Return of the man-machine interface: violent interactions

This paper presents the design and evaluation of “the man-machine interface” a punchable interface designed to criticise and react against the values inherent in modern systems that tacitly favour one type of user (linguistically and technically gifted) and alienate another (physically gifted). We report a user study, where participants used the device to express their opinions before engaging in a group discussion about the implications of strength-based interactions. We draw connections between our own work and that of evolutionary biologists whose recent findings indicate the shape of the human hand is likely to have been partly evolved for the purpose of punching, and conclude by examining violent force as an appropriate means for expressing thoughts and feelings

Perceptions of Seventh-day Adventist Church Elders in Ghana and the United States on Servant Leadership and Culture: a Correlational Study

Servant leadership has been discussed and described mostly in the North American context. Thus, there are concerns that this model of leadership may be culturally anchored in North American metaphors and thinking and may have limited universal applicability outside that context. In recent times, the Seventh-day Adventist Churchhas seen its membership swell mainly in non-Western areas such as Sub-Saharan Africa. With the changes taking place in the church membership globally, and the challenges these changes impose on leadership, this study was pursued with a twofold purpose. One was to investigate the differences in the perceptions of elders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ghana and the U.S. on four servant leadership attributes (Agapao Love, Empowerment, Vision, and Humility). The second was to investigate the relationship between servant leadership and three cultural dimensions (Power Distance, Gender Egalitarianism, and In-Group Collectivism). Method. A quantitative research design was used to survey the elders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in two selected union conferences in two different countries, Ghana and the United States of America (USA). The Servant Leadership Assessment Instrument (SLAI), prepared by Dennis (2004), three cultural variables incorporated from the GLOBE Research Study (2004), served as part of the survey instrument for thecollection of data on servant leadership and cultural attributes. In addition, a one-page, nine-item instrument was used to collect demographic information. These surveys were sent to 3,000 randomly selected Seventh-day Adventist church elders which resulted in responses from 1,284 elders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ghanaand U.S., 831 and 417 respectively. Hoteling\u27s T2 or two-group between subjects multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to analyze the differences in perception of servant leadership. Canonical correlation was used to analyze therelationships between servant leadership and culture. Conclusions and Recommendations. The findings revealed statistically significant differences in the perceptions of elders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ghanaand the U.S. regarding the servant leadership attributes of Agapao Love, Empowerment, Vision, and Humility. Elders in U.S. reported experiencing servant leadership behaviors significantly more than did their Ghanaian counterparts. Secondly, there were statistically significant relationships between the perceptions of elders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ghana and U.S. regarding the servant leadership attributes of Agapao Love, Empowerment, Vision, Humility and cultural dimensions ofPower Distance, Gender Egalitarianism, and In-Group Collectivism. The elders in both countries reported moderate relationships between servant leadership and the cultural dimensions. In Ghana, the relationships were high between Gender Egalitarianism and Empowerment, while in the U.S., they were high between In-Group Collectivism and Vision. Because the Seventh-day Adventist Church currently operates in 203 countries where cultures influencing the expectations about the process of leadership differ widely, it is imperative that it takes time to examine the qualities that characterize servant leadership, to assess current practices, to identify gaps, and to provide training to make up the difference

Chapter 2: A Native’s Flashback into the University of Dayton Global Education Seminar

A reflection on the 2018-19 Global Education Seminars in West Africa.https://ecommons.udayton.edu/cip_ges_2019/1005/thumbnail.jp

Enhancing Students Learning and Assessment through Positive Reinforcement

Students’ understanding of class material, and knowledge retention are assessed through homework, exams, and a host of other methods. None of these forms of assessment is intrinsically paramount to the others; however, the benefits depend on how well they are used. A good assessment depends on the purpose and learning objectives, and one way of maximizing the benefits of assessment is to involve students in the assessment methodology. This paper evaluates the benefits of having students prepare some of the questions for their final exams. Generally, students put in more effort when they understand that they are in charge. Each student in a class of 28 was asked to prepare five questions each, which must be multiple-choice, true or false (not more than 2), or fill-in-the-blanks. They were made to understand that 75% of questions for the final exam will entirely be from the questions prepared by the class. It was hypothesized that this will strengthen students\u27 engagement with class material, and their colleagues, which may aid them to achieve a better exam score. The instructor, acted as the expert system in this case to ascertain the quality of the questions. Unlike the orthodox exams, which are entirely prepared by faculties, it is believed that this may serve as positive reinforcement for students. Thus, knowing that the bulk of the exams questions were prepared by their colleagues, the desire to get a good score will be high, and ultimately translate to better material engagement and better exam score

