This paper reports on a needs analysis that sought to explore students' reading challenges as an initial step in designing an appropriate reading intervention programme for first-year Sociology students. The aim of the paper is to suggest conditions for the production of an effective reading intervention programme by determining the needs of the students in the first-year Sociology class. A survey using an open-ended questionnaire was used to explore students' reading challenges. The responses were analysed using content analysis. The analysis showed a variety of learner needs and revealed that most of the students have difficulty in reading their first-year Sociology texts. Comprehension was the main challenge, but other specific areas such as vocabulary, length of texts, language, and affective issues such as motivation and interest were also mentioned. The findings show that this cohort of first-year Sociology students had reading challenges that involve cognitive, language and affective issues. Based on the results of the needs analysis an intervention programme that addresses cognitive, language and affective issues is recommended for this cohort of students.

Blockchain and cryptocurrency are gradually going mainstream with new cryptocurrencies introduced every single day. The speculative nature of these digital assets expose their prices to large fluctuations. Trading these crypto-assets necessitate an adequate understanding of this emerging market as well as adequate tools to model the market risk and efficient allocation of funds. This may assist crypto investors in taking advantage of the highly volatile aspects of these assets. The portfolio consider in this study consists of six cryptocurrencies: four traditional cryptocurrencies (BTC, ETH, BNB and XRP) and two stablecoins (USDT and USDC). We examine the copula particle swarm optimization (CPSO) portfolio strategy against three other portfolio strategies, namely, the global minimum variance (GMV), the most diversified portfolio (MDP) and the minimum tail dependent (MTD). CPSO appears to be a promising strategy during extreme market conditions while GMV seem favorable during normal market conditions. Most importantly, hedge and safe-havens ability of the two stablecoins is clearly exhibited with CPSO, while their diversification property is inhibited.

There is a considerable lack of awareness of the interrelated nature of human or public sensitivity to participation, in fostering a sense of personal environmental responsibility and greater motivation towards achieving personal goals, becomes problematic. Using the poststructuralist theory, this article takes a qualitative approach to analyse discourses and people's reaction to an 'insecure' environment within South African communities. It examines organisations which provide support to empower communities through education in Cape Town. One assumption here is that people gain knowledge about themselves, their environment and others around them, if they are empowered. The focus thus is on educational schemes and activities that communities and organisations undertake to challenge, accept and negotiate their ideological positions. The inventiveness and responses of the organisations they enable an understanding of the challenges encountered in democratic South Africa, including the causes of xenophobia. Ultimately, the consequences of ignorance ISSN (Print) 1818-6874 ISSN (Online) 1753-7274 130 about one's environment are detrimental to both neighbouring communities and people at large. The local communities considered expressed this sentiment while implicating the government's role in depriving its people of vital socio-cultural and politico-economic information.

Language and critically thinking play a major role in academic performance. In multilingual contexts, multiple factors account for the way Second Language (L2) learners make sense of the academic texts they read. The students’ multilingual and multicultural diversity impacts on their interpretation of academic texts. This article is derived from a work with mixed method but focuses on qualitative design. This article qualitatively analyses how L2 students read and interpret academic texts in South African Universities. Members of a study group were interviewed both as a group and individually. In the end, students’ study practices towards academic literacy reveals translanguaging as one strategy of interpreting academic. One argument is that most African Universities have English as a medium of instructions whereas the students are often from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. This diversity tends to influence the way students read and interpret academic texts.