Assessing User Needs Analysis for Inter-school Social Information Sharing Portal

Abstract

Information sharing for schools involved the activities of sharing relevant contents, exchanging knowledge and interests, and document retrieval purposes. Our preliminary study shows, updating information for schools in Malaysia using web-based portal managed by Ministry of Education that acts as a platform in disseminating updates from ministry to all schools is still fairly under-researched. To date, no social information sharing platform serves between schools in Malaysia enabling them to update and share relevant contents and documents. The main objective of this paper is to discuss the user needs analysis that has been done to pursue the development of the model for the information sharing purposes. This paper includes fact-finding activities conducted by theoretical study that involves the review of reading previous researches and related documents. Empirical study involves the distributing of questionnaires and interview sessions with the teachers who are responsible in managing students’ activities from 140 secondary schools in Pahang. The aim of the fact-finding phase is to assess their willingness to share social information and identify types of social information to be shared among schools. This paper will produce the findings on variable that can be used to help in constructing an information sharing environment among schools.