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Course Data - Oxford Brookes University

Funded by the: Jisc e-Learning programme.

Lead Institution: Oxford Brookes University.

Learner Provider Type: Higher Education

Project Duration: January 2012 - March 2013

Key Words: Course Data

Case study tags: course data, process improvement, kis, course information, oxford brookes university 

Note: This is an abridged version of this project's final report.  The full version is available here.

 

Oxford Brookes University

Project Summary

This project has enabled Oxford Brookes to merge together in a standard format course data from our student management systems and our Web Content Management System. During the course of the project we have implemented a new Web Content Management System and a key challenge has been to keep the projects in step…. We have substantially increased our knowledge of where the data is held across different parts of the University. We had not realised quite how widely spread the data is at the moment. The project has highlighted this issue and given us an indication how to improve this situation.

 

What could have been improved?  What lessons have been learned?

Course advertising - This project has given Brookes a greater understanding of how to improve the way it manages and uses course information.  We have more understanding of how to adapt our internal processes to permit easier access to our course data.

 

…One of our risks namely: “Resources are not available at the times required by the project”; became an issue in that a key member of the project team was ill for a month. Also the recruitment of another member of the team took longer than expected and they did not start until the 23rd April. We made up time lost by using a greater proportion of the time of our senior data architect (10% - 30%)…

 

Immediate Impact

Course advertising

This project has given Brookes a greater understanding of how to improve the way it manages and uses course information.  We have more understanding of how to adapt our internal processes to permit easier access to our course data.


Ease of reference

This project has enabled internal use of course data.

 

Reduce duplication

A validated set course data has reduced the probability of data errors and duplication.


Ready for technology needs in the future - use of the ‘Data Services’ module to extract the data.

Experience of using SAP ‘data services’ has given valuable experience to staff and will enhance their ability to deliver future data driven projects. Use of course information in XCRI-CAP format has enabled interoperability between two of our key corporate systems.

 

Unseen benefits

We originally excluded franchised courses from the scope of course data we would collect. However we have found we do hold franchised course data (module or course rule information is not held for these courses) and once the data has been quality assured we may be able to include it in the XCRI-CAP feed after all.

 

The analysis of our current business processes has helped highlight the need for a review of the current data architecture relating to course information.

 

We have had a combined KIS & Jisc course data steering group, meeting monthly, with membership from key stakeholders in both projects. This has been helpful is managing the dependencies  between the two projects. For example: by co-ordinating the planning with our WebCMS implementation project. This governance has been effective and has been an effective means to agree and make decisions.

 

As the full benefit of the project may not be realised for some time this steering group will also put place events and processes that will help embed the use of XCRI-CAP data in the University systems.  This will make clear how project will make a practical difference to the institution

 

The project roles have remained unchanged throughout and have worked well.

 

Conclusions

We have substantially increased our knowledge of where the data is held across different parts of the University. We had not realised quite how widely spread the data is at the moment. The project has highlighted this issue and given us an indication how to improve this situation.

 

An outcome of our initial analysis sessions is that we have got the backing, in principle, to centralise the data. We have yet to agree with colleagues exactly how this should be done.

 

The Challenges in Managing & Publishing Course Data  

Specific challenges that we face in keeping course information up to date are: 

  • Currently course data is updated using MS word templates.
  • There is duplication of data entry as course data is transcribed from Word documents into the in-house Student administration system.
  • Marketing based course data used for prospectus etc. is held in our Web Content Management System.
  • Course data that is used for validation purposes is held in our in-house Student administration system.
  • There is no workflow for the update of course data. Subsequently the course approval process and update of course data in the central student administration system can be delayed as some parties may be unaware course data has been updated.
  • An “asis” Course Data process model is being developed and will be agreed with all stakeholders. Once this is agreed and understood stakeholders can agree the way forward to streamline the process.
  • In the meantime data from the two course data sources is being extracted and stored in a central course data mart which will hold historic data and be used to produce the XCRI-CAP data feed.
  • The course data lifecycle  process can take from between one hour to a year.
    • The course is designed by the faculty and a Word document based on a template is produced.
    • The course is approved by the APQO office.
    • The Admissions office get a UCAS number for the course
    • The Academic Management Office manually transcribes the course data from the Word document in to eCSIS, the in-house Student Management system.
    • Since the recent (September 2012) implementation of the new “Ektron” Web Management system Faculties and/or marketing enter course marketing data directly onto the web pages via Ektron. This is used for the online prospectus.
    • The same course marketing data in Ektron is fed into Quark to produce the printed copy of the prospectus.
    • The editorial front section of the Prospectus “Why come to Brookes” etc. is created separately. Further consultation with Claire Macrae (Senior Editor, Creative Services) is required.
    • Moodle, the Oxford Brookes Virtual Learning Environment is populated with courses automatically from Student Management system
    • Students can view course data on the faculties web site, the online or printed prospectus or via PIP for more detailed course data which also allows them to construct modular course plans etc.
    • A prospectus is printed at the same time the online prospectus is created using the same data held in the Ektron Web Content Management system.

 

Further details: email and contact names etc

Lead Institution          Oxford Brookes University

Project Director          Matthew Andrews

Project Manager        Adrian Kent

Contact email             akent@brookes.ac.uk

Project Webpage URL http://obis.brookes.ac.uk/jisc/

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