This study was conducted at the University of South Africa in the Department of Information Science and looked at the students’ perception about e-learning. The study context was Open Distance Learning (ODL) which allows multi-dimensional e-learning aimed at bridging the time, geographical, economic, social, educational and communication distance between student and institution, student and academics, student and courseware and student and peers. It has emerged in the literature that student’ perceptions and understanding of e-learning are susceptible to challenges related to infrastructure, geographic location, skills set, support services, pedagogical matters and other related matters. These challenges are likely to affect the students’ perceptions of e-learning which is likely to have a negative impact on effective learning as well as success and completion rates. The main aim of the study was to examine the perceptions of Information Science students towards e-learning. This study opted for multi-methods. The quantitative approach which involves the use of controlled questionnaires was employed. The questionnaire was designed in the web survey for the purpose of reaching scattered respondents and the opportunity to obtain large numbers of respondents to contribute. Also the qualitative method was considered as appropriate for this study because it helped to conceptualise the research and enabled the researcher to gather information from lecturers on influencing students and the strategies used to promote e-learning. The overall population of this study was 125 students and 17 lecturers. The study revealed that not all students knew what e-learning was, and the major challenge was the internet access as students complained about the shortage of internet bundles. Many students at UNISA considered e-learning as a flexible for teaching and studying method because it is not bound to a particular time and place, also they commended that the usability of myUnisa has created more accessibility in learning environment for tuition. If the current students are not assisted with the lowest prices for internet access, students might not continue interacting with lecturers in the e-learning platforms. Also, first year students at UNISA should be trained for the e-learning environment and be given an overview of the UNISA e-learning platform. / Information Science / M. Inf.

The study was necessitated by the fact that the throughput rates of accounting students studying at distance learning institutions in South Africa are disturbingly low when compared to students studying at residential universities. Bearing in mind the magnitude of the University of South Africa’s (Unisa’s) market share of accounting students in South Africa, it was pivotal to comprehend the unique challenges related to retention and throughput of these students. This thesis reports on a case study of the use of mobile phones in an Accounting module by applying the theories of didactic conversation and transactional distance to understand the retention and throughput rates of the Accounting students in an open distance learning (ODL) environment. Considering the landscape of accounting education in South Africa, the specific challenges faced by accounting students at Unisa and the recent scholarly discourse on retention and throughput of distance education students, this study contributes to the limited theoretical understanding of students’ retention and throughput rates in an Accounting module at Unisa. This theoretical understanding has been obtained through combining the transactional distance theory of Moore (1973) and the didactic conversation of Holmberg (1982) in a single conceptual framework. By applying this framework, this thesis makes an original contribution to the deepening understanding of the retention and throughput rates of accounting students in an ODL environment. The study has shown that retention and throughput rates can be improved through the lessening of the transactional distance between facilitator and student and by improving the quality and extent of the two-way didactic conversation in the learning process. To this effect, the study provided empirical evidence of the successful use of various complementing technology interventions, suitable for accounting students with time constraints, to enhance the learning process. / Management Accounting / D. Com.

Within medical facilities in South Africa, including the Western Cape, language barriers often exist between healthcare professionals and their patients. This can cause a barrier to efficient patient treatment. In order to address this problem, educational institutions in the Western Cape have started to introduce Xhosa language facilitation for healthcare professionals. In order to facilitate the learning of this additional language, the use of e-learning as a complement to traditional classroom lectures was investigated. The students who participated in this Xhosa language facilitation were specifically identified. This study was quantitative in nature and questionnaires were used. It was concluded that the combination of lectures and the complementary e-learning component helps to improve the student’s ability to learn an additional language, in this case Xhosa. Recommendations were made that would possibly alleviate the problem of language barriers in healthcare settings in the Western Cape. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / M. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

