Starting this academic year (2009/2010), the University of Manchester has moved to allowing MA students to submit their dissertations in electronic format, and gives students the option to “allow the University to make the dissertation open access.” [Insert applause here]
I would also like dissertations from prior years to be posted online, especially because (a) our current distance learning students would benefit from seeing examples of past dissertations, and (b) knowledge stored in libraries is easily lost. And for that, as long as there is the desire to share, there’s scribd (or any other file hosting site). So…
Below you will find two MA dissertations from two of our talented students who completed our MA in Digital Technologies, Communication & Education degree in September 2009. The first one (by Eman Tariq Mehana) is entitled Perceptions of Saudi Female Higher Education Students Using Web-Based Videoconferencing and it’s one I supervised. Eman used a videoconferencing system in a traditional higher education classroom in Saudi Arabia and juxtaposed the results with current practice. If you are interested in the global uses of educational technology, use of technology to solve real problems, cultural relevance, and don’t subscribe to the notion that technology is culturally neutral, then you should take a look at this one. Some illustrative quotes to entice you follow:
“In Saudi Arabia, gender segregation is conducted in institutions from the beginning of formal education until graduation from university…most campuses are designed with two main areas, one for males and the other for females, with high walls separating them. In each academic and administrative department there are female and male counterparts for all posts. The issues around gender segregation in higher education arise when male lecturers are asked to deliver lectures to female students; however, it is not acceptable for female lecturers to lecture males. For female students in higher education, the lectures they attend when given by male lecturers are delivered through videoconferencing or closed circuit television (CCTV). The rest are given by female lecturers, where there is no need for CCTV” (page 14).
“It is important for the sake of completion [comparison] to visualise the traditional CCTV class these female students are using as a means of comparing this new experience for them. A typical CCTV class in a Saudi Arabian university will be an auditorium of up to 100 seats with two medium-sized monitors hanging from the ceiling to allow better observation from the whole class. Female students take their seats before the class starts and a supervising university employee takes attendance and closes the auditorium doors before she notifies the male lecturer that they are ready for the lecture to begin. The male lecturer has no means of seeing what is happening in the female class except for what the university employee will tell him. There is no camera in the female auditorium. The single method of communication between the lecturer and the rest of his class is through a telephone placed on a desk across the auditorium. A student who wishes to speak to the lecturer, or request clarification as the distance between a student’s seat and the screen makes it difficult to observe details, has to leave her seat, walk through the auditorium until she reaches the telephone and then ring the extension of the telephone in the lecturer’s auditorium. Although this is technically two-way synchronous communication, these calls can only be made at the end of the lecture and there is only a remote possibility that a lecturer will engage his female students in a debate or an ongoing discussion” (page 81-82).
Full Dissertation appears below:
Perceptions of Saudi Female Higher Education Students Using Web-Based Videoconferencing
The second one, How effective is ICDL Training for Omani Teachers (by Fahad Khalifa Humaid Al Hatmi) is another good example of the type of work that our students engage with and it was supervised by my colleague Drew Whitworth.This one looks at a standardised computer training certification, the ICDL (International Computer Driving License), and, espousing a critical theory perspective, examines whether teaching fundamental technology skills to teachers effectively prepares them to critically integrate technology in their classrooms. Education departments who teach technology skills to their teacher trainees (aka pre-service teachers) should read this one. Here’s a quote:
ICT literacy, described in terms of both core skills and transferable skills, is an important element of education from the standpoint of both students and teachers. ICT education needs to include core skills training, critical thinking skills applied to ICT selection and use, and the ability to evaluate the outcomes related to the use of ICT. In general, and specifically in the Sultanate of Oman, ECDL/ICDL programs are not achieving all of these goals. (p. 35)
Full dissertation appears below:
How Effective is ICDL Training for Omani Teachers
Enjoy! If you have any comments, I am sure that both Eman and Fahad would love to read them.
“Usually under The University of Manchester’s Intellectual Property Policy (subject to some exceptions), the student owns the copyright and intellectual property (IP) in their thesis itself (IP described in the dissertation may belong to someone else). Those exceptions are where:
- the student is undertaking a sponsored studentship and the sponsoring body has a claim on arising IP
- the student participates in research together with employees of the University (other than simply being supervised) where potentially commercialisable IP may be created
- the student creates IP outside of their course using more than incidental use of University resources
- the student writes a thesis which is generated by research performed in whole or in part using equipment or facilities provided by the University under conditions that impose copyright restrictions e.g. software licenses”
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