Graph Based Semi-supervised Learning with Convolution Neural Networks to Classify Crisis Related Tweets

During time-critical situations such as natural disasters, rapid classification of data posted on social networks by affected people is useful for humanitarian organizations to gain situational awareness and to plan response efforts. However, the scarcity of labeled data in the early hours of a crisis hinders machine learning tasks thus delays crisis response. In this work, we propose to use an inductive semi-supervised technique to utilize unlabeled data, which is often abundant at the onset of a crisis event, along with fewer labeled data. Specif- ically, we adopt a graph-based deep learning framework to learn an inductive semi-supervised model. We use two real-world crisis datasets from Twitter to evaluate the proposed approach. Our results show significant improvements using unlabeled data as compared to only using labeled data.Comment: 5 pages. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1805.0515

The digital divide and social inclusion among refugee migrants: a case in regional Australia

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors which influence refugee migrants’ adoption of digital technology and its relevance to their social inclusion in Australia. This research developed a conceptual framework keeping the 'use' of digital technology as the centre-piece of the digital divide. The empirical data were derived from a series of focus group discussions with refugee migrants in an Australian regional city, Toowoomba in Queensland. There is a digital divide among refugee migrant groups and it is based on inequalities in physical access to and use of digital technology, the skills necessary to use the different technologies effectively and the ability to pay for the services. The opportunities to use digital technology could support the social inclusion of refugee migrant groups in the broader Australian community. Further research is required to examine whether this digital divide is unique in the regional context or common to Australian society and to confirm factors that might contribute significantly to refugee migrants’ social inclusion. This paper determined the role digital technology can play in building social capital and hence social inclusion among refugee migrant groups. Many of the factors identified as influencing refugee migrants’ use of digital technology can inform the Australian government and the information and communication technology industry in devising supportive policies and plans to reduce the risk of social exclusion, alienation and marginalisation among refugee migrant groups

Synthesis and antimicrobial activity of some 2- Piperidinomethylamino-4-(7-H/substituted coumarin-3-yl)- 6-chlorosubstitutedphenyl pyrimidines

Purpose: To prepare and evaluate some 2-piperidinomethylamino-4-(7-H/substitutedcoumarin-3-yl)-6- chlorosubstitutedphenyl pyrimidines as antimicrobial agents.Methods: Some 2-piperidinomethylamino-4-(7-H/substitutedcoumarin-3-yl)-6-chlorosubstitutedphenyl pyrimidines were prepared by reacting 2-amino-4-(7-H/substitutedcoumarin-3-yl)-6- (chlorosubstitutedphenyl) pyrimidines with piperidine and formaldehyde. The chemical structures of the synthesized compounds were elucidated by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), 1H-nuclear magnetic resonance (1H-NMR), mass spectrometry and elemental analysis. These compounds were investigated for their antimicrobial activity against ten bacteria and five fungi by serial plate dilution method using standard drugs, namely, ofloxacin and ketoconazole, respectively, and their minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) were also determined.Results: A total of eighteen new compounds (1a-18a) were synthesized. Compound 6a (MIC = 50 μg/mL; p < 0.05 or less) displayed the highest activity against S. aureus, E. faecalis, S. epidermidis, B. subtilis, and B. cereus. Compound 6a further showed good activity (MIC = 25 μg/mL; p < 0.05 or less) against E. coli; P. aeruginosa K. pneumonia, B. bronchiseptica, and P. vulgaris. Compounds 6a (MIC = 25 μg/mL; p < 0.0001) and 17a (MIC = 25 μg/mL; p < 0.0001) displayed very good activity against C. albicans, A. niger, A. flavus, M. purpureous, and P. citrinum, respectively. Analysis of structure-activity relationship revealed that the presence of bromo group at 7-postion of the coumarin moiety along with the 4-chlorophenyl group at position-6 of the pyrimidine ring is critical for antimicrobial activity against Gram-positive bacteria, Gram negative bacteria and fungi.Conclusion: The synthesized 2-piperidino derivatives are better antifungal and antibacterial agents than the earlier reported 2-morpholino derivatives, but require further investigations against other microbial strains to ascertain their broad spectrum antimicrobial activity.Keywords: Pyrimidine, Coumarin, Piperidine, Antibacterial, Antifungal, Structure activity relationshi

CrisisMMD: Multimodal Twitter Datasets from Natural Disasters

During natural and man-made disasters, people use social media platforms such as Twitter to post textual and multime- dia content to report updates about injured or dead people, infrastructure damage, and missing or found people among other information types. Studies have revealed that this on- line information, if processed timely and effectively, is ex- tremely useful for humanitarian organizations to gain situational awareness and plan relief operations. In addition to the analysis of textual content, recent studies have shown that imagery content on social media can boost disaster response significantly. Despite extensive research that mainly focuses on textual content to extract useful information, limited work has focused on the use of imagery content or the combination of both content types. One of the reasons is the lack of labeled imagery data in this domain. Therefore, in this paper, we aim to tackle this limitation by releasing a large multi-modal dataset collected from Twitter during different natural disasters. We provide three types of annotations, which are useful to address a number of crisis response and management tasks for different humanitarian organizations.Comment: 9 page

Amelioration Of Educational Conditions Through School Management Committees

Community participation in planning and managing for increased educational opportunity is necessary. To ensure the involvement of local community, the government of Pakistan experimentally launched a scheme in 1994 by establishing School Management Committees (S.M.Cs).  The major purpose of the present study was to observe the functions and performance of  S.M.Cs in Promoting Education in Pakistan.              The government schools of Punjab Province were considered to be the target population. The study sample consisted of SMCs. of eight government higher secondary schools, 34 government high schools and 34 government elementary schools the Punjab. A survey-type study questionnaire was used to gather the data which were collected and interpreted by using simple statistical techniques of percentage, mean, standard deviation, and t-test.  Tentative conclusions are drawn with regard to observations of head teachers and memebrs of SMCs