Description:
Extracts of three case studies, from a larger qualitative study, are used to illustrate an emerging theme about the issue of the risks versus the benefits of providing detailed information about adverse drug reactions (ADRs) to consumers. The case studies include the consumer, medical and expert views of a single event, a suspected adverse drug reaction. The consumers would like more information. The doctors expressed that providing information about all possible ADRs can result in some consumers choosing not to take medications due to the perceived risk of the medication. The ADR experts stated that providing ADR information to the consumers within the presented case studies, might have assisted in earlier detection of the ADR, resulting in a less severe reaction. This paper aims to illustrate this emerging theme of the risks versus the benefits of providing consumers with information about potential ADRs and suggest some ways of increasing the benefits and minimizing the risk. We then indicate how these finding may inform future development of ADR decision support systems.
Description:
Skills augmentation, through individual and collective learning, building destination relationships and network linkages through knowledge sharing and industry-wide benchmarking are internationally recognised as leading economic drivers for regional growth in general and the tourism industry in particular. The aim of this paper is to share the authors' initial insights into regional tourism industry network and capacity building via online skilling and knowledge sharing. Applying an ICT and Internet-enhanced platform for the delivery of business skills, this paper discusses an online learning pilot for micro tourism businesses in regional Australia designed to offer tourism information and skills development towards industry accreditation. While a tripartite university-government-industry partnership was successfully established to share knowledge towards regional capacity building and industry benchmarking, the authors also highlight silo politics, cultural differences, lack of leadership and lack of trust as some of the main barriers to effective and bilateral knowledge sharing towards regional industry capacity building.
Description:
Skills augmentation, through individual and collective learning, building destination relationships and network linkages through knowledge sharing and industry-wide benchmarking are internationally recognised as leading economic drivers for regional growth in general and the tourism industry in particular. The aim of this paper is to share the authors' initial insights into regional tourism industry network and capacity building via online skilling and knowledge sharing. Applying an ICT and Internet-enhanced platform for the delivery of business skills, this paper discusses an online learning pilot for micro tourism businesses in regional Australia designed to offer tourism information and skills development towards industry accreditation. While a tripartite university-government-industry partnership was successfully established to share knowledge towards regional capacity building and industry benchmarking, the authors also highlight silo politics, cultural differences, lack of leadership and lack of trust as some of the main barriers to effective and bilateral knowledge sharing towards regional industry capacity building.
Description:
Pearlman et al., (2002) defines a virtual community as a large, multiinstitutional group of individuals who use a set of rules, a policy, to specify how to share their resources. With such a large collection of data stores in these resources, each of which could be data mined to different degrees, the privacy of each of the individuals needs to be protected. Within a virtual community, especially one also used to facilitate knowledge discovery, there are a number of privacy issues that must be addressed and resolved in ways other than through privacy laws and policies alone. This is due to the fact that, as to date, these laws have proved mainly ineffective and there is an ever growing concern by individuals about their privacy. Web surveys Srikant R. (2002) have identified that 82% of users have said improved privacy policies and methods would matter in Web environments. Agarwal R. (2002) highlights the fact that a secure collaborative environment, such as a virtual community, needs to provide authentication, authorization, privacy and data integrity. In this paper, we identify the technology issues, followed by the presentation of our proposed solution. We provide a conceptual framework of the Hippocratic security method to provide information security for shield privacy in virtual communities and we describe the architecture and design of the proposed solution. We outline the implementation, testing and evaluation strategies of our solutions. The proposed solution shall monitor the use of personal information as it is passed around the virtual community and protected information paths, data at rest, database and information resources through the use of the Hippocratic database principle to enforce Hippocratic security policies and procedures together with privacy preserving data mining Evfimievski et al., (2003) method for excellent information security in a virtual community environment.
Description:
To date, most research into the implications of the Internet for small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) has focused on individual business barriers to information and communication technologies (ICT) and e-business adoption. Such research has shown that SMEs tend to be time and resource-poor, with their size being their main disadvantage vis-à-vis ICT adoption. Government intervention designed to overcome such barriers and facilitate adoption of ICT has not markedly increased the uptake of e-business by SMEs. In this discussion paper, the authors posit that the current approach to ICT adoption interventions fail to take into account the incremental nature of the SMEs e-business learning processes. An incremental learning model adapted from Earl (2000) is presented that positions ICT adoption as an evolutionary process and stresses the need for continuous learning and change. To help small business owners articulate, value and meet their evolving e-business needs, the authors suggest that ICT adoption strategies should focus on facilitating not only the acquisition of skills and knowledge, but also the development of e-business networks which underpin the SME ICT adoption process.
Description:
To date, most research into the implications of the Internet for small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) has focused on individual business barriers to information and communication technologies (ICT) and e-business adoption. Such research has shown that SMEs tend to be time and resource-poor, with their size being their main disadvantage vis-à-vis ICT adoption. Government intervention designed to overcome such barriers and facilitate adoption of ICT has not markedly increased the uptake of e-business by SMEs. In this discussion paper, the authors posit that the current approach to ICT adoption interventions fail to take into account the incremental nature of the SMEs e-business learning processes. An incremental learning model adapted from Earl (2000) is presented that positions ICT adoption as an evolutionary process and stresses the need for continuous learning and change. To help small business owners articulate, value and meet their evolving e-business needs, the authors suggest that ICT adoption strategies should focus on facilitating not only the acquisition of skills and knowledge, but also the development of e-business networks which underpin the SME ICT adoption process.
