UWCScholar :: Browsing by Author "Venter, Isabella M."

Browsing by Author "Venter, Isabella M."

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A bridge over the computer science graduate skill gap
(2013) Blignaut, Renette; Venter, Isabella M.; Renaud, Karen
Universities are increasingly required to respond to the ever evolving needs of an ever more sophisticated and globalised workplace, which requires well-rounded workers with more than mere technical knowledge. Employers expect their prospective employees to already have acquired a range of professional and personal skills. Universities face a challenge in helping students to develop these skills and it is debatable whether this can be achieved within the university environment. What is needed is a way for students to interact with the outside world as part of their undergraduate programme in a situated learning environment. This paper reports on a computer science assignment specifically designed to develop professional and personal as well as discipline-specific skills. The results suggest that situated learning assignments are indeed able to enhance the development of precisely those soft skills which are so valued by employers.
Comparative study of admissions criteria of a selection of South African universities
(Stellenbosch University, 2011) Blignaut, Renette; Venter, Isabella M.
Summary: The new school-leaving certificate, the National Senior Certificate (NSC), was awarded for the first time in 2008. This necessitated a relook at the entrance requirements for university, as the school subjects offered, and the evaluation thereof, had changed considerably compared with those for the previous schoolleaving certificate (Senior Certificate). It became important for universities to adjust their admission requirements from the 2009 firstyear intake onwards. The admission requirements of nine universities (considered by FinWeek, 18 March 2010, to be similar in terms of effectiveness and classification) were compared. The universities are: the University of the Free State (UOFS), the University of the Western Cape (UWC/WestCapU), the University of KwaZuluNatal (UKZN), the University of Pretoria (UP/UPret), NorthWest University (NWU/NWestU), the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS/UWits), the University of Cape Town (UCT), Rhodes University (Rhodes/RhodesU) and the University of Stellenbosch (US/UStell). (The second abbreviation appearing in some cases is the abbreviation used in Figure 1, which was taken directly from Finweek.) Effectiveness is defined by FinWeek as a combination of the following: undergraduate success rate; graduates as percentage of total enrolment; research output units and contracted research, while classification of institutions is defined as a range from mainly undergraduate training institutions to mainly researchled institutions. This study considered how the nine selected South African universities utilise the NSC results to select students for their mathematical statistics and computer science degrees. Some of the universities use only the NSC results for placement, while others use a combination of the NSC results and some additional admission tests. At most universities the NSC results are combined into an admission point score (APS). This APS is calculated differently at the different universities. The following questions were investigated:  How is the APS calculated by each of the nine universities considered in this study?  What minimum APS is required for general entrance to undergraduate studies at these universities?  What minimum APS do students need to enter a three-year programme in mathematical statistics or computer science at these nine universities? To compare the admission requirements of the universities considered, the entrance requirements documents of the various universities were studied and compared. Furthermore, secondary data of the University of the Western Cape were used to illustrate the differences in the APSs for these universities. A sample of 176 students who matriculated in 2008 with six or more designated NSC subjects and who were in their first year at UWC in 2009 was considered for this study. The UWC data were used to calculate the APSs according to the 2011 admission requirements of the nine universities. In general, students have to offer a minimum of four subjects from the designated subject list, with a level 4 (≥50 percent) or more, to qualify for university admission. For this study only students who had completed six or more designated subjects were considered. To further contain the study, only students that could possibly have qualified for a mathematical statistics or computer science degree were considered. These programmes require school mathematics and not mathematical literacy as a subject. Both these programmes are offered at all the universities considered in this study and could, therefore, be compared. The method for calculating the APS differs substantially between the universities, as does the minimum score required for university admission. To compare the minimum required APS for admission to the respective selected universities the research data of 176 UWC students were used. It was found that only 11 percent of the 176 students admitted to UWC would have qualified for admission at UCT. Although UWC and Rhodes use similar methods for calculating their APSs they have very different minimum APS requirements: Rhodes requires