DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF ONLINE REGISTRATION OF COURSES AND RESULT CONFIRMATION 

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Result, by way of definition is the consequence of an action; the conclusion of a problem, or experiment after a period of time. At the end of each academic semester, the results of the exams, tests, practical and labs are calculated and the grades are correspondingly computed. This is done by the various course coordinators of the courses. The next phase of the result processing process is done by the level course adviser. Each level of every department has its own dedicated course adviser. The course adviser acts on the list of results of all the students in his/her level and those of other students who sat for courses in other levels; either as borrowed courses or as carry over courses. The task ahead of the course adviser is to convert the grades of the students submitted to him into grade equivalents. Result processing is a routine activity. Every semester in the higher institution calls for assessment of the performances of the students. This assessment usually comes in the form of examinations, tests, practical, labs, and the like. Without an assessment of the students, there will not be the need to work hard. Assessment takes the form of a reward system. Students are interested in a competitive environment. Tracing this to the primary and secondary school systems where the students are graded in positions; each student works very hard to make the best results. The higher institution system is no difference. At the end of each academic semester, the results of the semester academic activities are computed. The issue here is in the conversion of the levels of involvement and expertise of the students into relative figures which ranks the students.

With a web browser, one can view web pages that may contain text, images, videos, and other multimedia and navigate between them using hyperlinks. The World Wide Web enables the spread of information over the Internet through an easy-to-use
and flexible format. There are many schools and colleges in our country. They have
to do a tough job of result processing. Teachers make tabulation sheet manually,
they make progressive report for every student and also make merit lists according to students' performance manually. So, it is anerroneous and time-consuming process.Many schools and colleges have websites in Nigeria. These websites arebasically of static format, which are used only as a bulletin Board. They display onlythe information of teachers, students and the school/colleges itself. They have noresult processing. Again, many schools and colleges have their branches in differentplaces. It becomes quite difficult for them to process results combinedly according tostudents' merit and compare their results among the branches.

It is the university policy to improve both the efficiency and effectiveness of course registration and result processing operations and services through the implementation of an integrated automated database system (Grey,2010) In a University like NOUN, the need for automated method of keeping data has been there. There have been several attempts to develop systems for automating result processing, but most of the work of this project will be on the processing of the results of the students at the undergraduate levels; and also span across other course advisers’ functions. With Information Management Technology department as the organization’s case study, this work is focused on providing alternative solutions to the general problems associated with result processing, adding and dropping of courses, registration of extra course units, timely computation of students’ grades, course registrations, and above all, security issues which hinders unauthorized access to results by students and lecturers.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The errors associated with the existing method of course registration and result confirmation is enormous. They make the process time-consuming and prone to errors even as they lead to late publication of examination results. Worst still, sometimes wrong grades are being entered and students’ grade point averages are computed wrongly. Consequently, the cumulative errors being generated are ultimately linked to awarding of erroneous class of degree. Some students could end up with undeserved good classes of degree, while others could be unfairly victimized, bringing about frustration. In this case, the image of the department(s) concerned and the whole University alike could become tarnished.

Also, quite worrisome is the fact that these processes are carried out every academic session, putting the operators in a continuous and ever demanding cycle. The computation of examination results and registration of students is obviously an object-centered activity, the student being the dominant object in this case. Hence, the need toevolvenotjustacomputerizedprocess,butan object-oriented softwaredesignandimplementationthatwilleffectivelyandefficientlycaptureallthe important objects associated with the registration and examination result processing within the University and the interactions among the objects. This genuine and noble desire necessitated the design and implementation of a result processing application for a course program, with National Open University as the organization in question.

So many pieces ofsoftwarehave been developed and even sold worldwide to solve this problem but most of such software have been discovered to be inefficient. Another problem which these pieces of software have posed is non-user specific problems as they are rather general use software, than specific use software. Students as well has researched and developed their own software but they could not give or develop error free software that will assist in result generation, automated course registration to keep or build a database of results in the university that will facilitate students’ transcripts.

This problem has been procrastinating the results of graduating or graduated students hence, delay in leaving for the National Youth Service when they ought to have gone. This problem has dominated the system. To arrest this problem, there is a need to develop software that is accurate, error free, and that can run on the web (using real time) in order to give students access to their results as at when needed. This will also help reduce the queue usually seen at the course advisers’ office during result’s check and in turn tackle the so much stress on both exams and record and the management in Universities.

1.3 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The aim of this work is to design an online course registration and result confirmation system that will increase throughput and reduce the response time involved in processing students result immediately after they examination.. To achieve the stated objective, the following specific objectives were laid out:

i. Provide a reliable secured solution for students to register their courses online.

ii. Provide software that will generate accurate, timely and error free results, using web technologies.

iii. Maintain a reliable database for storage of students’ records and update as the need arises.

iv. Produce relevant report of students’ Grade Point at the end of the academic semester.

v. The system should allow students confirm their results from any location.

1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The project work will help in a good number of ways to ease the delay in manual result confirmation. The software developed will help school’s management to achieve efficient Information Management System. There are many other advantages, and some of them are listed below.

 1. It saves time during examination processing.

2. Database for course registration and examination result is maintained.

3. References are very fast and delays can be avoided.

4. It allows easy access to stored information.

5. It provides a medium for the students to interact and discuss their results and the way forward of their academics.

6. It helps in reducing the costs such as labor, inventory and stationery.

7. Generation of accurate results/information on transactions is ensured.

8. It guarantees the students unshared access to their individual results.

1.5 SCOPE AND LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

This web-based application can be used in educational institutes anywhere anytime as user location doesn't matter. It can be accessed using a browser in an internet enabled system. For the purpose of this project, the system source files will be hosted on a localhost and accessed only the host system. Due to usage concurrency, the system enables the course adviser, the Head of Department, seen here as the enroller and the validator respectively, as well as the student to interact with the application effectively at the same time. This work will also use Information Management Technology department as the organization in question for its development. The system developed will only cover profile registration of students, course creation, mapping of students to courses, result processing and result display.

The major constraint experienced during the course of this project is time. Due time and inability to get required PHP codes, this system covers course registration and result confirmation in one semester. Also, money unavailability posed another constraint. There was much work to be done but, limited cash was available. The available related materials in this research topic were insufficient and so required the purchase of more relevant material.

1.6 DEFINITION OF TERMS

i. Computer Network: Computer Network is a system that connects two or more computers together using a communication link.

ii. Databases: A systematically arranged collection of computer data, structured so that it can be automatically retrieved or manipulated. It is also called databank.File 

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