Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Are Schools Deemed Effective Based on Overall Student Growth Also Closing Achievement Gaps? Examining the Black–White Gap by School

Background/Context: Closing achievement gaps is a major concern in U.S. education. These gaps can develop in a wide range of ways over the course of a student’s schooling. Yet, research on school effectiveness and accountability policies for schools often focuses on rank orderings of schools based on value-added models, which could mask those complex gap trends altogether. Purpose: In this study, schools’ contributions to student growth were estimated for Black versus White students such that some of the complex trends in how gaps develop can be disaggregated. Research questions were the following: (1) How different are the rank orderings of schools for Black versus White students? (2) Does relying on rank ordering alone mask any differences in how schools contribute to achievement gaps, including whether or not schools are (a) closing gaps, (b) preparing students for college differentially by race, and (c) generating comparable growth for White and Black students? Sample: Students in the sample, who ranged from roughly 92,000 to 139,000 in number depending on the year, all took a vertically scaled achievement test in math/reading and were followed longitudinally. Research Design: Rather than simply fit lag score models common in the value-added literature, growth curve models were estimated in a multilevel modeling framework. Conclusion: Results show that focusing on rank orderings of schools alone can mask troubling trends in relative achievement over time, including masking differential rates of progress toward college readiness for minoritized students.
Audio Noise Reduction Using Low Pass Filters

The study aimed to filter and remove noise from audio, and in this study researcher followed the descriptive analytical method. The study sample consisted of an audio file and has been save Audio of on a formula (WAV), and the study used matlab 7.10. 0 to read sound and design low pass filter, then insert the audio signal with the noise signal into the filter and output a signal audio without noise. The researcher has reached findings that differed according to the rank of the filter. The low pass filter has a great effect on removing noise during the registration process together with the times of implementation.
Transformative? Integrative? Troublesome? Undergraduate Student Reflections on Information Literacy Threshold Concepts

In this exploratory study the authors ask students enrolled in a credit-bearing undergraduate research methods course to rank and evaluate the troublesome, transformative, and integrative nature of the six frames currently comprising the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. The results indicate that students have valid insights into threshold concept-based instruction, but may confuse the application with the theory. If practitioners are to embrace not only the frames, but also the spirit of the Framework, we must directly involve students in our teaching and research practices.
Show and (sometimes) Tell: Identity Construction and the Affordances of Video-Conferencing

Abstract This article provides a preliminary answer to exactly why video-conferencing is evaluated as better than traditional telephony for long-distance familial interaction by allocating analytical attention to the showing of objects during interaction. While it is acknowledged that ‘showing’ constitutes an interactive move less contingent on linguistic maturation, more importantly, the showing of objects, artefacts or entities during video-conferencing interactions exemplifies an agentive and volitional production of identity elements on behalf of young children. Thus, while some have pointed to shortcomings of conversation-like activities mediated by video-conferencing in favour for more activity-driven tasks, I make a case for drawing upon pre-existing components of the material surround as a means to more comprehensively and longitudinally engage younger children in video-conferencing interaction.
SISE: A novel approach to individual effort estimation

Author’s note: This dissertation has been prepared following a manuscript style. Each chapter has been constructed as a stand alone manuscript, suitable for separate publication. Therefore, each chapter contains an abstract and introductory subject material, as well as some overlapping content. The software engineering discipline is filled with many varied examples of software process methods and tools focused on the team or organization. In recent years, the agile approach to software engineering has increased the focus of software process on small teams and individuals; however, not all aspects of software process have been deeply or fully addressed. The majority of effort estimation models – traditional and agile – focus on teams or groups of software engineers. The discipline is ripe with various examples of team-based models including Wideband Delphi, Planning Poker, function point analysis, COCOMO, etc. The few examples of effort estimation models focused on the lone software engineer are limited to traditional mathematical models with (relatively) substantial complexity and required time investment; the Personal Software Process (PSP) contains one such model: PROBE. The discipline lacks a truly agile model based on a minimal combination of empirical data and expert judgment. The SISE model under development at Auburn University’s microISV Research Lab is a simple to understand, lightweight, and agile effort estimation model that specifically targets individual software engineers. SISE combines an individual’s personal, empirical data with his or her expert judgment and experiences to produce relatively accurate estimates with a minimal investment of training and time.
Financial Liberalization, Money Demand, and Inflation in Uganda