an APS of 40, whereas UWC requires an APS of only 27. Consequently Rhodes would have accepted only 18 percent of the students that were accepted by UWC. Due to the stricter mathematics requirement for the programmes considered, fewer students qualify for these programmes than would have qualified for general university admission. In order to see what APS would be necessary for a student studying at UWC to successfully complete a first year, the 2009 end-of-year university results of the 176 students of this pilot study were used. Of the 176 UWC students that started their studies in 2009, only 108 (61 percent) progressed to the next academic year in 2010. Their average UWC APS was 41,4 with a 95 percent confidence interval of (40,4; 42,3). If a simplified method is used for calculating the APS, namely summing the school scores (without life orientation (LO)), the 95 percent confidence interval for the mean APS of the students that progressed is (30,4; 32,1). It needs to be noted that both UWC and Rhodes use a more complex method of calculating the APS which inflates the APS by approximately 10 points. Currently universities differ considerably in their calculation of the APS as well as their minimum entrance requirements. A simplified and standardised method for the calculation of the APS would allow learners and other stakeholders to easily determine the APS required to be selected for a particular tertiary programme. For most programmes further school subject requirements are specified. For the mathematical statistics and computer science programmes at the universities studied, the difference in the school mathematics requirement is most pronounced. According to this pilot study the APS a student requires to successfully complete the first academic year at UWC, is approximately 30 when the simplified method to calculate the APS is used (summing the scores of six designated school subjects (without LO)). An APS of 30 is currently being used by UP, UKZN and UFS as the minimum requirement for selection. Their method of calculating the APS is very similar to the method proposed by this study. Additional studies would need to be carried out to confirm the results of this pilot study. Further studies are also needed to determine how the scores of the nondesignated subjects should be adjusted for possible inclusion in the calculation of the APS. The NSC is now standardised across South Africa. If the APS is also calculated in a standardised manner it should be sufficient to use this information to determine which students would be able to succeed at university. The minimum admission requirement could vary from university to university depending on the programme for which a student applies. The minimum APS for a programme should be carefully considered and adjusted so that selected students have a chance to succeed. If academically underprepared students are selected for tertiary studies the universities should be aware that these students will need extensive extracurricular assistance. Without additional interventions these underprepared students will have no chance of succeeding at university, which is ethically unjustifiable.
Complex sequential data analysis: A systematic literature review of existing algorithms
(SAICSIT, 2020) Dandajena, Kudakwashe; Venter, Isabella M.; Ghaziasgar, Mehrdad
This paper provides a review of past approaches to the use of deep-learning frameworks for the analysis of discrete irregularpatterned complex sequential datasets. A typical example of such a dataset is financial data where specific events trigger sudden irregular changes in the sequence of the data. Traditional deep-learning methods perform poorly or even fail when trying to analyse these datasets. The results of a systematic literature review reveal the dominance of frameworks based on recurrent neural networks.
Cyber security education is as essential as “the three R's”
(CELLPRESS, 2019) Venter, Isabella M.; Blignaut, Renette J.; Renaud, Karen; Venter, Anja
Smartphones have diffused rapidly across South African society and constitute the most dominant information and communication technologies in everyday use. That being so, it is important to ensure that all South Africans know how to secure their smart devices. Doing so requires a high level of security awareness and knowledge. As yet, there is no formal curriculum addressing cyber security in South African schools. Indeed, it seems to be left to universities to teach cyber security principles, and they currently only do this when students take computingrelated courses. The outcome of this approach is that only a very small percentage of South Africans, i.e. those who take computing courses at university, are made aware of cyber security risks and know how to take precautions. In this paper we found that, because this group is overwhelmingly male, this educational strategy disproportionately leaves young South African women vulnerable to cyber-attacks. We thus contend that cyber security ought to be taught as children learn the essential “3 Rs”—delivering requisite skills at University level does not adequately prepare young South Africans for a world where cyber security is an essential skill. Starting to provide awareness and knowledge at primary school, and embedding it across the curriculum would, in addition to ensuring that people have the skills when they need them, also remove the current gender imbalance in cyber security awareness.
