Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / South African society is regulated by inequality and discrimination based on race. Fundamental human rights and privileges have been extended only to a small sector of the population. The majority of South African citizens remain constrained within a context of imposed inferiority in every aspect of their lives. Inequality, entrenched in political and economic apartheid structures, is also reflected in educational provision for Black citizens. Decades of apartheid schooling have resulted in a large population of illiterate, low-literate and educationally disadvantaged adults. Educational, political and economic discrimination all contribute to relegate Blacks to the lowest socioeconomic strata of South African society. Since numerous Blacks, particularly Africans, are restricted from effectively learning in South African schools, there is an escalating need for compensatory adult education Segregation and unequal educational provision have always characterized education in South Africa. The system of apartheid schooling was formalized by the government in 1953 when different education systems for distinct population groups were introduced. Inequalities in the structural features of apartheid schooling were evident in the discriminatory allocation of funds for public education. In 1953 government funds allocated for the education of each White child were approximately R128 (Rands), for every Indian and Coloured child R40, and for every African child R17 (a 7:1 ratio between the 'White and the African allocations). In 1976, the year of uprising by school children in Soweto, the discrepancy in allocation of educational funds had widened to a 10:1 ratio with the White allocation rising to R724, Indian to R357, Coloured to R226, and Africans to only R71 (Horrell, 1982, p. 115). At that time White, Indian and Coloured children were provided with at least ten years of free compulsory schooling. Nonetheless, the unequal distribution of educational funds afforded White children better educational facilities and better qualified teachers than those provided for other racial groups. The deliberate system of uneven educational provision for the various population registration groups was reinforced in the early 1960's with the progressive extension of free and compulsory schooling to Coloureds and Indians. This was done through the Coloured Person's Education Act of 1963 and the Indian Education Act of 1965. Africans, who constituted the majority of the population and who could least afford to pay for education, were not granted free and compulsory education until almost 20 years later. Not unexpectedly, failure and drop out rates among Africans within this system were very high, with the majority of school goers not staying beyond primary school (seven years) (Christie, 1986). Until the 1970's approximately 70 percent of Africans attending schools were attending primary school, and less than 1 percent of Africans were in Matric, the final year of formal schooling in South Africa (Christie, 1986, p. 56).In the late 1970's the White-controlled government was forced to make changes in Black education. In 1976 Black South African school children throughout the country demonstrated to the world their intolerance of the apartheid education system by rising up in protest. Continued school unrest into the 1980's not only revealed the need for an immediate and critical assessment of South African schooling, but also demanded an examination of the whole spectrum of education in South Africa. The immediate government response to these protests took the form of violent repression, student expulsions, school closures, teacher and student arrests, and the banning of 18 Black consciousness groups. Only in 1981 did the government react to the educational crisis in a more conciliatory manner with the establishment of the De Lange Commission of Inquiry. The proposals made by the Commission challenged the fundamental structures of apartheid society. The Commission recommended a single, unitary department of education for all South Africans and a changed school structure. After dragging its feet for two years, the government officially rejected the Commission's recommendation for a unitary education system for all South Africans.

This thesis deals with design of a laser position detector. Different types of sensor are mentioned and compared at the beginning. Special attention is paid to quadrant sensor. Its pros and cons are discussed with designing methods. The sensor is simulated in Matlab to test its output response. Then the laboratory tests follow to meassure real response of the chip. Then follows the design of the detector based on measured and simulated data. In the conclusion of this thesis parameters of created device are evaluated.

The topic of this thesis is the design and realization of a modular Data concentrator for various types of measurements in diverse conditions. The device conception, basic principles, design and functionality are described herein. Also, the lightweight protocol design for radio communication, standardized XML format for data storage and cloud usage are described. The electrical design of the device as well as the design of the printed circuit board was made using the Eagle Autodesk electronic design automation software (Eagle Autodesk EDA). The control software written in C/C++ for a target microcontroller (ESP32-WROOM-32) is based on a FreeRTOS platform and ESP-IDF framework. An IDE for managing this software is Visual Studio Code with PlatformIO extension. Selected and used Cloud Platform is ThingSpeak from Mathworks, which uses certain components from Matlab platform.

This thesis deals with design of electronic laboratory model for teaching mechatronic subjects. The main part of the model consists of a RLC-circuit embedded in PCB. Other parts of PCB and data acquisition card mediate communication with Matlab environment. In the thesis the progress of design process, simulation, manufacture and model testing is described. The results are functioning educational model and several educational tasks, for which the solution are presented.

The present thesis is focused on all pass filters. The principle of all pass filters, their properties, the design of nth degree of these circuits will be analysed in succession and then some of functional blocks, by which these structures can be made, will be described. After that, the allpass filters will be designed and simulated in program OrCAD PSpice. First of all, the analysis will be performed with ideal components, then with real components. After that, the sensitivity and tolerance analysis will be made and the influence of parasite effects on circuit parameters will be examined. Once the experiments are finished, the design of Printed Circuit Board's (PCB) will be realized. Circuit showing the best parameters will be chosen for the design.

The work describes the design and implementation of compact inverter for brushless DC motor, which have mechanical power 600 W and rated torque 1.6 Nm. Motor is designed for DC link voltage with value 300 V. The focus is placed on the cost and simplicity. On this basis, the inverter is designed for uses single purpose power and control circuit. The power part is solved using a circuit FSBB15CH60C. The circuit is placed on a separate board of power electronics. Cooling of the power circuit is performed by the surface structure of BLDC motor. Control of the inverter ensures circuits LB11696V and NE566. The both circuits are placed on separate board of control electronics. Circuit LB11696V contains a control algorithm, as well as protections, which are necessary for safe operation of the inverter. Power supply of electronics is performed using step-down converter from MYRRA company.

The master’s thesis describes development of control system for automatic mouth-organ. The process of development is divided into three parts: a concept of control system, design of hardware parts and development of software parts. Controlled device, system requirements and general design of the hardware and software components are described in the concept of control system. The detailed hardware design includes next processes: electronic component selection, printed circuit board design, assembly and debugging. The result of this chapter is electronic system, which function correctly. The aim of the last chapter is to specify and explain development of software parts of control system. Installation of required software and important aspects of control software and user interface development are described in this chapter. The goal of the thesis is to create a control system, which will function correctly and reliably.

This master’s thesis describes a wireless accelerometer module. The aim of this work was to study the properties and involvement of the accelerometer, wireless module design for data transfering from the accelerometer to the PC and the module implementation. As a wireless device is used bluetooth module that enables communication between the product and the computer. The wireless module used rechargable lithium ion battery that helps keep module alive without adapter or net cable.

This thesis deals with the measurement of physical quantities in building using decentralized system for data collecting. The system consists of Raspberry Pi as a master device of the system. There are three branches connected to this master device. Each branch consists of up to 32 modules for data-concentration from sensors of physical quantities. The Raspberry Pi has implemented web interface for displaying measured values and system administration.

This paper deals with the hardware and software design of the data acquisition distributed system with large amount of connected sensors. The intended application of this work is measuring some physical quantities in the building constructions. The designed system is hierarchically divided into the three levels. On the highest level there is a single-board computer Raspberry Pi which is used as a master on RS-485 bus. There can be up to 32 slave devices on the bus while each of them collects data from the sensors connected to 4-channel I2C bus. At the same time the Raspberry Pi is used as a web server, providing the user interface of the system.