Arts and Social Sciences Journal

Many students who study abroad face difficulties when adapting in new environments and communities. Thus, this study is trying to examine whether there is a relationship between social capital within Omani Society in Queensland (OSQ) in relation to adapting to the university life and the Australian community. There is no literature that has examined adaptation and social capital within Omani communities, within different cultural landscapes. This is an ethnographic study that incorporated both observations and semi-structured interviews, and a purposive sampling method was selected for this research. Based on the thematic analysis of the interviews and observations data, the research shows that OSQ supports its members, both singles and families, to adapt to university life and integrate within Australian culture. Indeed, there are two main findings of this study that relate to OSQ and social capital. These are emotional connection and cultural distinction.

The results of this research may encourage the formation of new social clubs to assist students in their cultural transition and academic achievements through fostering social capital. Moreover, this study opens new ground for social capital theory and adaptation.

This study explored Foundation Phase (FP) teachers' practices in their quest to improve curriculum implementation by using e-learning strategies in rural schools. Most studies underscore the significance of using contemporary curriculum approaches to guide teachers towards innovations to expedite the decolonisation of rural education using e-learning strategies. The purpose of this study was to understand how FP teachers' practices of using e-learning strategies helped improve the curriculum while ensuring quality education and an improvement in learner behaviour and rural education. The COVID-19 pandemic has raised serious questions about design flaws in the current curriculum and implementation, as it fails to respond to the challenges faced by the majority of learners in schools located in rural areas. This qualitative study used semi-structured interviews, classroom observations and teacher narratives framed by the philosophy of Ubuntu to generate data that were thematically analysed. Ethical issues were given high priority. The study found that most FP teachers struggle to infuse innovative practices targeted at promoting quality rural education into their daily praxis. Further, the facilitation of e-learning through a range of interactive strategies is only possible if issues of access to data and networks are urgently addressed.

Numerous decarbonization initiatives that aim to lessen the immediate and long-term effects of climate change depend heavily on biomass. Decision-makers must take into account all potential sustainability consequences of bioenergy systems when making decisions in this context. The present work uses the Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) methodology to compare the social performance of two biomass-to-electricity systems located in Portugal that use either fluidized-bed or grate furnace technology, in particular because studies addressing the social sustainability of bioelectricity are lacking. S-LCA uses a thorough methodology for the analysis and interpretation of social data. Child labour, forced labour, the gender wage gap, the proportion of women in different occupational groups, health care costs, and the contribution to economic development were the six social indicators that were benchmarked.