Answer

Usage of Computers on the Ground Floor in the UOW Library

Background of the Study

A library is among the most vital facilities in knowledge acquisition in learning institutions. Substantial number of researches are carried out in libraries (Kassim, 2017). When sourcing for information in a library, students prefer sitting in certain areas in the library based on the services they need. However, in some university libraries, the library management determines the sitting arrangement of students. In some cases, students may prefer to source library services from ground floor chambers of the library, while in some other cases, there are other factors that influence on the sitting positions of students in the library, such as urgency to attend subsequent classes among others. UOW University is one such kind of library facility in Australia.  The library’s management sets most of the computing services in the ground floor chambers (Cox & Jantti, 2015). In this regard, IT savvy students prefer pursuing their research from the ground floor spaces. The aim of this research is to attest whether the perceived number of computer users provide a representation of the whole students’ population enrolled for computer science course in the university.

Statement of the Problem

Most students appear to use computers in the ground floor. The university’s management has set aside library’s ground floor for computer science students. In this case, most of the available computer spaces seem occupied throughout the day. Selecting students who are to pursue computer science course appears a great challenge. The challenge comes in when the IT section in the university ground floor chambers is fully occupied throughout the day. Non-computer science students do not find sufficient number of computers to do their own research. In this case, the university selection board for computer science students needs to devise a technique that does not strain the available computer population in the library reserved for the computer science students. This proposal will try to respond to question: how can the management be able to match the available resources to the existing computer science students?

Objectives

General Objective

• To determine whether there is need for the selection board to reduce the number computer science students in the next intake.

Specific Objectives

• To determine whether there is need by the IT department to increase the number of computers in the university library ground floor.
• To determine whether there is need to fully equip another room for computer science students in the available rooms.

Significance of the Study

The study is essentially vital for the computer science department to determine whether to it is necessary to reduce the number of new students in the subsequent intakes. The main purpose of this is that there is need to ease on straining the readily available computers in the university ground floor. Secondly, the research will assist the university management to decide if there is need to create another IT section in the library or in any other available room for the IT savvy students to carry out their research. As highlighted in the statement of the problem, substantial number of computers in the ground floor is occupied by the computer science students leaving non-computer science with few computers. This has raised issues with the management on whether to reduce subsequent computer science students or not. The research will be a benchmark to the university management in admitting the next computer science students. Similarly, the research will evaluate whether there is need to equip another room space with computers for the students in the university.

Methodology and Procedure of the Study

Scope of the Study

This section reveals methodology technique in the research. The research will evaluate whether to reduce computer science students number in the next intake or whether there is need to equip another room with computers for the students.

Data Collection

This section displays the plan on data collection for the study. The researcher collected data for 20 observations at an interval of 2 hours. Each of the observation in the study has an equal chance of entering into analysis. Here, the probability is equal for each observation to be included in the study. The data was collected for five days in a week. Data collection started at 10.00 am up to 4.00pm in the evening with interval collection of 2 hours. In the specified period, that is from 10.00 am up to 4.00 pm in the evening, it was perceived that most of computer science students use the facility during this time unlike other students pursuing other courses in the university.

Table 1: Data

The illustration (table 1) reveals the data collected at an interval of 2 hours from Monday to Friday.

Data Analysis Technique

The main analysis technique employed in the research is one sample t test. One sample t test is among the non-parametric tests on quantitative data analysis aspect. The technique tries to assist the researcher in confirming whether a certain sample actually comes from the main population in the study (Eklund, Nichols, & Knutsson, 2016). One sample t test is valid in cases when the sample size is small enough and no one have an idea about the standard deviation of the data.

The technique in the study assumes that the data entered into the study meets normality assumptions. Normality assumption implies that the data values present mean zero and a constant variance. Secondly, the collected data cells must have no correlation with each other (Mendenhall & Sincich, 2016). In other words, this is termed as autocorrelation, which is a potential trait that can lead poor results thus making poor inferences. Another vital aspect in one sample t test is that the data values should have equal chance of being sampled into the analysis.

Equation 1

The illustration (equation 1) above is the formulae for the calculation of one sample t test statistic. In the analysis, the set significance level is 5% alpha level. Hypothesis testing using one sample t test entails some procedures. The procedures for the test are around 4 step. To begin with, the researcher defines the null and alternative hypothesis for the study. Secondly, there is need to calculate the test statistic using the equation 1 set above. Thirdly, there is need to compare calculated t test value with tabulated t value. Lastly, decision and conclusion based on the whether to accept or reject the stated null hypothesis is made. All the analysis is done in R-Studio software.

Data Analysis

In this section, analysis tool R-Studio is applied to extract one sample t test statistic. The library management assumes the set mean for the computer science students is 120 that actively use the facility on hourly basis. The researcher set hypothesis of the following kind for evaluation:

Against;

The null hypothesis is validated at 0.05 alpha level.

Figure 1: One Sample t test

The illustration (figure 1) displays one sample t test for the data. The analysis establishes that the data has a mean of 86.7. The hypothesis is a two sided one for the research. The analysis establishes that t=-1.6745, df=19, p-value=0.1104. In this case, under 5% level of significance the t statistic is statistically significant. Since the calculated t statistic lies in the acceptance region we fail to reject the stated null hypothesis and conclude that the mean is equal to 120 computer science students per hour.

Figure 2: t Tabulated

Figure 2 is tabulated t value for the test. Evidently, tabulated value is greater than calculated value under two-tailed test. Therefore, we fail to reject the stated null hypothesis. As such, the mean is equal to 120 computer science students per hour.

Conclusion

The research has evaluated whether there is need to reduce the number of computer science students in the subsequent intakes and whether there is need to equip one more room for IT savvy computer science students. Since the stated null hypothesis was not rejected, the implication is that there is no need to reduce computer science student number in the subsequent intakes. Additionally, there is no need to equip one more room for computer science students. In this case, computer science students do not reveal much competition with non-computer science students.