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A needs analysis for entrepreneurship education in selected high schools in Libreville, Gabon
No full textThesis (MTech (Business Administration in Entrepreneurship))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2015.This study aimed to identify the need for entrepreneurship education in developing countries, more specifically in Libreville, Gabon.
This research followed a mixed method. Quantitative data were collected by means of closed-ended questionnaires. Qualitative data were collected using individual face-to-face interviews.
A sample of 150 pupils/students, six teachers and three principals from three selected institutions in Libreville was selected. Furthermore, a member of the Ministry of Education of Gabon was interviewed.
The findings indicate that though there is an understanding of entrepreneurship education in Libreville, teaching of the actual subject entrepreneurship is required. The majority of participants agreed that entrepreneurship education should be included in the school curriculum, and that there was need for teachers training.
The lack of entrepreneurship education in schools in Libreville, Gabon, is mainly because an entrepreneurial mindset does not seem to exist. This research is important in the sense that it creates an awareness of entrepreneurship education and business creation in Libreville, which should serve as a major boost to the economy of Gabon
The impact of contemporary exhibitions in historical buildings: Retaining significance and authenticity during adaptation
No full textThesis (MTech (Design))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2016.Historical interiors hold within them significance which provides us with cultural identity,
as well as historical and aesthetic value, and their physical materials offer us a
connection to the past. These interiors and their functions often become obsolete and
need to acquire a new function that is more suited to our modern-day society. One
such change in function which was identified to be steadily on the rise in Cape Town is
the reappropriation of historical interiors into contemporary exhibition venues. It was
noted that during this process many of these historical interiors end up as neutral
contemporary white boxes, where the whole historical interior is replaced or
concealed by a pristine white interior and this leads to a loss of its internal historical
aesthetic value.
To counter this and to retain the significant aesthetics of these interiors for ourselves and
our future generations, heritage legislation offers a certain amount of protection
through their respective guidelines and principles during adaptation. However, these
guidelines do not offer concrete methods on the responsive adaptation of historical
interiors into contemporary exhibition spaces. To address this problem and provide a
substitute for the white box, alternative methods for the responsive adaptation of the
historical interior into a contemporary exhibition space are highlighted and
investigated. Through this investigation, this study aims to provide responsive approaches which
interior designers may adopt during adaptation that respect, acknowledge and
highlight the significance of the reappropriated space in the design of contemporary
exhibition venues
Development of the user input system for the control room upgrade of Southern African Large Telescope (SALT)
No full textThesis (MTech (Design))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2015.Whether one is fascinated by the night sky as a child, or as a professional astronomer looking back to the beginning of time solving life’s big questions; at some point in our lives we have curiously looked up at the heavens above. The desire to explore the universe has lead us to constructing larger and more advanced telescopes, with the sole focus of observing deeper into the cosmos in an attempt to unravel its secrets. Like with most other technological advances, it has created advanced and technically complex control rooms. Based on a design ethnographic study this thesis will focus on the exploration of the effects of complex interfaces of a control room environment and its users, where one of the leading twenty first century telescopes of its kind, Southern Africa Largest Telescope (SALT), is studied.
While the STS framework and policy debates concerning the rapid development and integration of complex human and non-human systems into larger systems become common practice. The design ethnographic study revealed that the operation of the SALT telescope and the research being conducted by the astronomers is clearly hindered by poor control room design. The study identified relationships between the framework and the empirical findings, which was used to frame a design pilot study to determine if further design intervention would have a positive impact on the interaction of a control room system. This project will consist of: a literature review, an ethnographic study and the analysis of the findings, design framing of a pilot study, a design pilot study, and an evaluation of the study. The results from the design pilot study clearly show that the application of a design intervention to a control room environment could potentially impact the space positively and reduced frustration, improve comfort, increased efficiency in the users work practices, and ultimately amplified productivity. Providing an appropriate starting point for the exploration of possible solutions for identified challenges experienced in complex control room environments, more importantly it contributed to narrowing the socio-technical gap, between the mechanical and research departments of a leading international optical telescope, SALT
Employee empowerment of frontline administrative staff at a University Of Technology, Western Cape Province, South Africa
No full textThesis (MTech (Business Administration))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2015.When one refers to tertiary education in general or specific institutions, its academic functions and features are paramount. Often, there is little dialogue around those who constitute most of the workforce, the administrative staff, and more specifically, the frontline administrators. Given that frontline administrators are ‘customer-facing’ and that their behaviour could significantly influence perceptions of the organisation, these staff members are often portrayed as ones who do not have any authority at work but merely serve a support role. Ensuring that these staff members are ‘taken care of’ is an operational way of guaranteeing that the customers (staff and stakeholders) have a pleasant experience that could positively affect the bottom line.