Designing mobile phone interfaces for age diversity in South Africa: “One-World” versus diverse “Islands”
(Springer, 2013) Renaud, Karen; Blignaut, Renette; Venter, Isabella M.
Designing for diversity is a laudable aim. How to achieve this, in the context of mobile phone usage by South African seniors, is a moot point. We considered this question from two possible perspectives: universal (one-world) versus focused design (designing for diverse “islands” of users). Each island would be characterised by a measure of relative homogeneity in terms of user interface needs. Our particular focus in this paper is age diversity. The universal approach attempts to deliver a design that can be all things to all people – meeting the needs of all users within one user interface. The islander approach delivers specific and different designs for islands within a diverse world. To determine which the best approach would be, in the South African context, we dispatched a team of student researchers to interview participants from an older generation, on a one-to-one basis. It was beneficial to deploy aspiring designers to carry out this research because we wanted to confront aspiring researchers with the differences between their own and other generations’ usage of, and attitudes towards, mobile phones. Our study found that there were indeed significant age-related differences in mobile phone usage. Our research delivered insights that led to a model of the factors impacting mobile phone usage of the senior generation as a series of filters between the user and their device. We conclude that the island approach is more suitable for age-specific design. This approach might well become less fitting as a more technologically experienced population ages, but at present there is a clear need for an agesensitive mobile interface design.
Empowerment of rural farmers through information sharing using inexpensive technologies
(ACM, 2011) Iraba, M. Louise; Venter, Isabella M.
This paper discusses how to empower rural farmers to do business by means of inexpensive mobile technologies. In particular, the aim is to take advantage of the inexpensive features of low-end mobile phones to access market related information and to allow farmers to promote their commodities competitively. The research targeted rural Transkei farmers in the Eastern Cape. The farmers’ requirements were identified and a prototype for a low- as well as high-end mobile environment was designed to address these requirements. The following features were effected: registration of users, posting of commodities, retrieval of information, and communication with others. The access to the system is through a website (on the phone or a personal computer) or by means of unstructured supplementary service data. The prototype was implemented and tested. The users found the technology easy to use.
Fast tracking students from disadvantaged backgrounds into main stream Computer Science
(Computer Society of South Africa, 2000) Blignaut, Renette; Venter, Isabella M.; Cranfield, D.J.
A computer-based training (CBT) system was used to teach Computer Literacy to full-time students at the University of the Western Cape. This approach was successful in creating computer literate students as well as creating an opportunity for students from educationally disadvantaged schools to enter the Computer Science course. The students experienced this new approach to learning positively. This has laid the foundation to export the computer-based education model to communities outside the university. Lifelong learning opportunities will thus be created.
Generalization of tooltips: An assistive technology extension
(Springer, 2017) Adams, Saira-Banu; Tucker, William David; Venter, Isabella M.
Software applications use tooltips to assist users to improve their understanding of icons. When hovering over an icon with the cursor, a short text description of the icon appears. Text-based tooltips are helpful for users without any literacy limitations. An extension was created to generalize tooltips for users with low text literacy. In this case study and to explore such generalization, video based tooltips show short South African Sign Language clips to assist those who use South African Sign Language as a first language …
Higher education students’ perceptions of online learning during COVID-19 a comparative study
(MDPI Educ. Sci., 2021) Cranfield, Desireé J.; Tick, Andrea; Venter, Isabella M.
