The challenges of student affairs at Kenyan public universities

Kenya is increasingly turning to the promise of mass higher education to help solve a range of economic and social issues. These efforts have had profound effects on university students, faculty and professionals who provide the vital student support services necessary for academic success. This case study explores the challenges that face Kenyan student services professionals within the context of the country’s history and cultures. Kenya’s student service professionals face four major challenges: the increasing costs of attendance, the resulting impact on student behaviours and actions, lack of training and senior leadership, and regular campus closures.Keywords: student affairs, accommodation, student housing, student services, university environment, higher educatio

Disentangling Cyclic Causality: An Instance-based Framework for Causal Discovery

Correlation does not imply causation is one of the fundamental principles taught in science, emphasizing that associations between variables do not necessarily indicate causality. Yet, over the past three decades, extensive research has begun to challenge this perspective by developing sophisticated methods to differentiate causal from correlative relationships. This research suggests that correlations often involve a blend of confounded and causal interactions, which, given certain assumptions, can be disentangled to uncover actionable insights and deepen our understanding of physical, biological, and societal systems. Accurately discovering causal relationships from data amidst cyclic dynamics remains a challenging open problem in causality research. This complexity emerges when two variables influence each other in a feedback loop, complicating the determination of causal directionality. Most existing research sidesteps this issue by initially assuming acyclicity in the system, an assumption that does not hold in complex domains such as biology and economics. This thesis introduces a novel approach that effectively addresses both cyclic and acyclic scenarios. It capitalizes on structure learning results within a probabilistic graphical modeling framework, specifically Bayesian Knowledge Bases, and establishes a Kolmogorov identifiability result that supports an instance-based method for causal discovery capable of managing and detecting cycles from data. The validity of this approach is demonstrated through its state-of-the-art cycle identifiability in 18 simulated fMRI experiments and its comparative performance with established acyclic algorithms across 22 real-world causal benchmark datasets. This thesis not only bridges a crucial gap in causal analysis with cycles but also sets a new standard for real-world empirical validation in the field

The challenges of student affairs at Kenyan public universities

Kenya is increasingly turning to the promise of mass higher education to help solve arange of economic and social issues. These efforts have had profound effects on universitystudents, faculty and professionals who provide the vital student support services necessaryfor academic success. This case study explores the challenges that face Kenyan studentservices professionals within the context of the country’s history and cultures. Kenya’sstudent service professionals face four major challenges: the increasing costs of attendance,the resulting impact on student behaviours and actions, lack of training and seniorleadership, and regular campus closures

Understanding Chinese students’ college choice to increase Chinese student recruitment: A focus on music majors

The focus of this study was to understand why 20 Chinese students selected a rural, regionally focused research university. The research sought to (1) offer new, nuanced understanding of how Chinese students selected a university not well-known to international students and (2) advance how an institution of this type could meet its goal of improving and increasing Chinese student recruitment. As a majority of the Chinese students who selected this institution were majoring in music, this study offers implications for niche marketing and recruitment. In addition to the knowledge produced, this study models academic and student affairs collaboration where the research findings directly inform practice

AI for Open Science: A Multi-Agent Perspective for Ethically Translating Data to Knowledge

AI for Science (AI4Science), particularly in the form of self-driving labs, has the potential to sideline human involvement and hinder scientific discovery within the broader community. While prior research has focused on ensuring the responsible deployment of AI applications, enhancing security, and ensuring interpretability, we also propose that promoting openness in AI4Science discoveries should be carefully considered. In this paper, we introduce the concept of AI for Open Science (AI4OS) as a multi-agent extension of AI4Science with the core principle of maximizing open knowledge translation throughout the scientific enterprise rather than a single organizational unit. We use the established principles of Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (KDD) to formalize a language around AI4OS. We then discuss three principle stages of knowledge translation embedded in AI4Science systems and detail specific points where openness can be applied to yield an AI4OS alternative. Lastly, we formulate a theoretical metric to assess AI4OS with a supporting ethical argument highlighting its importance. Our goal is that by drawing attention to AI4OS we can ensure the natural consequence of AI4Science (e.g., self-driving labs) is a benefit not only for its developers but for society as a whole.Comment: NeurIPS AI For Science Workshop 2023. 11 pages, 2 figure

