An exploration of the impact of an online MBA course on intercultural sensitivity development

While research on online MBA courses is growing rapidly, teaching specific skills using online delivery formats is a relatively new stream of research in graduate business education. In this study, adult learning methods such as experiential activities, discussion, teamwork, and action learning were used in a seven-week online MBA course to explore in what ways intercultural sensitivity could be developed. A two-trial, pretest-posttest research mixed methods design was implemented in the summers of 2004 and 2005 at a Midwestern Jesuit university. Quantitative and qualitative data were gathered and analyzed from thirty-eight participants (N=38). First, quantitative analysis of pretest-posttest scores from the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) (Hammer & Bennett, 1998, 2002, 2004), and demographic variables, revealed that sixty-eight percent (68%) of participants developed greater intercultural sensitivity while age, gender, and degrees of course engagement were predictors of IDI score change. Second, qualitative analysis of survey data found that the quality of virtual teamwork impacted perceived learning outcomes and most participants found the online MBA course to be a useful and complementary addition to traditional MBA face-to-face courses. Finally, six case studies were developed to explore IDI stage shift and construct explanatory schemas. Conclusions suggest that coping strategies, cooperative/collaborative efforts, flexible cognitive orientations, course engagement, introspective reflection, and cultural curiosity were factors that impacted intercultural sensitivity development. The results of the study confirm that intercultural sensitivity can be learned and measured using an online delivery format and the IDI. Recommendations to further develop this online MBA course include: 1) expand length of course, 2) incorporate role of intercultural coach, 3) include synchronous components, 4) provide clearer course expectations, 5) structure purposeful teams, and 6) enrich course content. Four directions for future research that emerged from the study include testing course effectiveness using larger graduate student samples, examining the effects of different team composition on intercultural sensitivity development, comparing a blended learning environment with purely online delivery, and conducting longitudinal studies to measure behavioral change

Human Activity Modelling in the Specification of Operational Requirements: Work in Progress

This paper describes our experience of integrating HCI concepts and techniques into a concurrent requirements engineering process called RESCUE. We focus on the use of a model of current human activity to inform specification of a future system. We show how human activity descriptions, written using a specially designed template, can facilitate the authoring of use case descriptions to be used in the elicitation of requirements for complex socio-technical systems. We describe our experience of using descriptions of human activity, written using the template, to support specification of operational requirements for DMAN, a system to support air traffic controllers in managing the departure of aircraft from airports. We end with a discussion of lessons learnt from our experience and present some ideas for future development of work in this area

Strategic Eurasian Natural Gas Model for Energy Security

The mathematical formulation of a large-scale equilibrium natural gas simulation model is presented. Although large-scale natural gas models have been developed and used for energy security and policy analysis quite extensively (e.g., Holz (2007), Egging et al. (2008), Holz et al. (2009) and Lise et al. (2008)), this model differs from earlier ones in its detailed representation of the structure and operations of the Former Soviet Union (FSU) gas sector. In particular, the model represents: (i) market power of transit countries, (ii) transmission pipelines in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Central Asia, (iii) differentiation among gas production regions in Russia, and (iv) gas trade relations between FSU countries (e.g., Gazprom’s re-exporting of Central Asian gas). To demonstrate the model, a social benefit-cost analysis of the Nord Stream gas pipeline project from Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea is provided. It is found that Nord Stream project is profitable for its investors and the project also improves social welfare in all market power scenarios. Also, if transit countries (Ukraine and Belarus) exert substantial market power then the economic value of Nord Stream to its investors and to society improves substantially. We also found that the value of Nord Stream investment is rather sensitive to the degree of downstream competition in European markets and that lack of downstream competition might result in the negative value of the Nord Stream system to Gazprom

Investigating Malay language writing proficiency level among upper secondary school students

This paper aims to present the findings of a research on writing proficiency in Malay language of upper secondary schools students in Malaysia. The research is designed to compare writing patterns of urban and rural students from four different zones. The focus of analysis is divided into three aspects, namely, language used, discourse and idea conceptualization. In language used, the focus is on sentence structure, dialect usage and punctuation while discourse looks at interesting phrases. The ideas in the writings are evaluated holistically by looking at the clarity, maturity and relevance of ideas presented. The respondents of this research are selected from five different zones; Kedah (northern zone), Kelantan (eastern zone), Negeri Sembilan (central zone), Sabah and Sarawak (East Malaysia). The total number of respondents is 1524 students. Generally, the findings of the research show that the writing proficiency of the students is at satisfactory level. However, there are differences in the students’ writing performance within the zones