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The paper aims to study more about young entrepreneur participation toward halal food industry. Many studies stated that halal food industry demand is growing rapidly in both Malaysia and global. The current situation in Malaysia is precisely targeting the youth to act as organizer and participant in Malaysia halal food industry. The factors which may influence the participation of young entrepreneurs includes job happiness, intention, perception, attitude, social norms, perceived behaviour, and financial. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chlorine-based bleaching agent can brighten the pulp effectively, but it harms the environment, especially water pollution. Thus, hydrogen peroxide, a total chlorine-free (TCF) bleaching agent is applied in this research to bleach pulp derived from Sesbania grandiflora. Sesbania grandiflora is being chosen as raw material due to its ideal characteristics as pulp source and native in Malaysia. This research aims to determine the effects of hydrogen peroxide on Sesbania grandiflora pulp and evaluate the paper properties made from Sesbania grandiflora pulp. The research was carried under different bleaching durations, 20 minutes, 40 minutes and 60 minutes under a constant temperature of 50°C and 3% concentration of hydrogen peroxide. The physical, optical and mechanical properties of Sesbania handsheet were measured according to the standard TAPPI. The overall result presented a significant effect on kappa number and handsheet brightness but little on mechanical properties. The longer bleaching duration gave the least kappa number of the Sesbania pulp, thus, improving the brightness of the Sesbania handsheet. However, it did not affect the strength properties of the handsheet. In this research, 60 minutes of bleaching duration on Sesbania grandiflora pulp exhibits the optimal bleaching performance without compromising paper mechanical properties significantly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The professional skills required to be a successful engineer continue to grow and expand as the engineering disciplines evolve. In the United Kingdom, the Engineering Council has released the latest version of the Accreditation of Higher Education Programmes (AHEP). AHEP4 as it has become known covers a wide range of topics central to engineering disciplines. As well as traditional core professional and subject requirements for engineering this document introduces challenges for the future such as sustainability, EDI, and cybersecurity. In addition, there is an expectation that appropriate digital skills for engineers form part of the toolkit for engineers as they move towards chartered engineering status. This paper discusses the digital skills that will enable engineers to develop their skill set as engineering professionals, enhance their employability by developing digital skills in the context of their engineering specialism and ensure that they have the digital skills to enable their activities to contribute to the betterment of society. In the paper the work done to embed digital skills in the engineering curriculum will be discussed. We will then go on to discuss the work done with engineering employers to identify the digital skills expectations for graduates entering employment and finally how the continued professional development process for digital skills can be embraced as engineers move through their careers. The session will conclude with a discussion on how colleagues from the UK and from Malaysia can work together to develop a framework to support engineers in developing their digital skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Floods in Malaysia are described as flash floods and monsoon floods by the Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID). Forecasting is a specialized form of predictive analysis used to predict future trends or behavior from existing data. Weather forecasting predicts the weather in the future from current data circumstances. As flood forecasting models become more accurate, however, their capacity to accurately predict flooding decreased as the forecast continues. Therefore, to understand the different techniques used to forecast flood levels, a systematic review of the literature was conducted. This paper's main objective is to examine the most common variable used to forecast floods, utilizing the systematic review technique. From the main focus, we can identify the research questions, such as the most commonly used prediction method and its accuracy. In the end, two of the most common variables used for flood forecasting are rainfall and water level. This study's data can help others forecast floods using standard variables that yield the best accuracy possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Malaysia is facing serious challenges in dealing enormous quantities of waste paper sludge produced in the country every year. This enormous quantity causing major economic problems and environmental problems over the paper and board industry. In order to confront with the economic problems associated with waste disposal costs, which make up almost half of the cost of wastewater treatment, there is a need to provide a viable solution to the reuse of waste and by reducing the use of natural resources. Hence, a comparative analysis of the experimental results novel properties of fresh and hardened concrete with recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) with different substitution of waste paper sludge ash (WPSA) as a partial substitute for cement is presented in the paper. Recycled aggregates is made by crushing the waste concrete cube laboratory tests. Recycled aggregate is made by crushing the concrete waste at laboratory. Utilize of WPSA and RCA is estimated to produce significant gains in strength performance (determine the strength characteristics of concrete structures) and properties of workability and water absorption for each series of mixed. Therefore, the application of those testing method were measured the quality of concrete, so that they can perform satisfactorily as structural element. The findings demonstrated that the WPSA and RCA seems to contribute to the favourable concrete compressive strength. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the laboratory result on compaction characteristic for soft soil subgrade which was stabilized by using waste paper sludge ash (WPSA). The soft soil sample was collected from Banting Selangor, Malaysia named as Banting soft soil and classified as slightly sandy Clay with intermediate plasticity. Additive of WPSA is a finely waste product produced from the incinerated waste paper. In ASTM C618, this WPSA samples are categorized as Type-C fly ash due to the high free lime (CaO) content (>20%) and possesses some cementitious and pozzolanic, resulting in the self-cementing characteristics. Therefore no entire activators such as lime are required. Objectives of this study are to determine the dry density and moisture content of Banting soft soil stabilized by WPSA through the different energy and method of compaction and to determine the Atterberg limit properties of Banting soft soil stabilized using WPSA. Several percentage of WPSA (4%, 8%, 12% and 16%) was used to stabilize the soft soil. Meanwhile the compactions methods are used in this study are standard proctor test and modified proctor test. The Atterberg limit properties testing involved the liquid limit testing, and plastic limit testing. The result showed the plasticity indexes of soft soil stabilized with series percentage (4%, 8%, 12% and 16%) of WPSA were reduced parallel to the increment of liquid limit and plastic limit result. Meanwhile, the compaction result for stabilized soft soil showed an increment dry density value followed by decrement of moisture content for modified compaction and standard compaction. However, 4% WPSA were giving the best of optimum moisture content and maximum dry density stabilized soft soil from modified compaction. From this experimental study, it shows that WPSA has a significant and effective to improve the geotechnical properties of soft soil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The International Conference on the Changing Academic Profession Project convened in Hiroshima City, Japan, January 24-25, 2014. It was jointly hosted by the Research Institutes of Higher Education at Hiroshima and Kurashiki Sakuyo Universities. The theme of the conference was "The Changing Academic Profession in Asia: The Formation, Work, Academic Productivity, and Internationalization of the Academy." Two keynote address and eight presentations were made by university professors from seven countries and regions. The present volume is a collection of the addresses and papers presented at the conference. Following a foreword by Fumihiro Maruyama, contents include: (1) Institutionalization of the R-T-S Nexus in the Academic Profession from an International, Comparative Perspective (Akira Arimoto); (2) Strong States, Strong Systems (William K. Cummings); (3) Quality of Education and Research at Higher Education Institutions in Cambodia: Results of the Survey on University Faculty Members (Yuto Kitamura, Naoki Umemiya, and Aki Osawa); (4) The Internationalization of the Academy in Asia: Major Findings from the International Survey (Futao Huang); (5) Effects of International Education Degree and Organizational Effectiveness Perception on Academic Research Productivity in China (Lu Li and Fengqiao Yan); (6) Career Prospects of the Malaysian Academic Profession (Aida Suraya Md. Yunus and Vincent Pang); (7) Academic Career Development in Vietnam (Pham Thanh Nghi); (8) The Self-Contained Academic Profession in Japan, a Matured Country (Akiyoshi Yonezawa); (9) The Impact of Research Productivity on Academics in Taiwan (Robin J. Chen and Ching-Shan Wu); (10) University Academic Staffs' Career and Research Productivity: Similarities and Differences in Six Asian Nations (Tsukasa Daizen); and (11) What Is a Mature University in This Competitive World? (Yumiko Hada). The conference program and list of participants are appended. Individual papers contain references. [Charles R. Barton edited the manuscripts in this report. For "The Internationalization of Higher Education: Realities and Implications. Report of the International Workshop on University, 2013. RIHE International Seminar Reports. No. 21," see ED574175.]

