Hackathons were once industry-specific programming sprints to get overdue features and applications completed; today they are a worldwide phenomenon, with businesses, educators, and entrepreneurs taking an interest in the benefits they can provide. Hackathons can be a breeding ground for brainstorming, innovation, networking, and product development, and as such they can have multiple outcomes including the sparking of new businesses and entrepreneurial activity. This paper investigates the effectiveness of utilising a hackathon as the genesis for the creation of sustainable student entrepreneurial activity. In particular, it seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of using hackathon-type events to initiate a successful University student enterprise project. The paper outlines the findings from this project, and concludes with a series of recommendations from the authors, on how one should market and structure a hackathon, and whether this vehicle should be chosen as a means to initiate a student enterprise project.The key factors that led to the success of this project were: the degree of formal structure that was introduced into the timings of the principle activities, not normally a feature of this kind of event, including scheduled "diversions" to break up the weekend; keeping the goals achievable; the duration of the event, in this case 48 hours spread over three days; the involvement of representatives from local businesses in the judging process; and crucially the adoption of an over-riding ethos for the event that focussed not on providing completed problem solutions but on potential innovative solutions that may not have been fully-functional.Areas for improvement included: inviting more students from earlier study years of degree programmes, not always the target audience for University hackathon activity; inviting students from a wide range of disciplines to ensure a broad set of participant skills and to encourage the formation of multi-disciplinary groupings by enforcing a balance of skills across teams, which as a corollary means not always allowing friendship groups to remain together; employing a team sufficiently large enough to support the duration of a long event; and careful consideration of the extent of competitiveness adopted in the event ethos.The project was part of the institution's "Student as Producer" initiative where students and staff work side-by-side on research projects. Undergraduate students were fully involved in all aspects of the project, including an independent team who contributed to the authoring of this paper.
Hackathons are a worldwide phenomenon, with both industry and educators considering the opportunities and benefits that they generate. They can provide a forum for innovation, networking, and product design and development, thereby offering multiple outcomes. This paper develops the authors' previous work on the effectiveness of utilising a hackathon as the spark for initiating student entrepreneurial activity by considering the success of the student enterprise that was created as a result and the extent to which that success was attributable to the hackathon event. Using a case study approach, the paper seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of using hackathon-type events to initiate a successful University student enterprise project and to identify the key elements in the future organisation of such a hackathon event that might lead to a sustainable and effective student enterprise. The paper outlines the findings from this project, which focus on the team building and bonding that take place in such an event, and concludes with a series of recommendations from the authors on how one should market and structure a hackathon to best ensure the success of a subsequently formed student enterprise, based on the evaluation of the project one year after it was founded.The evaluation of the project was undertaken as part of the institution's "Student as Producer" initiative where students and staff work side-by-side on research projects. An independent team of undergraduate students was fully involved in all aspects of the project evaluation, including the authoring of this paper.
Objective: To determine the influence of interlocking screw threads on the biomechanical properties of repaired canine humeral condylar fractures.Study Design: Ex vivo biomechanical study. Sample Population: Thirty-six humeral condyles.Methods: Simulated fractures of the lateral aspect of the humeral condyle were stabilized by a 3.5 mm interlocking thread screw (ITS) or 3.5 mm buttress thread screw placed in lag (BTS-L) or positional fashion (BTS-P) and axially loaded at a walk, trot, 2-mm displacement, and failure cycles. Compact flute drill bits (CFBs) were used for ITS constructs and standard flute drill bits (SFB) for BTS constructs. The effects of bit type on drilling parameters and screw type on screw insertion properties and fragment stability were assessed.Results: CFB produced a 6 C greater temperature increase (p = .042) and required 20 N higher torque (p = .003) than SFB. Insertional torque was greater for ITS than BTS-P (p = .001) and BTS-L (p = .001). Condylar fragment rotation at failure was lower in ITS (lsmean ± SE, 8.3 ± 1.9 ) than BTS-L constructs (14.5 ± 2.3 , p = .011). ITS resisted greater loads (1503 ± 105 N) than BTS-P (1189 ± 99 N, p = .038) but not BTS-L (1249 ± 123 N, p = .121) constructs. Conclusion:Biomechanical performance of constructs was improved with ITS rather than BTS fixation.Clinical Significance: ITS can be considered for stabilization of humeral condylar fractures in adult dogs.
Virtual learning environments (VLEs) form part of modern pedagogy in education; they contain student usage data that has the potential to inform and improve this pedagogy. The question this paper explores is how might the development of data mining and log analysis systems for the Moodle virtual learning environment improve students’ course engagement? The paper proposes that a student will complete missed tasks sooner if their utilisation of the VLE is automatically tracked and electronic prompts are sent when VLE activities are missed. To explore and test the hypothesis a software tool, MooTwit was developed to contact students when they fell behind in their VLE study. To establish if student timely engagement improved the study used MooTwit with two groups of students over a period of 15 weeks, messaging one group only when they fell behind. Statistical analysis and comparisons were made between how quickly each group engaged with the missed items. Using MooTwit to track and contact students did influence the timeliness of their engagement with the VLE activities. Specifically, the results suggest by direct messaging a student to engage with missed material, they completed missed activities closer to required completion date. The findings within the thesis show that educational data mining has the potential to improve pedagogy in VLE linked education offering opportunities to increase timely engagement and to raise course designers’ acceptance of data mining to improve the validity and quality of course evaluation.
The everyday dilemmas that residence-hall student staff members (RAs) face have become more challenging for the traditional college-aged student to handle. The need for the decisions and actions of our RAs to have a more solid base in their own moral judgment is important. Helping RAs in their moral judgment development is a task or goal that institutions of higher learning can accomplish in many different ways. One approach includes offering these individuals a preparatory course that addresses various dilemmas and ways they might handle them in their staff positions. How successful is this approach? This study focused on the impact of Resident Assistant training on the development of moral judgment of college students as measured by the Defining Issues Test-2. The research method incorporated pretest-posttest nonequivalent comparison-group and posttest-only control group designs. The findings suggest that students who set out to be RAs are predisposed to a higher level of post conventional moral judgment than students who do not pursue RA training, and completing a RA selection course may influence the development of moral judgement.
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