It was an unprecedented and meritorious Data analysis free seminar organised by the newly "proposed" club on campus. On Saturday 2nd December, 2017 at 2:00pm, "proposed" Jiangsu University Scientific Club for Research & Data Analysis (JSU-SCRD) organized a fantastic and fabulous ICT educative program at the Graduate school (G-106) to equip participants with relevant skills needed for scientific and social data analysis.

Exactly at the slated time, many participants were seated like travellers ready to board their flight! The program was unveiled with a warmed welcome address and a speech by Dr. Dragana Ostic, the Patron of the "proposed" club who smoothed the grounds for the commencement of the program. She expressed her delight upon seeing students on weekend in their numbers for haven sacrificed their time and energy for the event. Furthermore, she encouraged students to take the seminar seriously as it will help them in their academic endeavours. She finally advised the organizers to take into consideration the academic needs of students to organise similar programs for their benefit. In view of that, she concluded by saying speakers much also be effectively trained to deliver proper presentations.

Based on the program participation, she hoped that subsequent programs by the club will be much brighter and fruitful for its continuity and sustainability.

The first session of the event was coached by Dr Haroon Ur Rasheed. He gave tutorials on ORIGIN LAB. The organizers helped participants to install the software and guided them throughout the practical processes.

Some of the uses of the ORIGIN LAB include the following;

❖ Transfer data from Notepad file to MS Excel

❖ Deal with multiple data in a single page

❖ Smoothing of data

❖ Peak Analyser

❖ Making Graph more attractive and standardized

In summary, the instructor, Dr. Haroon Ur Rasheed said the ORIGIN LAB software is very effective for making standardized graphs with large data from XRD machine, Electro catalysis, UV machines among others to make proper data presentations for publication.

In addition, he said the aim of "proposed" JSU-SCRD is to help students in the areas of their research. According to him, “many students lack the knowledge of these softwares of which the club saw it beneficial to organize such event to help them publish good research papers to promote Jiangsu University.

Also, as a PG-group leader, many students do confront him with challenges with respect to research and publication. Therefore he pioneered the birth of this Club with other Core Committee members as follows;

The future envision of the Club is very illuminating in the sense that it does not only aim for science and engineering software workshops for Jiangsu University students exclusively but also to cover other Chinese Universities across the country with the support of OEC.

Similarly, the long-term plan includes training of more professionals in this field to go back to their respective countries and organise replica events for free under the auspices of OEC. This, he said can help promote Jiangsu University specifically and China as a whole.

The second half session was also instructed by Majid Murad, a PhD candidate from the School of Management Science & Engineering. He gave tutorials on ENDNOTE software.

The Primary objectives for the second session were as follows;

❖ To create EndNote library and add references into it.

❖ To manage your library and organize your references

❖ To export your references into word document as well as to make a bibliography

The instructors observed that most students didn’t have the two softwares and had little or no knowledge about their use. Therefore they found it most relevant to organise similar programs in future to cover almost all departmental Data Analysis prerequisite.

The two sessions were carried out systematically, efficiently and effectively. Participants were very grateful for not missing the golden opportunity and they aimed to participate in future programs of the club.

Baidoo Philip, a PhD candidate in Mechanical Engineering said, “The seminar was interesting, all inclusive-student centred, effective and consistent. He suggested that if OEC could support this initiative will help many students”.

To others, the program was a good initiative and they suggested a step-by-step instructions for operating the discussed software be made available next time to enhance technical comprehension. Some even said “they felt like publishing a paper” after the seminar.

Furthermore, the Interim Vice-President, Gabriel Murillo acknowledged some challenges to overcome. The late installation of the softwares somehow affected the efficiency of the presentations. Moreover, he proposed a venue with more facilities to help the students regarding electricity connection of laptops and wireless connection wifi to facilitate tutorial processes. “These are key teaching facilities that must be provided in order to have better conditions for the participants”.

Finally, Sheikh Farhan Ashraf, the interim General Secretary of JSU-SCRD recorded about 100 participants. He also encouraged participants to expect more fruitful workshops from the club. The program successfully ended at 4:10pm.

Credits

Writer : Mansuur Husein, Olive Daily (Olive Media)

Editor: Tso, Olive Daily (Olive Media)

Photographer: Mansuur, Olive Daily (Olive Media)