This is a phenomenographic study, of which the aim was to explore the variation of experiences, needs, views and understandings through a phenomenographic study of academics who were enrolled in the MEd in Open and Distance Learning (ODL) at Unisa during 2012-2015. The MEd in ODL is a dual university programme between University of South Africa (Unisa) and University of Maryland University College (UMUC). The research question was around issues which Unisa academic staff members experienced during the course of their enrolment for the MEd in ODL. Relevant scholarly literature on online learning, theories for online learning, and previous research on online learning, was surveyed in this regard. Variation theory which framed the study through a phenomenographic research lens was described. Interviews were conducted with seven participants from the students on the MEd in ODL programme. Postings on MyUnisa Discussion Forum which were treated as data were analysed in relation to the aspects raised in the interviews. The findings revealed students’ varied online experiences in the three main aspects namely, experience and understanding, understanding the object of learning and learning objects. Important recommendations made, were based on the findings. In conclusion, the findings exhibited students’ varied experiences about issues which they battle with in the MEd in ODL programme, of which Unisa should take into consideration as they further enrol students in the programme. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / M. Ed. (Open and Distance Learning)

Submitted in fulfilment of the requirement for the degree MAGISTER TECHNOLOGIAE in Quality Faculty of Engineering CAPE PENINSULA UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, 2012 / Post apartheid South Africa experienced major economic turbulence with poverty, unemployment and skills shortage, with most manufacturing and other key economic sectors affected by poor productivity and a subsequent downsizing of their labour work force. At the same time, many economic opportunities arose, including the full impact of globalisation, the emergence of China and Africa as economic partners and becoming a full member of the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) economic development group by the year 2010. The government and business communities at large realised the necessity for skills augmentation in order to expedite economic development and alleviate the scarcity of employment opportunities and growth across the major economic sectors. The backdrop of the economic upheaval of 2008 and 2009 placed manufacturing firms under pressure to reconsider their current operational strategies by streamlining their organisations and adopting aggressive lean and cost saving approaches in order to remain competitive. There is a perceived lack of alignment between industry and institutions alike, sometimes resulting in a perception that graduating industrial engineers do not entirely match industry expectations. Thus, it is imperative to explore the articulation and relationship between those industries that rely on the skills of industrial engineering technologists and the graduate industrial engineers with emphasis on the skills expectations as stressed by the national priorities and the academic capacity to meet these skills expectation in today’s competitive professional arena. This perceived lack of alignment between end user requirements and the service provided falls within the ambit of the field of quality management. This study focuses on two main sample groups within two areas of interest: • The industrial engineering student community and their respective academic environments; and • the relevant industrial engineering industry and its working environment. A self-administered questionnaire coupled with a number of interviews is employed in order to gather the required data. Grouped samples, involve the relevant industry employers, students and academic institutions. The research explores the pertinent roles and responsibilities expected of industrial engineers and industrial engineering technologists on entry into the working environment, as compared to the current level of training offered by various institutional bodies as expressed by the South African qualifications authority (SAQA) and the national qualifications framework (NQF). The validation of the analysis and outcomes of the study culminates through the exploration of the following: • The influence of skills levels on productivity within the relevant industrial engineering industries. • The demand and supply of industrial engineering skills. • Skilling industrial engineering graduates for their required roles and responsibilities. • Governing bodies responsible for the curriculation of industrial engineering programmes, offered by institutions of higher learning. The study aims to proffer valuable knowledge by identifying better opportunities for employment in the industrial engineering field, the addition of value towards better industrial engineering schooling and output quality of students emerging from institutions, and lastly superseding earlier misconceived perceptions of industrial engineering.

