Centralized Statistics Courses at SMU: opportunity and advantage for SOR; research benefits for SMU

  • Received October 1, 2017;
    Accepted November 3, 2017;
    Published December 6, 2017
  • Author(s)
    Gezani Richman Miyambu , Maria Mokgadi Lekganyane , Solly Matshonisa Seeletse
  • DOI
    http://dx.doi.org/10.21511/ee.08(4).2017.05
  • Article Info
    Volume 8 2017, Issue #4, pp. 37-43
  • TO CITE АНОТАЦІЯ
  • Cited by
    1 articles
  • 626 Views
  • 112 Downloads

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

The Department of Statistics and Operations Research (SOR) at the Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University (SMU) in South Africa offers courses in Statistics (Stats). Several departments in SMU campus require Stats training in their study program. In the interest of quality offering in Stats training and for statistical services needed for research, SOR oofers to collect, centralize and facilitate all the Stats modules on campus. This paper then reflects on the impressions of academics and researchers on SMU campus regarding their view on centralized Stats courses in SMU. This will help explore the opportunities, envisaged research benefits and challenges for centralizing all the SMU Stats training in SOR.

view full abstract hide full abstract
    • Bamber, J. (2012). Shrinking glaciers under scrutiny. Nature, 482(7386), 482-483.
    • Beyer, H. L., Haydon, D. T., Morales, J. M., Frair, J. L., Hebblewhite, M., Mitchell, M., & Matthiopoulos, J. (2010). The interpretation of habitat preference metrics under use-availability designs. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 365(1550), 2245-2254.
    • Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2013). Successful qualitative research: A practical guide for beginners. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
    • Bretschneider, S., Marc-Aurele, F. J., Jr., & Wu, J. (2005). Best practices research: A methodological guide for the perplexed. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 15, 307-323.
    • Creswell, J. W. (2009). Research design. Case study. California: Sage Publications.
    • Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches (4th ed.). University of Nebraska, Lincoln: Sage Publications.
    • David, M., & Sutton, C. D. (2011). Social research: An introduction (2nd ed.). London: Sage Publications.
    • Drucker, P. F. (2006). The effective executive: The definitive guide to getting the right things done. New York: Collins.
    • Feridun, M., & Karagiannis, S. (2009). Growth effects of information and communication technologies: Empirical evidence from the enlarged EU. Transformations in Business and Economics, 8(2), 86-99.
    • Fink, A. (2013). Conducting research literature reviews: From the internet to paper (4th ed.). London: Sage Publications Ltd.
    • Gorard, S. (2013). Research design: Creating robust approaches for social science. London: Sage Publications.
    • Graziano, A. M., & Raulin, M. L. (2013). Research methods: A process of inquiry (8th ed.). New York: Pearson International Edition.
    • HET. (Higher Education & Training) (2015). Report on the evaluation of the 2013 universities’ research outputs. Pretoria: Department of Higher Education and Training.
    • Howell, K. E. (2013). Introduction to the philosophy of methodology. London: Sage Publications.
    • Hussain, M. M., & Howard, P. N. (2013). What best explains successful protest cascades? ICT and the fuzzy causes of the Arab Spring. International Studies Review, 15, 48-66.
    • Irwin, R. E., Bronstein, J. L., Manson, J. S., & Richardson, L. (2010). Nectar robbing: Ecological and evolutionary perspectives. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics, 41(2), 271-292.
    • Kvint, V. (2016). Strategy for the global market: Theory and practical applications. London: Routledge.
    • Matsose, T., & Seeletse, S. M. (2016). Biases from poor data analysis. American Journal of Applied Sciences, 13(10), 1053-1059.
    • McGregor, K. (2010). South Africa: New university clusters emerge. University World News, retrieved 31st July 2017.
    • Peterson, A. T., Soberon, J., Pearson, R. G., Anderson, R. P. Martinez-Meyer, E. Nakamura, M., & Araujo, M. B. (2011). Species-environment relationships. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
    • Sahney, S., Benton, M. J., & Ferry, P. A. (2010). Links between global taxonomic diversity, ecological diversity and the expansion of vertebrates on land. Biology Letters, 6(4), 544-547.
    • Shaughnessy, J. J., Zechmeister, E. B., & Zechmeister, J. S. (2012). Research methods in psychology (9th ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
    • Somekh, B., & Lewin, C. (2011). Theory and methods in social research (2nd ed.). London: Sage Publications.
    • Swenson, N. G., & Enquist, B. J. (2008). The relationship between stem and branch wood specific gravity and the ability of each measure to predict leaf area. American Journal of Botany, 95(4), 516-519.
    • Wertz, F., Charmaz, K., McMullen, L. M., Josselson, R., Anderson, R., & McSpadden, E. (2011). Five ways of doing qualitative analysis: Phenomenological psychology, grounded theory, discourse analysis, narrative research and intuitive inquiry. New York: The Guilford Press.
    • Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (4th ed.). Singapore: Sage Publications.
Download Preview
Close
Environmental Economics
Environmental Economics