Multi-Dimensional Analysis of Poverty in Ghana Using Fuzzy Sets Theory

The paper studies the multidimensional aspects of poverty and living conditions in Ghana. The aim is to fill the vacuum that has been left by traditional uni-dimensional measures of deprivation based on poverty lines, exclusively estimated on the basis of monetary variables such as income or consumption expenditure. It combines monetary and non-monetary, and qualitative and quantitative indicators, including housing conditions, the possession of durable goods, equivalent disposable income, and equivalent expenditure, with a number of composite human welfare measures. The study employs the fuzzy-set theoretic framework to compare levels of deprivation in Ghana over time usig micro data from the last two rounds of the Ghana Living Standard Surveys (1991/1992 and 1998/1999). The estimation results of the membership functions, depicting the levels of deprivation for the various categories of deprivation indicators, show a composite deprivation degree of 0.2137 for the whole country in 1998/99 as compared to 0.2123 in 1991/92. This deprivation trend reveals that poverty levels hard scarcely changed in Ghana. In fact, it even rose slightly during the nineties, contrary to the uni-dimensional analytical GLSS 4 report of an overall broadly favourable trend in poverty in Ghana during the 1990s.Ghana, fuzzy set, multi-dimensional poverty, composite deprivation or poverty index

Functionalization of Silica Surface Using Chan-Lam Coupling

The reaction of base-free Chan-Lam coupling was successfully used for functionalization of surface of mesoporous silica gel. Various aromatic, aliphatic, and heterocyclic compounds were immobilized by a copper-catalyzed reaction of corresponding boronic acids with surface amino groups at mild conditions. Obtained functionalized materials were mesoporous although their surface area decreased after immobilization. The reactivity of some surface functional groups was tested in their characteristic reactions

The Sankofa Bird and Reflection

As a minister of the Gospel, I have often reflected on the tension between Paul’s counsel in Philippians 3:13, 14 (forgetting those things that are behind, I press toward the mark) and Ellen G. White’s (1902) counsel that “we have nothing to fear for the future, except as we shall forget the way the Lord has led us, and his teaching in our past history” (p. 196). On the one hand it seems that we should forget the past, while on the other hand we are advised to remember our past and the way the Lord has led us in order to have nothing to fear in our future. In this article, I will look back to my past while also looking forward into my present and future. Using “Sankofa,” the Ghanaian proverbial bird, as a metaphor, I will share several life experiences. Sankofa is expressed in the Akan language as “se wo were fi na wosan kofa a yenki.” Literally translated, it means “it is not taboo to go back and fetch what you forgot” (“Meaning of the Symbolism of the Sankofa Bird,” n.d.)

U.S Inflight Icing Accidents and Incidents, 2006 to 2010.

Through its recommendations, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has helped the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) introduce regulations that have helped to curtail icing accidents1 (an occurrence associated with the operation of an aircraft where as a result of the operation of an aircraft, any person receives fatal or serious injury or any aircraft receives substantial damage) and incidents1 (an occurrence, other than an accident, associated with the operation of an aircraft that affects or could affect the safety of operations). However, the only acceptable safety goal of zero accident, proposed by former Secretary of Transportation, Federico Fabian Pena, has not materialized. The aviation industry each year experiences more accidents and incidents. Steven D. Green of Flight Operations Research, Underhill, Vermont, researched US inflight icing accidents and incidents from 1978 to 2005.3 Using the NTSB online database, he observed that 645 accidents and incidents occurred in the US from 1978 to 2005. He identified another 299 incidents in the NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS) reports during the same period. The purpose of this thesis is to update and expand upon Mr. Green\u27s research by studying US inflight icing accidents and incidents from 2006 to 2010. The NTSB and ASRS databases were respectively, the primary means of obtaining accident and incident reports. The databases revealed 228 icing related accidents and 30 inflight icing related incidents from 2006 to 2010. Forty of the accidents were related to inflight icing occurring on the wings, fuselage or control surfaces.From all of the reports sampled it was determined that an aircraft in cruise is more likely to accrete ice than in any other phase of flight. Furthermore, aircraft in cruise are more prone toVIinflight icing during instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) than in visual meteorological conditions (VMC). Throughout this report there did not appear to be a direct correlation between the number of flights and inflight icing accidents or incidents. Additionally, it was determined that icing events depended more upon the ice protection system (IPS) equipment, its use and effectiveness, as well as the management of ice accretion by the aircre

Effects of Service Projects on the Perceived Skills of Engineering Technology Students

Client based service projects offer many advantages to instructors, students and host communities. However, instructors must carefully choose the projects in order to achieve the benefits that come with this pedagogical tool. The purpose of this research was to investigate the perception of engineering technology students on how different service projects influence performance and perceived skills. A modified perceived skill model was used to measure the perceived effect of the team based service projects on: motivation to learn, contribution to research knowledge, skills and personal benefit, and project as a learning device. The projects were either client based or non-client based. In addition, they were categorized as either engineering, non-engineering, or some engineering projects. The non-engineering were the projects with no engineering content, whereas those with some form of engineering content were classified as some engineering. From the results, it appears that all the project types and categories were highly perceived by the students as contributing to their perceived skills. They were also highly perceived as great learning tools. Additionally, the projects with engineering content (client based and non-client based) provided a significantly higher perceived motivation to learn. However, there was no significant difference in the exam performance