As the chairman and on behalf of the organizing committee, I am proudly present here and delighted to welcome you all to the 1st International Conference on Innovative Research Across Disciplines, ICIRAD 2015. This conference was initiated by the Research Institute of Ganesha University of Education to be a forum for all international researchers to share and publish the results of their innovative, excellent, and robust works in the field of education, social science and humanities, as well as science and technology.
ICIRAD 2015 has received in total of 111 abstract and full paper submissions from all three categories. Through our review process, a number of 107 submissions were accepted to be presented and 37 articles were selected out of them and have successfully been published in our proceeding. The attendees are researchers, practitioners, and students with affiliations from four countries, that is, Indonesia, Australia, Thailand, and The Netherlands. The conference is held on 18-19 November 2015 in Grand Inna Hotel, Kuta-Bali, together with our third national conference (SENARI III) which is the strength behind and a milestone in the initiation of our first international conference. Our keynote speaker is Dr. Muhammad Dimyati, Director General of research and development strengthening of The Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology, and Higher Education. We also present four speakers representing three countries and the four conference topics; they are Prof. Zainal Arifin Hasibuan, Ph.D from Indonesia to represent the national education standards body (BSNP) and also the association of Higher Education of computer science (APTIKOM), Prof. Harry Aveling from La Trobe University Australia, Prof. KongkitiPhusavat from Kasetsart University Thailand, and Prof. Sariyasa, M.Sc., Ph.D. from Ganesha University of Education Indonesia. Our speakers will discuss about the current issues and policies regarding research in various fields. And for that, on behalf of all of the committee members, I would like to thank all of our invited speakers for having fulfilled our request to share with us valuable and state-of-the-art information in this event. Our event would not be possible without the supports of all parties involved. Therefore, on this very occasion, allow me on behalf of the committee to extend our thanks to: (1) the Higher Education Directorate General as the provider of the research funds so that our researchers are able to share and publish their works; (2) Rector of Ganesha University of Education for his full support for the event; (3) the government of Bali Province and Buleleng Regency for their cooperation in our research and service programs; (4) all of the program committee members who have given all of their efforts to prepare and run this event; (5) all of the reviewers in providing us with the selected articles to be presented in our conference; and (6) all the participants for the strong support and participation in our event.
I hope this conference will prove to be a fruitful, inspiring and transformative experience to you, and all of us.