The pandemic and subsequent ‘lockdowns’ dramatically changed the educational landscape of higher education institutions. Before-COVID-19, traditional universities had choices in pedagogical practice, which included a variety of teaching delivery modes. Overnight, a single mode of delivery became the only option for traditional higher education institutions. All services migrated to digital platforms, leading to a period of “emergency eLearning”. The full impact of this sudden shift to digital platforms on all cohorts of students is still unclear. A measure of disruption to the normal student learning experience, especially for those attending traditional universities, was inevitable. Moreover, this disruption was varied depending on the University’s country and the country’s lockdown logistics. This international, comparative, quantitative research project investigated and explored higher education students’ perceptions of emergency eLearning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Experiences of students at universities in three countries were evaluated in terms of four dimensions: (1) home learning environment, (2) engagement, (3) participation preference, and (4) impact on learning skills. The research revealed significant differences between the participating universities students’ experiences. The most important differences were in the ‘home learning environment’, followed by ‘engagement’ and the perception of ‘impact on learning skills’. The differences in the ‘home learning environment’ can be attributed to the differing economic and digital development of the surveyed countries: South Africa, Wales, and Hungary. Finally, different cultural backgrounds suggest a noticeable difference in student engagement, participation, and learning skills
Higher education students’ perceptions of online learning during Covid-19—A comparative study
(MPDI, 2021) Cranfield, Desireé J.; Tick, Andrea; Venter, Isabella M.
The pandemic and subsequent ‘lockdowns’ dramatically changed the educational landscape of higher education institutions. Before-COVID-19, traditional universities had choices in pedagogical practice, which included a variety of teaching delivery modes. Overnight, a single mode of delivery became the only option for traditional higher education institutions. All services migrated to digital platforms, leading to a period of “emergency eLearning”. The full impact of this sudden shift to digital platforms on all cohorts of students is still unclear. A measure of disruption to the normal student learning experience, especially for those attending traditional universities, was inevitable. Moreover, this disruption was varied depending on the University’s country and the country’s lockdown logistics. This international, comparative, quantitative research project investigated and explored higher education students’ perceptions of emergency eLearning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Experiences of students at universities in three countries were evaluated in terms of four dimensions: (1) home learning environment, (2) engagement, (3) participation preference, and (4) impact on learning skills. The research revealed significant differences between the participating universities students’ experiences. The most important differences were in the ‘home learning environment’, followed by ‘engagement’ and the perception of ‘impact on learning skills’.
Improved Hand-Tracking Framework with a Recovery Mechanism
(Telkom, 2013) Achmed, Imran; Venter, Isabella M.; Eisert, Peter
Abstract−Hand-tracking is fundamental to translating sign language to a spoken language. Accurate and reliable sign language translation depends on effective and accurate hand-tracking. This paper proposes an improved hand-tracking framework that includes a tracking recovery algorithm optimising a previous framework to better handle occlusion. It integrates the tracking recovery algorithm to improve the discrimination between hands and the tracking of hands. The framework was evaluated on 30 South African Sign Language phrases that use: a single hand; both hands without occlusion; and both hands with occlusion. Ten individuals in constrained and unconstrained environments performed the gestures. Overall, the proposed framework achieved an average success rate of 91.8% compared to an average success rate of 81.1% using the previous framework. The results show an improved tracking accuracy across all signs in constrained and unconstrained environments.
Inexpensive mobile technologies to empower rural farmers with m-agriculture
(University of the Western Cape, 2010) Iraba, Marie Louise; Venter, Isabella M.; Dept. of Computer Science
Market information and established communication between seller and buyer play an important role in business activities. This thesis investigates the Transkei area in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa to find out how to empower rural farmers by providing them with less-expensive mobile technology enabling them to post and advertise their produce, access market information on a common database, and find and communicate with potential customers. The farmers’ requirements were identified using quantitative and qualitative methods and a prototype consisting of USSD and web applications was developed. It allows the farmer to follow a sequence of menu commands to send a request to the database and access market information, such as commodity prices, and post information about their own produce so as to attract more customers. The low cost of USSD and the ubiquity of mobile phones enable the system to be usable, affordable and effective. During the final stage of development, the system was tested successfully and addressed a major problem faced by farmers, i.e. lack of access to market information.
Insights into the use and affordances of social and collaborative applications for student projects
(South African Institute of Computer Scientists and Information Technologists, 2017) Bankole, Omolola O.; Venter, Isabella M.
