Authentic Assessment: Evaluating the Saudi EFL Tertiary Examination System

As early as 1983, Rossi propounded that one of the issues of particular interest and development within the foreign and second language teaching profession is that of proficiency testing or the evaluation of a learner's level of linguistic and communicative competence. This still holds true. On the contrary our pilot study using the Question Paper Evaluating Checklists (included in this paper) indicates that all is not right with the designing of EFL question papers in Saudi Arabia though EFL assessment patterns in the KSA have undergone much change from the time that English was first introduced into the curriculum as a compulsory foreign language. It is the demand of time that evaluation patterns be evaluated on the touchstone of latest research and their relationship with classroom practices be established. This will help the learner-teacher combine to plug the loopholes in language training. In other words, we have to realise as educators that good assessment forms the basis of a wealth of learner information that has direct and indirect ramifications on curriculum and pedagogy. Hence the need to study this aspect of EFL in the light of modern literatures in order come up with constructive recommendations

A critical edition of "Al-Kawkab al-durri al-mustakhraj min kalam al-nabi" by Ahmad b. Macadd b. cIsa b. Wakil al-Tujibi al-Uqlishi

This thesis consists principally of an edition of al-Kawkab al-durri al-mustakhraj min kalam al-Nabi by Ahmad b. Macadd al-Uqlishi, a muhaddith of the 5th century A. H. This is a work in which Prophetic ahadith are collected and arranged in alphabetical order according to the initial letter of the first word, rather than in sections according to the subject matter. In addition to the edition itself, there is a brief introduction, in which an attempt is made to establish the main facts concerning the author, his dates, his education, his works and so on. It would seem that he was one of the first, if not the first, to adopt the alphabetical arrangement of ahadith, an arrangement that later enjoyed a considerable popularity, particularly in the West, as a means of simplifying the verification of the transmission, and of the precise wording, of ahadith, particularly for the non-specialist. A later work with which it is inevitable that al-Kawkab al-durri must be compared is al-Suyuti's al-Jamic al-saghir. If this is done, the former is clearly greatly at a disadvantage; the latter is a far more comprehensive and useful work. However, regard must be had to the chronology; for its early date, al-Kawkab al-durri represents a considerable achievement, and al-Uqlishi was clearly a man of scholarship and erudition. It is to be hoped that this edition will make at least a modest contribution to the study of hadith

An adaptive reliable multicast protocol in ad hoc networks

Multicasting is an essential service for ad-hoc wireless networks. In multicast communication, many reliable multicast schemes were studied in order to overcome packet losses in the network. This paper describes our effort to build a Source Tree Reliable Multicast protocol for ad-hoc networks (STRM). STRM provides the delivery of an ordered contiguous sequence of data packets from one sender to many receivers in an ad-hoc network. It is designed to support applications based on bulk data transfer, like files, images and software packages. The core to its support of node mobility, and also what makes the protocol unique, is the dynamic selection of a sub set of 1-hop neighbors from the sender as its Forward Servers (FSs). The key idea behind selecting this sub set 1-hop neighbors is to forward the retransmit lost data packets that needed by some receivers to achieve higher throughput and to receive the ACK packet from receivers to avoid the ACK-implosion problem inherent in any reliable multicast scheme. Finally, simulation results show that the protocol has high delivery ratio and low end-to-end delay comparing with ReMHoc protocol

Corporate Governance and profitability: Evidence from Indian IT companies

Corporate governance provides the guidelines to the companies how can be directed and controlled. The objective of this study is to examine the relationship between corporate governance mechanisms and profitability for the IT companies listed Indian stock Exchange

