CourseViewer: tool integration with academic management systems and comparison of student transcripts

• Grant number: 15/11095-8
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): September 01, 2015
• Effective date (End): August 31, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Computer Science
• Principal researcher: Celmar Guimarães da Silva
• Grantee: Matheus Gonçalves da Silva
• Home Institution: Faculdade de Tecnologia (FT). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Limeira , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The use of interactive graphics to represent student transcripts and course catalogs has been the main strategy used by CourseViewer software to help students, teachers and coordinators of university courses to analyze information on subjects such as credits and prerequisites. This prototype allows visually rearrange disciplines according to the needs of users, how to plan for future semesters or understand the impact of a discipline as a prerequisite for other courses of the program. Among its limitations, we highlight that the current software architecture makes it difficult to integrate academic management systems as adopted by Unicamp. Besides, the software does not allow the comparison of a set of student transcripts. Thus, this research project aims to implement an integration layer in CourseViewer that enables the integration of academic management systems. It also aims to research and implement techniques for visualizing and comparing multiple student transcripts. We expect that this integration and the proposed enhancements allow the use of this system by more users, benefiting especially Unicamp community with better access and understanding of student transcripts and course catalogs.