Idag byggs fler bostäder än vad som gjorts under de senaste 60 åren. Det finns många utmaningar med den volym bostäder som behöver byggas. Många bostäder kommer byggas i exploateringsområden, detta ställer krav på infrastrukturinvesteringar exempelvis i form av nya skolor. Enligt prognoser kommer antalet grundskoleelever öka med 250 000 till år 2025. Detta innebär ett behov av 1000 nya skolor på tio år. Behovet av skolor är långsiktigt och lärmiljöer behöver planeras för att vara långsiktiga. Dagsljus och utblick har en stor inverkan på vår arbetsmiljö, prestation och är nödvändig för vår hälsa. Studier har visat att dagsljusbelysta skolmiljöer får elever att prestera bättre. Trots detta har vi sedan 50-talet halverat kravet på dagsljusnivåer i skolor från 2 % till 1,0 % dagsljusfaktor. Idag har vi samma dagsljuskrav för klassrum som för ett sovrum i en bostad. Syftet med examenarbetet är att problematisera moderna skolmiljöer sett ur dagsljusets betydelse för hälsa och prestation i relation till dagens myndighetskrav för tillgång av dagsljus. Vidare syftar arbetet till att ta fram goda exempel på dagsljuslösningar som kan nyttjas vid utformning av moderna skolmiljöer. För att bedöma moderna skolors dagsljustillgång har ett urval av fem skolor i Stockholmsområdet utgjort studieobjekt där tillgången på dagsljus undersökts mot myndighetskraven. Undersökning av studieobjekten har utförts genom 3D modellering i Rhinoceros 3D samt dagsljusfaktorsimuleringar i programmet Grasshopper och Honeybee. Studieobjekten har modellerats upp efter inhämtade bygglovsritningar och dagsljussimuleringarna har utförts med simuleringsmotorn Radiance. Resultatet från dagsljusfaktorsimuleringen visar att ingen av de undersökta skolornas fullt ut uppfyller myndighetskraven. Anledningen till varför skolornas undersökta rum inte uppfyller kraven varierar mellan eller utgör en kombination av; rumsdjup, fönsterstorlek, fönstersättning i fasad, avskärmningsvinklar, avskärmande byggnadsdelar och fast solavskärmning. Undersökningen visar att rum som hemvistytor och uppehållsrum ofta saknar fönster mot det fria och följaktligen underkänns. Dessa rum är vanligt förekommande vid nyttjande av progressiva pedagogiska inriktningar. Beroende på rummens tilltänkta användning kan de komma att klassas som vistelserum och behöver därför tillgång till dagsljus. Ur litteraturgenomgången förstås att en tidig integrering av dagsljusdesign i gestaltningsprocessen är nödvändigt för att säkerställa en god tillgång till dagsljus i lärmiljöer. Som del av examensarbetet har därför ett gestaltningsförslag tagits fram där en dagsljusdesign nyttjas. Iterativt under gestaltningsprocessen har dagsljustillgång simulerats för att motivera gjorda designval och säkerställa en god dagsljusnivå. För jämförande och platsspecifika resultat har klimatbaserade simuleringsmetoder använts. Det nyttjade mätvärdet Optimal Day-lit Area (ODA) simulerar användbarheten i det tillgängliga dagsljusets belysningsstyrka över ett år. Samtidigt tar ODA hänsyn till överbelyst golvyta som kan vara problematisk då obehagsbländning och överhettning kan uppstå. Det presenterade gestaltningsförslaget utgör ett konceptförslag i syfte att gestalta användningen av en integrerad dagsljusdesignprocess och dess resultat. / Currently more housing is being built than in the past 60 years. There are many challenges accompanied with the volume of housing that needs to be built. Many of the dwellings that are going to be built are placed in new densely planned urban areas, which imposes requirements for infrastructure investments, for example in the form of new schools. According to forecasts, the number of students in primary school will increase by 250,000 by the year 2025. This implies a need for approximately 1000 new schools in ten years. The need for new schools are long term and therefore the learning environments need to be designed to be long term. Daylight and view have a major impact on our work environment, performance and are necessary for our health. Studies have shown that daylight-lit school environments enhance the performance of the students. The building legislation regulates the required levels using the daylight factor metric. Since the 50’s the requirements of daylight levels in schools have been approximately halved from 2 % to 1,0 %. Today the daylight requirements are the same for classrooms as for bedrooms in dwellings. The purpose of this thesis is to examine modern school environments in relation to today's regulatory requirements for access to daylight. Furthermore, the work aims to produce good examples of daylight solutions that can be used when designing modern school environments against the regulatory requirements. To assess the daylight access in modern schools, a selection of three nursery schools and two primary schools in the vicinity of Stockholm were chosen. Case studies were conducted using the 3D modelling software, Rhinoceros 3D and the daylight factor was then simulated using the Grasshopper and Honeybee plug-ins. The schools were modelled according to the acquired drawings and daylight were performed using the simulation engine Radiance. The result from the daylight factor simulation show that none of the schools examined fully meet the requirements. The