The working lives, feelings of efficiency, job satisfaction and overall empowerment of frontline administrative staff, especially in tertiary education, have not been well documented in scholarly literature. This research project attempts to identify areas where universities of technology could take cognisance of the power that frontline administrative staff hold and also to ascertain how to improve their overall work experience
Influence of socio-economic status on people’s perception of the health condition of the Elsieskraal River, Cape Town, South Africa
No full textThesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree
Master of Technology in Environmental Management
In the Faculty of Applied Sciences
Department of Environmental and Occupational Studies
At the
Cape Peninsula University of TechnologyRivers, lakes and streams are the only way people encounter water sources in urban
areas. Human endeavours have consequently deteriorated the environmental quality
provided by river systems thus rivers are supporting a fraction of their original
biodiversity and abundance. Urban streams are highly valuable and sensitive
systems which, can be assessed by means of impacts of urban catchment and
pathway influences. Many of the problems associated with environmental quality and
management of urban watercourses are as a result of poor public perception.
Advances in river assessment and management has come about through the
recognition that water resource problems involve biological, physical and chemical
components and more recently the addition of social and economic aspects. Social
public participation is therefore achieved by studying and acting on people’s values,
behaviours and perceptions of environmental quality.
The main aim of this research was to identify whether a difference in socio-economic
status is an influential factor in people’s perception of environmental quality. The
objectives of the research were to determine whether the Elsieskraal River has a
perceived low environmental relevance and quality (health and aesthetics), to
determine what sensitizes people about issues relating to the natural environment
and to identify people’s uses and perceptions of the Elsieskraal River corridor and its
importance to the enjoyment as a recreational space. The study used a qualitative
approach to obtain the data using the focus group technique. The purposive sample
of participants from Pinelands and Thornton were the population that this study
sought to investigate. Two focus group discussions; one in each study area was
conducted. The results of this study found both similarities and differences in
people’s perceptions of the Elsieskraal River between the two different socioeconomic
urban communities. The perceived observation that the Elsieskraal River
was a canal and not a river set the foundation for the envisaged low environmental
quality the river so acquired. The majority overall environmental quality scores for
the attributes of aquatic life, vegetation and water quality were found to be lower than
they were scientifically found to be. Two clear avenues concerning environmental
information sourcing and sensitization to the public was found. Politicians and government officials were unreliable to relay environmental information of a
trustworthy nature. Community newspapers were a useful tool to present theevidence of information concerning the status of the natural environment especially at
a local level. Three themes namely safety, maintenance and facilities and community
attachment emerged on the importance of the Elsieskraal River as a recreational
space. It is recommended that further studies should examine the perceptions of
other similar rivers in the urban environment, both natural and canalised within Cape
Town and the greater South Africa. The findings can assist environmental managers,
planners and educators identify the gaps between the scientific environmental
conditions and what people’s perceived awareness and knowledge about
environmental quality are (factual versus perceived). It is also recommended that
emphasis and support from local authorities must be given to non-governmental
organisations (NGO’s) and adjacent property owners to aid in mobilising people into
“ownership of rivers” within their communities to enhance their value and utilisation
The influence of job satisfaction and organisational commitment on turnover intention
No full textDissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Technology: Business Administration in the Faculty of Business and Management Sciences at the Cape Peninsula University of TechnologyThe study identified elements of job satisfaction and organisational commitment and examines their influence on employees’ turnover intentions: to understand elements influencing turnover and the extent to which they correlate with job satisfaction and organisational commitment. This examination was done quantitatively using an online survey method to administer 247 likert scale questionnaires to randomly selected respondents. An impressive 107 responses representing 42.97% were received and analysed.
The findings showed that positive relationship exists between job satisfaction and organisational commitment as well as the negative influence they have on turnover intention. The positive relationship suggests that increased level of job satisfaction (employee and supervisor relationship) and organisational commitment (affective commitment) leads to the reduction in turnover intention and vice versa.
