Introductory programming: a systematic literature review

As computing becomes a mainstream discipline embedded in the school curriculum and acts as an enabler for an increasing range of academic disciplines in higher education, the literature on introductory programming is growing. Although there have been several reviews that focus on specific aspects of introductory programming, there has been no broad overview of the literature exploring recent trends across the breadth of introductory programming. This paper is the report of an ITiCSE working group that conducted a systematic review in order to gain an overview of the introductory programming literature. Partitioning the literature into papers addressing the student, teaching, the curriculum, and assessment, we explore trends, highlight advances in knowledge over the past 15 years, and indicate possible directions for future research

Financial literacy and inclusive growth: A Study on marginalized sections of Karnataka

All individuals share the same goals-economic security for themselves, their families and future generations. However, the poor, the marginalized sections especially, Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled tribes (ST) have lesser resources and economic opportunities to do so. Most of them live in high-risk and unpredictable environments. In this context, managing the little money that they have is vital. Astute money management is critical for meeting day-to-day needs, dealing with life cycle events and unexpected emergencies, taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves and planning for the future. Building assets is important for these sections, because they provide the basis for economic security. Hence, sound financial management is critical to the process of accumulating all kinds of assets and preserving them. However, financial conditions of these sections are very pathetic and one of the main reasons is the lesser knowledge in managing financial matters and it leads to financial exclusion. Studies also reveal that despite making significant improvements in all the areas relating to financial viability, profitability and competitiveness, there are concerns that Indian formal financial institutions have not been able to include vast segment of the population, especially the underprivileged sections of the society, into the fold of basic banking services. An ICRIER study by Mandira Sarma (Sarma 2009) placed India at a low 29th rank (out of 55 countries) on an Index of Financial Inclusion with a value of 0.2. At this juncture, financial literacy or financial education campaign by the RBI doing well in bringing excluded population to the main stream of formal banking system on the one hand and maintaining financial stability of the country on the other hand. However, the status of marginalised sections is still not improved due to numerous reasons including lack of financial literacy

Impact of yeshaswini health scheme on out of pocket expenditure: an empirical investigation

Out-of-pocket payments for health can cause households to incur catastrophic expenditures, which in turn can push them into poverty. Hence, key to protecting people is to ensure prepayment and pooling of resources for health, rather than relying on people paying for health services out-of-pocket at the time of use. The present study was conducted with the following objective of 1. To analyze the impact of Yeshaswini Health Insurance Schemein reducing out of pocket expenditure 2. To suggest suitable policy prescriptions. The primary sources of data were collected from two taluks of Tumkur district of Karnataka. Totally 80 sample household respondents in the study area was interviewed for the study purpose. The study found that Yeshasvini scheme introduced in Karnataka has helped in reducing out of pocket expenditure considerably

Dalith muslims and affirmative action: An overview

Muslims are one of the main minority communities in India, and are found almost in every nook and corner of India. The available data reveals backwardness among Muslims on many counts. It shows that there has been a serious lack of attention to the condition of the Muslim community by various actors, but more so, by the State in Indian democracy over the last five decades. These facts cannot be ignored by the state, the policy-makers, civil society and the Muslim leadership. The Muslims have lagged behind at all fronts, concerning socio-economic factors both in rural and urban areas because of their unique historical origin. Although the factors responsible can be numerous from within and outside, there is no denying the utter failure of the state in the largest democracy in the world in providing conducive environment for growth and development to its largest minorit

Socio- economic status of Dalit Muslims in India: An overview

In numerous parts of the country, Dalit Muslim community continues to lag behind other socio-religious categories in socio-economic and educational development. The condition of this community is dreadful with regard to educational attainment, income, employment in public sector, access to healthcare and other infrastructures, and there is a disproportionately high share of community members in prisons. Identity stereotyping, communal violence, ghettoisation etc. are other major issues which these community faces. Among others, the deprivation of community has been a result of their exclusion from important spheres of socio-economic decision making, lack of political empowerment, discrimination, frequent occurrence of communal violence etc. The Sachar Committee Report (2006) highlights most of these issues and deprivations which the community faces across almost all the states of India

Women empowerment and microfinance: impact on agriculture and allied activities

A large chunk of the SHG members combine several strategies or diversify among the members to meet both physical and survival needs so that the decent standard of living can be ensured. Depending on the availability of their capital assets such as land, labour, savings, etc, the livelihood strategies are adopted by the SHG members to meet their physical and survival needs. The important livelihood strategies adopted by most of the SHG members are related to the agricultural sector such as cultivation of paddy, dairy farming and sale of milk, milk made products, composite. The main objectives of the study is to know the status of Distribution of workers and investment and income received from agriculture related livelihood strategies of women in Agricultural Related Self Employment. The major findings of the study is that Out of 240 SHG women, about 1.67 per cent, were involved in agricultural activities by taking micro credit from both internal and external sources. The share of men in total family labour involved in agricultural activities was not more than 15 per cent. The average micro credit investment in agriculture was much higher in the case of NGO, followed by Cooperative and Government promoted SHGs. Whereas in the case of social groups, it has been observed that the average micro credit invested in agriculture was higher for the SHG members of Other households as compared to that of SCs/STs

Structuring social capital through Micro-Finance: tool for reducing urban poverty

The problem of urbanization and urban poverty is considered as the biggest challenge to development planning in India and eradication of urban poverty has continued to be the target of most of the policies framed in India. It is experienced that most of the poverty alleviation programmes through organized credit channels have not achieved the enquired success. At this juncture to micro-finance can work as a powerful tool to fight urban poverty became the effective approach of financial inclusion. Keeping the above views, the present paper is designed with the following objectives; to examine the dynamics of urbanization and urban poverty in India; to study the role of microfinance in reducing urban poverty; to offer policy suggestion. The paper is based on the secondary information. In India about 25.7 per cent of the total urban population still lives below the poverty line but only 5% of all microcredit in India go to the urban poor. The studies reveal that the urban market poses different demands and challenges compared to the rural sector, which probably contributes to the sectors’ slower growth. The study mainly suggests that there is a need to develop new poverty reduction tools and approaches to attack the multi-dimensional issues of urban poverty. For this, policymakers at the national and local levels should have a good understanding of the nature of urban poverty as well as accurate data on various issues relating to it, in order to develop programme/policies to manage urban poverty in a systematic manner

Hybrid metal grid-polymer-carbon nanotube electrodes for high luminance organic light emitting diodes

Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) incorporating grid transparent conducting electrodes (TCEs) with wide grid line spacing suffer from an inability to transfer charge carriers across the gaps in the grids to promote light emission in these areas. High luminance OLEDs fabricated using a hybrid TCE composed of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) poly(styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS PH1000) or regioregular poly(3-hexylthiophene)-wrapped semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes (rrP3HT-SWCNT) in combination with a nanometre thin gold grid are reported here. OLEDs fabricated using the hybrid gold grid/PH1000 TCE have a luminance of 18 000 cd m−2 at 9 V; the same as the reference indium tin oxide (ITO) OLED. The gold grid/rrP3HT-SWCNT OLEDs have a lower luminance of 8260 cd m−2 at 9 V, which is likely due to a rougher rrP3HT-SWCNT surface. These results demonstrate that the hybrid gold grid/PH1000 TCE is a promising replacement for ITO in future plastic electronics applications including OLEDs and organic photovoltaics. For applications where surface roughness is not critical, e.g. electrochromic devices or discharge of static electricity, the gold grid/rrP3HT-SWCNT hybrid TCE can be employed