Magister Educationis - MEd / When it comes to education, the legacy of apartheid in South Africa has had major implications for the higher education system. The White population group long dominated the nrolment of students in higher education institutions, although they were, and still are, one of the minority population groups in the country. The under-preparedness of black students means that they require structures to prepare and assist them within the higher education environment. In order to assist these disadvantaged students, higher education institutions have established certain Academic Support Programmes. One such programme is the Career Preparation Programme (CPP) being offered at the University of the Free State. This study attempts to measure the success rate of the Career Preparation Programme and to time to completion of graduates. / South Africa

Magister Educationis - MEd / The main aim of the study was to investigate change of programmes of study at University of the Western Cape (UWC). This involved examining the extent, nature and possible range of factors which shape change of programmes. The factors influencing choice to study at UWC and choice of programmes formed the background for understanding the link between choice and change of programmes. The study focused on first-time entering undergraduates in selected faculties: Arts, Economics and Management Sciences (EMS) and Community and Health Sciences (CHS). The progression “pathways†of these students were tracked from first year of enrolment in 2001 to 2004. The findings of the longitudinal data showed that the percentage of students who changed their programmes in the Faculty of Arts and in CHS was very minimal. In total 5% changed their programmes in CHS in three-year programmes while in four-year programmes only 2% changed their programmes. In the Faculty of Arts in three-year and four-year programmes change of programmes ranged from 6% to 10%. The significant change of programmes of study happened in EMS which also had the highest enrolments. In total 18% of the students changed their programmes. It appeared from the statistical data that failure and academic exclusion could be associated with change of programmes of study. Other factors such as financial problems, poor grouping of courses, exploring and changing to preferred programmes as well came out from the interviews as major influences of change of programmes. / South Africa

Taking the representative P2P lending platform Renrendai as an example, this paper focuses on the impact of borrower's region on the behavior of lenders and borrowers in the market. According to the Chinese six geographical regions the borrowers are from, this paper empirically analyzes the difference of success rate of borrowing and default rate in the six regions using the binary logistic regression model and further studies the reasons behind the regional difference. The result shows that the impact of regional difference is significant and the borrower from northern China are more likely to fund successfully, but the impact of regional difference on the default rate is insignificant, and the economic, financial and education development level in regions have a significant impact on the success rate of borrowing. This paper studies the regulatory differences of P2P platforms in various regions of China, the result shows that eastern China, central and southern China, and Beijing (in northern China) have paid more attention and importance to the regulation of P2P platforms. Keywords ： China; P2P lending; the success rate of borrowing; regional difference; regulation policy

Magister Public Health - MPH / This is a qualitative study, the aim of which is to explore experiences influencing the academic performance of 1st Year nursing students at the Western Cape College of Nursing, South Africa, during 2008 when the College was confronted with unprecedented failure rates among 1st Year students. It describes the College's collaboration with a higher education institution and the changes that emanated from this collaboration. The influence of situational factors on 1st Year nursing students is explored. These include the legacy of the inequality of past learning opportunities, institutional factors which hamper students' sense of belonging, and the social and academic integration of students into their learning environment. The methodology used in the process of exploring these factors included focus group discussions with students and in-depth interviews with staff in order to explore their respective perceptions of the problem. From this it is hoped that the quality of human resources for health will be enhanced. / South Africa

<p>This is a qualitative study, the aim of which is to explore experiences influencing the<br /> academic performance of 1st Year nursing students at the Western Cape College of Nursing,<br /> South Africa, during 2008 when the College was confronted with unprecedented failure rates<br /> among 1st Year students. It describes the College‟s collaboration with a higher education<br /> institution and the changes that emanated from this collaboration. The influence of<br /> situational factors on 1st Year nursing students is explored. These include the legacy of the<br /> inequality of past learning opportunities, institutional factors which hamper students‟ sense of<br /> belonging, and the social and academic integration of students into their learning<br /> environment. The methodology used in the process of exploring these factors included focus<br /> group discussions with students and in-depth interviews with staff in order to explore their<br /> respective perceptions of the problem. From this it is hoped that the quality of human<br /> resources for health will be enhanced.</p>

