This paper presents a report on students who decided to drop out of the BSc programme offered by Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). This study was designed to determine the reasons leading to students' decisions to withdraw from the programme. Identified and reported in this study are nine major reasons leading to drop out. Results of this study lead to several suggestions for improving current instructional and delivery strategies of IGNOU's BSc Programme. Following such suggestions could help to reduce students' dropout rate for this particular programme through implementation of timely interventions at different critical stages of their learning journey.

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This study aims at examining the relationship between principal technology leadership practices and teacher ICT competency in Negeri Sembilan secondary schools in Malaysia. This is a non-experimental quantitative research using survey technique through the administration of a set of questionnaires on teacher demographic variables, principal technology leadership practices and teacher ICT competency. Some 417 returned questionnaires have been analyzed. The findings showed that teachers in Negeri Sembilan secondary schools perceived that their principals have high level of technology leadership and they also rated themselves as having high level of ICT competency. Furthermore, data indicated a statistically significant positive and moderately strong correlation between principal technology leadership practices and teacher ICT competency. In addition, the multiple regression analysis showed that digital citizenship and systemic improvement are the two principal technology leadership practice dimensions that are statistically significant predictors of teacher ICT competency. The fitness indices of the proposed structural model do not achieve the level of fitness required for RMSEA (Root Mean Square of Error Approximation), GFI (Goodness of Fit Index), and Ratio Chisq/df (Chi-square/ Degrees of Freedom). Thus, a re-specified structural model was established for this study.

This article explores the implications of the knowledge society for education and education systems. It focuses on how education systems in Asia are contributing to the development and sustainability of the knowledge society through creating powerful professional learning communities. The article explores how professional collaboration, at scale, is being used to generate social capital in order to promote educational transformation and improvement. The article draws upon a range of theoretical perspectives to examine how professional learning communities are contributing to educational improvement and the construction of new knowledge. The article concludes by arguing that disciplined, collective and inter-dependent learning is critical for the knowledge society to be sustained.

KeywordsThis paper examines the effects of leadership behavior of deans on their university's academic and scholarly development policies. Using a sample of 400 faculty members across eight faculties, a selfdeveloped questionnaire was administered to examine the deans' leadership behavior its effectiveness on the quality of their policies.The results indicate that the leadership behavior in this research university is linked with different dimensions of effectiveness for quality. Leadership behavior Quality effectivenessResearch university MalaysiaArticle Info