The study concludes that job satisfaction and organisational commitment indeed have an influence on employee turnover intention. While all elements have potential influence, the influence between (supervisor and affective commitment) is found to be stronger than other elements. It is understood that the two elements (supervisor and affective commitment) have higher propensity to influence employee turnover intention as found
Leveraging big data for competitive advantage in a media organisation
No full textThesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Technology: Information Technology In the Faculty of Informatics and Design at the Cape Peninsula University of TechnologyData sources often emerge with the potential to transform, drive and allow deriving never-envisaged business value. These data sources change the way business enacts and models value generation. As a result, sellers are compelled to capture value by collecting data about business elements that drive change. Some of these elements, such as the customer and products, generate data as part of transactions which necessitates placement of the business element at the centre of the organisation’s data curation journey. This is in order to reveal changes and how these elements affect the business model. Data in business represents information translated into a format convenient for transfer. Data holds the relevant markers needed to measure business elements and provide the relevant metrics to monitor, steer and forecast business to attain enterprise goals. Data forms the building blocks of information within an organisation, allowing for knowledge and facts to be obtained. At its lowest level of abstraction, it provides a platform from which insights and knowledge can be derived as a direct extract for business decision-making as these decisions steer business into profitable situations. Because of this, organisations have had to adapt or change their business models to derive business value for sustainability, profitability and transformation. An organisation’s business model reflects a conceptual representation on how the organisation obtains and delivers value to prospective customers (the service beneficiary). In the process of delivering value to the service beneficiaries, data is generated. Generated data leads to business knowledge which can be leveraged to re-engineer the business model. The business model dictates which information and technology assets are needed for a balanced, profitable and optimised operation. The information assets represent value holding documented facts. Information assets go hand in hand with technology assets. The technology assets within an organisation are the technologies (computers, communications and databases) that support the automation of well-defined tasks as the organisation seeks to remain relevant to its clientele. What has become apparent is the fact that companies find it difficult to leverage the opportunities that data, and for that matter Big Data (BD), offers them. A data curation journey enables a seller to strategise and collect insightful data to influence how business may be conducted in a sustainable and profitable way while positioning the curating firm in a state of ‘information advantage’. While much of the discussion surrounding the concept of BD has focused on programming models (such as Hadoop) and technology innovations usually referred to as disruptive technologies (such as The Internet of Things and Automation of Knowledge Work), the real driver of technology and business is BD economics, which is the combination of open source data management and advanced analytics software coupled with commodity-based, scale-out architectures which are comparatively cheaper than prevalent sustainable technologies known to industry. Hadoop, though hugely misconstrued, is not an integration platform; it is a model the helps determine data value while it brings on-board an optimised way of curating data cheaply as part of the integration architecture. The objectives of the study were to explore how BD can be used to utilise the opportunities it offers the organisation, such as leveraging insights to enable business for transformation. This is accomplished by assessing the level of BD integration with the business model using the BD Business Model Maturation Index. Guidelines with subsequent recommendations are proposed for curation procedures aimed at improving the curation process. A qualitative research methodology was adopted. The research design outlines the research as a single case study; it outlines the philosophy as interpretivist, the approach as data collection through interviews, and the strategy as a review of the method of analysis deployed in the study. Themes that emerged from categorised data indicate the diverging of business elements into primary business elements and secondary supporting business elements. Furthermore, results show that data curation still hinges firmly on traditional data curation processes which diminish the benefits associated with BD curation. Results suggest a guided data curation process optimised by persistence hybridisation as an enabler to gain information advantage. The research also evaluated the level of integration of BD into the case business model to extrapolate results leading to guidelines and recommendations for BD curation
Effect of synthesis duration and HCl acid concentration on the formation of hydrothermally synthesised TiO2 nanoparticles
No full textThesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Technology: Chemical Engineering in the Faculty Of Engineering at the Cape Peninsula University of TechnologyIt is known when synthesising nanomaterial on laboratory scale, a variation in a single synthesis parameter may alter the product. Numerous synthesis techniques have been employed in the synthesis of titanium dioxide with varying phase, size and shape. It was found that changes in the phase directly affect their properties and application, such as treating of textile wastewater by photodegradation. However, when synthesising nanoparticles, changes to any reaction parameters and/or kinetics can have a desirable or undesirable effect on titanium dioxide nanoparticles. There is therefore a need to understand how HCl acid concentration (homogeneous catalyst) and shortened gel formation duration affect synthesis of TiO2 nanoparticles and photocatalytic properties.
A sol-gel followed by hydrothermal treatment was employed to synthesise 2.8 grams of titanium dioxide nanorods for the duration of 96 hours, initially. A systematic study was conducted to exploit reaction kinetics by varying HCl acid concentration (3, 4, 5 molar), water feed for TiO2 gel formation (72, 24, 12 hours), and hydrothermal treatment time for the transformation of gel to crystalline TiO2 (1–20 hours). The photocatalytic activity of synthesised TiO2 nanoparticle was evaluated, when irradiated with a UV-C bulb to degrade an industrial textile dye, methylene blue. Systematic studies were successful in identifying the effects HCl acid concentration, gel formation time and lengthened hydrothermal treatment time have on TiO2 nanoparticles’ phase, size and shape. Increased HCl concentrations for shortened gel formation times resulted in mixed phases of TiO2, decreases in particle size and particle shape deformed from nanorods. Increased photocatalytic activity was found for a decrease in the rutile and increase in the brookite phase percentage, but this plateaued after 42% brookite phase. Furthermore, lengthened hydrothermal treatment assisted in phase transformation of particles synthesised at shortened gel formation times for high HCl acid concentrations. Pure rutile TiO2 was synthesised at a sixth of the initial synthesis time. Furthermore, the effects of changes in nanoparticles on the photocatalytic activity was discussed. Moreover, exploiting reaction kinetics resulted in the synthesis of a more efficient photocatalytically active TiO2 nanoparticle sample at shortened synthesis time
Biodegradation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon contaminants in a mixed culture bioreactor
No full textThesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor Technologiae: Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology - Cape Town, South AfricaPolycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are one of the most common and recalcitrant environmental contaminants – known for their potential toxicity, mutagenicity, and carcinogenicity to humans. Biosurfactant application can enhance the biodegradation of PAHs. The main object of this work was to explore the novelty of biosurfactant produced by the isolated strains of Bacillus sp and Pseudomonas aeruginosa grown exclusively on Beta vulgaris, and the modification of the zeolites nanoparticles by the biosurfactant, for enhanced biodegradation of PAHs in soil. Novel biosurfactant-producing strains were isolated from hydrocarbon-contaminated environments, while several agrowaste were screened as primary carbon sources for the expression of biosurfactants, which were quantified using various standardized methods.....
