Submission to the Commons Select Committee on Education

Computing is a rigorous, intellectually rich discipline alongside Maths, Science, or History. Like those subjects, Computing explores foundational principles and ideas, rather than training students in skills that date quickly. In an increasingly digital, knowledge-based age, Computing is fundamental both to full citizenship, and to our economic health as a nation. Yet, incredibly, Computing is virtually absent from UK schools. Instead, secondary schools in England currently teach ICT. The original concept behind ICT was to teach students how to use software to solve real-world problems. That would have been a tremendous achievement had it succeeded. However, what has actually happened in far too many schools is that ICT focuses solely upon IT literacy, and supporting teaching and learning in other curriculum contexts. ICT is not the discipline of understanding and knowledge of computers and the way they work.The creation of the EBac provides the perfect opportunity to send a clear signal to schools and pupils of the importance of Computing. Our key recommendation is that Computing (unlike ICT) should “count” towards the English Baccalaureate.On behalf of Computing at School:Dr. John WoollardProf. Simon Peyton-JonesDr. Bill Mitchel

Students’ Perceptions of Female Faculty Members based on Vocal Characteristics

This study examines the relationship between the acoustic properties of female faculty members’ voices and the perception of the female faculty members age and personality characteristics by undergraduate students. A standardized acoustic analysis using the Multidimensional Voice Program (MDVP) and the RealPitch program was performed to determine the participating faculty members’ fundamental frequency (habitual and conversation), vocal jitter, and vocal shimmer. Faculty members were then recorded reading a brief preselected passage. Student participants listened to the recorded audio samples and completed a survey regarding the faculty members’ ages and personality characteristics. A Pearson product-moment correlation (Pearson r) analysis completed in SPSStatistics v. 22.0 found statistically significant correlations between the fundamental frequency of faculty members’ voices and students’ evaluations of the faculty members’ age, authoritativeness, approachability, attractiveness, competency, and fluency

Accessible choral ensembles for visually impaired singers

Choral activities are generally led by a conductor who uses visual cues and non-verbal instructions to drive the performance. Song dynamics are generally well rehearsed however live performances may necessitate unrehearsed messages in order to correct errors or to introduce dynamics in response to external factors. These messages are communicated by the choir master just-in-time, to which however, visually impaired choristers have no access. This paper outlines an investigation into how technology can contribute to this end while presenting a solution which adopts optoelectronic devices for gesture recognition, real-time communication protocols and over-the-air haptic-feedback to enable participation while minimising adoption barriers via intuitive and low-friction interaction. Insights from both qualitative and quantitative techniques will be presented along with techniques used to understand, assess and evaluate the domain in an iterative series of interventions.peer-reviewe

Butterfleye : supporting the development of accessible web applications for users with severe motor-impairment

Various accessibility standards and guidelines exist, targeting different disabilities. Nonetheless persons suffering from Severe Motor Disabilities (SMD) are generally excluded from development efforts, mainly because of a lack in accessibility regulations, standards and developer support. This work presents Butterfleye, a novel developer-centric tool that facilitates the development of accessible gaze-driven web applications for SMD users. Butterfleye relies and builds upon a widely-adopted open-source front-end framework to incentivise frictionless developer adoption. Low cost eye-tracking devices are also examined to lower barriers for end-user adoption. We present an open-source library developed iteratively over a series of user-centric studies and report initial evidence of, and observations on, its effectiveness with SMD users.peer-reviewe

Designing acceptable user registration processes for e-services

User registration can have a serious impact on the success of online government services. Different services require different levels of identity assurance, and different registration processes are put in place to deliver them. But from the citizen’s perspective, these processes often require a disproportionate amount of effort, which reduces users’ acceptance. Typically, when sign-up to high-effort services is not mandatory, take-up is low; when it is compulsory, it causes resentment, and neither is desirable. Designers of services requiring registration currently have no way of assessing likely user acceptance at design time. We are introducing a tool that allows system designers to identify the impact of registration processes on different groups of users, in terms of workload and friction. Personas have been successfully applied to assist security designers, and we extend the concept with statistical properties, and introduce the Persona Group Calibration (PGC) exercise to calibrate the different personas for sensitivity to specific identity-related elements.peer-reviewe

How functional programming mattered

In 1989 when functional programming was still considered a niche topic, Hughes wrote a visionary paper arguing convincingly ‘why functional programming matters’. More than two decades have passed. Has functional programming really mattered? Our answer is a resounding ‘Yes!’. Functional programming is now at the forefront of a new generation of programming technologies, and enjoying increasing popularity and influence. In this paper, we review the impact of functional programming, focusing on how it has changed the way we may construct programs, the way we may verify programs, and fundamentally the way we may think about programs

Effect of Anti-Tuberculous Therapy on Uveitis Associated with Latent Tuberculosis

PURPOSE: To describe the clinical features of patients with uveitis associated with latent tuberculosis (TB) and examine the effect of anti-TB treatment (ATT) on uveitis outcome. DESIGN: Retrospective cohort study METHODS: 199 eyes of 129 patients diagnosed with uveitis associated with latent TB were evaluated for recurrence of disease following treatment. Eighty nine of the patients (69%) received ATT and information was gathered retrospectively regarding clinical outcome, vision and treatment. Outcome measures included: best corrected visual acuity (BCVA) and rate of disease recurrence. RESULTS: This study included eighty-nine patients (69%) received ATT and 40 patients who did not. The uveitis was treated with local and systemic anti-inflammatory and immunosuppressive therapy in all patients. The mean change in BCVA following treatment was 4.5±1.4 letters over the follow-up period, with no difference between eyes of patients receiving ATT and those who did not. Sixty-eight eyes (34.9%) had a recurrence of uveitis (0.64±0.08 recurrences per-year), with eyes of patients receiving ATT less likely to develop a recurrence compared to those not receiving ATT (29.5% vs. 48.2%, OR 0.47, 95% CI 0.29-0.77, p=0.003). Eyes treated with ATT recurred at an estimated median of 120 months compared with 51 months in eyes with no treatment (p=0.005). CONCLUSIONS: Treatment with ATT halved the risk of uveitis recurrence and delayed the onset of the first recurrence in eyes with uveitis associated with latent TB