At an international level, demands for accountability in respect of the quality of teaching and learning in higher education are increasing. This is also the case in South Africa. The response to these demands has taken the form of the introduction of quality assurance systems to higher education. In South Africa, a formal national external quality assurance was introduced to the higher education system in 2001 as a result of the establishment of the Higher Education Quality Committee. The Higher Education Quality Committee is a standing committee of the South African Council on Higher Education. Like other quality assurance agencies across the world, the Higher Education Quality Committee has the responsibility for i) auditing institutions of higher education and ii) accrediting learning programmes. The first cycle of institutional audits ran from 2004 until 2011. As quality assurance was introduced to the higher education system and the first cycle of institutional audits began, universities in South Africa developed policies and procedures intended to assure quality in three areas of their core functioning: research, teaching and learning and community engagement. The University of Venda, which is the focus of the study on which this thesis is based, was no exception. As a practitioner in the Centre for Higher Education Teaching and Learning at The University of Venda, it was my observation that the policies and procedures intended to assure quality in teaching and learning were not always implemented by academic staff members. This was in spite of poor student performance data which raised questions about the quality of the teaching and learning processes in place. The study underpinning this thesis was designed to explore this phenomenon. More specifically, it aimed to identify the conditions enabling and constraining the implementation of policies and procedures in two Schools in the University: the School of Health Sciences and the School of Human and Social Sciences. In order to explore these conditions, I adopted Roy Bhaskar’s Critical Realism as an under-labouring philosophy for the study. Critical realism posits a view of reality comprising three strata, none of which can be reducible to the other. The first of these strata is termed the level of the Empirical and consists of the experiences and observations which become apparent to us through the senses. The second layer, the Actual, consists of events from which these experiences and observations emerge. Underpinning both of these layers is a further layer, the Real, which is not accessible by empirical means and which consists of structures and mechanisms which generate both events at the level of the Actual and experiences and observation at the level of the Empirical. The design of my study sought to reach this deepest layer of reality to identify these mechanisms. Bhaskar’s critical realism is philosophy which needs to be operationalized using substantive, or explanatory, theory. For this purpose, I drew on Margaret Archer’s social realism. The design on my study drew on case study methodology and involved in-depth interviews with members of the two Schools which each formed cases within the more overarching case of the University itself. In addition to these interviews, I analysed a range of institutional documents related to the assurance of quality in teaching and learning. The exploration of enabling and constraining conditions at the level of the Real allow me to make a series of recommendations in the final Chapter of my thesis intended to enhance the quality assurance system introduced to the University.

Arising from Marxist theory, critical theory investigates the mechanisms that enable continued domination in capitalist society, with a view to revealing the real, but obscured, nature of social relations and enabling these to be challenged by subjugated classes. Within the broad spectrum of Marxist theory, social relations of domination and subordination are assigned according to the relationship of social classes to economic production. However, the neo-Marxist perspective developed by Antonio Gramsci locates relations of power within the broader context of the political economy. In doing so, the role of the State in a capitalist society assumes greater significance than that of maintaining and securing social relations on behalf of the dominant class through coercion and force. Instead, the State embarks on a range of activities in the attempted “exercise of hegemony”, or the cultivation of general acceptance by all social classes of existing social relations and conditions. Gramsci refers to this desired outcome as “consent”, the product of the successful exercise of hegemony, a political function which is thus crucial to the accumulation of capital. When unsuccessful, dissent cannot be contained by the State, and the extent to which contestation constitutes a threat is revealed by recourse to coercion. The manner in which relations of power are cemented through the exercise of hegemony lies at the core of this thesis. It investigates the relationship between the State and the administrators of an institution within civil society, the University of Fort Hare, as well as the responses to the activities of the State and University Administration within the University itself, over an extended period of time between 1916 and 2000. This period is divided into three specific time frames, according to changes in the expression of the South African State. In general, it is seen that conformity characterises the relationship between the State and the University Administration, underscoring the success of the State in fostering the role of education in the reproduction of social relations and values and in eliciting conformity. The nature of conformity is seen to vary according to different expressions of the State and changes in social relations, which are in turn informed by the overarching political economy and events taking place within society and the University of Fort Hare. Manifestations of consent and dissent, as responses to the attempted exercise of hegemony, are presented in the three periods corresponding to different expressions of the State. Four reasons for conformity, as presented by Gramscian scholar Joseph V Femia (1981), are utilised in order to explain and illustrate the nature of control and compliance at the University of Fort Hare between 1916 and 2000.

Throughput rates and student retention are a burning concern that all higher education institutions share, as student dropout rates remain high. Promoting student academic success has become imperative. This study is concerned with students who display innate resilience and overcome adversities in their personal lives, but fail to demonstrate resilience when it comes to being academically successful. The objective of this study was to explore: (1) the personal resilience in at-risk students who overcome adversities in their personal lives, but fail to demonstrate resilience when it comes to being academically successful and (2) how their personal resilience can be tapped into to promote academic success. A mixed methods approach was used, employing both quantitative and qualitative methods. At-risk students at a particular higher education institution were identified using their study records. From these students a subgroup of resilient students were selected by means of a resilience questionnaire. This group completed a pre-interview questionnaire, resulting in 10 students being selected on the grounds of being information rich cases of the at-risk resilient student. Through the process of social constructivism and dialogue between the researcher and the participants, themes were identified and analysed using an inductive data analysis style. The data was finally linked to supportive literature. The primary finding was that the same protective factors that can assist a student in developing innate resilience, can also cause the student to be placed academically at- risk. The study further revealed, that if the environment in which students find themselves does not allow them to negotiate for resources, these students' innate resilience alone cannot assist them to overcome the challenges of higher education. The researcher concludes that higher education institutions in their attempts to retain and assist students should be encouraged to tap into students’ innate resilience to develop their academic resilience / Psychology / M. A. (Psychology)