Description:
This paper endeavours to examine the challenges that introducing sustainability into the curriculum brings for academics, students and engineering programs. The paper addresses the various international, national and regional drivers for increasing curriculum sustainability content and environmentally responsive behaviour by Universities. Finally, the consideration of triple bottom line reporting within a common first year engineering subject at The University of Ballarat is discussed as a recent curriculum development to incorporate current sustainability thinking.
Description:
Networks have increasingly been recognised by educators as important in adult and vocational learning contexts, in that they have the capacity to help potential learners engage and become better connected with a wide range of learning organisations through their families, jobs and communities and also with opportunities for future learning and work. The importance of ‘being connected’, including through networks to and between learning organisations, has come into higher relief with a recent increase in theorising about aspects of social capital including learning networks, the growth of lifelong learning and an identification of the particular penalties associated with several forms of disengagement from learning for people of all ages. This paper begins with a scan of research literature on networks in adult and vocational learning. The paper identifies some new techniques involving networks, found by experience to assist in the process of adult and vocational learning research: particularly for identifying potential research interviewees within learning organisations and communities, strengthening relationships between learning organisations and identifying opportunities for future collaboration. It also provides some insights from new data on organisational networks derived from a number of recent research studies about learning networks in TAFE, adult and community education and public safety organisations in small and remote towns. The paper finally provides a number of tentative, general findings about the broader applicability of network theory to research and theories about learning in such contexts.
Description:
Networks have increasingly been recognised by educators as important in adult and vocational learning contexts, in that they have the capacity to help potential learners engage and become better connected with a wide range of learning organisations through their families, jobs and communities and also with opportunities for future learning and work. The importance of ‘being connected’, including through networks to and between learning organisations, has come into higher relief with a recent increase in theorising about aspects of social capital including learning networks, the growth of lifelong learning and an identification of the particular penalties associated with several forms of disengagement from learning for people of all ages. This paper begins with a scan of research literature on networks in adult and vocational learning. The paper identifies some new techniques involving networks, found by experience to assist in the process of adult and vocational learning research: particularly for identifying potential research interviewees within learning organisations and communities, strengthening relationships between learning organisations and identifying opportunities for future collaboration. It also provides some insights from new data on organisational networks derived from a number of recent research studies about learning networks in TAFE, adult and community education and public safety organisations in small and remote towns. The paper finally provides a number of tentative, general findings about the broader applicability of network theory to research and theories about learning in such contexts.
Description:
This paper is based on recent PhD research. The practices for appointing Vice Chancellors (VC’s) in Australian Universities were examined together with the changing role of the VC and new demographic patterns in VC backgrounds. A number of other issues was also examined, including the ‘training’ and preparation of VCs, mentoring and the changing skill base required to be effective in the role. In addition, the paradox was investigated of appointing academics from the ranks of individuals with non-business backgrounds, to run large enterprises which are being compelled to adopt an increasingly business-oriented focus.
Description:
This paper is based on recent PhD research. The practices for appointing Vice Chancellors (VC’s) in Australian Universities were examined together with the changing role of the VC and new demographic patterns in VC backgrounds. A number of other issues was also examined, including the ‘training’ and preparation of VCs, mentoring and the changing skill base required to be effective in the role. In addition, the paradox was investigated of appointing academics from the ranks of individuals with non-business backgrounds, to run large enterprises which are being compelled to adopt an increasingly business-oriented focus.
Description:
The aim of this paper is to quantify the answer to the question “How does voltage variation affect the power consumption and energy cost of a domestic household”. Over 20 typical domestic appliances were subjected to normal voltage variations and their power and energy measured and analysed. The results reveal that although supply voltage variations may affect power consumption, the use of certain modern appliances will ensure that the overall change in energy cost can be minimal.
Description:
The aim of this paper is to quantify the answer to the question “How does voltage variation affect the power consumption and energy cost of a domestic household”. Over 20 typical domestic appliances were subjected to normal voltage variations and their power and energy measured and analysed. The results reveal that although supply voltage variations may affect power consumption, the use of certain modern appliances will ensure that the overall change in energy cost can be minimal.
Description:
The field of constrained non-linear optimization is one of the most practically applicable areas of mathematics. It has been used successfully to solve problems in a wide range of areas including economics, communications and computational chemistry. In recent years some problem reformulation techniques have been suggested for dealing with non-convex problems. However most of this study has been of a theoretical nature and very little is known about its effect on the practical impact of these techniques. In this seminar we will outline some of the reformulation techniques which have been suggested and present numerical results which show their relative efficiencies in solving some test problems. We will ultimately suggest that a reformulation scheme which combines a logarithmic reformulation of the objective function and an exponential reformulation of the constraint function provides many desirable outcomes.
Description:
The field of constrained non-linear optimization is one of the most practically applicable areas of mathematics. It has been used successfully to solve problems in a wide range of areas including economics, communications and computational chemistry. In recent years some problem reformulation techniques have been suggested for dealing with non-convex problems. However most of this study has been of a theoretical nature and very little is known about its effect on the practical impact of these techniques. In this seminar we will outline some of the reformulation techniques which have been suggested and present numerical results which show their relative efficiencies in solving some test problems. We will ultimately suggest that a reformulation scheme which combines a logarithmic reformulation of the objective function and an exponential reformulation of the constraint function provides many desirable outcomes.