These proceedings contain the papers of the International Conferences on Educational Technologies (ICEduTech 2014), and Sustainability, Technology and Education (STE 2014). The International Conference on Educational Technologies (ICEduTech 2014) is the scientific conference addressing the real topics as seen by teachers, students, parents and school leaders. Scientists, professionals and institutional leaders are invited to be informed by experts, sharpen the understanding of what education needs and how to achieve it. Topics for the ICEduTech Conference include: (1) Education in Context: Education in the Network Society, Educational Games, Social Media in Education, Home Schooling, Students' Rights, Parents' Rights, Teachers' Rights, Student-Safe Searching, School Violence, Education and Tolerance for Peace and Education in Developing Countries; (2) Education as Professional Field: Teacher Education, Teachers' Professional Development, Teachers' Workload, Teacher Support for Grading, Time Tabling, Grading, Learning Tools, and Online Learning Software, Teachers' learning in Communities of Practice, Web-based Communities for Teacher Support, Teachers' Career Planning, Legal and Financial Issues, Conflict Resolution and Mediation, Governance and Servant Leadership and Educational Policies; (3) Curricular Evolution: Problem-based Learning, Critical Thinking Skills, Creativity Skills, Learning Citizenship, Global Education, Media Literacy / Pedagogy, Multicultural Education and Alternative Assessment Methods; (4) Learner Orientation: Student-Oriented Learning, Peer- and Collaborative Learning, Learning Strategies: Learn how to Learn, Motivating Students, Recognizing Students' Learning Styles and Special Education; (5) Integrating Educational Technologies: Social Media and Social Networking, The Semantic Web 3.0, Podcasting for Broadcasting Video Lectures, Podcasting feedback to students, Wiki and blogs in Higher Education, Mobile, Virtual and Vicarious Learning and Simulations and Modeling; and (6) International Higher Education: Marketing Higher Education as a Business Case, Pitfalls and Solutions in Joint and Double Degree Programs, Enculturation and International Teacher Accreditation, Web-based, Mobile, Virtual Presence and Social Media to Overcome Student Mobility, Blended Learning and Student Assessment at a Distance, Student Mobility and Distance Education, New-Emerging Standards and Benchmarks for Higher Education, Education, Research, Exchange and Capacity Building, 21st Century Academic and Industrial Brain Exchange, Academic Salaries, Faculty Contracts, Residence Permits and Legal Issues, International Student Exchange Funding Programs: Erasmus Mundus, the U.S. Council on International Educational Student Exchange, and the Euro-American "Atlantis" program, Networks for International Higher Education in the Pacific, Australia, Europe, Asian and European countries and Higher Education, Cultural Diversity, Tolerance and Political Conflict. The International Conference on Sustainability, Technology and Education (STE) aims to address the main issues which occur by assessing the relationship between Sustainability, Education and Technology. Broad areas of interest are: Sustainability and Leadership, Sustainability and Green IT, Sustainability and Education. Following three Keynote Lectures by Chun-Yen Chang, David Tawei Ku, and Pedro Isais, the full papers presented are as follows: (1) The Study of Adopting Problem Based Learning in Normal Scale Class Course Design (Chia-ling Hsu); (2) Student Learning Through Hands-On Industry Projects (Lingma Lu Acheson); (3) A Study of Facilitating Cognitive Processes with Authentic Support (Rustam Shadiev, Wu-Yuin Hwang, Yueh-Min Huang and Tzu-Yu Liu); (4) Mobile-Assisted Second Language Learning: Developing a Learner-Centered Framework (Choy Khim Leow, Wan Ahmad Jaafar Wan Yahaya and Zarina Samsudin); (5) Social Interaction Development through Immersive Virtual Environments (Jason Beach and Jeremy Wendt); (6) Teaching and Learning in the Digital Era: A Case Study of Video-Conference Lectures from Japan to Australia (Seiko Yasumoto); (7) Lessons Learnt from and Sustainability of Adopting A Personal Learning Environment & Network (PLE&N) (Eric Tsui and Farzad Sabetzadeh); (8) Studying Challenges in Integrating Technology in Secondary Mathematics with Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) (Dorian Stoilescu); (9) Building Better Discipline Strategies for Schools by Fuzzy Logics (Dian-Fu Chang, Ya-Yun Juan and Wen-Ching Chou); (10) Assessing Critical Thinking Performance of Postgraduate Students in Threaded Discussions (Cheng Lee Tan and Lee Luan Ng); (11) Work-Integrated Learning with Work-Integrated Learners (Martin Gellerstedt and Tobias Arvemo); (12) A Framework for Gamified Activities Based on Mobile Games (Ana Amelia Carvalho, Inês Araújo and Nelson Zagalo); (13) The OpenForest Portal as an Open Learning Eosystem: Co-Developing in the Study of a Multidisciplinary Phenomenon in a Cultural Context (Anu Liljeström, Jorma Enkenberg, Petteri Vanninen, Henriikka Vartiainen and Sinikka Pöllänen); (14) Designing Participatory Learning (Henriikka Vartiainen); (15) The Relationship among Principals' Technology Leadership Teaching Innovation, and Students' Academic Optimism in Elementary Schools (Chuan-Chung Hsieh, Hung-Chin Yen and Liu-Yen Kuan); (16) Design Research Methods for Future Mapping (Sugandh Malhotra, Prof. Lalit K. Das and Dr. V. M. Chariar); (17) Makahiki: An Open Source Serious Game Framework for Sustainability Education and Conservation (Yongwen Xu, Philip M. Johnson, George E. Lee, Carleton A. Moore and Robert S. Brewer); (18) The Relationships among Principals' Distributed Leadership, School Knowledge Innovation and ICT Use in Taiwanese Elementary Schools (Chuan-Chung Hsieh, Jui-Hsuan Hung and Hao-Chiou Li); (19) Beauty of Wholeness and Beauty of Partiality "New Terms Defining the Concept of Beauty in Architecture in Terms of Sustainability and Computer Aided Design (Ayman A. Farid, Weaam M. Zaghloul and Khaled M. Dewidar); (20) Galvanizing Local Resources: A Strategy for Sustainable Development in Rural China (Eun Ji Cho); (21) Teaching Assembly for Disassembly: An Under-Graduate Module Experience (Eleftheria Alexandri); and (22) System-Events Toolbox- Activating Urban Places for Social Cohesion through Designing a System of Events that Relies on Local Resources (Davide Fassi and Roberta Motter). Short Papers include: (1) A Design and Development of Distance Learning Support Environment for Collaborative Problem Solving in Group Learners (Takuya Nitta, Ryo Takaoka, Shigeki Ahama and Masayuki Shimokawa); (2) Academic Use of Social Media Technologies as an Integral Element of Informatics Program Delivery in Malaysia (Jane See Yin Lim, Barry Harper and Joe F. Chicharo); (3) Digital Storytelling across Cultures: Connecting Chinese & Australian Schools (Mark Pegrum, Grace Oakley, Cher Ping-Lim, Xi Bei Xiong and Hanbing Yan); (4) A Study on Building an Efficient Job Shadowing Management Methodology for the Undergraduate Students (Koichi Sakoda and Masakazu Takahashi); (5) Using Tablet PCS in Classroom for Teaching Human-Computer Interaction: An Experience in High Education (Andre Constantino da Silva, Daniela Marques, Rodolfo Francisco de Oliveira and Edgar Noda); (6) Technology and Motor Ability Development (Lin Wang, Yong Lang and Zhongmin Luo); (7) The Integrated Framework of College Class Activities--Using Learn Mode with the Introduction of Educational Technology as an Example (Chia-Ling Tsai and David Tawei Ku); (8) Training Pre-Service Chinese Language Teachers to Create Instructional Video to Enhance Classroom Instruction (Lih-Ching Chen Wang and Ming-Chian Ken Wang); (9) Using Project-Based Learning and Google Docs to Support Diversity (Amy Leh); (10) Exploring Social Equity Aspects in Integrating Technology in Primary Mathematics Education (Dorian Stoilescu); (11) Chinese Fantasy Novel: Empirical Study on New World Teaching for Non-Native Learners (Bok Check Meng and Goh Ying Soon); and (12) Building of a Disaster Recovery Framework for E-Learning environment Using Private Cloud Collaboration (Satoshi Togawa and Kazuhide Kanenishi). The reflection papers include: (1) Stoic Behavior Hypothesis in Hint Seeking and Development of Reversi Learning Environment as Work Bench for Investigation (Kazuhisa Miwa, Kazuaki Kojima and Hitoshi Terai); (2) Alternative Assessment Methods Based on Categorizations, Supporting Technologies and A Model for Betterment Marion G. Ben-Jacob and Tyler E. Ben-Jacob; (3) Wiki -Enhanced Scaffolding to Encourage Student Participation in a Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) Classroom (Chun-Yi Lin) ; and (4) Pragmatics and Seminotics: Movies as Aesthetic Audio-Visual Device Expedite Second Language Acquisition (Lucia Y. Lu). Individual papers contain references. An author index is included. [These conferences are co-sponsored by Curtin University, Curtin Business School (Australia), and the International Society for Professional Innovation Management.]

These proceedings contain the papers of the 11th International Conference on Cognition and Exploratory Learning in the Digital Age (CELDA 2014), October 25-27, 2014, which has been organized by the International Association for Development of the Information Society (IADIS) and endorsed by the Japanese Society for Information and Systems in Education (JSISE). The CELDA 2014 conference aims to address the main issues concerned with evolving learning processes and supporting pedagogies and applications in the digital age. There have been advances in both cognitive psychology and computing that have affected the educational arena. The convergence of these two disciplines is increasing at a fast pace and affecting academia and professional practice in many ways. Paradigms such as just-in-time learning, constructivism, student-centered learning and collaborative approaches have emerged and are being supported by technological advancements such as simulations, virtual reality and multi-agents systems. These developments have created both opportunities and areas of serious concerns. This conference aimed to cover both technological as well as pedagogical issues related to these developments. The conference included the Keynote Lecture: "Designing Learning Environments in a Digital Age: The Quest for What to Consider," by Professor Jan Elen, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, K.U. Leuven, Belgium. The conference included a panel entitled: "Competencies, Challenges, and Changes: A Global Conversation About 21st Century Teachers and Leaders" by Lynne Schrum, Rose Dolan, Dirk Ifenthaler, Ronghuai Huang, Dale Niederhauser, and Neal Strudler. Papers in the proceedings include: (1) Interactive Application in Spanish Sign Language for a Public Transport Environment (José Guillermo Viera-Santana, Juan C. Hernández-Haddad, Dionisio Rodríguez-Esparragón, and Jesús Castillo-Ortiz); (2) A Game-Based Assessment of Students' Choices to Seek Feedback and to Revise (Maria Cutumisu, Doris B. Chin, and Daniel L. Schwartz); (3) Investigating Teachers' Readiness, Understanding and Workload in Implementing School Based Assessment (SBA) (Norsamsinar Samsudin, Premila A/P Rengasamy, Jessnor Elmy Mat Jizat, Hariyaty Ab Wahid, and Norasibah Abdul Jalil; (4) The Effects of Frequency of Media Utilization on Decision Making of Media Choice (Yasushi Gotoh); (5) Comparing Novices & Experts in Their Exploration of Data in Line Graphs (Bruce H. Tsuji and Gitte Lindgaard); (6) Assessment Intelligence in Small Group Learning (Wanli Xing and Yonghe Wu); (7) Collaborative Creativity Processes in a Wiki: A Study in Secondary Education (Manoli Pifarré, Laura Marti, and Alex Guijosa); (8) LSQuiz: A Collaborative Classroom Response System to Support Active Learning Through Ubiquitous Computing (Ricardo Caceffo and Rodolfo Azevedo); (9) Impacts of MediaWiki on Collaborative Writing Among Teacher Students (Said Hadjerrouit); (10) Teachers' Perceptions of the Individual Case Studies' Literacy Performance and Their Use of Computer Tools (Odette Bourjaili Radi); (11) Exploring Opportunities to Boost Adult Students' Graduation--The Reasons Behind the Delays and Drop-Outs of Graduation (Päivi Aarreniemi-Jokipelto and Asta Bäck; (12) Effective Use of a Learning Management System to Influence On-Line Learning (Xu Hongjiang, Sakthi Mahenthiran, and Kenton Smith); (13) Order Effects of Learning with Modeling and Simulation Software on Field-Dependent and Field-Independent Children's Cognitive Performance: An Interaction Effect (Charoula Angeli, Nicos Valanides, Eirini Polemitou, and Elena Fraggoulidou); (14) Comparative Case Study on Designing and Applying Flipped Classroom at Universities (Cheolil Lim, Sunyoung Kim, Jihyun Lee, Hyeonsu Kim, and Hyeongjong Han); (15) Organizational Leadership Process for University Education (Ricardo Llamosa-Villalba, Dario J. Delgado, Heidi P. Camacho, Ana M. Paéz, and Raúl F. Valdivieso); (16) Academic versus Non-Academic Emerging Adult College Student Technology Use (Joan Ann Swanson and Erica Walker); (17) Creative Stories: A Storytelling Game Fostering Creativity (Antonis Koukourikos, Pythagoras Karampiperis, and George Panagopoulos); (18) An EVS Clicker Based Hybrid Assessment to Engage Students with Marking Criteria (Steve Bennett, Trevor Barker, and Mariana Lilley); (19) ICT Competence-Based Learning Object Recommendations for Teachers (Stylianos Sergis, Panagiotis Zervas, and Demetrios G. Sampson); (20) Improving Content Area Reading Comprehension with 4-6th Grade Spanish ELLs Using Web-Based Structure Strategy Instruction (Kausalai [Kay] Wijekumar, Bonnie J.F. Meyer, and Puiwa Lei); (21) Preparing Special Education Teachers to Use Educational Technology to Enhance Student Learning (Teresa Wallace and David Georgina); (22) ASK4Labs: A Web-Based Repository for Supporting Learning Design Driven Remote and Virtual Labs Recommendations (Panagiotis Zervas, Stefanos Fiskilis, and Demetrios G. Sampson); (23) Digital Storytelling: Emotions in Higher Education (Sandra Ribeiro, António Moreira, and Cristina Pinto da Silva); (24) Design in Practice: Scenarios for Improving Management Education (Lee Schlenker and Sébastien Chantelot); (25) Factors Influencing Students' Choice of Study Mode: An Australian Case Study (Dirk Ifenthaler, Maree Gosper, Matthew Bailey, and Mandy Kretzschmar); (26) Addressing Standardized Testing Through a Novel Assessment Model (Catherine C. Schifter and Martha Carey); (27) "It's Just Like Learning, Only Fun"--A Teacher's Perspective of Empirically Validating Effectiveness of a Math App (Ka Rene Grimes); (28) A User Centered Faculty Scheduled Development Framework (Shohreh Hadian and Nancy Sly); (29) Musical Peddy-Paper: A Collaborative Learning Activity Supported by Augmented Reality (José Duarte Cardoso Gomes, Mauro Jorge Guerreiro Figueiredo, Lúcia da Graça Cruz Domingues Amante, and Cristina Maria Cardoso Gomes); (30) Undergraduate Students' Experiences of Time in a MOOC: A Term of Dino 101 (Catherine Adams and Yin Yin); (31) The Answering Process for Multiple-Choice Questions in Collaborative Learning: A Mathematical Learning Model Analysis (Yasuyuki Nakamura, Shinnosuke Nishi, Yuta Muramatsu, Koichi Yasutake, Osamu Yamakawa, and Takahiro Tagawa); (32) Using Five Stage Model to Design of Collaborative Learning Environments in Second Life (Sevil Orhan and M. Kemal Karaman); (33) Students' Reflections Using Visualized Learning Outcomes and E-Portfolios (Takatsune Narumi and Yasushi Gotoh); (34) The Efficiency of Different Online Learning Media--An Empirical Study (Franziska J. Kößler and Marco M. Nitzschner); (35) Microblogging Best Practices (Shohreh Hadian and Maria-Elena Froese); (36) DIY Analytics for Postsecondary Students (Timothy Arndt and Angela Guercio); (37) Project "Flappy Crab": An Edu-Game for Music Learning (Cristina Maria Cardoso Gomes, Mauro Jorge Guerreiro Figueiredo, José Bidarra, and José Duarte Cardoso Gomes); (38) Higher Education Institutions (HEI) Students Take on MOOC: Case of Malaysia (Jessnor Elmy Mat-jizat, Norsamsinar Samsudin, and Rusliza Yahaya); (39) A Cross Cultural Perspective on Information Communication Technologies Learning Survey (Hale Ilgaz, Sacide Güzin Mazman, and Arif Altun); (40) An App for the Cathedral in Freiberg--An Interdisciplinary Project Seminar (Cindy Kröber and Sander Münster); (41) Possible Science Selves: Informal Learning and the Career Interest Development Process (Leila A. Mills); (42) A Case Study of MOOCs Design and Administration at Seoul National University (Cheolil Lim, Sunyoung Kim, Mihwa Kim, Songlee Han, and Seungil Seo); (43) Persistent Possible Science Selves (Leila A. Mills and Lin Lin); and (44) Towards a Collaborative Intelligent Tutoring System Classification Scheme (Rachel Harsley). Individual papers contain references. An author index is included.

Capacity planning under uncertainty is one of the crucial points as it relates on the investment in a company. This research is based on case company in a multinational hard disk drive company in Malaysia. This research is extended on the previous research by Chong and Asih (1) which proposed some scenarios of capacity planning under demand uncertainty towards the number of required testers. These scenarios impact on the investment on expansion planning in order to meet customer demand. Therefore, this research is proposed to develop CVP analysis for multi products to evaluate how many units or dollars must be earned to break-even for capacity planning under demand uncertainty. The result shows scenario 9 has the highest number of products and dollars to break-even because this scenario has high protection level to handle demand uncertainty. In addition, compared to other products, Product B has the lowest number to break-even. It is because this product has the lowest customer demand and the longest testing durations. On the other hand, Product T has the highest number to break-even as it has the highest demand and the lowest testing durations. For managerial insight, this research could assist decision maker in analyzing the different scenarios for capacity planning under demand uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding heritage food is important and useful for planning of national identity conservation, gastronomy tourism marketing and food safety. However, research on heritage food is not uniform globally; it tends to be concentrated in specific areas or region, and thus would hinder our understanding of heritage food acceptance, marketability and sustainability. This study examined the trends in heritage food research, namely Pekasam over the past decade by analysing publication data from Scopus through Systematic Literature review method. In particular, this study focused on the countries in which the studies were done, the affiliation of the authors, the funding sponsor, the types of publication discipline area of research, and citation details. A total of 148 publications were examined. The results showed that research on heritage food of Pekasam is not only scarce, to such an extent a large number of the research published are in the discipline of agriculture, chemistry and engineering. Despite the small number of research publications on Pekasam, the citations on the existing publications have grown exponentially since 2017 indicating that Pekasam is a potential research topic in the area of heritage food. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As widely known, plastic has become an integral element of human culture. Despite posing a serious environmental hazard, plastic continuously used in a variety of domains ranging from industries to agriculture to our daily lives due to its lightness, sturdiness, inertness, and low cost. Low-Density Polyethylene (LDPE) is the thermoplastic that are commonly used to manufacture plastics bags and other plastic products. However, the excessive use of LDPE has caused a major environmental problem when they are accumulated in the environment. Currently, the physical and chemical methods of plastic degradation was proved to be inefficient and posed other environmental issues. As a result, eco-friendly methods like microbial plastic decomposition are being pursued as a better solution. This paper reports the potential ability of a Malaysian Rhodococci isolate obtained from Unisel Culture Collection (UCC), the Rhodococcus pyridinovoran strain UCC0018 in.LDPE biodegradation. The bacterium was cultured in nutrient broth supplemented with LDPE fine strips to evaluate the degradation of LDPE by weight reduction test. Results obtained demonstrated degradation activity where it reduced the weight of LDPE strips up to 5.2% after 24 hours of incubation. This result indicated the promising potential of Malaysian Rhodococcus in degrading LDPE. Based on this discovery, the initiative intends to cultivate the bacteria in large quantities, optimize the degradation activity, and work with the industry to turn the bacteria into a product that can be utilized to address Malaysia's plastic waste problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, i.e., 4IR or Industry 4.0, the digital world has witnessed enormous technological advancement. Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine learning (ML) such as supervised learning (SL), unsupervised learning (USL), semi-supervised learning, and reinforcement learning (RL) are the most exciting recent technologies in today's world. Learning algorithms such as web search engines like Google or Yahoo, E-Mail filtering, Social Media, Airlines, E-hailing ride/price matching are the most valuable features of ML in our daily lives. The e-hailing, which is a process of ordering a cab or taxi online through a digital app, relies on machine learning to perform ride fare calculations. This paper briefly explains how e-hailing providers build dynamic pricing using reinforcement learning and associated problems in the existing pricing algorithm. Often dynamic pricing terms are unfair/discriminated pricing, and it remains controversial amongst consumers. The article discusses how supervised learning can help address pricing issues linked to the dynamic pricing algorithm's reinforcement learnings. The expected outcome of this paper is to help play a reference in creating a practical solution that can resolve pricing issues that float around dynamic pricing algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As globalization intensifies, knowledge as a vital competitive asset is becoming more and more important. Managing knowledge is becoming a must in light of this scenario. In Malaysia, the awareness of knowledge management is growing in various organizations. However, the practice of knowledge management is still in the infant stage, comprehensive review of academic literature on knowledge management in the context of Malaysia is scare and fragmented. Therefore, this study aims to conduct a systematic literature review to investigate the research trend of knowledge management and identify the future directions from the perspective of Malaysia. Through a comprehensive content analysis to the 55 articles from Scopus database. The results show that the research interest has been a slight increase in recent several years, but the number of publications on knowledge management in the context of Malaysia was very small compared with worldwide. The findings also indicated that the research on knowledge management involves all industries, including business activities, government organizations and agencies, social life and healthcare and education. The most research publications focused on business field. In addition, seven categories of research topics identified by an in-depth analysis. Moreover, a variety of qualitative and quantitative research techniques like Delphi method, Canonical Action Research, and Observation were used in this field of study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability has been a significant concern in development and construction upon the rising environmental issues around the globe. As such, efforts have been made to come up with sustainable construction via the invention of sustainable housing. The sustainable concept is extended to housing as demand for sustainability development for energy saving. However, high prices of houses have been denoted as an issue in the housing industry. As conventional development is already associated with high costs and high prices, houses with sustainable features are offered and sold at even higher prices. This worsens affordability, which is already a problem in Malaysia. This paper explores sustainable affordable housing via a combination review of issues and challenges. This investigation sets to accomplish two objectives. Firstly, it includes studying issues concerning sustainable affordable housing. The second objective covers a detailed identifying the challenges of implementing sustainable affordable housing and gaps of this area of study around the globe. This paper structurally investigates the literature from valid databases and eminent journals from 2004 to 2018 in matters related to issues and challenges sustainable affordable housing. As very limited work has been carried out in the areas of issues and challenges of implementing sustainable affordable housing, this paper fills this knowledge gap in the context of a structured review. The findings of the research are critically discussed in light of the literature. In conclusion, the commitment of an organization or construction industry and the government will lead to actions that will accelerate the move towards sustainable development of the housing sector, especially affordable housing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The non-destructive testing (NDT) module is an alternative instructional course developed and provided in the industry since the techniques have become more attractive in science and engineering. There is a demand to integrate the NDT instructions module into the university curriculum. This paper proposes integrating courses and other elements into the bachelor's curriculum at the universities level. The method has looked into three countries that established NDT programs at the University's level, e.g., Germany, Singapore, and Ukraine, where the guidelines from the NDT program structure were referred. The findings and concepts are different from the well-known courses offered in the private non-academic industrial company. Other than the application, it should address the development of new techniques and applications in a research-driven environment. While distorted elements of NDT are included in most programs at universities in Malaysia, it is uncoordinated. There is a close relation to topics like measuring techniques, data mining, and statistics, and the first elements of NDT can be integrated into Bachelor courses. This paper summarizes relevant scholarly articles, identifies methods and ideas, and the need for further action leads to recommendations for an NDT curriculum design. Thus, some references to structure NDT courses in universities are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Behavioral biometric traits are not fully distinguished in recognition tasks, but they can improve the overall performance of biometric recognition systems by adding them. The behavioral biometric studied in this paper is related to keystroke dynamic. This paper examines the touch keystroke dynamics of computer users for the purpose of identifying their culture by using four different SVM kernels. It has been confirmed that racial classifications can be made by gathering keystroke data from 250 respondents representing various culture in Malaysia. Results show that different culture categories display different typing patterns. The classification is made using four SVM kernels and a comparison of the accuracy results is shown. The four kernels are Linear, Quadratic, Cubic and Fine Gaussian. The linear kernel has provided the highest accuracy and consistent readings compared to other kernels for the four features evaluated for dynamic keystrokes, namely press-press time, release-release time, press-release time and release-press time. The linear kernel has the highest accuracy reading of 92.4% for classification using press-press time features for the Malay vs Chinese category. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precast concrete is one of Industrialized Building System (IBS) types that is mainly used in Malaysia. Even though precast shows promising performance in ongoing project but in building maintenance, precast shows otherwise. This is due to the usage of the conventional method (paper-based report/unsystematic data of maintenance which is Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) and by integrating it with BIM technology will help in enhance maintenance. BIM shows its benefits through maintenance by showing its coordination in design and three-dimensional visualization. This paper help into identifying the requirement of integrating CMMS and BIM technology in precast building maintenance. An interview was conducted to gain the objective of the study. Results showed that there are two requirements to support CMMS and BIM integration in maintenance management which is a complete and organize data and a compilation of a standard requirement that stated by the department (e.g., Fire and Rescue Department of Malaysia, Syarikat Air Selangor and JKR). This resulted in the creation of a crucial aspect of the maintenance management system that uses emerging technology to aid engineers at precast building in improving their present maintenance management practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Entrepreneurial intention, as the preliminary idea of pursuing new ventures. Entrepreneurship is an important component to enhance the country's economic growth and sustainability as well as to meet the challenges of globalisation, such as increasing the unemployment rate among students. The objectives of this paper are to determine the relationship between personality, government support and entrepreneurship education with entrepreneurial intention among business students from selected public university in Malaysia and to measure the predictor of entrepreneurial intention. This study is quantitative in the form and questionnaires distributed to collect information from respondents based on the size of 100 samples and use convenience sampling method. The data obtained through questionnaires is analyzed and evaluated by correlation and regression testing. The results showed that all moderate linkages with entrepreneurial intentions. Government support also show the the most impact on the entrepreneurial intention. This paper provides a comprehensive framework that contributes to conceptualization and assists the Government and academic in enhancing skills and courses to increase the desire of business students to become future successful entrepreneurs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Promotional activities are among the most significant aspects in ensuring continual visits and engagements from visitors to heritage sites and institutions, including museums. An ineffective marketing technique will make it challenging to attract visitors and communities. This leads to the decrease number of visitors, undermining the fundamental mission of museums as an informal educational establishment for the public. However, few studies have been done on a promotional strategy for museum management in Malaysia. This paper seeks to bridge the gap by exploring the current museum's marketing technique, using the Kelantan State Museum as a case study. It aims to look further into the museum's promotional strategy, the involvement of responsible bodies, and the challenges in promoting the museum, specifically during the covid-19 pandemic. The research employed a qualitative design with purposeful approaches and snowballing techniques by interviewing the personnel at the Kelantan State Museum. The collected data were then analysed by applying Braun and Clarke's six-step thematic analysis methodology. The results identified three main themes: marketing strategies and activities, collaboration between stakeholders and challenges going forward. The overarching findings highlighted major stakeholders and their degree of participation in museum promotion. This paper also discussed the challenges posed by the museum management in promoting their establishment to the public. This include issues such as visitor expectations, funding cuts and digital adaptation; and the cessation of many museum hubs for physical visitations due to the Covid-19, leading to new rules being presented to adapt to the recent changes in ensuring visitors' safety. It is believed that the new norm has impacted the museum management's efforts to promote their institution, necessitating the development of new strategies to increase public participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of the country is not only focusing on the role of government alone. The private sector and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) also play important role in ensuring that the public will get the benefits of sustainable development. The NGOs play a major role at grassroot level since they are close to community for implementing the programmes that will benefit to the community as a whole. They do have expertise and skills to deliver the services to the communities. Understanding the important role of the NGOS, this paper will explore their roles and contributions towards the community development in Malaysia. The research focused on members of NGO in Malaysia. The questions asked about their roles and contributions towards communities. The descriptive analysis will be discussed throughout the paper. This paper also will highlight the future relationship that should be focused by the NGOs and other stakeholders like government and corporate organisations towards creating sustainable development for the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Coronavirus Disease 2021 or COVID-19 has affected almost all individuals around the globe. Consequently, Malaysia is one of the nations that has been facing tremendous changes in various sectors due to COVID-19. As the number of positive cases is on the rise, the Malaysian government has executed its National COVID-19 Immunization Program to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and the severity of disease in case a vaccinated person is infected. However, there are also individuals who have contributed to vaccine refusal due to many factors including misinformation about vaccines, religious beliefs, lack of knowledge, and awareness. Therefore, this paper presents a combination of instructional design and cognitive load theory named CoLoMo model, to increase the awareness of COVID-19 among parents. The CoLoMo model is a theory for mobile application development involving three elements in mobile instruction design which include platform, design, accessibility, and design page. These elements have been chosen prior to the target users which are parents or adults. The three cognitive load theory types in this model are intrinsic, extraneous, and germane cognitive load. The combination of the mobile interaction design and cognitive load theory types will affect the user's cognitive performance which are concentration, learning capabilities and attributes. This paper also discusses the previous research on the implementation of cognitive load theory through mobile applications. Several strategies that emphasize different relevant cognitive processes which are useful to consider when developing mobile applications are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The period of substantial economic ambiguity such as recession and economic crisis had urged us to boost the savings rate as people forgo their current consumption expenditure to compensate for an unpredictable financial future. The exigency of saving amid new normal endemic is vital for economic growth and recovery. Hence, this paper is aimed to analyze some macroeconomic factors such as interest rate, inflation rate, household income, government consumption expenditure, and the household final consumption expenditure that can influence the household savings in Malaysia by using the ordinary least square method (OLS). This paper utilizes the secondary data sources from the World Bank Data and Department of Statistics Malaysia over the period from 1999 to 2019. The findings manifest that a new predictor variable which is the government consumption expenditure, as well as the household final consumption expenditure had a negative significant effect on household savings whereas household income and interest rate are known as less significant factors. Nonetheless, inflation rate is found insignificant towards the household savings in Malaysia. Therefore, this paper implies the exploration of factors affecting household savings could be useful to policymakers, investors, and financial advisors to help sustaining the macroeconomic wellbeing and hence raise the standard of living. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prevalence of obesity in Malaysia is one of the highest among the Asian countries and it is one of the risk factors for cardiovascular disease which is the main cause of death in Malaysia. This paper aims to investigate the relationship between obesity and mortality rate and find its association with sociodemographic factors such as education and household income. This time-series study used secondary data from World Bank data and Household Income Survey (HIS), and it used annual data from 1990 to 2019. ADF test is used to test the stationarity. Simple linear and multiple linear regression were used in this paper to study the relationship between mortality with obesity, education, and household income. Multicollinearity, heteroskedasticity and R-squared were used to define the best regression model in this study. This study found that mortality was positively associated with obesity. Besides, the findings also shows that there was an inverse relationship between obesity and education, meanwhile positive relationship appears between obesity and household income. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Malaysia has targeted to achieve 40% of renewable energy (RE) by 2035. It is evident that solar energy shall contribute the largest portion of the target due to the abundant resources of solar in Malaysia. Nevertheless, Malaysia should not limit its' RE resources to only solar energy. This includes RE in the likes of wind energy. Although generally Malaysia has comparatively low annual average wind speed, numerous studies have shown that there are several areas with relatively higher annual average wind speed. These areas may potentially be considered for wind energy development. Several methodologies have been utilized by researchers to identify such areas. Several researchers opted to develop wind maps to identify the potential area in Malaysia for wind energy development. Interpolation methods such as Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW) and Kriging are commonly utilised in wind mapping studies as these methods are effective to estimate the wind speed at unmeasured area. This paper reviews the comparison between the wind speed interpolation methods which are IDW and Kriging for wind energy applications in Malaysia. Among the interpolation parameters compared include input, results and validation. The way forward proposed by this paper will aid as a reference for future advances in wind mapping in Malaysia and its surrounding region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID 19 disease has spread worldwide, disrupting the economy, society, education, and health. It became crucial to understand the transmission curve and identify the best action in combating this highly transmissible epidemic. Epidemiological parameters of the deterministic Susceptible-Infected-Removed (SIR) model are widely used in explaining the characteristics and behavior of the disease spreading. Disease like COVID-19 is highly influenced by the uncontrolled factors of randomness, hence in this paper, the deterministic susceptible-infected-recovered-death (SIRD) model is extended to the stochastic SIRD (SSIRD) model. SSIRD model takes into consideration the noisy behavior of the process which explains the uncontrolled effects of the COVID-19 outbreak. The epidemiological parameter of the model changes throughout the epidemic due to external factors such as enforcement and public obedience to the control measures as well as the changes in healthcare facilities. These parameters need to be estimated. This paper estimates the epidemiological parameters of the SSIRD model using the Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method of the Metropolis Hasting algorithm. The COVID-19 data from Malaysia and Indonesia are used and the dynamical behavior of the COVID-19 outbreak in both countries is simulated. The results show the parameter changing due to the uncontrolled factors influencing the trend of the pandemic curve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green products are highly demanded by the global population due to the fast depletion of world resources and high energy intensity use. However, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) still appear to lack knowledge in environment monitoring and improvement including the SMEs in Malaysia. For example, the implementation of a green innovation into products in SMEs is still relatively young and limited. This paper underlines the operational upgrade necessity to companies is needed in long run in the adoption of green product innovation. In addition, this paper analyses the issue, challenges, and significant characteristics of green environmental management practice in Malaysian SMEs. The related articles from secondary sources were carefully selected and analysed from reliable journal publishers. A total number of 26 paper that highly related to Malaysia SMEs cases, ranged from 2017 to 2021 were reviewed thoroughly. The major finding of this research paper has been related to the problems and barriers that faced by Malaysian SMEs. Research and development (R & D) are typically lacking in SMEs, as are economies of scale and the inability to change established operating practices. Many SMEs do not pay enough attention to improving the skills and knowledge of their employees, or they are unwilling to take advantage of government-sponsored training programs, which are designed to do just that. The results of this paper highlight the Malaysian SMEs challenges and possible changes to be done in assisting the SMEs to accomplish their sustainability goals through green product innovation change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies show that tax compliance is closely related to the tax return process. Suppose the electronic tax system can provide an efficient and fast tax return process. In that case, the tax compliance rate will significantly be improved. However, the current tax structures were built solely for tax purposes and lack of tax strategy and business considerations. Hence it becomes a passive transactional system that serves as the end-point taxpayer data that finally lead to taxpayer non-compliance. Nevertheless, Enterprise Architecture (EA) is a conceptual blueprint that defines the structure and operation of an organisation that align the business, data, application and technology. Therefore, this paper will investigate how EA can be a workable alternative in managing income tax enforcement problems in Malaysia. This study proposed to create a hybrid EA framework influenced by EA framework called TOGAF, Ishikawa Diagram and MyGovEA. As a result, a 'To-Be' Architecture of Malaysian Tax Return Process is proposed based on five considerations obtained from 'As-Is' analysis earlier on. This paper concludes that the tax compliance rate can potentially be improved if the tax agency can align the strategy, business process and tax systems together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The shift from paper-based to web-based practice is a significant trend, as paper-based practice consumes time, is prone to error, and is more prone to data loss, all of which lead to inefficiency. Smart farming or agriculture 4.0 defined the new era of agriculture that moving toward digitalization. However, the absence of a centralized information system, which results in information asymmetry among agricultural sectors. One of the keys to success is reaching out to farmers with pertinent agricultural information at the appropriate time and platform. The purpose of this study is to design and create a dynamic web-based knowledge management system for the dissemination of agricultural knowledge in Malaysia. A centralized information system capable of achieving information symmetry, in which all important information is accessible to all participants. Creating an advanced learning environment allowing for virtual engagement between external and internal stakeholders via a web-based knowledge management system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States and China are strong trading partners of Malaysia, with about 23% of total exports in 2017. Therefore, the trade war pressures since 2018 between the United States and China have affected the Malaysian economy. Thus, this paper aims to analyse the effects of the war on the Malaysian stock market using a threshold network approach. Then, the networks examine the changes of important stocks before, during and after the trade war in which the periods are taken from 16th March 2017 until 31st May 2021. The important stocks are determined by four standard centrality approaches, namely degree centrality, closeness centrality, betweenness centrality, and eigenvector centrality. This paper uses 240 companies of the FTSE Bursa Malaysia Emas Index to create the Malaysian stock market networks. The results show that Dagang Nexchange Berhad and Jaya Tiasa Holdings Berhad have higher connectivity with other stocks during the turmoil period and after the turmoil period respectively. Besides, Dagang Nexchange Berhad acts as the most important stock according to all centrality measures. The findings of this study give an insight to the government regulators and investors with information regarding the current topological structure of Malaysia's stock market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individuals must begin saving money early to meet their future personal and household needs. It is important to focus on savings as soon as possible to achieve a healthy and stable economy after retirement. Retirement expectations can be unrealistic since many believe retirement is still a long way off. Insufficient money made it difficult for people, particularly B40 groups in Malaysia, to continue their monthly savings due to a restricted budget in the face of rising living costs. The majority of the B40 group in Malaysia are struggling with the issue of not having enough money to support the desired lifestyle after retirement, and this issue has deteriorated over time. This concept paper proposes financial literacy, future expectations, self-awareness, social influence, and financial management as predictive factors for the B40 group to plan for their retirement savings, applying the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) and supported by prior studies. Due to this interest, this paper proposes a conceptual framework for the factors affecting the retirement decisions of B40 groups in Malaysia. The suggested framework could benefit all, especially B40 groups, in term of how they prepare themselves for retirement life. Related organizations can use the proposed model to encourage early retirement savings among Malaysians, especially the B40 group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Safety procedures at highways are essential to ensure safe, clean and accessible roads and highways. The workers were often exposed to hazardous situations, as seen by numerous accidents involving highway workers on the road in recent years. Safety technologies in the highway construction work zone may help improve the roadway construction and maintenance workers' safety. This paper reviews the statistics of road accidents in Malaysia, highway work zone safety problems and existing applications of safety sensor systems as an improvement of safety technology in the construction work zones. As an improvement towards the safety technology, Signal Warning Detector (SWAD) system was developed to increase the safety at highway work zone especially on PLUS highways in Malaysia. The development of the SWAD system's parameter setting was discussed later in the methodology section of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The economic uncertainties due to Covid-19 pandemic has forced businesses to survive, maintain their long-term profitability and remain competitive through the unexpected market upsets. As businesses have to shut down, jobs are lost, people will suffer and economy will be shrinking. Thus, understanding the purchasing behavior of customer is a vital step not only in building but also in maintaining a business. Good customer management comes from good customer measurement. With the latest advent of customer analytics, businesses nowadays can thoroughly comprehend their consumers at all phases of the purchasing process, recognizing patterns in customer data, forecasting the actions that their customers will do, and then making decisions about how to enhance their business in order to attract new customers and retain existing ones. The objective of this paper is to perform customer profiling and customer segmentation of Starbucks Malaysia during the hit of Covid-19 pandemic in Malaysia. Dataset are collected during the second Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO 2.0). Customer profiling tries to gain a deeper understanding of customers and describe their personalities types or personas, while customer segmentation is a powerful technique to understand the patterns that differentiate a customer. A customer segment is a grouping of customers that share certain characteristics. In this paper, k-means clustering algorithm is used to segment the customers of Starbucks Malaysia according to their income and spend data. From the clustering analysis, one can determine the optimal number of clusters and comprehend the underlying customer segments to identify the statistical patterns of Starbucks customers. This research will contribute both theoretically where this research can uplift the theoretical foundation of customer analytics and practically towards Starbucks Malaysia and other organization and marketing teams where they can understand their customers better and can increase their revenue with the improved marketing campaigns especially during this long-run Covid-19 crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many parts of the world, many studies reveal that family firms dominate public corporations, particularly in emerging markets. In Malaysia, it is obvious that the majority large and growing businesses are mostly family owned in most emerging markets. In emerging countries, firms are highly owned by the controlling family shareholders. Given with this concentrated ownership in emerging market like Malaysia, the family shareholders can have ultimate power on firm's affair. They even can dominate the management and board members of firms. This paper aims to identify the importance of contributing factors of family ownership on dividend policy in Malaysia using both multilayer perceptron and radial basis function approaches. From the analysis done, the best artificial neural network model is multilayer perceptron (MLP) with 9-7-1 configurations. Based on the sensitivity analysis, debt ratio plays the most important predictors towards dividend yields, followed by retained earnings, return on assets (ROA), reinvested earnings, total assets, investment opportunities, board diversity ratio, independent director ratio and family ownership. Using the approach in this paper, it is expected that transparent responsibilities and rights incorporate strategies can be practiced successfully, so that no overlapping role problems happen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment decision is difficult to be determined as the investors need to earn highest possible return in generating profit and protecting capital. Mathematical model which can provide the ranking and proportion of the investment alternatives will benefit investors as selection guideline. This paper aims to investigate in ranking and allocating proportion of asset funds using fuzzy preference relation and weighting algorithm. The evaluation of asset fund is expressed in trapezoidal fuzzy number. The data used for this study is 30 asset funds that listed in the Bursa Malaysia. This study found that 14 asset funds are suggested based on ranking and proportion allocation obtained from this model. As a conclusion, this study can assist investors in making decision in terms of ranking and allocating asset funds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studied the risk factors that affect road accident casualties in Malaysia as it has a positive impact on the death index of the country. A total of five risk factors including driver, vehicle, road, weather and pedestrian were studied in this paper. Three different LASSO models: without the removal of multicollinearity and influential observation (Case A), removal of multicollinearity (Case B) and influential observation (Case C) are formed to identify the significant risk factors that influence road accident casualties in Malaysia. Based on the findings, Case C with the smallest Mean Square Error of Prediction, MSE(P) is chosen as the best LASSO model in this paper. Therefore, variables in Case C including overloading passengers, drug, dangerous turning, driving too close, not conforming to traffic light, road shoulders low/high, potholes, slippery road, no guard rails, straight, roundabout, rethread, daylight, dawn/dusk, dark without street-light and lastly infirmity act as the significant risk factors that lead to an increment of road accident casualties. With these findings, some appropriate and strategic precautions can be implemented by the authorities to reduce road casualties in Malaysia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A trade war between China and United States began on March 23, 2018, that affecting the Malaysian economy. Basically, China is Malaysia's most essential and largest trading partner. Meanwhile, the United States is Malaysia's third-largest export market, accounting for 9.5 per cent of total exports, or RM88.7 billion. Any trade liberalisation between these two countries would have a major impact on the economic development of Malaysia. Therefore, the first objective of this research is to investigate the effect of the US-China war trade on the Malaysian market by using network analysis. The second objective is to examine the network's topological properties over the specified period. The data is based on FTSE Emas Index on Bursa Malaysia. The duration is divided into three phases in which before the trade war, after the trade war and overall duration. The threshold network approach is employed to visualize the relationship between the components of the FTSE Emas Index. The results showed that the US-China trade war affect the linkages of the Malaysian stock market in which the stock is more correlated with each other during the trade war. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cervical cancer is a common disease that can be carried by women. It is the 3rd leading cause of female cancer in Malaysia and the 4th most common type of cancer for women globally. Referring to the HPV Information Centre in 2018, it is estimated that 1682 women are diagnosed and 944 die from having cervical cells. In 2018, 569, 847 of the 18,078,957 cases were categorised as cervical cancer, which is 3.2%. With the advancement in science and technology, cervical cancer can be detected at an early stage by conducting a Pap smear test. This test will filter abnormal cervical cells and detect precancerous changes in cervical cells based on the colour and shape properties of their nuclei and cytoplasm. The problem is that performing the procedure manually can be time-consuming and cause inconsistencies and errors even further because the cervical cell itself does not show an obvious difference in texture and colour from normal cells. This paper will focus on colour contrast enhancement of the cervical cell using a few methods such as Contrast Stretching (CS), CLAHE, Histogram Equalization (HE), Image Adjustment, and Multi Scale Retinex (MSR). From this research, the cervical cell colour contrast can be enhanced to a better level and the detection of cervical cells can happen faster and more accurately. Hence, the errors in detecting can be reduced again so they can be treated soon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human-elephant conflict (HEC) poses significant challenges especially in areas impacted with land development and habitat fragmentation. Inadequate management of HEC is one of the factors affecting conservation concern in elephant range countries, including Malaysia. In addressing this issue, conflict prevention strategies methods have been widely utilized by combining multiple strategies and techniques including the establishment of protected areas, physical exclusion methods, acoustic deterrents, domestication and translocation of elephants. This paper reviews current HEC mitigation practices addressing the Asian elephant in Peninsular Malaysia with an emphasis to the physical exclusion method of constructing reinforced concrete (RC) wire rope fencing in preventing elephants from entering agricultural lands and human settlements. Presently, elephant fencing generally adapt an integration of the electrical fencing system which understandably requires periodic maintenance as well as costly. This paper discusses the various design criteria that needs to be addressed from an engineering perspective to ensure adequate performance of an unelectrified RC wire rope fencing system, thus providing a more economical approach to address HEC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water services in Malaysia is a crucial element whereby there is an aggressive demand every year. Among the areas of concern are the water supply coverage and volume, sustainability of water quality, high operation and maintenance cost, high non-revenue water (NRW) and operational efficiency of the water industry. In this paper, the main objective is to analyse the occupational safety and health management system implementation towards contractor engagement related to the water industry in Malaysia, in relations to the management capability, knowledge resources and risk assessment. This paper provides preliminary overview of the OSH Management System related issues in water services through the interviews with 10 employees at different company levels, addressing perceptions of various safety management activities according to managers and operational personnel. The interview shows that managers and operational personnel at engineering construction agree that the significant effect measures aimed to improved safety continuously. At the end of this paper, the improvements including involving operational personnel in the design of procedures, contractor engagement, considering all risk dimensions that may affect OSH and challenging the value of specific OSH activities based on a detailed knowledge if the distinctive characteristics of workplace in engineering construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A significant issue exists when trying to provide mechatronic modules within the framework of a single-discipline degree program. This paper presents the implementation of a mechatronic problem-based learning approach using a new robotic project for teaching mechatronic modules for undergraduate mechanical engineering students at the Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. The robotic project consists of two main sections, theoretical aspects of robotic and laboratory work. In laboratory work, a problem-based learning approach is used for improving the outcome-based education learning process. It is perceived as an effective solution for teaching and learning process in mechatronic module. The paper explains the concept and model of this robotic teaching kit and how it is used in the problem-based learning (PBL) of the mechatronic module. Detail explanation on how the PBL robotic project is organised is deliberated and presented. The entry and exit surveys result of the students' achievement indicate a notable learning outcomes attainment at the end of the PBL project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Once German Government had declared their Industry 4.0 strategy, many countries also followed suit to set their aim on promoting the manufacturing computerization in their country. However, there is a gap between the existing machines and the technology advances in Industry 4.0 such as cloud computing, internet of things, system integration and etcetera. The lack of experience to develop the industry 4.0 infrastructure is also one of the major obstacles in the developing countries. The aim of this paper is to address the challenges of implementing industry 4.0 Technology in machine-based manufacturing for small and medium companies. This paper focuses on Malaysia's Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) that are undergoing Industry 4.0 transformation in order to serve as a reference for other developing countries like Malaysia in which a lot of SMEs are facing similar challenges. Based on the literature review and real cases in collaboration with companies in the industry, the challenges of data collection and system interoperability as well as the solutions are presented in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a hybrid rule-based machine learning approach to produce a student profiling model for University Selangor (UNISEL) a state-owned private higher education institution in Malaysia. This project attempts to address UNISEL's interest by proposing a student profiling model that can assist in predicting student intake using existing data from a survey conducted by UNISEL among its current students. Maintaining a healthy student intake is vital to ensure the continuity of any private educational institution. Hence, this research aims to predict student intake towards academic entrance in UNISEL based current data profile using hybrid rule-based methods