Analytical Evaluation of College Learning Experiences on Students’Problem-Solving Efficacy among Technical and Scientific Areas

Problem-solving is important for students to become effective problem solvers in their profession, and for later career success. This study was conducted to explore how learning experiences affect problem-solving efficacy of Vietnamese college students within technical and scientific areas. The study used a questionnaire survey with 430 students’ technical and scientific areas from three member universities at Vietnam National University of Ho Chi Minh City. Results of this study indicated that students’ problem-solving efficacy was within the range of “average” to “high” response. There existed significant differences of problem-solving efficacy of students among the three universities. Various learning experiences of teaching approach, and learning engagement influenced as significant factors affecting students’ problem-solving efficacy.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11591/ijere.v1i2.166

Predictors of depression in American Indian adolescents

Discriminant analysis was conducted to examine the empirical use of psychosocial variables and stressful life events scales in classifying depressed and non-depressed American Indian adolescents using a standardized criterion measure. Subjects attending a Bureau of Indian Affair boarding school were administered a mental health screening survey and were interviewed within four weeks using the Diagnostic Interview Schedule f or Children-Revised (DISC-R). Three models of discriminant analysis were used to determine the overall and incremental variance contributed by the stressful life events scales and the related psychosocial variables (i.e., gender, perceived social support from family and from friends, self-esteem, and depressive symptoms) to the criterion variable of depression. Results indicated that none of the models contributed significantly to the overall and unique variance in the classification of the groups. It is recommended that psychosocial correlates other than those that had been identified in this study (e.g. substance abuse, suicide behaviors, etc.) need to be examined and considered in future examination of American Indian adolescent depression

From Institutional Autonomy to Accountability for Higher Educational Leadership in Vietnam

Institutional autonomy plays a significant role in attempts to define international standards of university governance. Institutional accountability is enforced and can have important implications for institutional autonomy. Leaders of higher education institutions in Vietnam do not at present have much institutional autonomy and accountability within their governance. This study aims to investigate the impacts of the governance forms in Vietnamese higher education institutions from the perception of the nation and discusses the central importance of institutional autonomy and accountability for leadership in higher education. Standards for the governance of institutional autonomy and accountability in Vietnamese universities are advanced. This study was used as evidence from Hanoi University of Science and Technology for applications of institutional autonomy and accountability. Keywords: institutional autonomy, institutional accountability, leadership, Vietnamese higher education

MULTICARRIER TRANSMISSION TECHNIQUES

In this thesis, multicarrier transmission techniques envisioned for the fifth-generation wireless networks are studied. First, three basic techniques, namely orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM), filter-bank multicarrier offset quadrature amplitude modulation (FBMC-OQAM), and generalized frequency-division multiplexing (GFDM) are reviewed in detail. In particular, the block-based structure and cyclic prefixing of OFDM are discussed and its bit error rate (BER) performance is analyzed. Then it is demonstrated that with offset QAM the orthogonality between subcarriers in FBMC-OQAM is preserved. Next, the roles of tail biting technique and circular convolution in GFDM are explained. An efficient implementation of GFDM is also described. Second, circular filterbank multicarrier offset QAM (CFBMC-OQAM), a technique which combines the block-based structure of GFDM and offset QAM of FBMC-OQAM, is presented. Then a precoded scheme is proposed, in which the Walsh-Hadamard (WH) transform is applied to CFBMC-OQAM system, resulting in a precoded scheme called WH-CFBMC-OQAM. The proposed system has a block-based structure and can be implemented efficiently using fast Fourier transform (FTT) and inverse FFT (IFFT). In addition, a cyclic prefix can be inserted to facilitate simple equalization at the receiver. WH-CFBMC-OQAM exploits the frequency diversity by averaging the signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) over all subcarriers. A theoretical approximation for the bit error rate performance of WH-CFBMC-OQAM over a frequency-selective channel is derived. Under the same system configuration, simulation results demonstrate the excellent performance of the proposed scheme when compared to the performance of other techniques. Simulation also verifies that the theoretical results match perfectly with simulation results for any SNR value

Modelling and Fast Terminal Sliding Mode Control for Mirror-based Pointing Systems

In this paper, we present a new discrete-time Fast Terminal Sliding Mode (FTSM) controller for mirror-based pointing systems. We first derive the decoupled model of those systems and then estimate the parameters using a nonlinear least-square identification method. Based on the derived model, we design a FTSM sliding manifold in the continuous domain. We then exploit the Euler discretization on the designed FTSM sliding surfaces to synthesize a discrete-time controller. Furthermore, we improve the transient dynamics of the sliding surface by adding a linear term. Finally, we prove the stability of the proposed controller based on the Sarpturk reaching condition. Extensive simulations, followed by comparisons with the Terminal Sliding Mode (TSM) and Model Predictive Control (MPC) have been carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. A comparative study with data obtained from a real-time experiment was also conducted. The results indicate the advantage of the proposed method over the other techniques.Comment: In Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Control, Automation, Robotics and Vision (ICARCV 2018