Judy Van Biljon - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Judy Van Biljon
IFIP AICT, 2022
Machine learning, a field of artificial intelligence application, will profoundly impact countrie... more Machine learning, a field of artificial intelligence application, will profoundly impact countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the next few decades. The extent of the impact will depend largely on the countries' readiness. Roadmaps and research agendas towards implementing machine learning for development (ML4D) exist, but little is known about the state of ML4D research in sub-Saharan Africa. Guided by an existing ML4D roadmap, we conducted a critical literature review on selected research publications papers published from 2010 to 2021 with the aim of describing the status of SSA ML publications and informing future research. This should be of interest to researchers and funding organizations investigating the potential impact of ML4D projects in the SSA region.
Government initiatives have been undertaken to provide ICT infrastructure including digital conte... more Government initiatives have been undertaken to provide ICT infrastructure including digital content to public schools in South Africa, however the educators' views on the sustainability of integrating tablet technology into teaching in resource constrained environments have not been adequately advanced. Cost, sustainability and efficient use of ICTs are critical elements which will define ICT's future as an effective tool for social and economic development. The purpose of this paper is to investigate educators' perspectives on digital content and sustained use in integrating tablet technology into teaching in resource constrained environments in South Africa. Participants in the study included educators from eight public schools at one of the school districts in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. A case study approach using open-ended questions was used to gather information on educators' perspectives on content related factors that affect their ability to use tablets for teaching and the steps that can be taken to address their concerns. The findings provided evidence that while educators' use of the tablets is affected by the availability and accessibility of digital content and e-resources for different subjects, communication and knowledge gaps also affect digital content use by educators. The findings validate the elements in existing frameworks and model of sustainability for mobile learning in schools. However, identified differences in the context and environment necessitate some adaptation of the exiting frameworks and the person-centred sustainable model and that was presented as an adapted framework for sustainable mobile learning in resource constrained environments.
Human-computer interaction for development (HCI4D) is an interdisciplinary field aimed at underst... more Human-computer interaction for development (HCI4D) is an interdisciplinary field aimed at understanding and designing technologies for under-served, under-resourced, and underrepresented populations around the world. The interdisciplinary nature complicates knowledge transfer and articulation between the disciplines contributing to the HCI4D domain with the consequence that researchers in one sub-domain do not always build on the extant theoretical and methodological progress in other sub-domains. The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework for HCI4D that could facilitate a better understanding of this domain, for knowledge mobilisation and articulation between researchers in HCI4D and the related field of information and communication technology for development (ICT4D). Previous studies have presented an overview of the HCI4D field in terms of the geographies it covers, technologies it targets, and its varied epistemological and methodological underpinnings. This paper builds on those methodologies and findings to conduct a systematic literature review which revisits the domain questions, thus, the core issues and topics (why), the phenomenon of interest (what) and the research methods (how). A comparison of the findings from three seminal HCI4D papers led to the identification of three core issues (motor themes) namely, context, design and development. Based on Ward's idea of a knowledge mobilisation framework, the findings from the systematic literature review are then synthesised and presented as a framework which comprises the core issues, recurring themes and the salient elements for each of the domain questions. The contribution is a knowledge mobilisation framework to enrich discussions on positioning HCI4D as research field.
In South Africa, the potential of mobile phones as tools that facilitates inclusive information a... more In South Africa, the potential of mobile phones as tools that facilitates inclusive information access and interaction at Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) has not been fully realized. A number of factors could be attributed to the slow growth and they include technological factors, economic factors and human factors. This study focuses on human factors as a source of slow growth in providing students with mobile centric services for information access and interaction. The human factors are the focus of this study because lecturers are critical in the provision of mobile centric services in HEI. Hence, the objective of this study is to investigate the factors that could affect the readiness of lecturers in providing mobile centric services that facilitate students' information access and interaction at HEIs in developing countries. The research was undertaken within the Open and Distance Learning (ODL) context in South Africa. Qualitative data was captured by interviewing fourteen lecturers and the data was analysed using the Framework for Qualitative Data Analysis. The findings of the study revealed that lecturers' readiness is affected by their technical skills in designing mobile phone content and services, workload, motivation and access to resources for designing mobile phone content and services. The contribution of this article is to identify the factors that affect the readiness of HEIs lecturers in providing mobile centric services.
