Globalisation and rapid environmental change have created many challenges for public and private organisations across Iraq as a developing country, particularly in the higher education sector. This includes, for example, decreases in government funding; increased demand for higher education; a need for economic transformation, and related competitiveness of organizations. Such challenges require exceptional leaders and strategic planning in order to take action to improve. In Iraq, the higher education sector is still one of the main foundations in progressing the knowledge economy. Studies into leadership style, strategic planning processes, and the importance of leadership and organisational culture to an organisation’s success have been used to assist both public and private Iraqi colleges in responding to the challenges they face. Although, some studies have examined the interaction between leadership and strategic planning, and leadership and organisational success, there has been no empirical study that has investigated how these three variables interact together. Thus, this study aimed, firstly, to identify the current leadership styles and strategic planning processes in the colleges and the challenges they faced, and to gain an understanding from the perspective of the senior leaders themselves as to how they might best respond to the current situation. Secondly, based on the participants’ experiences, knowledge and perceptions, the study aimed to identify implications for both practice and policy to help improve the colleges’ outcomes. The study involved a mixed-methods approach and was conducted in two stages. During the first stage, the researcher gathered quantitative data by administering a survey package to 129 leaders (deans, associate deans, and heads of departments) across both public and private colleges in the capital city of Baghdad. During the second stage, the researcher gathered qualitative data to more deeply explore the survey results by conducting individual interviews with a sub-sample of 21 leaders from both college types (ten public and 11 private). In the data analyses stages, both descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were applied to compiling tables and charts, and to test hypotheses, by employing the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), Microsoft Excel, and NVivo. The results of study showed that both transformational and transactional leadership styles played a varied and vital role in the colleges’ strategic planning processes, and in turn their success. The fact that private colleges were ‘for profit’ and public colleges were ‘not for profit’, as well as their contrasting funding models, highlighted key differences between the two college types’ leadership and general modus operandi. While it was found that both transformative leadership and transactional leadership styles were necessary to address the challenges colleges faced in the Iraqi educational context, the impetus for change extended far beyond the need for professional development of leaders. The embracing of information communication technologies, and reliable Internet was seen as necessary in all aspects of the colleges’ work and provision for teaching and learning, and students’ success. This applied to both college types along with the need for closer adherence to government regulations and more focused government coordination of colleges’ administrative functions. Furthermore, implications for making successful improvements to practice also identified the need to manage the challenge of sociocultural influences on the appointments and promotions of leaders. It was concluded that a greater emphasis on teamwork and provision of incentives for staff, along with a ‘boost’ to pedagogy and practice, which could be provided through the adoption of information communication technologies and appropriate professional development strategies, would enhance the colleges’ ranks and the status of their qualifications. Also, theoretically, the study offers a value-add to leadership, strategic planning process, and organisational success literature in the form of a conceptual model that links these variables in the context of Iraqi higher education sector.
Wildfire risk has globally increased during the past few years due to several factors. An efficient and fast response to wildfires is extremely important to reduce the damaging effect on humans and wildlife. This work introduces a methodology for designing an efficient machine learning system to detect wildfires using satellite imagery. A convolutional neural network (CNN) model is optimized to reduce the required computational resources. Due to the limitations of images containing fire and seasonal variations, an image augmentation process is used to develop adequate training samples for the change in the forest’s visual features and the seasonal wind direction at the study area during the fire season. The selected CNN model (Mob
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Mammary tumors (CMT) in dogs in Iraq may be induced by carcinogenic war ordnance. In our study, 10 virgin un- spayed military/pet bitches aged 5-15 years presented with abnormal masses in the abdomen with painful oedema, swelling, anorexia, weight loss, weakness and mild fever. Examination of regional lymph nodes and thoracic radiography confirmed metastasis. Tumors were excised and determined to be mostly adenocarcinomas involving multiple glands, solid in texture, 5-15 cm in size, mostly in the inguinal mammary glands at stage T3: >5 cm. Microscopy confirmed presence of adenocarcinoma in 8 dogs and solid carcinoma in 2 with half of tumors being grade III. Tumors had pleomorphic hyperchromatic cell nuclei in stroma, epithelial cells of duc
... Show MoreArtichoke (Cynara scolymus L.) is a nutritious vegetable that grown all over the world. It is a promising herbal plant, rich in bioactive components. It is considered as medicinal plant due to its nutritional and phytochemical composition, especially high proportion of phenolic compounds. The primary aim of this study was to achieve chemical profile analyses of artichoke for different phytochemcials, especially Scolymoside and Cynaroside. Methanolic crude was extracted from Artichoke leaves by rotary evaporator and separated by column chromatography. The fractions monitored by Thin Layer Chromatography (TLC), and identified in High-Pressure Liquid Chroma
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Capparis spinosa is one of the oldest genera grown in Iraqi land with worldwide traditional medicinal uses beside the culinary uses. These uses were own to the presence of many phytochemical including flavonoids, polyphenols. Among the reported polyphenolic acids are caffeic, chlorogenic and ferulic acids with well-known powerful antioxidant properties. The present work aimed to identify the presence of these polyphenolic acids in Iraqi caper naturally gown in the rural area of middle Iraq following standard chromatographic procedures. Aerial parts of the plant (buds, berries and leaves) were extracted with hydroalcoholic solvent by maceration method. Thin layer chromatographic techniques and HPLC analysis were performed to iden
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هدفت الدراسة إلى التعرف على مستوى تقييم الإعلاميين العراقيين المقيمين في الأردن لتغطية الإصلاحات السياسية و الاقتصادية في العراق من قبل الفضائيات العراقية. و هدفت كذلك إلى التعرف على الف
The control charts are one of the scientific technical statistics tools that will be used to control of production and always contained from three lines central line and upper, lower lines to control quality of production and represents set of numbers so finally the operating productivity under control or nor than depending on the actual observations. Some times to calculating the control charts are not accurate and not confirming, therefore the Fuzzy Control Charts are using instead of Process Control Charts so this method is more sensitive, accurate and economically for assisting decision maker to control the operation system as early time. In this project will be used set data fr
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At the beginning of the twentieth century distorting handling totalitarian phenomena of art, which can be called the stage of the test, transition from the theory of ideal theory and other realistic is not cushy, since it requires vision and reading and other concepts, and in light of this dialectic manifested research problem by asking the following Is affected by the design idealism and realism. Through the above mentioned questions, the researcher found rationale for addressing this problem, the study through his research, which is marked (idealism and realism in a comparative study design). And demonstrated the importance of research in the identification of the concept and the effectiveness of the two theories idealism and realism a
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