The use of social and collaborative computing has the potential of assisting learning and improving the ability to work together as part of a team. Team work is a graduate attribute that students need to acquire before transitioning from university into the workplace. The aim of this exploratory research was to provide insights into the use of social and collaborative applications by Computer Science students, and the emergent affordances student project teams have created with the use of these applications. It answers the questions: What elearning platforms or applications do students use to collaborate for team projects? What technology affordance draws students to use these applications? This study adopts affordance theory as the theoretical framework. Two types of content analysis: conventional content analysis and summative content analysis were used to analyse the data. Data was gathered using a pre-designed questionnaire with the teams during the first semester of 2016. Findings show that the university’s elearning platform is utilised for some of their courses; however students seem to prefer free and open source platforms. Student project teams used applications such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Dropbox, Google Drive, Google Docs, as well as email messages, to work jointly, and were successfully able to complete their team projects. Four types of technology affordances: communicative-affordance, document share-affordance, course resource-affordance, and integrity-affordance, were identified as being relevant.
‘Lockdown’: Digital and emergency elearning technologies—A student perspective
(MDPI, 2022) Venter, Isabella M.; Cranfield, Desirée J.; Blignaut, Renette J.
The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent emergency measures had a fundamental and disruptive impact on societies and, in particular, on the educational sector. The transition of the modality of educational delivery from face-to-face to online occurred within days; this research study considered the concepts of digital trust and digital access, using structuration, postmodernism, and critical social theory as lenses to understand Higher Education (HE) student experiences during the first wave of the lockdown. The study compared these aspects in Hungary, South Africa, and Wales (UK) with different digital and network readiness indices. The digital development of the countries is presented using both the Digital Intelligence and Network Readiness indices. The research approach was cross-country, international, comparative, inductive, and quantitative.
A mobile platform traffic generator for network performance evaluation
(Telkom, 2013) Tiemeni, Ghislaine Livie Ngangom; Venter, Isabella M.; Rey-Moreno, Carlos; Tucker, William David
This work in progress paper presents an overview of the development of an efficient and accurate mobile traffic generator based on an open source computer-based traffic generator software. A high performance mobile traffic generator would simplify the evaluation of the quality of networks deployed in remote areas. The motivation for this software is to ease feasibility testing and monitoring in the field particularly in rural areas by using affordable and lightweight technology such as a mobile device. Furthermore, a mobile system is more suitable than a personal computer (PC) or laptop in a rural area where the deployment of computers is difficult and impractical. To conduct the research, both an experimental and a simulation research methodology will be applied and the method of investigation will combine methods such as laboratory experiments, document analysis and a literature survey.
Peer-to-Peer Computing and Grid Computing: towards a better understanding
(Akamai University, 2011) Azeez, Nureni A.; Abidoye, Ademola P.; Adesina, Ademola Olusola; Agbele, Kehinde K.; Iyamu, Tiko; Venter, Isabella M.
Currently, both Peer-to-Peer Computing (P2P) and Grid Computing have remained the most vibrant and useful forms of distributed computing all over the world. Their applications are such that they cut across both academia and industry. It has come to the notice of researchers that there are great misunderstanding and misinterpretation on what these forms of distributed computing actually portend and stand for. In this paper therefore, we take a critical look at comparative study of both computing technologies with aim of making readers understand in a clear cut what each really stands for. To have a good comparison, we start by giving a well referenced definition of Grid Computing as well as Peer-to-Peer Computing. Also, we used technical issues and general features in our comparison vis-à-vis the architecture, security issue, data movement, application deployment, and operating system requirement. We also considered the strength of both distributed computing system and finally we considered what could be the future of both technologies.
Relevant computing curricula in Sub-Saharan Africa
(2011) Rai, Idris; Rodrigues, Anthony; Venter, Isabella M.; Mills, Godfrey; Suleman, Hussein; Edumadze, John
The principle objective of this research was to establish what computing curricula are required for the Sub-Saharan Africa region. Input from academics, businessmen and the analyses of curricula from several African universities revealed a gap between existing curricula and what is considered to be ideal for this region. Required knowledge clusters were identified: Science and Technology; Soft and Research skills; Society and Development; Environment; Business and Entrepreneurship; Institutional; and Practical Skills. These were used to propose a model for enhancing the computing curricula of the Association of Computing Machinery and the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers’ for the SSA region.