Collectivists’ Decision-Making: Saudi Arabian Graduate Students’ Study Abroad Choices

The authors in this qualitative study explored how Saudi Arabian students Saudi Arabiaselected a teaching focused research institution by examining Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and U.S. national influences, institutional factors, and personal influencers. Despite the continued rise in Saudi Arabian students studying at U.S. universities, limited published research exists on this unique student population. This study on Saudi graduate students reconceptualizes the homogenous perspectives on international student mobility. It demonstrates that study abroad decisions are not made from just push-pull or economic factors but through culturally specific social processes involving various actors both in and beyond their home country as well as intermediaries that is indicative of a more collectivist society

Saudi international students’ perceptions of their transition to the UK and the impact of social media

In their transition to a new country, international students often feel lost, anxious or stressed. Saudi students in the UK in particular may face further challenges due to the cultural, social and religious differences that they experience. There is a lot of evidence that social media play a crucial role in this experience. By interviewing 12 Saudi students from different cities in the UK, the aim of this study is to investigate how they perceive their transition to the UK and how social media is involved. The analysis indicates that Saudi students’ perceptions of transition tend to fall in to one of two markedly different camps. Some students see transition as an opportunity to detach themselves from their home country and to engage with the new society. Those students turn to social media as a tool allowing them to build bridges with the new society. Other students feel less enthusiastic to make a full engagement with the UK society. Those students find social media as a good tool to maintain connections and links with family and friends in their home country

Tumour antigen expression in hepatocellular carcinoma in a low-endemic western area

Background: Identification of tumour antigens is crucial for the development of vaccination strategies against hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Most studies come from eastern-Asia, where hepatitis-B is the main cause of HCC. However, tumour antigen expression is poorly studied in low-endemic, western areas where the aetiology of HCC differs. Methods: We constructed tissue microarrays from resected HCC tissue of 133 patients. Expression of a comprehensive panel of cancer-testis (MAGE-A1, MAGE-A3/4, MAGE-A10, MAGE-C1, MAGE-C2, NY-ESO-1, SSX-2, sperm protein 17), onco-fetal (AFP, Glypican-3) and overexpressed tumour antigens (Annexin-A2, Wilms tumor-1, Survivin, Midkine, MUC-1) was determined by immunohistochemistry. Results: A higher prevalence of MAGE antigens was observed in patients with hepatitis-B. Patients with expression of more tumour antigens in general had better HCC-specific survival (P=0.022). The four tumour antigens with high expression in HCC and no, or weak, expression in surrounding tumour-free-liver tissue, were Annexin-A2, GPC-3, MAGE-C1 and MAGE-C2, expressed in 90, 39, 17 and 20% of HCCs, respectively. Ninety-five percent of HCCs expressed at least one of these four tumour antigens. Interestingly, GPC-3 was associated with SALL-4 expression (P=0.001), an oncofetal transcription factor highly expressed in embryonal stem cells. SALL-4 and GPC-3 expression levels were correlated with vascular invasion, poor differentiation and higher AFP levels before surgery. Moreover, patients who co-expressed higher levels of both GPC-3 and SALL-4 had worse HCC-specific survival (P=0.018). Conclusions: We describe a panel of four tumour antigens with excellent coverage and good tumour specificity in a western area, low-endemic for hepatitis-B. The association between GPC-3 and SALL-4 is a novel finding and suggests that GPC-3 targeting may specifically attack the tumour stem-cell compartment

The Impact of US Intervention and War-time Dynamics on Ethnic-based Political Mobilization in Iraq and Afghanistan Between 1978 and 1989

This thesis will examine the development of ethnic division in Iraq and Afghanistan over the course of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iran-Iraq war through the context of US intervention. Specifically, it will use theories of political mobilization and foreign intervention to argue that in both cases, war-time dynamics increased ethnic-based political organization, and that this process was furthered by US intervention. While war-time dynamics played a more central role in the development of ethnic organization than the indirect impacts of US aid, this thesis demonstrates how US intervention helped to create the very ethnic identities the US has typically claimed have always existed.Bachelor of Business Administratio