THE INSTITUTE OF FINANCE MANAGEMENT
FACULTY OF MATHEMATICS AND INFORMATION
SYSTEMS.
PROJECT REPORT
TITLE: INVIGILATION
SYSTEM
ACKNOLEDGEMENT
Secondly we would like to
express our heartfelt appreciation to our lecturers and Mr. Nderingo H. For his valuable efforts and encouragement
towards developing this system which included
In-class, out-class lessons
and other requirements details for invigilation management
We are thankful to our external
guide Dr. Dorie E. It has been a highly encouraging and knowledge gaining
experience. He has been a source of inspiration throughout the project and has
helped us in all our problems. This being the first company experience has
proved to be of great help for the overall development of the future.
Lastly we would like to offer our sincere gratitude to our fellow
students who in one way or another dedicated their time and extended a helpful
hand when we needed them most during the development process of this system.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This
report is mainly about the invigilation system. Due to the difficulty on
managing and assigning invigilators for exams in a respective venue and also
allocating student in those venues referring to their registration numbers we
have come up with the idea to automate all those procedures instead of doing
them manually. The system will have details of venues and their capacity, staff
whom will be categorized into two i.e. academic staff and non-academic staff
also the system will keep record of registered students for a certain course
and the type of exams that will taken that is tests, final and supplementary
exams.
Requirement
gathering is always essential part during project development. The success of
the project depends on the availability of the related requirements. In this
project, prototyping has been used as the tool (methodology) for collecting
requirements that will suite the whole process of project development. The
process of analysing system requirements resulted into important system objects
and functionalities. The system requires objects like administrator and user
who will be interacting with the system while on the other hand the
functionalities identified are as such register, login, view venues, assigning
invigilators, allocating students to venues manage user accounts, user profile
settings. The designing part involves modelling process such as drawing class
diagram, sequence diagram, entity relationship diagram, data flow diagram and
Use Case diagram. Use case diagram shows how different objects interact with
the system (system functionalities). In case of this project, there are
identified two objects that are user and administrator. User is shown how
he/she interacts with system functionalities such as register, view venue to
invigilate. On the other hand administrator is shown how he/she interacts with
system functionalities such managing user account and assigning invigilators to
venues and also allocating students to venues.
Sequence
diagrams are meant to show how events take place within the system as relating
to each system’s object. (Show some events series)
Class
diagram presented in this project is there to show relationship between
different objects and operations of each object.
During
implementation phase coding of all that has been designed is done. All
functionalities are made available and useful to different system’s object as
prior described. Testing of each read made peace of code is done eventually.
The implementation phase makes the completion of the system development.
Installation and maintenance of the readymade application becomes the last part
and is done when the application is required to work.
CHAPTER ONE
1.0. Introduction
The
manual procedure used in educational institutions for invigilating exams is
time consuming and error prone due to human limitations. The purpose of this
project is to provide a solution concerning the invigilation of examinations in
educational institutes. Recently most of these educational institutes use
manual procedures to assign invigilators of a certain exam in a respective
venue and also to allocate students to venues in which they will be doing their
exams. By using manual procedures the institutions were able keep record of all
students, venues, exams (tests, final and supplementary) and staffs (invigilators).
The institutions manually supposed to differentiate different categories of staff
i.e. academic and non-academic staffs and then assign them to invigilate the
exams. When assigning invigilators the institutions supposed to determine the
capacity of the venue and how many students can sit in that venue and also how
many invigilators are needed.
This project will provide the best solution to
automatically perform all those activities within a reasonable time with
minimum efforts needed.
1.1.Overview
The
system will be web-based application using client-server architecture. It will
be able to track all issues related to venues, invigilators, students, and
types of exams. Thus, the system will guide the invigilators from commencing
exams to the finishing of exams in the educational institutions.
The
application will be developed using PHP as the server-side scripting language
and therefore will run on a server that supports PHP frameworks and; it will be
connected to the Database (MySql) using appropriate database connectivity means.
Users will access the system using web browsers (Mozilla Firefox, Opera,
Chrome) through an account which will be created by the System Administrator.
1.2.Problem statement
Examination
invigilation system is a challenging task due to a number of factors that
cannot be avoided. One of them is time constraint. The invigilation schedule is
usually prepared within a short time frame as the examination schedule is only finalized
and released about three weeks before the examination commences. The committee
working on the schedule is small in number, and it has to manually process the
information provided by the examination board. Then the committee assigns each academic
and non-academic staff the best possible slots by optimizing his preferences
besides ensuring that the lecturer does not invigilate his own subjects. Thus,
every semester, the committee is working under pressure to produce the most favorable
and yet effective invigilation schedule for almost all lecturers. There is an
urgent need to lessen the burden by incorporating automation in the scheduling
task.
The
purpose of this project is to identify the effect of using manual procedures in
invigilating the examinations and allocating the students to a certain venue.
The
basic hypothesis is that manual procedure used in different educational
institution have attendance of having so many errors due to human limitations
such as the same invigilator can be assigned to more than one venues or a
single venue can be assigned so many invigilators than what was supposed to be
and also one student can be allocated to more than one venues.
1.3.Objectives
The
main objective of this project is to design a web based application that can
automate all invigilation procedures that were done manually in different
educational institutions.
The
specific objectives of this work are to:
·
Create
a Web application to be used in place of old paper based invigilation process.
·
Make the application of invigilation system usable for the College or
Universities.
·
Assign invigilators for an exam in certain venue.
·
Allocate students in different venues within an
institute or collage.
·
Automate the existing system of manually maintain the
records of the student records, courses, venues, and exams.
·
Increase data accuracy; make invigilation management
more secure, effective, convenient and accessible.
·
Coordinate information across the system to simplify
staff access to invigilation details.
·
Reduce manual
involvement and amount of time taken by the examination invigilation scheduling
committee in preparing the examination invigilation schedule.
·
Create a centralized
database for collecting information which are pertinent to the preparation of
invigilation schedules.
·
Identify
suitable software systems which will aid the process of data processing and
support the invigilation system on-line.
·
Develop a
systematic approach for preparing the invigilation schedule.
·
Identify the
constraints that exist in the designing process.
1.4.
Proposed solution
The proposed solution of these manual
procedures is the web based application that can help the administrator to
automatically perform all those procedures.
Drawbacks
of manual work
The following are some drawbacks of
manual work:
·
time consuming:
Getting
the required information from the available data takes a lot of time.
Assigning invigilators of exams for a certain venue
can take a lot of time.
Changing, editing and updating
the information contained in several files are slow and time consuming process.
Allocating students to venues
according to their registration numbers and in a range of certain amount could
take a lot of time too.
·
Needs large space:
In manual work done
data item has to be stored at several places, similarly student’s record is
maintained in separate registers. It requires more storage space.
·
Need of effort:
In manual systems, a
student’s record is maintained in separate files so it takes much effort to
collect data from several files for each student and if we want to change or
delete the data of any student then it has to be changed or deleted from all
the files and places.
Also the staff records
is maintained in separate files as well as venues and exams records all of
these are kept in separate files therefore changing or deleting any of the
records could consume a lot of time.
·
Need of several people:
Several people are
required to manage the information. This also increases the system costs.
Advantages
of the proposed system
There are much advantages of the
proposed system than a manual work, some are as follows:
·
Data consistency:
In proposed system one
data item is stored at one place. So whenever data is retrieved, always current
value of data is used.
·
Better data
accessibility:
Data can be retrieved
more easily in database system. It provides special data access language and
techniques to store data.
·
Less effort:
The data maintenance in
a database management system needs less effort in the proposed system as
compared to manual work system.
·
Data sharing:
A database is created
for one application. But this database can also be easily used for new
applications that need the same data or portion of the data.
1.5.System architecture:
Agreed: Two-tier, client server
architecture commonly used for web based applications. The following figure
shows the suggested system architecture.
Figure 1: Suggested System
Architecture
From the above figure, the http request
originates from the user; it is sent to the web server which processes it using
appropriate script(s). The web server sends to the user/client the http
response.
1.6.Project methodology:
To solve
actual problems in an industry, software developer or a team of developers
must incorporate a development strategy that encompasses the process,
methods and tools layers and generic phases. This strategy is often referred to
as process model or a software developing paradigm. A process model for
software developing is chosen based on the nature of project and application,
the methods and tools to be used, and the controls and deliverables that are
required. All software development can be characterized as a problem solving
loop in which four distinct stages are encountered: Status quo, Problem definition,
technical development and solution integration. Regardless of the process model
that is chosen for a software project all of the stages coexist
simultaneously at some level of detail.