Strategies for information management in education: some international experience
(AOSIS Open Journals, 2013) Bytheway, Andrew J.; Venter, Isabella M.
Background: Recent analysis of the management of information and communications technologies in South African education suggests strongly that there is only limited strategic thinking that might guide policy-makers, school principals, teachers, learners and suppliers of educational technologies. It is clear that here in South Africa, as elsewhere, the actual practice of technology-mediated education is driven more by the available technologies than by actual learner needs, good management principles and the wider national imperative. There might be lessons to be learned from experience elsewhere. Objectives: This article reports and analyses conversation with eight international educators in Europe, Canada, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. All are managing the impact of technology in different ways (reactive and pro-active), at different levels (pre-primary through to senior citizen), in different roles (teachers, administrators and senior managers) and in different contexts (schools and universities). Method: Open-ended conversations with educators and educational administrators in developed countries were recorded, transcribed and analysed. The qualitative analysis of the content was done in the style of ‘open coding’ and ‘selective coding’ using a qualitative content analysis tool. Results: Whilst technology is still seen to drive much thinking, it is found that that success is not derived from the technology, but from a full and proper understanding of the needs and aspirations of those who are directly involved in educational processes, and by means of a managerial focus that properly recognises the context within which an institution exists. Conclusion: Whilst this result might be expected, the detailed analysis of the findings further reveals the need to manage investments in educational technologies at different levels and in different ways.
Towards ensuring scalability, interoperability and efficient access control in a multi-domain grid-based environment
(South African Institute of Electrical Engineers, 2013) Azeez, Nureni A.; Venter, Isabella M.
The application of grid computing has been hampered by three basic challenges: scalability, interoperability and efficient access control which need to be optimized before a full-scale adoption of grid computing can take place. To address these challenges, a novel architectural model was designed for a multi-domain grid based environment (built on three domains). It was modelled using the dynamic role-based access control. The architecture’s framework assumes that each domain has an independent local security monitoring unit and a central security monitoring unit that monitors security for the entire grid. The architecture was evaluated using the Grid Security Services Simulator, a meta-query language and Java Runtime Environment 1.7.0.5 for implementing the workflows that define the model’s task. In terms of scalability, the results show that as the number of grid nodes increases, the average turnaround time reduces, and thereby increases the number of service requesters (grid users) on the grid. Grid middleware integration across various domains as well as the appropriate handling of authentication and authorisation through a local security monitoring unit and a central security monitoring unit proved that the architecture is interoperable. Finally, a case study scenario used for access control across the domains shows the efficiency of the role based access control approach used for achieving appropriate access to resources. Based on the results obtained, the proposed framework has proved to be interoperable, scalable and efficiently suitable for enforcing access control within the parameters evaluated.
Unmasking community trust issues in rural field work
(ACM, 2013) Ufitamahoro, Marie Josée; Venter, Isabella M.; Tucker, William David; Rey-Moreno, Carlos
The principal objective of this paper is to describe the au thor's fieldwork and research in a remote rural area of South Africa, where a Village Telco is deployed to provide Voice over Internet Protocol on a wireless mesh network. The users' social environment was evaluated to understand trust issues associated with the adoption of the network. Qualita-tive measures such as contextual inquiry, participant obser-vation, focus group and individual interviews were used during data collection. Focus group discussions were held with community members involved with the planning of ways in which to sustain the network. Involving the community gave them a sense of commitment and ownership of the network. To maintain the network, different solutions were proposed. One of these was a billing system for the use of the network. This will be designed to meet users' needs and should also be transparent so that the community will trust it. A prototype is being developed, with input from the community, using open source software to address their requirements.

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