This paper uses cointegration analysis to investigate the empirical relationship among money, prices, income, and a vector of interest rates in Uganda from 1982 to 1998. Despite the substantial financial market liberalization in the early 1990s, quarterly time-series data confirm that a stable relationship prevailed among real broad money, income, and domestic and foreign interest rates. The empirical results indicate income homogeneity, a strong own-rate-of-return effect, a high degree of international capital mobility, and asset substitutability, and they demonstrate that both domestic and foreign factors are important determinants of inflation in Uganda.
Enacting User-Generated Experience for Rich-Profiling

This paper introduces a profiling method, which empowers users to convey their personal experiences by utilizing dramaturgical techniques. Designers and stakeholders rely upon insights about the user’s mindset, for which user-profiles have proven to be a helpful tool. However, existing profiling methods show two major deficits. First, they neglect the information about subjective experiences and latent thoughts resulting from personalized relationships to a product or service, and secondly, they lack to propose effective ways to represent that hidden information. The reason for those shortcomings lies in the nature of user-profiles to generalize characteristics in favor of a quantifiable standard. Yet, contemporary challenges to user research demand for approaches beyond superficialities and simplifications. Users are dynamic and indicate depths that can no longer be represented by static and hollow archetypes. Accordingly, the two guiding questions of this study are: What are user-generated experiences? How can they be represented in the context of user-profiles? In consequence to these research aims, the method suggested in this paper encourages the user to explore own features of distinctions and own taxonomies by utilizing methods from staging practice and experimental acting. Instead of being pressed in prefabricated categories, the user actively defines oneself while performing different roles and conducting improvised dialogues that both deal with the user’s relationship to a product or service.
Hardware Automated Datafow Deployment of CNNs

Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) are the state of the art systems for image classification and scene understating. However, such techniques are computationally intensive and involve highly regular parallel computation. CNNs can thus benefit from a significant acceleration in execution time when running on fine grain programmable logic devices. As a consequence, several studies have proposed FPGA-based accelerators for CNNs. However, because of the huge amount of the required hardware resources, none of these studies directly was based on a direct mapping of the CNN computing elements onto the FPGA physical resources. In this work, we demonstrate the feasibility of this so-called direct hardware mapping approach and discuss several associated implementation issues. As a proof of concept, we introduce the haddoc2 open source tool, that is able to automatically transform a CNN description into a platform independent hardware description for FPGA implementation.
Effects of Stem and Response Order on Response Patterns in Satisfaction Ratings

Considerable research has examined the effect of response option order in ordinal bipolar questions such as satisfaction questions. However, no research we know of has examined the effect of the order of presentation of concepts in the question stem or whether stem order moderates response option order. In this article, we experimentally test the main and interaction effects of both stem and response option order for items in self-administered surveys on response distributions and answer changes in eight satisfied/dissatisfied questions. We find consistent evidence that response option order impacts answers. We also find that the order of “satisfied” or “dissatisfied” in the question stem impacts response distributions for four of our eight items but does not moderate the effect of response option order. We discuss the implications of our findings for questionnaire design and secondary data analyses.
Improving Psychological Well-being Among Undergraduates: How Creativity in Learning Can Contribute?

Psychological well-being (PWB) is considered an important variable since it correlates with many other important variables, particularly in mental health. Nevertheless, studies on PWB among university undergraduates are limited. This in turn, limits our ability to provide interventions to increase their PWB. As such, the purpose of this study is to assess levels of psychological well-being among undergraduates and to suggest how creativity can contribute to the enhancement of PWB. We also assessed PWB of the undergraduates with regards to gender and years of study. A total of 1965 undergraduates from seven local public universities participated in this cross-sectional survey study. Responses from the Flourishing Scale was used to assess the levels of PWB as well as comparing the mean score of the undergraduates’ PWB in terms of gender and years of study. Results showed that 256 undergraduates fall under the low and moderate low levels, with the majority of them are from the first year cohort. The undergraduates demonstrated the highest mean score with regards to leading purposeful and meaningful life at university but scored low in terms of engagement in their daily activities. We also reported that gender and age have significant effects on the PWB of the undergraduates. We discussed three methods, namely, open-ended projects, brainstorming sessions, and visualisation that can be incorporated into teaching and learning that can enhance creativity. Based on a review of past studies, we argue that incorporating creativity can contribute to enhancing undergraduates' PWB. Keywords : Creativity, flourishing scale, psychological well-being, Schlossberg transition theory, university undergraduates.
ÖRGÜTSEL İÇERME ÖLÇEĞİNİN TÜRKÇE FORMUNUN GEÇERLİLİK VE GÜVENİRLİK ÇALIŞMASI