The development process of this software
will follow the Iterative Process to provide a room for modification even if
progress has been made. To allow future scalability of the system, the Object
Oriented System Analysis and Design approach will be used during the
development process. This document will provide the relevant design elements
used in development of the system to include class diagram, sequence diagram,
entity relationship diagram, data flow diagram and Use Case diagram. More
diagrams can be added to the document as needs arise.
1.7.Chapter summary:
CHAPTER
TWO: Literature review
2.0.Overview:
Invigilation refers to the action of keeping
watch over examination candidates to prevent cheating. The
Invigilator Management system allows the administrator to nominate invigilators
for the forthcoming exams and also sends notification about the invigilated
slots to all the nominated invigilators. The notification is being sent to
their respective accounts created during registration period. Also the invigilation
management system will enable the administrator to allocate students to the
available venues in a certain range according to their registration numbers.
2.1.Background:
The invigilation system of the institute
of finance management (IFM) is done manually thus facing a lot of challenges
due to human errors. The process of assigning invigilators for various venues
and allocating students to those venues is currently done by human (manually).
These results into many problems such as inefficiency, time consuming,
duplication of records where by a single invigilator can be assigned to more
than one venue and also one student can be allocated to more than one venue.
The administrator takes the trouble of
collecting students record from record management department, then put them
into ranges of a certain number per range according to their registration
number also takes the list of all available staffs (academic and non-academic)
and venues with their capacity and assigns those staffs to invigilate the
students allocated in venues. Before assigning the administrator has to know
how many invigilators are needed to invigilate a given venue with respect to
its capacity. After assigning the invigilators the administrator has to take
trouble of informing all nominated/assigned staffs to invigilate the students
during that period of exams. Also he has to inform the invigilators about other
invigilators that he/she will be invigilating within a certain venue. This is a
tedious process.
2.2.Challenge faced by organization:
The Current
system of invigilation is highly complicated and expensive. Whenever exams are
to be conducted there are various tasks that have to be done again and again.
·
Assigning invigilators.
·
Allocating students to venues in ranges according to
registration number.
·
Informing the invigilators who have been nominated to
invigilate exams.
·
Also informing the invigilators about the invigilators
who are going to be within a same venue.
Weaknesses in Current System
The current
system is as mentioned earlier very complicated and expensive as compared to
the new system. It also wastes the precious time of the faculties which
can then be used in solving student queries and helping them improvise.
Slow retrieval of data:
The information
customers are stored in different parts of the site and take a long time to
retrieve the data. In all it can take up to 30 minutes finding the relevant
information on the person. The Delivery goes out the next day. Deliveries are
sometimes held up due to the amount of time taken to get the relevant
information. This leads to unhappy customers.
Paper wastage:
Much paper is waste due to the number of
customers in the company. Information on each of the orders is stored in the customer's
file on another page.
Unproductive use of storage space:
Paper takes up a massive amount of room in the
site. If a computer system was bought the paper could all go and there would
lots more free space which could be used for other purposes.
Poor Data Storage:
All the data is stored
in filing cabinets. Data could be misplaced due to human error or in the event
of a break in data on the customer could be stolen very easily.
2.3.Best practices:
The concept of ‘best practice’ is defined as:
The formulation of key process steps and or
events (strategies and tactics) and sub-steps in an organized, structured and
chronological order as they take place in practice. The description of the
events is clear and simple to understand by all levels of staff working in the
particular function.
Defined and formulated ‘best practice’ should:
·
Set benchmarks
which institutions strive to accomplish;
·
Implement
practices that work, rather than theoretical models and prescribed text;
·
Be the leading
practice that works best for a particular individual process, rather than an overall
performance at one institution;
·
Be dynamic; and
·
Be reviewed from
time to time to incorporate the latest implemented ‘best practices’.
In case of an invigilation system the
following are the good practices:
·
Centres should prepare
a handbook for invigilators incorporating appropriate sections from the JCQ instructions for conducting examinations
booklet.
·
A training session
should be held for any new invigilators.
