Archives-August 2011

This study attempted to bring Critical Language Testing principles into practice by means of distributing the power, traditionally hold by teachers as the only source of knowledge, in a more unprejudiced way. The study took advantages of three features of fifteen CLT principles proposed by Shohamy (2001).Based on the first feature, which is encouraging an active, critical response from test-takers; learners could develop an assessment scale including five components which was used in the subsequent steps in their peer assessment. In line with the second principle, which is admitting to the limited knowledge of any tester and the need for multiple sources of knowledge, learners moved toward the leading edge taking the control of assessment process to some extent. Peer assessment as one criterion of democratic assessment was applied. The third principle exploited in the study was considering ‘interpretive’ approaches to assessment that allow for different meanings and interpretations rather than a single absolute truth. Students’ scores were reported by both quantitative and interpretive modes with some suggestive sentences. In this way learners’ voices are validated. After that and in line with “consequential validity” as one component of alternative assessment, it went through completing the process by bringing testees’ problematic areas into the teaching syllabus in a systematic way. With a qualitative study learners’ (the most critical figures of all assessment procedures) attitudes toward rejecting or retaining CLT principles were inquired. They, offering one caveat, which was the significance of teacher assessment to them, pronounced the method as a striking system.

Systems simulation is growth rapidly as one of the most useful management tools today. This article tries to model and finally improve process of remittance and withdrawal from current account (ordinary and golden) of bank with use of discrete simulation methodology. For this purpose, the said process is identified and then a logical model is simulated with use of ED model (Enterprise Dynamic) for identification of the said model process and data relating to each entity is obtained with use of chronometry and then sample volume has been calculated. For validation and confirmation of the model, a comparison between results of simulation and real measurement has been made by statistical tests. In the next stage, two criteria which include output of the customers and average waiting time of the customers are selected and some suggestions were presented for improvement of remittance and withdrawal processes with regard to the obtained results.

Despite all the "talk" of lean production, it is obvious that many manufacturers have yet to grasp the full benefits of this philosophy, the strong weapon what Japanese used it to overcome American (and the other strong economies) giant organizations. So many organizations like to know their organization how far from lean standard benchmark system, and fill these gaps. The main goal of this research that is a competitive benchmarking, is introduction a simple mathematical model to shows positions of an Iranian automaker relative to Toyota, and helps them to calculate the size of their gaps between them and lean benchmark (Toyota).

Although electronic commerce has a lot of advantages it suffers from technological and non-technological limitations as well which have hindered its growth and acceptation. The imagination of insecurity and the lack of internationally accepted standards for quality, security and reliability are among the most important technological and non-technological obstacles facing electronic commerce. The insecure imagination of this technology has led to carrying out financial transactions by customers using traditional methods. Now, the question is raised that how the security of electronic financial transactions can be guaranteed for customers? Secure electronic transaction (SET) is one of the most important security protocols and guarantees the security of transactions of any kind. The present article explains the use of this protocol and the method of applying it in Telemedicine. Also, advantages and disadvantages of using SET will be discussed.

Sathe, Y. S. (1977) found a new set of sharp upper and lower bounds on the variance of the UMVUE in the case of inverse sampling motivated by the fact that a close-form expression to capture the actual variance is unavailable. Sahai, Ajit (1985) improved the variance upper bound in Sathe, Y. S. (1977). This note is motivated by their papers and by their inherent desire to capture that variance possibly more closely using their set of the sharp Sahai-Sathe’s upper-and-lower bounds. It was very heartening for the authors to realize that the same is possible. In fact the seminal result achieved by the authors in this note could be used for improving the sharpness of these bounds iteratively till it pleases the one using it for the purpose of being close to the actual variance of the UMVUE in the absence of its capture in the closed-form. The achievement is briefly illustrated through a modest empirical study to bring forth the power of the proposed iterative algorithm for the aforesaid purpose.

The present study deals with the isolation of polyurethane (PU) degrading microorganisms from the soil, analysis of biodegradation and optimization of various factors (temperature, pH and by using different co-metabolites). Soil sample was collected from dumping area, Sector H/8, Islamabad, Pakistan and was used as a source for isolation of polyurethane degrading bacteria. Sterilized polyurethane films were buried in soil for three months. The PU pieces were taken from the soil, washed with sterilized distilled water and enriched in liquid MSM for a period of one month. Six different bacterial strains were isolated through enrichment technique, which were identified on the basis of standard morphological and biochemical tests. The study yields that the bacteria with the ability to degrade polyurethane were isolated from soil. It is therefore concluded that soil contains the potential candidates for bioremediation of plastic wastes.

Postgraduate study has been considered as a main life event which can lead to marital discordance. Various adjustments have to be done by the students and their spouse. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate marital adjustment among married postgraduate students in two public universities in Malaysia. A random sample of 176 students from two public universities in Malaysia has been selected. The instrument employed is the adjusted Locke-Wallace Marital Adjustment and a set of demographic variables. ANOVA 2x3x2 is used to investigate the means differences of marital adjustment according to gender, nationality, and university among the participants. Results indicated significant differences marital adjustment mean scores between gender, three nationalities, and two universities. Implications on family and college counseling are discussed. Finally, direction for future research on marital adjustments among postgraduate is suggested.

This paper is concerned with the global asymptotic stability analysis problem for a general class of uncertain stochastic neural networks with mixed time-delays. The mixed time-delays under consideration comprise both the discrete time-varying delays and unbounded distributed delays. The main purpose of this paper is by using Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional, the well-known Leibniz-Newton formula and the linear matrix inequality (LMI) approach, and then to establish easy to test sufficient stability conditions under which the addressed neural network is globally, robustly, asymptotically stable in the mean square for all admissible parameter uncertainties. The proposed criteria can be checked effectively by the Matlab LMI toolbox. Finally a simple example is provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed criteria.

The purpose of this study was to examine gender and age differences in computer usage, competence, attitudes, self-efficacy, and anxiety among teachers. Four hundred and sixty five teachers (223 females and 242 males aged 20 to 50 years) from twenty rural schools in south Jordan participated in the study. The data for the study were collected through the use of quantitative method. The results illustrated some gender and age differences in computer use, competence, attitudes, self-efficacy, and anxiety. However, the differences in computer use between male and female teachers are not similar. Males’ teachers typically had higher scores than females’ teachers in the use of computer for educational purposes. In addition, males’ teachers tend to have higher levels of computer self-efficacy and computer competence than females’ teachers. Likewise, both genders exhibited the same levels of attitudes towards computer use. Females’ teachers seem to have higher levels of computer anxiety than males’ teachers do. Finally, general age differences in computer use, competence, attitudes, self-efficacy, and anxiety among teachers were also found. The outcomes confirm the findings of other studies conducted in different educational settings regarding teachers’ gender and age differences in computer use, competence, attitudes, self-efficacy, and anxiety. Consequently, implications of the study give valuable insight to the future use of computers in schools. Recommendations were made based on findings.

A study is conducted to investigate the effects of socio economic factors on agricultural land use in Malaysia. Relevant socio – economic variables for the study were aggregated from the databases of various international and national agencies such as FAO, Index Mundi and Malaysian Departments of Agriculture and Statistics. These data were subjected to statistical analysis using stepwise regression method in SPSS version 18. Findings indicated that, relevant socio – economic factors in agricultural land use in Malaysia are available workforce in the population and their working conditions in the agricultural and non – agricultural sectors. This study has revealed that labour supply and their conditions of service are major factors in agricultural land use in Malaysia. This study further underscores the need for greater application labour saving technology in agricultural practices given the competition between agricultural and non – agricultural uses of available workforce in the population.