reasons why the examined schools do not meet the requirements vary between or constitute a combination of; room depth, window size, window façade, obstruction angles, obstructing components and shading devices. The study shows that rooms such as: common areas and study hall often lack windows towards the outside and therefore only gets borrowed light from other areas. These kinds of rooms are common when using progressive pedagogical approaches. Depending on the intended future use of the rooms, they may be classified in such a way that they need to fulfil the regulations regarding daylight. From the literature review it is understood that early integration of daylight design in the design process is necessary to ensure good accesses to daylight in learnings environments. As a part of the thesis project, a design proposal has been developed using a daylight design process. During the design process, the access to daylight has been iteratively simulated to motivate selected design choices and ensure a good daylight level.  For comparison and site-specific results, climate-based simulation methods have been used. The use of the Optimal Day-lit Area (ODA) metric measures the usefulness of the available daylight illumination intensity over a year. At the same time, ODA takes the eventual over lit areas that may cause overheating and glare into account. The presented design proposal demonstrates the use of an integrated daylight design process and its results.

A large number of students are struggling with Information System and other computer related subjects. This has a negative impact on students’ academic performance at large. In fact, a number of students from various institutions of higher learning are facing serious Information System challenges. Information System student on NATED curriculum at Majuba TVET College are facing serious challenges on their studies. This has been indicated by their performance on Information System. This article intends to draw an attention of education stakeholders, College management and lecturers to this matter. A number of reasons leading to students poor performance in this field has been mentioned. Various studies have been conducted but yet the lack of Information System skills still persists. The main question that guided this study was: What are the stakeholders’ perceptions of the challenges encountered Information System students? In order to explore and to get some findings for this case qualitative study, semi-structured interviews with relevant stakeholders were conducted. Sample of lecturers, student’s focus groups and college management members was conducted. Data collected from various participants were transcribed verbatim. A combination of literature and data collected produced some findings on the matter. In an attempt to answer the main question, recommendations were made. / Educational Leadership and Management / M. Ed. (Education Management)

Career Academy instructors’ technical literacy is vital to the academic success of students. This nonexperimental ex post facto study examined the relationships between the level of technical literacy of instructors in career academies and student academic performance. It was also undertaken to explore the relationship between the pedagogical training of instructors and the academic performance of students. Out of a heterogeneous population of 564 teachers in six targeted schools, 136 teachers (26.0 %) responded to an online survey. The survey was designed to gather demographic and teaching experience data. Each demographic item was linked by researchers to teachers’ technology use in the classroom. Student achievement was measured by student learning gains as assessed by the reading section of the FCAT from the previous to the present school year. Linear and hierarchical regressions were conducted to examine the research questions. To clarify the possibility of teacher gender and teacher race/ethnic group differences by research variable, a series of one-way ANOVAs were conducted. As revealed by the ANOVA results, there were not statistically significant group differences in any of the research variables by teacher gender or teacher race/ethnicity. Greater student learning gains were associated with greater teacher technical expertise integrating computers and technology into the classroom, even after controlling for teacher attitude towards computers. Neither teacher attitude toward technology integration nor years of experience in integrating computers into the curriculum significantly predicted student learning gains in the regression models. Implications for HRD theory, research, and practice suggest that identifying teacher levels of technical literacy may help improve student academic performance by facilitating professional development strategies and new parameters for defining highly qualified instructors with 21st century skills. District professional development programs can benefit by increasing their offerings to include more computer and information communication technology courses. Teacher preparation programs can benefit by including technical literacy as part of their curriculum. State certification requirements could be expanded to include formal surveys to assess teacher use of technology.