The Information and Communication for Development (ICT4D) research landscape can be described as ... more The Information and Communication for Development (ICT4D) research landscape can be described as a dynamic, fragmented adhocracy and hence, predictably, attempts at producing a shared conceptual framework for the field have had mixed success. Given the multi-, inter-and trans-disciplinary nature of ICT4D it may be impossible to reach complete consensus on such a framework. However, many basic research activities, such as guiding novice researchers and structuring information sources for efficient access, necessitate a shared vocabulary and generally agreed concepts and hence the quest continues. The purpose of this paper is to propose a non-prescriptive, dynamic conceptual framework for ICT4D. An initial representation was developed based on a literature review and an informal expert interview and this was used to categorize the papers in the ICTD2013 conference proceedings. The results were then used to refine the initial framework from the Computer Science and Information Systems perspectives. This paper presents this framework as point of departure for an ongoing discourse with the purpose of structuring the ICT4D research domain.
Students enrolled at Open and Distance Learning (ODL) institutions tend to combine study and work... more Students enrolled at Open and Distance Learning (ODL) institutions tend to combine study and work and to succeed they have to optimize free time for studying. Therefore, many ODL students access and interact with information in a mobile context, which implies that interaction takes place in dynamic and changing environments. This presents students with a number of overlapping contextual challenges that need to be managed when accessing and interacting with information. Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) are also confronted by these challenges as they strive to provide access through technologies that are accessible, usable, scalable and sustainable to students. Against this background, it is important to have an understanding of the categories of information that students would want to access and interact with through the devices that they privately own, of which mobile phones are the most common. This study investigated the categories of information that students would want to access through mobile cellular phones. The data capturing involved both qualitative and quantitative data. In order to get a comprehensive and representative set of information access needs it was necessary to start with openended questions. Based on the analysis of the 50 responses to the open-ended questions, fixed-response questions were formulated. The 84 responses to the fixed-response questions were then analyzed to determine the importance of the information access needs as well as the access frequency. The contribution of this paper is a set of prioritized information needs that provide some insight into the mobile centric information needs of students at the University of South Africa (UNISA) as an example of an ODL institution.
South African journal of higher education, 2016
Supervision is a vital aspect in the success of postgraduate students and even more so in open di... more Supervision is a vital aspect in the success of postgraduate students and even more so in open distance learning. Various factors influence supervision success, some relating to the student, some to the supervisor and others to the institution. This article addresses an over-arching factor, namely the number of stakeholders involved in a supervision relationship, that is termed multiplicity. The allocation of more than one supervisor has capacity implications which have to be traded against improvements in quantitative success measures and quality factors such as richer pools of knowledge and complementary expertise. This study investigates the perceptions on multiplicity of 22 supervisors who have undertaken supervision in ODL contexts. The research strategy is qualitative, based on an open-ended questionnaire survey and interviews. The main contribution is a set of dimensions, comprising factors that influence postgraduate supervision relationships, and the identification of conditions for considering more than one supervisor.
Springer eBooks, 2022
Developing and presenting a well-formulated research argument is core to the learning journey of ... more Developing and presenting a well-formulated research argument is core to the learning journey of a graduate student. In open distance e-learning, computer-supported learning is instrumental in providing a platform for graduate students to develop their argumentation skills. However, there is little guidance on the elements required in using computer supportive collaborative learning (CSCL) to augment argumentation skills development (ASD). This paper reports on elements identified in literature that should be present in a framework using CSCL to augment ASD. The thematically analysed data gathered during the focus group sessions were used to confirm the structure of the argumentation skills development framework (ASDF), and confirmed that there is a need for a framework to provide guidance in using CSCL to augment ASD. The contribution includes the conceptual ASDF using CSCL, comprising seven elements, that provides a strategy of scaffolded learning for implementation in a graduate course to augment ASD.
Springer eBooks, Sep 17, 2021
The 2020 COVID-19 health pandemic has accelerated the trend towards digitizing education. Increas... more The 2020 COVID-19 health pandemic has accelerated the trend towards digitizing education. Increased digitization necessitates a robust and regulatory framework for monitoring standards in a knowledge society, which requires adaptivity to the continuous changes in the quality assurance processes (moderation). This provides the rationale for an investigation into the literature trends in eModeration processes. This study draws on a systematic literature review as methodology to examine the extant literature on trends in eModeration research including the purpose of the research, methodologies and limitations regarding existing eModeration systems. The findings reveal that there is little, if any, empirical evidence of systems dedicated to online moderation of assessments specifically within the secondary school sector and that eModeration is mainly an emergent phenomenon with numerous adoption challenges, especially in resource constrained contexts.
Capacity in and enhancement of critical, scarce and intermediate skills are seen as a national pr... more Capacity in and enhancement of critical, scarce and intermediate skills are seen as a national priority in South Africa. The Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) in South Africa has prioritized the success of the Further Education and Training (FET) sector to meet this need for capacity development in critical, scarce and intermediate skills. Management information systems (MIS) are pivotal in the efficient and effective running of FET colleges. Therefore, the evaluation of MIS success is an essential spoke in the wheel of FET college success. The problem is that no MIS success evaluation model for FET colleges could be found. In this paper, we describe the development and testing of an evaluation model and tool for MIS success. Information system's evaluation theory and an analysis of FET policy documents were used to propose an initial success evaluation model and tool (questionnaire) for an educational environment (FET colleges) in South Africa. Using a quantitative approach the tool was applied in a survey at one public FET college to evaluate the success of the MIS deployed at the college. Findings from the survey lead to the refinement of the model which is also articulated in this paper and reflected as the SA-FETMIS model. The paper is novel in proposing an IS theory based model and tool which can be used to evaluate MIS success at FET colleges and similar education contexts. The paper should be of interest to researchers in the field of Information Systems success evaluation and also to practitioners and managers in the field of Education.
eModeration is an essential aspect of quality assurance in electronic learning, but eModeration s... more eModeration is an essential aspect of quality assurance in electronic learning, but eModeration systems are not a regular feature of assessment in educational institutions. One reason could be the lack of evidence-based requirements to guide the implementation and evaluation of eModeration systems. To ensure adoption, it is important that eModeration system requirements comply with technology acceptance requirements. The purpose of this paper is to determine the adoption requirements for the development of an eModeration system. We employ a critical literature review as methodology to extract an initial set of eModeration requirements from the literature. The initial set of eModeration requirements are then used as a basis for eliciting requirements from technology acceptance models. The lack of eModeration systems especially in the secondary school environment necessitated a focus on pre- adoption requirements, which was a challenge since most technology acceptance models assume the use of a system. The Human, Organisation and Technology model is useful in supporting pre-adoption requirements and was thus selected as the basis for synthesising the refined set of requirements. The contribution is a set of requirements that should be useful in the design and evaluation of eModeration systems towards ensuring adoption and use.
The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa, Dec 31, 2011
Variability of goals and evolving research methodologies are fundamental characteristics of trans... more Variability of goals and evolving research methodologies are fundamental characteristics of transdisciplinary research. This integration of research strategies from different fields complicates the evaluation of transdisciplinary research since the variability of goals drives variability of criteria and quality indicators. The aim of this research is to investigate the implications of using research methods across disciplinary boundaries by drilling down into the use of one research strategy in one research context (Information Systems) and a related sub-context (Human-Computer Interaction). Surveys with questionnaires as data-capturing tools were selected as an established research method which is widely used in transdisciplinary research. Questionnaires are one of the most established data capturing tools and yet the validity of questionnaire-based findings have often been questioned. The main problem areas have been identified as the sampling of the data, the questionnaire design and the interpretation of the results. This paper looks into questionnaire reporting practices-an essential determinant in the validity and reliability of survey-based research. The field of Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction has been chosen as the research context. Information Systems research is by nature interdisciplinary in focusing on social and organisational issues regarding the development and use of software in organisations. Human-Computer Interaction studies address the challenges of making computers and computations useful, usable, and universally accessible to humans. Both Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction studies address complex, heterogeneous, real-world problems, thereby meeting the first criteria to be classified as transdisciplinary research. The research design entails document analysis of papers presented at conferences in Computer Science and Information Systems over a three-year period to identify trends in the reporting of survey results, especially the questionnaire design. Transdisciplinary research methodology facilitates the application of research methods across fields. However, if the constraints of the method are not recognised the validity of the results may be compromised in a plethora of ways. While fusion of methods are encouraged on a theoretical level in transdisciplinary research the findings of this study are a warning about the dangers of interdisciplinary application of research strategies without due diligence in observing best practices in the parent discipline. The paper aims to advance the discussion on research design and practice beyond disciplinary research and should be of interest to researchers and practitioners who deal with multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary research.
Developing countries and South Africa in specific have shown phenomenal growth in the mobile sect... more Developing countries and South Africa in specific have shown phenomenal growth in the mobile sector. This has ushered in a new era of challenges and opportunities for alleviating digital poverty through distance education. One of these challenges is that many students are mobile primary and accustomed to incorporating their mobile devices' information capabilities into their daily routines while institutional information access is personal computer based. The rapid pace of mobile technology development may well create a mobile divide where educators, administrators and policy makers do not understand the students' usage of mobile devices in teaching and learning. Therefore they may be reluctant to promote mobile-centric access and this will lead to a disparity between information provision and students' information needs. Distance education is often the only higher education opportunity available to developing communities and these communities are generally more mobile centric than pc-centric. Therefore, there is a need at institutional level to understand the mobile information access needs of mobile primary users and to develop strategies that facilitate mobile cellular technology access to services, content and participation. This study investigates students' needs and expectations regarding mobile cellular technology access to educational services, content and participation mechanisms in an open distance learning (ODL) university. The context of this study is the University of South Africa (Unisa). The contribution of the paper is to identify Open ODL students' needs regarding mobile phone access needs to information. The research design includes capturing the students' mobile information access needs by using an open ended survey.
Communications in computer and information science, 2023
The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa
Collaboration among researchers and across disciplinary, organisational and cultural boundaries i... more Collaboration among researchers and across disciplinary, organisational and cultural boundaries is essential for addressing the increasingly complex challenges and opportunities facing international development. Despite the known advantages and various incentives, research collaboration within Africa (specifically within South Africa) is lacking. To better understand the reasons for this lack of research collaboration, this study explored collaboration between students and supervisors in an information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) postgraduate student project in South Africa. South Africa, a country with major social inequalities and asymmetric power relations, provides an appropriate context. The students’ perspectives provided a space for investigating the collaboration factors by unpacking the capability inputs according to Robeyns’ representation of personal capabilities. Data were captured from a survey and focus groups (FG) with students and supervisors...
Developing countries in general, and South Africa in particular has shown phenomenal growth in th... more Developing countries in general, and South Africa in particular has shown phenomenal growth in the mobile cellular technology sector. Providing mobile cellular access to information and services has ushered a new era of challenges and opportunities for Higher Education Institutions. The aim of this article is to investigate students’ needs and expectations regarding mobile cellular technology access to services, content and participation mechanisms in an Open and Distance Learning (ODL) university context. The research methodology is qualitative, with document analysis and a survey as data capturing strategies. The contribution of this article is to refine existing categories of students’ needs regarding mobile phone access and make recommendations about providing mobile cellular technology access to services and content in an ODL university context.
IFIP AICT, 2022
Machine learning, a field of artificial intelligence application, will profoundly impact countrie... more Machine learning, a field of artificial intelligence application, will profoundly impact countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the next few decades. The extent of the impact will depend largely on the countries' readiness. Roadmaps and research agendas towards implementing machine learning for development (ML4D) exist, but little is known about the state of ML4D research in sub-Saharan Africa. Guided by an existing ML4D roadmap, we conducted a critical literature review on selected research publications papers published from 2010 to 2021 with the aim of describing the status of SSA ML publications and informing future research. This should be of interest to researchers and funding organizations investigating the potential impact of ML4D projects in the SSA region.
Government initiatives have been undertaken to provide ICT infrastructure including digital conte... more Government initiatives have been undertaken to provide ICT infrastructure including digital content to public schools in South Africa, however the educators' views on the sustainability of integrating tablet technology into teaching in resource constrained environments have not been adequately advanced. Cost, sustainability and efficient use of ICTs are critical elements which will define ICT's future as an effective tool for social and economic development. The purpose of this paper is to investigate educators' perspectives on digital content and sustained use in integrating tablet technology into teaching in resource constrained environments in South Africa. Participants in the study included educators from eight public schools at one of the school districts in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. A case study approach using open-ended questions was used to gather information on educators' perspectives on content related factors that affect their ability to use tablets for teaching and the steps that can be taken to address their concerns. The findings provided evidence that while educators' use of the tablets is affected by the availability and accessibility of digital content and e-resources for different subjects, communication and knowledge gaps also affect digital content use by educators. The findings validate the elements in existing frameworks and model of sustainability for mobile learning in schools. However, identified differences in the context and environment necessitate some adaptation of the exiting frameworks and the person-centred sustainable model and that was presented as an adapted framework for sustainable mobile learning in resource constrained environments.
Human-computer interaction for development (HCI4D) is an interdisciplinary field aimed at underst... more Human-computer interaction for development (HCI4D) is an interdisciplinary field aimed at understanding and designing technologies for under-served, under-resourced, and underrepresented populations around the world. The interdisciplinary nature complicates knowledge transfer and articulation between the disciplines contributing to the HCI4D domain with the consequence that researchers in one sub-domain do not always build on the extant theoretical and methodological progress in other sub-domains. The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework for HCI4D that could facilitate a better understanding of this domain, for knowledge mobilisation and articulation between researchers in HCI4D and the related field of information and communication technology for development (ICT4D). Previous studies have presented an overview of the HCI4D field in terms of the geographies it covers, technologies it targets, and its varied epistemological and methodological underpinnings. This paper builds on those methodologies and findings to conduct a systematic literature review which revisits the domain questions, thus, the core issues and topics (why), the phenomenon of interest (what) and the research methods (how). A comparison of the findings from three seminal HCI4D papers led to the identification of three core issues (motor themes) namely, context, design and development. Based on Ward's idea of a knowledge mobilisation framework, the findings from the systematic literature review are then synthesised and presented as a framework which comprises the core issues, recurring themes and the salient elements for each of the domain questions. The contribution is a knowledge mobilisation framework to enrich discussions on positioning HCI4D as research field.
In South Africa, the potential of mobile phones as tools that facilitates inclusive information a... more In South Africa, the potential of mobile phones as tools that facilitates inclusive information access and interaction at Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) has not been fully realized. A number of factors could be attributed to the slow growth and they include technological factors, economic factors and human factors. This study focuses on human factors as a source of slow growth in providing students with mobile centric services for information access and interaction. The human factors are the focus of this study because lecturers are critical in the provision of mobile centric services in HEI. Hence, the objective of this study is to investigate the factors that could affect the readiness of lecturers in providing mobile centric services that facilitate students' information access and interaction at HEIs in developing countries. The research was undertaken within the Open and Distance Learning (ODL) context in South Africa. Qualitative data was captured by interviewing fourteen lecturers and the data was analysed using the Framework for Qualitative Data Analysis. The findings of the study revealed that lecturers' readiness is affected by their technical skills in designing mobile phone content and services, workload, motivation and access to resources for designing mobile phone content and services. The contribution of this article is to identify the factors that affect the readiness of HEIs lecturers in providing mobile centric services.
The Information and Communication for Development (ICT4D) research landscape can be described as ... more The Information and Communication for Development (ICT4D) research landscape can be described as a dynamic, fragmented adhocracy and hence, predictably, attempts at producing a shared conceptual framework for the field have had mixed success. Given the multi-, inter-and trans-disciplinary nature of ICT4D it may be impossible to reach complete consensus on such a framework. However, many basic research activities, such as guiding novice researchers and structuring information sources for efficient access, necessitate a shared vocabulary and generally agreed concepts and hence the quest continues. The purpose of this paper is to propose a non-prescriptive, dynamic conceptual framework for ICT4D. An initial representation was developed based on a literature review and an informal expert interview and this was used to categorize the papers in the ICTD2013 conference proceedings. The results were then used to refine the initial framework from the Computer Science and Information Systems perspectives. This paper presents this framework as point of departure for an ongoing discourse with the purpose of structuring the ICT4D research domain.
Students enrolled at Open and Distance Learning (ODL) institutions tend to combine study and work... more Students enrolled at Open and Distance Learning (ODL) institutions tend to combine study and work and to succeed they have to optimize free time for studying. Therefore, many ODL students access and interact with information in a mobile context, which implies that interaction takes place in dynamic and changing environments. This presents students with a number of overlapping contextual challenges that need to be managed when accessing and interacting with information. Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) are also confronted by these challenges as they strive to provide access through technologies that are accessible, usable, scalable and sustainable to students. Against this background, it is important to have an understanding of the categories of information that students would want to access and interact with through the devices that they privately own, of which mobile phones are the most common. This study investigated the categories of information that students would want to access through mobile cellular phones. The data capturing involved both qualitative and quantitative data. In order to get a comprehensive and representative set of information access needs it was necessary to start with openended questions. Based on the analysis of the 50 responses to the open-ended questions, fixed-response questions were formulated. The 84 responses to the fixed-response questions were then analyzed to determine the importance of the information access needs as well as the access frequency. The contribution of this paper is a set of prioritized information needs that provide some insight into the mobile centric information needs of students at the University of South Africa (UNISA) as an example of an ODL institution.
South African journal of higher education, 2016
Supervision is a vital aspect in the success of postgraduate students and even more so in open di... more Supervision is a vital aspect in the success of postgraduate students and even more so in open distance learning. Various factors influence supervision success, some relating to the student, some to the supervisor and others to the institution. This article addresses an over-arching factor, namely the number of stakeholders involved in a supervision relationship, that is termed multiplicity. The allocation of more than one supervisor has capacity implications which have to be traded against improvements in quantitative success measures and quality factors such as richer pools of knowledge and complementary expertise. This study investigates the perceptions on multiplicity of 22 supervisors who have undertaken supervision in ODL contexts. The research strategy is qualitative, based on an open-ended questionnaire survey and interviews. The main contribution is a set of dimensions, comprising factors that influence postgraduate supervision relationships, and the identification of conditions for considering more than one supervisor.
Springer eBooks, 2022
Developing and presenting a well-formulated research argument is core to the learning journey of ... more Developing and presenting a well-formulated research argument is core to the learning journey of a graduate student. In open distance e-learning, computer-supported learning is instrumental in providing a platform for graduate students to develop their argumentation skills. However, there is little guidance on the elements required in using computer supportive collaborative learning (CSCL) to augment argumentation skills development (ASD). This paper reports on elements identified in literature that should be present in a framework using CSCL to augment ASD. The thematically analysed data gathered during the focus group sessions were used to confirm the structure of the argumentation skills development framework (ASDF), and confirmed that there is a need for a framework to provide guidance in using CSCL to augment ASD. The contribution includes the conceptual ASDF using CSCL, comprising seven elements, that provides a strategy of scaffolded learning for implementation in a graduate course to augment ASD.
Springer eBooks, Sep 17, 2021
The 2020 COVID-19 health pandemic has accelerated the trend towards digitizing education. Increas... more The 2020 COVID-19 health pandemic has accelerated the trend towards digitizing education. Increased digitization necessitates a robust and regulatory framework for monitoring standards in a knowledge society, which requires adaptivity to the continuous changes in the quality assurance processes (moderation). This provides the rationale for an investigation into the literature trends in eModeration processes. This study draws on a systematic literature review as methodology to examine the extant literature on trends in eModeration research including the purpose of the research, methodologies and limitations regarding existing eModeration systems. The findings reveal that there is little, if any, empirical evidence of systems dedicated to online moderation of assessments specifically within the secondary school sector and that eModeration is mainly an emergent phenomenon with numerous adoption challenges, especially in resource constrained contexts.
Capacity in and enhancement of critical, scarce and intermediate skills are seen as a national pr... more Capacity in and enhancement of critical, scarce and intermediate skills are seen as a national priority in South Africa. The Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) in South Africa has prioritized the success of the Further Education and Training (FET) sector to meet this need for capacity development in critical, scarce and intermediate skills. Management information systems (MIS) are pivotal in the efficient and effective running of FET colleges. Therefore, the evaluation of MIS success is an essential spoke in the wheel of FET college success. The problem is that no MIS success evaluation model for FET colleges could be found. In this paper, we describe the development and testing of an evaluation model and tool for MIS success. Information system's evaluation theory and an analysis of FET policy documents were used to propose an initial success evaluation model and tool (questionnaire) for an educational environment (FET colleges) in South Africa. Using a quantitative approach the tool was applied in a survey at one public FET college to evaluate the success of the MIS deployed at the college. Findings from the survey lead to the refinement of the model which is also articulated in this paper and reflected as the SA-FETMIS model. The paper is novel in proposing an IS theory based model and tool which can be used to evaluate MIS success at FET colleges and similar education contexts. The paper should be of interest to researchers in the field of Information Systems success evaluation and also to practitioners and managers in the field of Education.
eModeration is an essential aspect of quality assurance in electronic learning, but eModeration s... more eModeration is an essential aspect of quality assurance in electronic learning, but eModeration systems are not a regular feature of assessment in educational institutions. One reason could be the lack of evidence-based requirements to guide the implementation and evaluation of eModeration systems. To ensure adoption, it is important that eModeration system requirements comply with technology acceptance requirements. The purpose of this paper is to determine the adoption requirements for the development of an eModeration system. We employ a critical literature review as methodology to extract an initial set of eModeration requirements from the literature. The initial set of eModeration requirements are then used as a basis for eliciting requirements from technology acceptance models. The lack of eModeration systems especially in the secondary school environment necessitated a focus on pre- adoption requirements, which was a challenge since most technology acceptance models assume the use of a system. The Human, Organisation and Technology model is useful in supporting pre-adoption requirements and was thus selected as the basis for synthesising the refined set of requirements. The contribution is a set of requirements that should be useful in the design and evaluation of eModeration systems towards ensuring adoption and use.
The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa, Dec 31, 2011
Variability of goals and evolving research methodologies are fundamental characteristics of trans... more Variability of goals and evolving research methodologies are fundamental characteristics of transdisciplinary research. This integration of research strategies from different fields complicates the evaluation of transdisciplinary research since the variability of goals drives variability of criteria and quality indicators. The aim of this research is to investigate the implications of using research methods across disciplinary boundaries by drilling down into the use of one research strategy in one research context (Information Systems) and a related sub-context (Human-Computer Interaction). Surveys with questionnaires as data-capturing tools were selected as an established research method which is widely used in transdisciplinary research. Questionnaires are one of the most established data capturing tools and yet the validity of questionnaire-based findings have often been questioned. The main problem areas have been identified as the sampling of the data, the questionnaire design and the interpretation of the results. This paper looks into questionnaire reporting practices-an essential determinant in the validity and reliability of survey-based research. The field of Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction has been chosen as the research context. Information Systems research is by nature interdisciplinary in focusing on social and organisational issues regarding the development and use of software in organisations. Human-Computer Interaction studies address the challenges of making computers and computations useful, usable, and universally accessible to humans. Both Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction studies address complex, heterogeneous, real-world problems, thereby meeting the first criteria to be classified as transdisciplinary research. The research design entails document analysis of papers presented at conferences in Computer Science and Information Systems over a three-year period to identify trends in the reporting of survey results, especially the questionnaire design. Transdisciplinary research methodology facilitates the application of research methods across fields. However, if the constraints of the method are not recognised the validity of the results may be compromised in a plethora of ways. While fusion of methods are encouraged on a theoretical level in transdisciplinary research the findings of this study are a warning about the dangers of interdisciplinary application of research strategies without due diligence in observing best practices in the parent discipline. The paper aims to advance the discussion on research design and practice beyond disciplinary research and should be of interest to researchers and practitioners who deal with multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary research.
Developing countries and South Africa in specific have shown phenomenal growth in the mobile sect... more Developing countries and South Africa in specific have shown phenomenal growth in the mobile sector. This has ushered in a new era of challenges and opportunities for alleviating digital poverty through distance education. One of these challenges is that many students are mobile primary and accustomed to incorporating their mobile devices' information capabilities into their daily routines while institutional information access is personal computer based. The rapid pace of mobile technology development may well create a mobile divide where educators, administrators and policy makers do not understand the students' usage of mobile devices in teaching and learning. Therefore they may be reluctant to promote mobile-centric access and this will lead to a disparity between information provision and students' information needs. Distance education is often the only higher education opportunity available to developing communities and these communities are generally more mobile centric than pc-centric. Therefore, there is a need at institutional level to understand the mobile information access needs of mobile primary users and to develop strategies that facilitate mobile cellular technology access to services, content and participation. This study investigates students' needs and expectations regarding mobile cellular technology access to educational services, content and participation mechanisms in an open distance learning (ODL) university. The context of this study is the University of South Africa (Unisa). The contribution of the paper is to identify Open ODL students' needs regarding mobile phone access needs to information. The research design includes capturing the students' mobile information access needs by using an open ended survey.
Communications in computer and information science, 2023
The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa
Collaboration among researchers and across disciplinary, organisational and cultural boundaries i... more Collaboration among researchers and across disciplinary, organisational and cultural boundaries is essential for addressing the increasingly complex challenges and opportunities facing international development. Despite the known advantages and various incentives, research collaboration within Africa (specifically within South Africa) is lacking. To better understand the reasons for this lack of research collaboration, this study explored collaboration between students and supervisors in an information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) postgraduate student project in South Africa. South Africa, a country with major social inequalities and asymmetric power relations, provides an appropriate context. The students’ perspectives provided a space for investigating the collaboration factors by unpacking the capability inputs according to Robeyns’ representation of personal capabilities. Data were captured from a survey and focus groups (FG) with students and supervisors...
Developing countries in general, and South Africa in particular has shown phenomenal growth in th... more Developing countries in general, and South Africa in particular has shown phenomenal growth in the mobile cellular technology sector. Providing mobile cellular access to information and services has ushered a new era of challenges and opportunities for Higher Education Institutions. The aim of this article is to investigate students’ needs and expectations regarding mobile cellular technology access to services, content and participation mechanisms in an Open and Distance Learning (ODL) university context. The research methodology is qualitative, with document analysis and a survey as data capturing strategies. The contribution of this article is to refine existing categories of students’ needs regarding mobile phone access and make recommendations about providing mobile cellular technology access to services and content in an ODL university context.