relationship between young aspiring social entrepreneurs, young social entrepreneurs and relevant stakeholders in social entrepreneurship can unlock the potential of youth social entrepreneurship to address socio-economic challenges to enhance community development in Phuthaditjhaba, Free State. The study recommends that to enhance community development through social entrepreneurship, effective management strategies on organisational and community level should be formulated that inform a good practice to solve socio-economic challenges and maximise impact. The study closes the limited research gap by laying down and documenting youth social entrepreneurship understanding and experiences in addressing socio-economic challenges facing communities, especially in the South African context. Therefore, further study about young social entrepreneurs' relationship-building skills with stakeholders is required
Guidelines for peer physical examination as a teaching tool for health professional students in South Africa
No full textGlobally, students learn clinical skills and surface anatomy in health professions education using each other as models (Rees, Wearn, Vnuk & Sato 2009:104). In the South African context, with its multicultural student population, practising on one another might bring forth challenges for various reasons, such as differences in gender, ethnicity, age, religion and culture. The researcher could not establish any policy or best practice guidelines regulating the use of PPE as an educational tool at any South African university. The researcher addressed the problem by conducting a study to establish the elements students and lecturers regard essential to include in best practice guidelines when PPE is used as the educational tool of choice at South African universities.
The researcher followed a qualitative research design and conducted the study in four phases. During phase one, the researcher conducted a comprehensive literature study to answer the question, ?
In phases two and three, which ran concurrently, the researcher conducted focus groups and semi-structured interviews with students and lecturers, respectively, at the Faculties of Health Sciences of five South African universities. The empirical phase of the study happened amid the global Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in the majority of the interviews being conducted virtually. The researcher transcribed all the interviews verbatim and identified themes, categories, and subcategories. The identified data were compared with the literature on existing guidelines and policies on PPE use at universities in New Zealand and Australia. The results of these two phases answered the last research question, ?
The researcher then compiled preliminary guidelines to use when PPE is the educational tool of choice at South African Faculties of Health Sciences. During the last phase of the study, the researcher asked a panel comprising seven experts to validate the proposed guidelines. With the input of the expert panel, the guidelines were finalised to reach the aim of the study
Towards a conceptual framework for communicating library training to students in South African university libraries: a literature review
No full textDeveloping conceptual frameworks to improve library training among librarians in South African university libraries is not common. The purpose of this article was to assess, synthesise and critique available literature to determine the extent to which librarians in South African university libraries could reflect on their library training and synthesise relevant theories and models that can assist develop a conceptual framework for communicating library training. The integrated literature review focuses on five central themes namely: communication models, the evolution of technology, learning theories, social learning and web based learning environments, and the role of authority in teacher-learner relationships. The article argues that academic librarians operate within the universe of teacher-learner relationships in library training initiatives, albeit unconsciously so. This makes library training in South African university libraries a mature topic needing reconceptualization. Future research should employ single and multiple case study research designs to formulate frameworks on a case-by-case basis.Publisher's versio