Computer-Assisted Language Learning: A Study of EFL Teachers’ Perceptions of University of Sindh, Jamshoro

This study aims to investigate EFL teachers’ perceptions on Computer Assisted Language Learning in English language classrooms. For the last 15 years, there has been great interest in researching teachers’ perceptions, thinking and beliefs towards implementation of ICT in English language teaching classrooms. As teachers’ perceptions shape and determine language teaching and learning practice. To investigate the problem, 47 in service teachers of Higher Secondary Schools were taken as participants, out of which there were 14 females and 33 males. A questionnaire was administered among the EFL teachers based on investigation of beliefs and perspectives of EFL teachers. Findings of the study suggest that use of online web chats and other connecting forums are practiced by EFL teachers to interact with the students. Furthermore, preparing lectures to use computers and getting help for material development is highly frequent. Keywords: EFL Teachers’ Perceptions, Computer Assisted Language Learning, implementation of ICT, English language classrooms DOI: 10.7176/JEP/11-30-04 Publication date:October 31st 202

Critical evaluation of the claims made by pharmaceutical companies in drug promotional material in Pakistan

Background: In Pakistan, there is no mechanism to monitor the drug promotional campaign by pharmaceutical industry despite the fact that there is enough evidence that irrational pharmacotherapy is increasingly encountered even in the developed countries due to unethical practices of pharmaceutical promotion. Objectives. To audit the drug promotional claims made by the pharmaceutical companies in Pakistan.Methods: Drug promotional pamphlets and brochures containing claims for the drugs, which were circulated by the pharmaceuticalrepresentatives were collected from 122 general practitioners (GPs) from Karachi and Larkana cities of the Sindh Province. The claims were critically analyzed and audited with the help of currently available evidence in the medical literature.Results: 345 distinct advertisements covering 182 drugs from different manufacturers were critically analyzed for information content. Sixty two out of 345 (18%) of the reviewed advertisements were adjudged to be misleading / unjustifiable, which were again classified as, exaggerated (32%), ambiguous (21%), false (26%), and controversial (21%). The primary source of information (approximately 78%) about the newly launched drugs for the GPs was found to be the pharmaceutical representatives followed by hospital doctors (5%) and colleagues (5%). Furthermore, 110 (90%) GPs were of the view that the drug promotion has definitely an influence on their prescribing pattern.Conclusions: Since GPs in Pakistan rate pharmaceutical companies as their primary source of information regarding drugs, it can be anticipated that inappropriate advertisement claims would lead to irrational prescribing if physicians had no any other information to follow

‘Are we equal citizens?’ : a critical discourse analysis (CDA) of language textbooks and minority faith learners’ insights in Pakistan

Language textbooks are discourse-led documents that contain official knowledge and construct specific learner subjectivities. Official knowledge embodies a worldview that serves the interests of dominant social group. In Pakistan, studies suggest that textbooks in general tend to distort the historical facts in favour of the national narrative. Using six language textbooks (Sindhi, Urdu, and English) taught at government-run schools in Sindh province of Pakistan, this study aims to understand how language is used to construct “Muslim identity”. Moreover, the study also considers minority faith language learners’ perspectives in order to understand their experiences and reactions. The analysis is informed by Fairclough’s (2001, 2003) writings on critical discourse analysis (CDA). The findings reveal that Muslim identity is constructed through a variety of discourses related to Islam. Furthermore, minority faith language learners perceive language learning spaces to be ideologically motivated, promoting a dominant religious identity narrative while disregarding diversity. The study recommends that the process of textbooks design should consider minority faiths to a considerable extent in the interest of inclusive and a sustainable society. The study has implications for wider global contexts, including Asia Pacific where language textbooks promote biases based on religion, gender, ethnicity, and language.peerReviewe

Green Information Technology (IT) framework for energy efficient data centers using virtualization

The increasing demand for storage, networking and computation has driven the escalation of large complex data centers, the massive server farms that run many of today’s Internet, financial, commercial and business applications. A data center can comprise many thousands of servers and can use as much energy as a small city. The massive amounts of computation power required to drive these server systems results in many challenges like energy consumption, emission of green house gases, backups and recovery issues, etc. The rising costs of oil and global warming are some of the biggest challenges of today’s world. The research proposed in this paper discusses how virtualization can be used to improve the performance and energy efficiency of data centers. To prove this work, Green Information Technology (IT) based framework is developed to seamlessly and securely divide data center components into different resource pools depending on different parameters like energy consumption ratio, utilization ratio, workloads, etc. The framework highlights the importance of implementing green metrics like power usage effectiveness (PUE) and data center effectiveness, and carbon emission calculator to measure the efficiency of data center in terms of energy utilization and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The framework is based on virtualization and cloud computing to increase the utilization ratio of already installed servers from 10% to more than 50%

Neoliberalizing Subjects through Global ELT Programs

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Internet Use and Its Addiction Among Medical Students in Hyderabad, Pakistan

Background: With the advances in information and technology, internet addiction appears as a serious obsessive condition that has numerous dreadful effects on human physical and mental health. The objective of the study was to determine the level of internet addiction among medical undergraduate students of Isra University, Hyderabad. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted at the Isra University, Hyderabad from August to December 2019. All medical (MBBS) undergraduate students of either sex were included. A stratified sampling technique was used for the selection of participants. A structured 5-point Likert scale questionnaire for the internet addiction test was adopted from Dr. Kimberly Young and used for the collection of participant’s information and measurement of their level of addiction. Results: A total of 263 undergraduate medical students participated in the study. The majority (56.65%) were males while 51.71% were from the age group 21-22 years. Over two-thirds (85.17%) of participants were found to be internet addicts. Of these internet addicts, 63.84% were mild or minimal internet addicts while 12.05% were severely addicted participants. A statistically significant difference (p<0.05) was observed between gender, age groups, year of study, and current residential status of participants. Conclusion: Internet addiction was highly prevalent among undergraduate medical students, specially in the age group (19-20) years, hostlers, 2nd year of study and male

Robust Dynamic Control of Constant‐Current‐Source‐Based Dual‐Active‐Bridge DC/DC Converter Used for Off‐Board EV Charging

Due to the high power density, inherent zero-voltage-switching (ZVS), and high voltage-conversation ratio, the current source-based isolated dual-active-bridge DAB–DC/DC converters are extensively used for charging EVs under constant-current mode. However, the fast dynamic response of an output current is a crucial requirement for dual-active-bridge DC/DC converters operating as a constant-current source. This study proposes a fast current controller (FCC) for tracking the desired output current under various input/output parameter disturbances/variations. The proposed control strategy can ensure a fast transient response with negligible overshoot/undershoot for output current during start-up and when there are variations in the load or input voltage. Furthermore, the dynamic behavior of the current control against change in the reference current value has also been improved. A constant-current-based DAB–DC/DC converter is modeled and simulated in MATLAB/Simulink software and a scaled-down 300 W lab prototype DAB–DC/DC converter is designed with the TMS320F28335 DSP controller of Texas Instruments. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed current controller, different test cases, such as a change in the load, a change in the input voltage, and a change in the desired output current, are considered. Moreover, under these test cases, the proposed current-control strategy is compared with the conventional proportional–integral (PI) current controller, model-based phase-shift controller (MBPS), and load current feed-forward controller (LCFF). Both the experimental and simulation results have validated the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy