Student’s Perceptions of the Use of CBT for the Conduct of General Studies (GST) Examinations in Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto

The paper investigated the students’ perceptions of the use of CBT for the conduct of General Studies (GST) examinations in Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto. The study employed a descriptive survey design. All the 5600 undergraduate students who sat for GST examinations during the 2019/2020 academic session formed the population of the study. The Israel Model (2013) was used to determine 372 students as the sample size for the study. An instrument titled "Students’ Perceptions of Writing CBT Examination" (SPWCBTE) was used for the data collection. The instrument was validated, a pilot study was conducted, and a reliability index of 0.95 was obtained. Results from the study revealed that the students have positive views on the CBT examinations. Some of the problems confronted by students during the examinations, as indicated by the results, include system errors, login issues, and the slow nature of the systems during submission. The study concluded that the students have positive views of the CBT examinations in the university. It was recommended that the university management should be organizing presentations and workshops to promote the CBT system. Majors should be taken to ensure quality assurance and control of the ICT facilities during and after the conduct of examinations.

Prioritizing Suitable Quality Assurance and Control Standards to Reduce Laboratory Airborne Microfibre Contamination in Sediment Samples

The ubiquity and distribution of microplastics, particularly microfibres, in outdoor and indoor environments makes it challenging when assessing and controlling background contamination, as atmospheric particles can be unintentionally introduced into a sample during laboratory analysis. As such, an intra-laboratory examination and literature review was completed to quantify background contamination in sediment samples, in addition to comparing reported quality assurance and control (QA/QC) protocols in 50 studies examining microplastics in sediment from 2010 to 2021. The intra-lab analysis prioritizes negative controls, placing procedural blanks in various working labs designed to prepare, process, and microscopically analyse microplastics in sediment. All four labs are subject to microfibre contamination; however, following the addition of alternative clean-air devices (microscope enclosure and HEPA air purifiers), contamination decreased by 66% in laboratory B, and 70% in laboratory C. A review of microplastic studies suggests that 82% are not including or reporting alternative clean-air devices in their QA/QC approaches. These studies are found to be at greater risk of secondary contamination, as 72% of them ranked as medium to high contamination risk. It is imperative that laboratories incorporate matrix-specific QA/QC approaches to minimize false positives and improve transparency and harmonization across studies.

Critical Quality Control Issues of Antibiotic Susceptibility Tests for Developing Countries

Antibiotic therapy has been the mainstay of treatment of bacterial infections and the initial successes of the earlier generations of antibiotics for treatment and prevention of bacterial infections spurred further efforts to discover newer antibiotics. Antibiotic Susceptibility Test (AST) is a standardized procedure usually carried out on cultivable bacterial pathogens to determine their sensitivity to specific antibiotics, and to guide physicians on the best antibiotic treatment regimens for specific infections. The quality assurance and control for antibiotic susceptibility tests should be prioritized in deliberate efforts to reduce the burden of antibiotic resistant bacterial infections in developing countries.

The challenge of quality management in crowdsourced translation: the case of the NGO Translators Without Borders

The rise of machine translation and translation memories along with the technologies of the Web 2.0 have brought about new flavours and workflows, setting new challenging research pathways for translation studies. Emerging crowdsourcing-based models have been presented as de facto mainstream approaches in the translation industry. Therefore, exploring the newborn approaches and processes is a priority for translation studies for better insights and further understanding of relevant impacts that may reach the stage of deprofessionalizing the discipline and marginalizing the profession. To pursue this question, the present paper explores a unique and interesting model of translation that is both crowdsourced and collaborative, the non-profit organization Translators Without Borders or TWB. TWB does not only resort to crowdsourcing to provide humanitarian translation services on pro-bono basis but also maintains a global network of volunteers and deploys a fully fledged environment for translation management as well as quality assurance and control. This paper demonstrates the array of processes adopted by TWB to manage quality and the myriad of challenges it presents. Through TWB model study, this paper investigates the way various theoretical concepts are confronting the industry realities and implications and examines the extent of dynamicity and tolerance thresholds in the application of such concepts.

A nationwide evaluation of the prevalence of human papillomavirus in Brazil (POP-Brazil study): protocol of data quality assurance and control (Preprint)

BACKGROUND The credibility of a study and its internal and external validity depend crucially on the quality of the data produced. Quality control aims to monitor sampling errors and measurements during the execution of a study and is based mainly on two pillars: planning and standardization of procedures. OBJECTIVE The present article aimed to describe the stages of quality control in the POP-Brazil study and to present an analysis of the quality indicators. METHODS Quality assurance and control included several phases and processes that were initiated with the planning of the study and continued through the development of the project; thus, all centers were trained in loco. RESULTS The data were through a structured questionnaire and collection of biological samples, both performed by more than 250 trained and certified health professionals. Furthermore, to correct possible inadequacies, all 119 centers (public health units) received at least one monitoring visit, which evaluated the professionals' performance and the process of completing the online data platform. The data were monitored daily and were audited through the double entry of data, performed by the central team. The reliability of data was analyzed through the test-retest method, comparing data from the online platform and a second application of the interview, and conducted through telephone, also by the central team. The agreement between the test and retest was considered good (kappa between 0.59 and 0.74). Large multicenter clinical trials are the basis of medical evidence-based and health-based prevention, so their design, logistics, and quality processes should always be carefully considered. CONCLUSIONS This article presents the processes and quality indicators in the POP-Brazil study that allow other studies to generate reliable data.