Overview
Executive Summary
SMART (Student Marks And Records Tool) is a system thatmanages students’ coursework, exam and assessment results, course marks, degree progression and classification. This project has been raised as a follow up to the last enhancement project (STU221) delivered in August 2012. There are currently only two HSS schools (Divinity and Business School) using SMART. By addressing and prioritising enhancements and current bugs, this project will support other Schools within HSS in adopting SMART.
Business Objectives and Project Deliverables
The first three objectives (No O1, O2, and O3) are mandatory.
The remaining objectives (no O4 onwards) have been prioritised by HSS/CSE users, and development will be done as per available budget.
No | Description | Phase | |
O1 | Two new reports run from SMARTMI BOXI and increase the frequency of the update of the Universe | 1 | |
D1 | A report for exam boards that displays student classification profiles by mean for a given programme of study; contains all relevant course and exam details for a student on one page, for easy reference during an exam board. BOXI report to be based on the stakeholder agreed report ‘CHSS SMART report 1’. |
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D2 | A quick glance, student-per-line report that shows progression over years 3 and 4, spread of achievement by classification, and indicates to an exam board whether a student is a borderline case. This report to be based on the ‘Prog Grad BS’ report produced by Paul Kydd and agreed by stakeholders. |
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D3 | Increase the current frequency of the SMARTMI Universe update (from once a day at the moment).It will either be directly updated from the SMART database (see performance risk 3.3) or the update frequency will be increased as per the users’ requirements (every hour 9.00 to 17.00). It is currently updated once overnight.
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O2 |
Managing Pass/Fail results | 2
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D1 | Process to calculate and record Pass/Fail |
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D2 | Display Pass/Fail |
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D3 | Manage pass/fail in existing reports |
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O3 |
System scalability as increased use by HSS schools |
2
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D1 | Ensure that increased number of users can access SMART at the same time, that current queries remain efficient, and that system allows increased data storage.
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| Prioritised enhancements | Priority | Phase |
O4 |
Handling zeros and null values |
1 |
2 |
D1 | Resolution of zeros and null values in the output files reported by users |
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O5 |
Averaging marks/grades for a programme |
2 (tied) |
2 |
D1 | Resolution of incorrect calculations of marks |
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O6 |
Modify the yearly roll over process |
2 (tied) |
2 |
D1 | Improve the roll over process to allow PGT programmes to calculate programme results in Sept/Oct |
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O7 |
Change calculation of Honours degree from ratio of years 3 to 4 from 50:50 to 1:2 |
4 |
2 |
D1 | Ability to enter 1:2 ratio |
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O8 |
Add a column to record reference at course level |
5
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2 |
D1 | To allow users to record notes against a particular student on a particular course |
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O9 |
Vertical Text alignment in column headers for Progression Spreadsheets in SMART |
6 |
2 |
D1 | To allow vertical text alignment for ease of printing and viewing course marks on spreadsheets |
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O10 |
Investigate disappearance in SMART of BA Exchange students who study at Edinburgh from other universities |
7 |
2 |
D1 | To ensure those students appear on the lists |
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Scope
The project’s scope is to deliver mandatory requirements and to include prioritised requirements that are enhancements/bugs fixes within the agreed budget. The prioritised requirements have been identified and agreed by HSS/CSE users at a meeting held by USD/SACS on 29/10/12. The enhancements which cannot be completed within the budget will be out of scope.
There will be two phases:
- · Phase 1: Objective 1.
o The reports are required for the Exam Board held in January 2013, and will be delivered in Dec 2012.
o There will be more regular updates of the SMARTMI Universe used for reporting. Desirable for January 2013 Exam Board. Hard deadline is for May 2013 Exam Board.
- · Phase 2: the remaining objectives will be delivered by end March 2013. The analysis, build, testing and deployments of the enhancements and bugs can be done in several iterations as they have now been prioritised. That will ensure a better use of IS Apps resources, increase confidence in delivering the project’s objectives and earlier use of the functionality. Two iterations have been identified:
o Iteration 1. Objectives 2, 3 and 4
o Iteration 2: the remaining objectives
Out of scope:
- User group has identified and prioritised issues that will be done as part of support. They will need to be coordinated so that they do not interfere with project work.
Problem with the ‘s’ being included on returns to registry in .csv files (SMART wiki issue 34, incident I120119-0246) | 1 |
Some keywords are not coming through the progression sheets in SMART (SMART wiki issue 48, problem P1206-017) | 2 |
Intercalated students show up with the wrong year (SMART wiki issue 5, incident I120423-0298) | 3 |
Some barcode labels do not appear to format properly (SMART wiki issue 42, problem P1205-010) | 4 |
Configure SMART to flag up the specific error when a user incorrectly keys in data (SMART wiki issue 52, incident I120604-0127) | 5 |
- · It is expected that user documentation and training are also out of scope of this project, and will be done by USD/SACS.
Category
This is a discretionary project.
Project sponsor has agreed to use the remaining 141 days from the HSS ring-fenced budget (initially 150 days budget minus 9 days used to complete STU221).
Milestones
Description | Date | Type (& Reason if Required) |
Planning(this is when the project Terms of Reference and associated documents will be signed off) | 16/11/12 | Soft |
Phase 1 BOXI reporting | ||
PPAR(this is when the business requirements for the project will be signed off) Phase 1 | 3/12/12 | Hard to meet the end Dec deadline for the exam board to use the new reports in January |
PPBR(this is when the build stage by Config Team of the project will be signed off) | 7/12/12 | Hard as above |
PPIR(this is when the solution will be fully integration tested by Service Management and signed off) | 13/12/12 | Hard as above |
ASOR (this is when the solution will be fully acceptance tested and signed off by the customer and user community) | 8/1/13 | Hard as above |
Deployment (this is when the solution will be deployed in the live environment) | 9/1/13 | Soft as could be delivered early Jan (w/b 7th Jan 13) still in time for the exam board |
Deployment sign off
| 14/1/13 | Hard as above |
Phase 1 SMARTMI Update of the refresh | ||
PPDR | 7/1/13 | Soft as hard deadline for deployment is end March 13 |
PPBR | 14/1/13 | Soft |
PPIR | 21/1/13 | Soft |
ASOR | 31/1/13 | Soft |
Deploy | 7/2/13 | Soft as hard deadline for deployment is end March 13 |
Deploy sign off | 14/2/13 |
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Phase 2 enhancements/bugs: Iteration 1 | ||
PPAR | 10/12/12 | Hard so that we can meet the code freeze for the exam diet starting 1/4/13 (end 10/6/13) |
PPDR
| 28/1/13 | Hard as above |
PPBR
| 25/2/13 | Hard as above |
PPIR
| 28/2/13 | Hard as above |
ASOR | 7/3/13 | Hard as above |
Deploy | 13/3/13 | Hard as above |
Deployment sign off | 19/9/13 |
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Phase 2 enhancements/bugs: Iteration 2 | ||
PPAR
| 18/12/12 | Soft, Dev resource on iteration 1 until PPBR iteration 1 |
PPDR
| 4/3/13 | Soft as will be hit by code freeze (starting 1/4/13, ending 10/6/13), and budget limit |
PPBR
| 1/4/13 | Soft as above |
PPIR
| 4/4/13 | Soft as above |
ASOR | 11/4/13
| Soft as above |
Deployment
| 19/6/13 | End of code freeze (mid June) |
Deployment sign off | 21/6/13 | Soft as above |
Closure of the project | 10/7/13 | Soft |