Bu çalışmanın amacı Örgütsel İçerme Ölçeğinin Türkçe literatüründe geçerlik ve güvenirlik araştırmasının yapılmasıdır. Örgütsel içerme; literatürde bireyin üyesi olduğu grubu/örgütün bireyde aidiyet duygusu ile diğerlerinden farklı olma gereksinimlerini optimal derecede dengeleme derecesi olarak ifade edilmektedir. Araştırmanın Türkçe alan yazında kullanıma uygunluğu çeviri-geri çeviri yöntemi ile yapılmıştır. İç tutarlılık güvenirliği α= 0.924 olarak belirlenen ölçekte keşfedici (açımlayıcı) faktör analizi sonucunda faktör yükleri %45,63 ile %27,79 arasında değişen ve ölçeğin orijinal yapısından faklı olan 2 faktörlü bir yapı elde edilmiştir. Bununla birlikte, keşfedici (açımlayıcı) faktör analiz sonuçları doğrulayıcı faktör analizi ile de test edilmiş; test güvenirliği yüksek olan 2 faktörlü yapıya sahip Örgütsel İçerme ölçeğinin Türkçe alan yazında kullanıma uygun olduğu tespit edilmiştir.
Real-time Lip Synchronization Based on Hidden Markov Models

We propose a novel method of lip synchronization by re-using training video as much as possible when an input voice is similar to training voice sequences. Initially, face sequences are clustered from video segments, then by making use of sub-sequence Hidden Markov Models, we build a correlation between speech signals and face shape sequences. From this re-use of video, we can decrease the discontinuity between two consecutive output faces and obtain accurate and realistic synthesized animations. Our method can …
Towards Developing a Morphological Analyser for Arabic Noun Forms

— This paper studies the Morphological analysis and processing of noun forms in Arabic language. It focuses on the inflected noun forms and discusses the singular, dual and plural formation as well as case representation. The deterministic finite state morphological parser for the Arabic forms can deal with Morphological and orthographic features of Arabic and the morphological processes which are involved in Arabic verb and noun formation and declension. The Morphological analyser adds all the necessary information (prefix, suffix, stem, etc.) to each morpheme of the words; so the values will be added to each morpheme. Using Finite State tool to build the computational lexicon that are usually structured with a list of the stems and affixes of the language together with a representation that tells us how they can be combined together and how the network of all forms can be represented.
Islam Nusantara that is Sacred and Ignored (Thinking Analysis of Sasak Lombok Ulama)

This article reveals the views of ulama of Sasak regarding to Islam Nusantara as a characteristic of religiosity in Indonesia which is considered friendly, tolerant, appreciating differences and caring for others. However, there is a problem, whether all Indonesian society’s diversity can be said to be Islamic Nusantara? For that, the author uses qualitative methods with a sociological approach accompanied by observation techniques and in-depth interviews. This study found that Islamic Nusantara is divided into two characteristics, namely: Islam Nusantara which is sacred, which is in accordance with the teachings of Islam as a banchmark that is flexible with the situation, conditions, tolerant towards others, syncretic Arabism and local, pluralistic in cultural da’wah, nationality and universal humanity, love of nationalism, becoming a tolerant Islam in a multicultural society, both in the local sphere of Lombok society that is multiculturally and nationally. Second, Islam Nusantara is ignored, which as a pattern of diversity that violates and differs from general teaching of Islam in terms of very basic teachings and there are no customary norms of Nusantara as a characteristic of Indonesian Muslim society.
The DevOps 2.0 Toolkit: Automating the Continuous Deployment Pipeline with Containerized Microservices

This book is about different techniques that help us architect software in a better and more efficient way with microservices packed as immutable containers, tested and deployed continuously to servers that are automatically provisioned with configuration management tools. It's about fast, reliable and continuous deployments with zero-downtime and ability to roll-back. It's about scaling to any number of servers, design of self-healing systems capable of recuperation from both hardware and software failures and about centralized logging and monitoring of the cluster. In other words, this book envelops the whole microservices development and deployment lifecycle using some of the latest and greatest practices and tools. We'll use Docker, Kubernetes, Ansible, Ubuntu, Docker Swarm and Docker Compose, Consul, etcd, Registrator, confd, and so on. We'll go through many practices and even more tools. Finally, while there will be a lot of theory, this is a hands-on book. You won't be able to complete it by reading it in a metro on a way to work. You'll have to read this book while in front of the computer and get your hands dirty.
Max Weber on Russia: Between Modern Freedom and Ethical Radicalism

