A prestigious university has recently implemented a consolidation strategy that will require it to centralize their student records

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A prestigious university has recently implemented a consolidation strategy that will require it to centralize their student records. In order to move forward, the local university will need to develop a data model that will retain student records and perform various data extract transform and load (ETL) processes. Imagine that you have been hired as a database consultant to assist in the development of a data design strategy for the student records.

You met with various university subject matter experts and have determined the following after performing various business analysis processes:

Faculty groups are divided by core competencies that the university offers. For example, there are groups such as the art faculty, computer technology faculty, language faculty, and science faculty. Each faculty member has an assigned dean and is designated to teach at one particular campus and school. They are able to teach as many courses as required.
Courses are categorized by course code and title. Certain courses have prerequisites and the university has asked for this to be cataloged as well.
There are various schools within each campus. For example, the Los Angeles campus holds the following schools: School of Science, School of Law, and School of Computer Technology. Additionally, each school offers different professional study programs, such as Forensic Computer Science, Marine Biology, Business Management, and Civil Engineering, to name a few.
The study path for students requires that they be enrolled in a specific professional study program. The professional study program requires the students to complete a specific set of core courses. The university also requires that an online grade book be available. The online grade book should show grades awarded to students for specific courses and the term they completed the course.
The university identifies each student by their name, date of birth, social, and professional study program.
Instructions
Using these findings, write a 3 page paper in which you:

Analyze the university’s requirements and provide a proposal to organize all the required data elements. The proposal should include the following:
Provide an entity relationship model (ERM) that will describe the data structure that will store all data elements. Note: The graphically depicted solution is not included in the required page length.
Describe any assumptions or limitations for each relationship. For example, professors are able to teach more than one course, or students can only be enrolled in one program.
Create the primary key and foreign keys using a UML class diagram for each table.
Suggest at least four types of business intelligence reports that could help the university in course management, student enrollment, or historical tracking. Support your answer by providing specific business functions that these reports could be used for to assist executives of the university.
Consider outsourcing the functions above as an alternative for development of the database. Research the Internet and other media sources for vendors who develop registrar and school management database systems.
Suggest three vendors that developed and are employing efficient registrar and school management database systems and support your reasons to choose from one of these three vendors.
Compare and contrast the key aspects that each system offers. Examples of system aspects include but are not limited to cloud based, pricing model, open source, et cetera.
Go to the Strayer Library to locate at least three quality resources in this assignment. Note: Wikipedia and similar websites do not qualify as quality resources.

Sample Solution

Data Model Design for University Student Records

1. Analysis and Entity Relationship Model (ERM)

The university’s data can be organized into the following entities and their relationships:

  • Student: This entity represents a student at the university. Attributes include:
    • StudentID (Primary Key)
    • Name
    • DateOfBirth
    • SocialSecurityNumber
    • ProgramID (Foreign Key)
  • Program: This entity represents a professional study program offered by the university. Attributes include:
    • ProgramID (Primary Key)
    • ProgramName
    • SchoolID (Foreign Key)
  • School: This entity represents a school within a campus. Attributes include:
    • SchoolID (Primary Key)
    • SchoolName
    • CampusID (Foreign Key)
  • Campus: This entity represents a physical location of the university. Attributes include:
    • CampusID (Primary Key)
    • CampusName
  • Faculty: This entity represents a faculty member at the university. Attributes include:
    • FacultyID (Primary Key)
    • Name
    • DeanID (Foreign Key)
    • CampusID (Foreign Key)
  • Dean: This entity represents a dean overseeing a faculty group. Attributes include:
    • DeanID (Primary Key)
    • Name
  • Course: This entity represents a course offered by the university. Attributes include:
    • CourseID (Primary Key)
    • CourseCode
    • CourseTitle
  • Prerequisite: This entity represents a prerequisite course for another course. Attributes include:
    • PrerequisiteCourseID (Foreign Key) (References Course.CourseID)
    • RequiredCourseID (Foreign Key) (References Course.CourseID)
  • Enrollment: This entity represents a student’s enrollment in a specific course during a term. Attributes include:
    • EnrollmentID (Primary Key)
    • StudentID (Foreign Key)
    • CourseID (Foreign Key)
    • Term
    • Grade

Assumptions and Limitations:

  • A student can only be enrolled in one program at a time (ProgramID is a foreign key in Student).
  • A professor can teach multiple courses (Faculty is not related to Course directly).
  • A course can have multiple prerequisites (Prerequisite table with many-to-many relationship).
  • A course can be offered in multiple terms (Enrollment table includes term).

2. UML Class Diagrams with Primary and Foreign Keys

Student

+----------------+
| Student         |
+----------------+
| StudentID (PK)   |
| Name            |
| DateOfBirth     |
| SocialSecurityNumber |
| ProgramID (FK)   |
+----------------+

Program

+--------------+
| Program        |
+--------------+
| ProgramID (PK) |
| ProgramName   |
| SchoolID (FK)  |
+--------------+

School

+--------+
| School  |
+--------+
| SchoolID (PK) |
| SchoolName  |
| CampusID (FK) |
+--------+

Campus

+-------+
| Campus |
+-------+
| CampusID (PK) |
| CampusName  |
+-------+

Faculty

+--------+
| Faculty |
+--------+
| FacultyID (PK) |
| Name            |
| DeanID (FK)      |
| CampusID (FK)   |
+--------+

Dean

+-----+
| Dean  |
+-----+
| DeanID (PK) |
| Name        |
+-----+

Course

+-------+
| Course |
+-------+
| CourseID (PK) |
| CourseCode   |
| CourseTitle  |
+-------+

Prerequisite

+-----------------+
| Prerequisite     |
+-----------------+
| PrerequisiteCourseID (FK) |  (References Course.CourseID)
| RequiredCourseID (FK)   |  (References Course.CourseID)
+-----------------+

Enrollment

+-----------+
| Enrollment |
+-----------+
| EnrollmentID (PK) |
| StudentID (FK)    |
| CourseID (FK)     |
| Term             |
| Grade            |
+-----------+

3. Business Intelligence Reports

  • Course Enrollment Report: This report would show the number of students enrolled in each course by term. This information could be used to identify popular courses, adjust course offerings, and optimize faculty allocation.

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