The clinical trial is the most import study for the development of successful novel drugs. The aim of this dissertation is to develop innovative statistical methods to overcome the three main obstacles in clinical trials: (1) lengthy trial duration and inaccurate maximum tolerated dose (MTD) in phase I trials; (2) heterogeneity in drug effect when patients are given the same prescription and same dose; and (3) high failure rates of expensive phase III confirmatory trials due to the discrepancy in the endpoints adopted in phase II and III trials. Towards overcoming the first obstacle, we originally develop a hybrid design for the time-to-event dose escalation method with overdose control using a normalized equivalent toxicity score (NETS) system. This hybrid design can substantially reduce sample size, shorten study length, and estimate accurate MTD by employing a parametric model and adaptive Bayesian approach. Toward overcoming the second obstacle, we propose a new approach to incorporate patients’ characteristic using our proposed design in phase I clinical trials which considers the personalized information for patients who participant in the trials. To conquer the third obstacle, we propose a novel two-stage screening design for phase II trials whereby the endpoint of percent change in of tumor size is used in an initial screening to select potentially effective agents within a short time interval followed by a second screening stage where progression free survival is estimated to confirm the efficacy of agents. These research projects will substantially benefit both cancer patients and researchers by improving clinical trial efficiency and reducing cost and trial duration. Moreover, they are of great practical meaning since cancer medicine development is of paramount importance to human health care.

No description available.

<p>This is a qualitative study, the aim of which is to explore experiences influencing the<br /> academic performance of 1st Year nursing students at the Western Cape College of Nursing,<br /> South Africa, during 2008 when the College was confronted with unprecedented failure rates<br /> among 1st Year students. It describes the College‟s collaboration with a higher education<br /> institution and the changes that emanated from this collaboration. The influence of<br /> situational factors on 1st Year nursing students is explored. These include the legacy of the<br /> inequality of past learning opportunities, institutional factors which hamper students‟ sense of<br /> belonging, and the social and academic integration of students into their learning<br /> environment. The methodology used in the process of exploring these factors included focus<br /> group discussions with students and in-depth interviews with staff in order to explore their<br /> respective perceptions of the problem. From this it is hoped that the quality of human<br /> resources for health will be enhanced.</p>

The thesis deals with an incidence of mental stress of college students. The thesis is not only focused on the present, but also on the degree of mental stress and the factors that affect the degree of stress. The first objective is to analyse the incidence and impact of mental stress at students of the faculty. A partial objective is to describe the relation of physical activity and mental load, as many authors state that physically active individuals are mentally more resistant. Furthermore, to determine how many students suffer from a particular degree of depression and whether students sought professional help. The practical part deals with the analysis of individual questions from the questionnaire, which are graphically presented in the form of graphs. In this section it is also stated the evaluation of standardized part of the questionnaire, the division of students into groups according to the SDS index and evaluation of hypotheses using statistical processing by method of multiple regression analysis by using the freely available Gretl program. For the purposes of the research two hypotheses were formulated: H1: Mental stress is present at the first-year students of bachelor's degree. H2: The degree of mental load varies among physically active and inactive students. These hypotheses were statistically evaluated using multiple regression analysis in freely available Gretl program and according to the results they were confirmed or disproved. The results of this thesis can be used for the needs of the faculty, which can obtain a comprehensive view on the impact of the faculty environment on the students' mental status. Studying at university is not only an instrument to gain professional knowledge and qualification in the field of study, but also the social environment where you can get a lot of contacts.

The topic of my Diploma thesis is the integration of children from Orphanages to Elementary school. The theoretical part of this work is focused on the description of the Orphanage as an institution and the life in this institution from many aspects. As I think the most important part of the theoretical work are information which refer to the integration of children from the Orphanages to the classes of primary school and work of these kids within a primary school. The practical part is taken in a qualitative way as an analysis of inteviews with individual pupils from the Orphanages who attend the first and the second grade of the primary school which are aimed to the integration of these people to the collective in the primary school and on their subjective opinions. The work is finished with the syntesis of theorecital and practical work and the interpretation of results which have been found in the research. In the end there is also presented an overlap of topics which related to the disscused problematic.