The Weberian writings on the Russian Revolutions have been mostly overlooked by scholars, and treated as secondary within the large corpus of Max Weber’s sociological and political texts. Nonetheless, they deal with a central question in Weber’s work: the destiny of freedom in late modernity. While questioning the chances of success of the liberal struggle in Russia, Weber turns back to the moment in which modern freedom emerged in history, singling out the specific conditions that made it possible. Among these, a very central (although also very neglected) role is played by what Weber calls “a particular religious viewpoint. ” Instead of being a result of economic development (Weber refuses the thesis according to which capitalism is necessarily emancipatory and bounded to democracy), or of an idea of tol-erance grounded on indifference (as a certain interpretation of liberalism would suggest), modern freedom has its cen-tral birthplace in religious radicalism, in particular in the puritan one. Weber seems to suggest that modern (that is, negative) freedom is born in a position of ethical intransigence, when religious virtuosi refuse to obey to political (i.e. worldly) authority in order to follow their own conscience, that is God’s voice. In order to better comprehend this pecu-liar link, the article investigates the Weberian conception of modern freedom as it emerges from his writings on Russia, seeking to deepen the relationship between modern freedom and ethical radicalism.
Reading Between the Bits: Uncovering New Insights in Data for Efficient Processor Design

Reading Between the Bits: Uncovering New Insights in Data for Efficient Processor Design Joshua San Miguel Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Toronto 2017 Three emerging trends pose challenges to the design of efficient processors. First, applications are executing on strictly energy-constrained hardware due to the rise of IoT and mobile computing. Traditional architectures expend a great deal of energy providing exactness despite the approximate applications that often run on these systems. Second, data sets are growing to enormous proportions due to the rapid gathering of user information in modern devices. We can no longer rely on data being readily available in on-chip computer storage. Third, active chip area is diminishing at smaller technology nodes due to power density limitations in process technology scaling. We can no longer fully utilize all on-chip hardware resources simultaneously. Our research tackles these challenges by recognizing that they stem from fundamental gaps in the way that data is contextualized in hardware. The goal of a processor is to process real-world information; yet in modern computers, hardware perceives data as nothing more than bits. Can the hardware tell if an integer is purely numerical or if it will be used as a memory address later? Can it tell that two elements are adjacent in a multidimensional data structure even though they are not stored contiguously? Can it tell if contiguous data elements will be accessed at the same time or accessed independently? Traditionally, hardware cannot interpret data bits on their own; it only interprets data bits by how instructions use them. It lacks an understanding of what information is encoded in the bits (functional context), where that information is located (spatial context), and when that information is needed (temporal context). Our research fills these gaps in data context to address the three challenges, recognizing that 1) functional context enables approximation for greater efficiency under tight energy constraints; 2) spatial context demystifies patterns and correlations to more efficiently and concisely process massive data sets; and 3) temporal context infers the criticality of data to allow for better utilization of precious on-chip resources.
User’s Emotions and Usability Study of a Brain-Computer Interface Applied to People with Cerebral Palsy

People with motor and communication disorders face serious challenges in interacting with computers. To enhance this functionality, new human-computer interfaces are being studied. In this work, a brain-computer interface based on the Emotiv Epoc is used to analyze human-computer interactions in cases of cerebral palsy. The Phrase-Composer software was developed to interact with the brain-computer interface. A system usability evaluation was carried out with the participation of three specialists from The Fundacao Catarinense de Educacao especial (FCEE) and four cerebral palsy volunteers. Even though the System Usability Scale (SUS) score was acceptable, several challenges remain. Raw electroencephalography (EEG) data were also analyzed in order to assess the user’s emotions during their interaction with the communication device. This study brings new evidences about human-computer interaction related to individuals with cerebral palsy.
An Efficient Approach towards Crimes against Women using Time Series Algorithm

One of the major issues in every nation these days is the rise in crime against women. Every day we come across various cases of abuse against women. Study of past crime data can help us in analysing crime patterns and important hidden relations between the crimes. So, crimes predicting model can be simulated which will study verified past crime records and predict future criminal activities. In recent past, there has been an increased interest in time series research. This has been used particularly for finding useful similar trends in multivariate time series in various applied fields such as environmental research, agriculture, sales and finance. This paper elaborates upon the use of time series algorithm in accurately predicting and extracting patterns that occur frequently within a dataset to obtain useful hidden information.