·
An update meeting
should be held for the existing invigilation team so that they are aware of any
changes.
·
Make sure that
invigilators know what is expected of them.
·
Consideration should be
given to the appointment of senior invigilators.
·
Invigilators should
always be provided with badges so that they may be easily identified by
candidates and other staff as a member of centre staff.
·
Keep a database of your
invigilation team and use them all.
·
Run de-briefing
sessions after exams.
·
You may want to put in
place a confidentiality agreement between your school/college and each
invigilator. We have provided a sample agreement,
however more examples can be found online.
2.4.Benefits of a new system:
Quick Scheduling
Examination
invigilation scheduling can be created very quickly as compared to the existing
system as it allows the use of previously schedule to be used again. It saves
time required to get the schedule printed and distributed before the
examination. The schedule prepared once can be accessed by the staff as soon as
they login to their account.
Easy to Store and Retrieve
Information
The new
system makes it easy to store and retrieve information as required and does not
involve storing information in separate sheets or papers. It thus saves data
management problems faced in the current system as it has a Database Management
System of its own which allows reports to be generated when needed.
Cost Effective
One of the
main reasons of the new system is its cost effectiveness.
It saves the amount of money spend on stationery and personnel.
2.5.Similar projects:
The following are the similar
projects/systems as the invigilation system;
·
Exam invigilation –
University of British Colombia (UBC).
·
Invigilator management
system – British Council.
·
Invigilator booking
system – King’s College
CHAPTER
THREE: Analysis and design
3.0.Requirement gathering:
Requirement gathering is always
essential part during project development. The success of the project depends
on the availability of the related requirements. In this project, observation
and prototyping has been used as the tool (methodology) for collecting
requirements that will suite the whole process of project development. The
process of analysing system requirements resulted into important system objects
and functionalities. The system requires objects like administrator and user
who will be interacting with the system while on the other hand the
functionalities identified are as such register, login, view venues, assigning
invigilators, allocating students to venues manage user accounts, user profile
settings.
3.1.Functional requirements:
3.2.Non-functional requirements:
3.2.1. Security and reliability requirements
Security
The
Information should be secure; there should not be any kind of malfunctioning.
All the results, details of Exams taken and venues, invigilators are stored
securely in the system. System Information will not be changed by any person
rather than the management.
Reliability
System
should be reliable. It should keep secure all the information regarding to
particular exam invigilation schedule. It should work effectively in tremendous
rush. The system must give the perfect calculation and perfect results in kind
of damn situation. The Particular result must be listed in to the particular
user only; there should not be any kind of data integrity or other problem between
Administrator, and staff.
Flexibility
System is
working easily on the Intranet with the username and password of the user. The
Institute has given the rights to the staff and the students to use the system
with their username. The system can also work on other kind
of technology with the little modification. System should be quite flexible
to install and maintain.
Efficiency
System
should be efficient enough to meet all kinds of requirements as required
by the Administrator, Faculty and Student. The system should not hang or lose
its efficiency in any kind of worse conditions. It should provide the correct output
in all manners.
User
Friendliness
System
should be user friendly, so that any user can access the system.
3.2.2.
Organizational
requirements:
Implementation Requirements
It requires
good skill for implementation of project. As this project is using 3- tier business
architecture. All the classes, functions, procedures and objects are created in
the system wise architecture. The three tiers are given below.
1)
GUI.
2)
Business logic layer.
3)
Data access layer.
Entire
coding will be done using Php, xhtml, css, JavaScript, apache and MySql. Soft
copy for the documentation is provided in Microsoft Word Format. Entire coding
would not be shown to the client for any reasons. Implementation does not
require any more software support without as mentioned below in the system
requirements.
Standards Requirements
Industry
standards will be followed by us in any negotiation or deal related to the
product software. Coding, Documentation and final product delivery will be
followed by the standards
3.2.3. External requirements:
Ethical Requirements
Product
Software should be negotiated with human ethics and it is wished that the
software should be used with ethical requirements. Any non ethical use of this
software will be at the user’s own risk.
Legislative Requirements
1)
privacy requirements
Privacy of
any particular things and strategy will be served based on prior
negotiation and it should be cleared purposed for that requirement.
2)
Safety requirements
Safety will
be provided based on the requirement of the members and necessary critical
points.
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