Is the Achievement of Moral Character the Ultimate Goal of Higher Education?

This article is to explore whether the achievement of moral character is the ultimate goal of higher education from a cross cultural approach. To discuss this study logically, three major research questions are addressed. First, what are the concepts of moral, ethics, and character? Second, what is the achievement of moral character from the Eastern and the Western perspectives? Third, what is the role of higher education for the achievement of moral character? To defend these research questions, the author uses a descriptive content analysis method, with a cross cultural approach. In order to explore the questions, the researcher in this study sets several limitations. Moral character is generally limited to the ancient Greek philosophy and Judeo-Christianity as well as to the classical Chinese thought and religion. Specifically, the study is mainly focused on not only Plato's "Republic" and Aristotle's "Nicomachean Ethics," but Confucius' "Analects" and Mencius' "Scripture (The Works of Mengzi)." Additionally, this paper also adjusts the lenses on moral theories, especially moral character, cardinal virtues, social harmony, and the common good. Lastly, higher education is focused on the lenses of Canada and South Korea. The significance of this study is to provide basic theories and valuable resources about moral and character education for educational theorists and practitioners, finding the theories of moral and ethics in the Eastern and the Western thoughts and religions

Progressive Processing of Continuous Range Queries in Hierarchical Wireless Sensor Networks

In this paper, we study the problem of processing continuous range queries in a hierarchical wireless sensor network. Contrasted with the traditional approach of building networks in a "flat" structure using sensor devices of the same capability, the hierarchical approach deploys devices of higher capability in a higher tier, i.e., a tier closer to the server. While query processing in flat sensor networks has been widely studied, the study on query processing in hierarchical sensor networks has been inadequate. In wireless sensor networks, the main costs that should be considered are the energy for sending data and the storage for storing queries. There is a trade-off between these two costs. Based on this, we first propose a progressive processing method that effectively processes a large number of continuous range queries in hierarchical sensor networks. The proposed method uses the query merging technique proposed by Xiang et al. as the basis and additionally considers the trade-off between the two costs. More specifically, it works toward reducing the storage cost at lower-tier nodes by merging more queries, and toward reducing the energy cost at higher-tier nodes by merging fewer queries (thereby reducing "false alarms"). We then present how to build a hierarchical sensor network that is optimal with respect to the weighted sum of the two costs. It allows for a cost-based systematic control of the trade-off based on the relative importance between the storage and energy in a given network environment and application. Experimental results show that the proposed method achieves a near-optimal control between the storage and energy and reduces the cost by 0.989~84.995 times compared with the cost achieved using the flat (i.e., non-hierarchical) setup as in the work by Xiang et al.Comment: 41 pages, 20 figure

Religious Factors Historically Affecting Premodern Korean Elite/Higher Education

1998The purpose of this study is (1) to examine and analyze two main religious factors, Buddhism and Confucianism, historically affecting premodern Korean culture and (2) to evaluate the influence of the two religions on formal and informal premodern Korean elite/higher education in terms of educational administration. To research the study systematically, three research questions are addressed: (1) what are the characteristics of Buddhism and Confucianism in the history of Korean culture? (2) how did Buddhism have an effect on Hwarang (Flowers of Youth) and monastic Buddhist schools in the Three Kingdoms and the Unified Silla periods? and (3) how did Confucianism affect Seongkyunkwan (National Confucian Academy) and Kuia-Iceo (national civilian and military service examinations) systems in the Choson era? Through descriptive content analysis, the questions were logically defended as the following: First, the two foreign ideologies adopted as national cults or religions provided political and ethical guidance in premodern Korean history. Next, Buddhism had an effect on the Hwarang and the informal Buddhist institutions dogmatically and spiritually. In addition, Confucianism affected both the Seongkyunkwan and the Kwa-keo institutionally and systematically with the collectively' authoritative organizational culture. Finally. Confucian ethical values and Buddhist creeds are essential religious factors to cultivate an individual's virtue and to make a healthy culture in institutional organizations

Korean Experience and Achievement in Higher Education

2001The purpose of this paper is to introduce the transition of Korean higher education reform and to weigh Korean experience and achievement in contemporary higher education. The paper first of all illustrates a historical perspective on higher education in light of educational reform. Secondly, this study reviews the achievements of Korean higher education linking to economic growth. Thirdly, the author examines educational zeal as a main factor for the development of Korean higher education. Finally, the current national policy of Korean higher education is discussed. The author evaluates that between the 1960s and the 1970s a modernization doctrine and a human capital theory, as a link of policy for manpower demand and supply, were accepted by policy makers of the government and brought about the national economic development as well as individual's income. In addition, from the early 1980s until the present time, Korean higher education has been drastically increased in the aspects of manpower requirement and social demand due to the diversity of industrial and social structure as well as Koreans' educational zeal. Although Korea has already achieved universal higher education, the quality still lags behind its international competitors

Heterologous Expression of Plant Cell Wall Degrading Enzymes for Effective Production of Cellulosic Biofuels

A major technical challenge in the cost-effective production of cellulosic biofuel is the need to lower the cost of plant cell wall degrading enzymes (PCDE), which is required for the production of sugars from biomass. Several competitive, low-cost technologies have been developed to produce PCDE in different host organisms such as Escherichia coli, Zymomonas mobilis, and plant. Selection of an ideal host organism is very important, because each host organism has its own unique features. Synthetic biology-aided tools enable heterologous expression of PCDE in recombinant E. coli or Z. mobilis and allow successful consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) in these microorganisms. In-planta expression provides an opportunity to simplify the process of enzyme production and plant biomass processing and leads to self-deconstruction of plant cell walls. Although the future of currently available technologies is difficult to predict, a complete and viable platform will most likely be available through the integration of the existing approaches with the development of breakthrough technologies.open8