Investigating the composting methods for enhancement of the fertilizing value of desiccated human faeces produced by the mobisan facility for agricultural application
No full textThesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Technology: Civil Engineering in the Faculty of Engineering at the Cape Penisula University of TechnologyAgriculture in rural communities of South Africa is negatively affected by the poor quality of soils with low fertility. With limited financial resources, non-commercial farmers are not able to purchase chemical fertilizers or other products necessary for plant production. Alternatives such as composting of human excreta and animal manure have found favour in many regions of the world for improving soil fertility for sustainable crop production.
Human faeces contain nutrients and have potential to be used as fertilizer in agriculture. Faeces should not be regarded as waste, but rather as a product that can be used for the provision of an affordable agricultural fertilizer. The MobiSan facility is a urine diversion toilet installed at Pooke se bos informal settlement, where the disposal of waste is difficult for number of reasons such as lack of space, inadequate infrastructure and no access roads. However, the lack of safe disposal of desiccated human faeces from MobiSan facility has created a detrimental effect within the settlement that lead to unwanted conditions. The alternative means of reducing the pollution loads within the settlement areas is to look at localized on-site treatment of composting methods that can treat desiccated human faeces from MobiSan facility to meet standards for agricultural applications. Faeces can be treated and stored under controlled process called composting to enhance the nutrients value for plant production. Without composting, human faeces usually have a low initial fertilizing value. Analysis of the studies done in Uganda showed an enhancement of the composted faeces-to-food waste from 78-litre reactors attained 19% N, 34% P and 28% K; and also E. coli and total coliforms were found lower than the detected value with high temperatures exceeding 50°C and pH (4.5-8.7). Given the initial low fertilizing value of human faeces, further treatment method is required to make it suitable for agricultural use. Several methods are used to enhance the fertilizing of human excreta, amongst these is the composting. In this line, three composting methods, namely Co-composting, Skyloo-composting and Bio-process composting were piloted with great importance in the settlement for reasons such as: Low O&M costs, Use of locally available materials, and no energy needed to treat human faeces…The application of the three composting methods could provide the community within the settlement with work opportunities and also improving soil fertility using locally-available fertilizers. The initial characteristics of desiccated human faeces from the MobiSan facility were determined by sampling and testing quality parameters namely pH, Oxygen, temperature, moisture content, Carbon, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, Faecal coliform and E. coli. The initial results of desiccated human faeces from the MobiSan facility showed a low fertilizing value when compared to previous literature, with values of Nitrogen, Phosphorous and Potassium being respectively 4.7%, 3.4% and 1.5%, while those of E-Coli and Faecal coliform being 5.9x103cfu/g and 7.8x103cfu/g respectively. Results on the composted faeces using the Co-composting method were as follows: Nitrogen: 22.2%, Phosphorus: 25.4%, Potassium: 31.1%. Skyloo composting method results were found with Nitrogen: 16.2%, Phosphorus: 19.6%, Potassium: 15.2% and results obtained from Bio-process composting method were: Nitrogen: 25.3%, Phosphorus: 28.6%, Potassium: 33.2%.
Results of the study showed that the three composting methods were suitable for treating human faeces from the MobiSan facility. Results indicate that the enhanced fertilizing value and reduction of pathogens in composting process could make the compost safe for agricultural application. Bio-process composting was found to be the most suitable method as it enhanced the fertilizing value of desiccated faeces to 83% N; 88% P and 95% K. The composting process also significantly reduced the concentration of E.coli and Faecal coliforms. Results of this study intended to address the issue for the disposal of desiccated human faeces from MobiSan by assessing the potential of composting in enhancing the fertilizing value of human faeces for agricultural application. Results provided also an understanding of the fertilizing value of human faeces and assisted subsistence farmers (small scale) with valuable knowledge of the fertilizing value of desiccated human faeces from Mobisan and the potential of composting in enhancing it for safe use in agriculture