The study sought to understand how higher education institutions conceptualize and teach academic literacy at the two regional universities in KwaZulu Natal. That was done by determining the extent to which academic literacy curriculum provides for the acquisition of academic literacy skills across a diverse range of student teachers. It was done to determine the role it plays in student’s learning, in terms of the topics that are incorporated in the academic literacy curriculum and by establishing how student teachers, view the academic literacy module in terms of its benefits to them. This study is underpinned by both the sociocultural and sociocognitive theories. A qualitative research approach and a case study research design were adopted by the study. Participants were three lecturers teaching academic literacy in Institutions understudy and eleven, fourth-year student - teachers who were registered for the academic literacy module in their first year of study. Data collection instruments used were, semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews and document analysis in the form of module outlines. The findings from the lecturers’ point of view, show that their teaching qualification and teaching experience assist them when teaching academic literacy module. The findings further revealed that both lecturers and students view academic literacy as the core of the module. The study also highlighted that students should be actively involved during the teaching and learning process and that feedback plays an important role in students’ learning. From the students’ perspective, the findings revealed that the students improved on their understanding of academic requirements and in their academic writing. The students also viewed the module as a leveller because irrespective of their background they were also of the view that academic literacy should be viewed as a way of life. The study also highlighted that the usage of English as a medium of instruction to students whose mother tongue is not English is a challenge and so is the gap between the secondary schooling system and the Institutions of higher learning. The recommendations of the study based on the research findings are that the generic form in which the module is currently offered, does benefit them and it should be continued. However, there is a need to consider discipline-specific interventions where students are exposed to their disciplinary discourses. The study also proposed the model to improve academic literacy in Higher Education. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

PhD (Business Management) / Department of Business Management / This thesis demonstrates the researcher’s efforts to put into practice the theoretical foundations of information systems research, in order to come up with a context-aware business intelligence framework (CABIF), for the South African higher education institutions. Using critical realism as the philosophical underpinning and mixed methods research design, a business intelligence (BI) survey was deployed within the South African public higher education institutions to measure the respondents’ satisfaction and importance of business intelligence characteristics. The 258 respondents’ satisfaction and importance of the 34 observed business intelligence variables, were subjected to principal components analysis and design science research to come up with the CABIF. The observable BI variables were drawn from four latent variables namely technology and business alignment; organizational and behavioural strategies; business intelligence domain; and technology strategies. The study yielded good values for all the observed satisfaction and importance business intelligence variables as indicated by the Kaiser- Meyer-Olkin (KMO) Measure of Sampling Adequacy and the Bartlett Test of Sphericity. The data set collected from the survey deployed at the South African public higher education institutions, was reliable and valid based on the Cronbach α values which were all above 0.9. The researcher then used the descriptive and prescriptive knowledge of design science research, and the meta-inferences of the results from the principal components analysis to produce five contexts of CABIF. The BI contexts developed were, the Basic Context; the Business Processes Context which was divided into Macro and Micro business process contexts; the Business Intelligence Context; and the Governance Context. These contexts were extrapolated within the University of Venda’s business processes and this researcher concluded that the CABIF developed, could be inferred within the South African higher education institutions. At the University of Venda, this researcher managed to draw up CABIF based business intelligence tools that spanned from leveraging the existing ICT infrastructure, student cohort analysis, viability of academic entities, strategic enrolment planning and forecasting government block grants. The correlations and regression measures of the technology acceptance variables of the business intelligence tools modelled using CABIF at University of Venda, revealed high acceptance ratio. Overall, this research provides a myriad of conceptual and practical insights into how contextualised aspects of BI directly or indirectly impact on the quality of managerial decision making within various core business contexts of South African higher education institutions.