Enhancing the Fake News Classification Model Using Find-Tuning Approach

Over the last few years, the rise of fake news on social media has emerged as a significant issue, posing a potential threat to individuals, organizations, and society as a whole. As a solution to this issue, researchers have been using various natural language processing (NLP) techniques to detect fake news. In this study, we introduce a new strategy for fake news detection and classification. Our approach involves enhancing the performance of accuracy through fine-tuning, by merging BEART model with the proposed model DCNN. We have collected the data from secondary sources and combined it into a unified dataset. To improve its quality, we performed various processes such as data cleaning, transformation, integration, and reduction, which involved techniques like stop word removal, tokenization, and stemming, resulting in binary classification. Therefore, DCNN" was trained to classify news articles as real or fake, and the experiments on the dataset show that this approach performs better than several recent studies for detecting fake news, achieving high accurac

Inhibition of growth of Leishmania donovani promastigotes by newly synthesized 1,3,4-thiadiazole analogs

AbstractLeishmania donovani, the causative agent of visceral leishmaniasis, is transmitted by sand flies and replicates intracellularly in their mammalian host cells. The emergence of drug-resistant strains has hampered efforts to control the spread of the disease worldwide. Forty-four 1,3,4-thiadiazole derivatives and related compounds were tested in vitro for possible anti-leishmanial activity against the promastigotes of L. donovani. Micromolar concentrations of these agents were used to study the inhibition of multiplication of L. donovani promastigotes. Seven compounds were identified with potential antigrowth agents of the parasite. Compound 4a was the most active at 50μM followed by compound 3a. These compounds could prove useful as a future alternative for the control of visceral leishmaniasis

Prevalence of Energy Drinks Consumption among Adolescents and Young Adults in Makkah, KSA

Energy drinks are a carbonated beverage containing high amount of caffeine and sugar as well as added vitamins and other substances. Objective: to estimate the prevalence of energy drink consumption among adolescents and young adults in Makkah, KSA. Methods: cross sectional study was conducted during the academic year 1437 H. The study included 1190 participants. A convenience sample of 1190 participants (521 female – 669 male) were recruited of the study. They were categorized into two groups based on their age; group 1: 575adolescents (12-19 year) and group 2: 615young adults, aged (˃19-25 year). Self-administered questionnaire was used to assess the prevalence of energy drink consumption. Questionnaire included five items: a) Demographic characteristics; b) Anthropometric measurements; c) Food Habits; d)Knowledge and believes; and E) Medical history. All analyses were conducted using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) program, Version 20.0.Differences between males and females in respect of frequency of energy drinks intake were assessed by conducting a Chi-Square test. P- Value of less than 0.05 was considered to indicate statistical significance. Results: nearly half of the participants (46.73%) were consume energy drink. About (33.33%) from young adults male were consumed energy drinks while driving. Among young adult male who consumed energy drink, about 27.2% were drank more than 2 cans per day. 43.88% of young adult male were drank energy drink in the exam period. The most favorite energy drink was Code Red. Conclusion: energy drinks consumption is common practice among adolescents and young adults in Makkah, Saudi Arabia. We recommend further studies to evaluate the side effects of energy drinks consumption and factors that increase the consumption between adolescents and young adults. Also we recommend that handling of energy drinks to be under the supervision of the Ministry of Health. Keywords: Energy drinks, Adolescents, Young adult

The impact of board diversity on financial reporting quality in the GCC listed firms: the role of family and royal directors

The present study examines the impact of board diversity on financial reporting quality with special consideration of the extent to which family and royal directors influence financial reporting quality (FRQ). The study utilises a sample of 181 listed GCC firms over the period from 2010 to 2016. Board personal attributes, including board expertise, age, gender, and nationality are investigated along with some other board issues such as; board size, meetings, and independence. Panel data analysis with fixed and random effect models are conducted to estimate the results. The results reveal that companies with large board size and greater age have less FRQ. Further, the results report that institutional founders, higher board independence, and expertise associate with greater levels of FRQ. The results also find that board meetings and family founders negatively influence FRQ. However, female directors, foreign directors, and royal board members setting in the board did not contribute to the levels of FRQ in the sampled companies. Finally, the results indicate that companies with a CEO royal member have higher levels of FRQ however, companies with chair board royals have less levels of FRQ. This research has valuable implications for investors, board of directors, analysts, academicians, and policymakers