subject to past student intake data to improve better decision-making process. The two algorithm that had been selected using the hybrid rule-based machine learning approach combines rule-based (i.e., expert system) with multi-level machine learning (i.e., K-Mode's clustering and decision tree classification) to produce the final student profiler model. This paper first outlines the assumptions made before dividing the proposed approach into five main phases: data cleaning, feature extraction and selection, model formulation and model testing. Results shows that the project managed to propose a creative workaround that suited the use-case presented to produce the student profiler model in predicting student intake in UNISEL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tourism industry has become an important sector for Malaysian economy through foreign exchange earnings and employment opportunities where generally increases the economic development of the country. Due to significant effect to Malaysia economy, it motivated us to come up with the best model for forecasting both outbound and inbound tourists in Malaysia. Hence, this paper aims to develop the best model for forecasting outbound and inbound tourists in Malaysia by using Box-Jenkins SARIMA model and multilayer feedforward neural network (MFNN) model. The dataset used was monthly basis, recorded from January 2010 to December 2019, and was split into in-sample data from January 2010 to December 2017 and out-sample data from January 2018 to December 2019. The accuracy of the models was measured by using MAPE. By applying SARIMA and MFNN to the dataset, results shown MFNN model is more accurate than the SARIMA model to forecast outbound and inbound tourists in Malaysia. The paper provides implications for policy makers and suggestions for future tourism forecasting models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Malaysia, sustainable development is getting momentum within organizations, businesses, and even communities. In Higher Education, we can observe that green initiatives have been taken on campus, although community awareness is still at an average level. As a result, the emphasis of this study was on UTMSPACE community's green environmental awareness, which included their study location at the UTM Kuala Lumpur campus. The introduction to this study and the concerns that arise will be the first section of this paper's structure. The literature review on green awareness, initiatives, and motivation will be covered in the second half of this study. A preliminary investigation was conducted among Diploma students in SPACE UTM Kuala Lumpur. The goal of the first inquiry is to determine the green awareness among the students. According to the poll, 132 students took part in the short online survey. We quizzed them on their thoughts of green awareness implementation, and the results of the analysis were presented in a descriptive manner. We suggest student involvement activity based on preliminary research to improve environmental awareness among the UTMSPACE community by engaging in green environment initiatives. However, because to the Covid-19 pandemic, a variety of green environmental actions can be undertaken or implemented. As a result, in the methodology section of this study, we propose a mobile application design to ensure that green awareness activities are practicable and at a constant pace, in order to ensure social distancing and activities can be done by individuals. As a result, in order to achieve this goal, we created a mobile application to raise green awareness among the campus community, which we will demonstrate at the end of this paper. The content of the mobile apps will be structured using aspects from the UI World Universities Ranking Based on Green Metric and UTM Sustainable Campus's sustainability project area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As Industrial Revolution 4.0 (IR 4.0) expands globally, international competition rises, thus, requiring the industry to be steadfast in its efforts to be at par with other international players within the nation. To overcome this, it is with the view that the help of technological digitalisation in construction is deemed significant throughout a project‟s cradle-to-cradle lifecycle. Building Information Modelling (BIM) in its application has been widespread within the construction scene. The technological adoption, nonetheless, brought about challenges to the present method of the construction process. In addition, organisations face difficulties in embracing the innovative revolution of digitalisation due to the present legalese which was made for conventional construction processes. Existing contractual solutions do not identify facilitation towards BIM‟s specific roles, processes and outcomes. Therefore, the paper is aimed to ascertain setbacks particularly legal issues brought about by the usage of BIM within the construction industry worldwide against Malaysia. The paper undergoes an investigation of past publications worldwide through a narrative literature review in uncovering the scepticism and a lack of enthusiasm for its adoption. The study found eleven variables within four main themes on contractual issues surrounding BIM. The identification of these issues, hence, would further assist in the contractual status of BIM within the industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Malaysian construction industry, the Bumiputera contractors held special benefits, among others, a special policy on the allocation for participation in public projects. However, failure amongst Bumiputera contractors in delivering the project according to specifications has become an issue for the Government and there is a need to address the issue. There are various ways to improve the contractor's performance, among other initiatives are training and development and thus it is essential to look into these aspects to find a solution to the problem in the construction industry. The scope of this paper is limited to Bumiputera contractors attending training programs by PKK. Questionnaire surveys were distributed to a sample of 350 Bumiputera contractors physically and online. 269 questionnaires were received, covering five different regions in Malaysia. This paper analyses four (4) major aspects which are significant in addressing the impact and importance of training towards contractors' development and organizational performance concerning the industry requirement. Subsequently, a list of elements related to each aspect is ranked according to importance based on the survey which is important to be included in designing the training and development modules for contractors. All the findings lead to the establishment of a preliminary framework of training and development. Among the major recommendations is toconduct a Training Needs Analysis (TNA) to find the best direction for content and structure in the Bumiputera contractors' training and development programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

TVET is the key to Malaysia's future as an advanced nation. The supplies for the local skilled workers are in very high demand, especially for the construction industry from these TVET graduates. Past research has found that self-efficacy is a critical factor for graduates' career success. However, the self-efficacy among these TVET graduates is questionable. Therefore, this paper aims to conduct a systematic narrative review on the effect of self-efficacy on academic perseverance and career pursuance among TVET graduates. The literature finds there are relationships between self-efficacy among the factors (i.e., motivation and outcome expectations). The findings of this paper are expected to explore and contribute to the understanding of self-efficacy from the perspective of education, training, and the working environment for the TVET graduates. Thus, it will form the foundation for an extended investigation to propose TVET Capability Approach Framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Culture and heritage are two significant components that need to be understood and appreciated by key stakeholders such as local authorities, residents, users, etc., within rural and urban development. Having reliable and holistic data on a particular culture and heritage, including taking the local wisdom of a community into account, could help in understanding the community and developing a meaningful place for the present and future generations. Whereas local communities arrange, practise, comprehend, and apply a system of values and norms based on their knowledge of and experience with interacting with the environment is referred as local wisdom. It is very instrumental in interior design and can also be integrated into designing a space. To preserve tangible and intangible cultural assets, cultural mapping is used to understand a place and is also a fundamental issue in any redevelopment projects. This paper takes Zhongshan Building to study the local social-cultural identity elements of The Zhongshan Building, which are reflected in the interior environmental design. In this paper, the author focused on examining the application of local wisdom in interior design that is connected to the design development. To carry out the goal of this paper, the two-method methodology was conducted; (a) desk research, and (b) a SWOT Analysis. On the other hand, a pilot survey of the respondents is also required to complete this study, and the result shows that the respondents do acknowledge The Zhongshan Building as a creative hub. Through the discussion of this paper, The Zhongshan Building plays a vital role in portraying the creative culture as a creative hub in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. The strength of the interior environment and the significance of local wisdom on site can re-defined the meaning of the building and show the identity of The Zhongshan Building. For future reference, this paper suggests that any research instruments for future data collection in heritage buildings should be considered significant without ignoring the elements of the local wisdom of a community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural land development focuses on settlements and agricultural areas are crucial to be managed efficiently. This paper highlights the FELDA settlement area as in Malaysia FELDA has become an established organization that manages both the rural settlements and the crop areas well. The Felda scheme has changed the lives of landless residents by providing housing, employment, income from agribusiness shareholders, and the ownership of valuable land titles. Improving productivity and the quality of rural settlement and crop area plantation operation is one of the most difficult challenges and groundwork. Therefore, determining the highest and best use and ensuring the sustainability of the development needs to be catered for. This paper will conceptualize the elements essential for SHBU, and then, from the SHBU model, it will further develop the assessment of land suitability for crops and other land uses. This shows that the framework can assist in determining the highest and best use of the available land. The findings can be implemented in other rural areas within other agencies concerned with managing and developing rural and regional areas, such as RISDA, FELCRA, UDA and other rural development agencies in Malaysia [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]