This means reports and presentations must be

QUESTION

ISIT 102SystemsCase studyWeek: October 16th, 2015Due date: At the beginning of the ISIT102 Tutorial of week 11, (22/11/2015).This means reports and presentations must be handed in:•For the Monday tutorialo At 16:30 pm sharp, not at 16:45pm nor any later on. Any delay on that daywill result in 10% deduction from your mark.•For the Tuesday tutorialo At 10:30 am sharp, not at 10:45pm nor any later on. Any delay on that daywill result in 10% deduction from your markLast NameFirst NameStudent IDSignatureThe learning outcomes of this case study include:1. Applying your knowledge of Porter’s five competitive to assess their impact on thestrategy of a University in selecting either a quarter-based curriculum or a semesterbased one.2. Exploring and assessing the business value chains3. Read and solve a case study by producing a business report1/6Directions:1. You must read the case study very carefully.2. Before answering the questions, you may consult additional information from theweb, the electronic resources available from the UoW or UoWD . Just make sure toreference any source of information you used.3. You are expected to produce a business report to present your answers andsolutions to the case study.4. The structure of your business report should follow the guidelines used by UOW. Youwill find the required information at http://unilearning.uow.edu.au/report/4b.html.5. It is very important to justifying your answers using business-oriented facts.6. You must submit to the lecturer a typewritten copy of this handout with yourtypewritten report, and a power point presentation.7. The submission deadline for all groups forms all tutorial groups is set to at thebeginning of the ISIT102 Tutorial of week 11, (22/11/2015). This means reportsand presentations must be handed in:a. For the Monday tutorial at 16:30 pm sharp, not at 16:45pm nor any later on.Any delay on that day will result in 10% deduction from your mark.b. For the Tuesday tutorial at 10:30 am sharp, not at 10:45pm nor any later on.Any delay on that day will result in 10% deduction from your mark.8. Presentations will start at the beginning of the tutorials of week 11.•All members of the tutorial MUST be present at the start of the tutorial. Groupswill be called on randomly.• If a group is not present when called on, then a 10% penalty will be applied toall its members.• If your group is called on, and you are n absent, unless you have a medicaljustification, your presentation mark will be zero.9. Each group will be allocated 15 minutes for the presentation, followed by 5 minutesof questions.10. All members of the group must be able to answer any of the asked questions.Therefore, it is advisable that all members of the group should be active participantsin this case study.2/6Advice:•You have all of week7, week 8, week 9, and week 10 to work on the case study. Donot wait until week 10.•The sooner you start your assignment the more time you will have.•Each member of your group should read the assignment ,•Then you should discuss it as a group.•After that you may assign tasks to each member of the group•Keep in mind that each member of the group is expected to be knowledgeable of theentire case.•You have enough time to produce a good work if you succeed inCOLLABORATING as members of team.3/6Case StudyWhich university system will you advise? Quarter or Semester?In this case study, you will act as a system analyst who will advise a local university toselect either a semester-based curriculum or a quarter based one.A. Background information about quarter and semester based curriculumIn the United States, world famous universities such as The Ohio State University, theUniversity of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of California at Davis (UCDavis), Stanford University, Caltech University operate on the quarter system, in which theacademic year is broken into four terms (including summer) of about 10 weeks each. Moststudents at these schools attend three quarters a year:• Fall• Winter,• Spring,• Summer is optional. Students may choose not to attend the summer.Other universities (in fact, the majority in the United States) operate on the semester system,where the year is broken into three terms of 15 weeks each:• Fall,• Spring,• Summer is optional. Most students attend only the fall and spring semesters.B. Which system is better?Students and faculty, two of the main actors in a university, have different opinions on therelative merits of the two systems.Academically speaking, one unit of credit in the quarter systems is worth two-thirds a unit ofcredit in the semester system. The following table summarizes some of the most cited ofarguments:4/6Semester sessionQuarter sessionTable 1. Some of the most cited arguments cited by students and faculty (professors)ProsConsA. StudentsA. Students• You can take more classes in a• You may feel that learning is too fastquarter-based curriculumpaced• You will have less incentive to take a • You will exam at a much higherfrivolous class such as ballroomfrequency.dancing for an elective.• If by mischance you get sick for aweek, you will have a very hard time• If you happen to take a bad class(boring subject), your experience willgetting up to date in your classesbe relatively shorter than in a• The session is too short for students tosemester system.work on serious projects.• You will have the chance to• You are out of synchronization with theinteracting with more professorsmajority of the other universitiesB. Professors(They adopt the semester system).• The system offers more flexibilityB. Professorsfor professors.• They will have to accomplish morework.A. StudentsB. Students• A student has more time to focus on • Some subjects do not need a fulldifficult subjectssemester• Courses are not as fast paced as in the • The session is too long to rememberquarter systemcourse content for finals.• Students have more time to work on• The experience of a bad class will lastserious projectsforever.• Students have more time for meetingother students, practicing sports,hobbies.The above table did not include any arguments about costs? Yet, cost is an importantfactor for both private and public universities. Academic and administrative staff has to bepaid. Students have to pay tuition fees. Utilities like electricity, internet, gas, water need alsobe paid.According to Porter’s, every new term, be it quarter or semester, a set business processesare needed ever faculty or college of a university. The following list includes some of thenecessary processes that must be initiated at the start of a term (quarter, or semester).a) Adjust enrollments via add/ dropb) Allocate classrooms and related equipmentc) Allocate final exam rooms,d) Hire invigilatorse) Enroll students , plan open days, orientation daysf) Grade finalsg) Prepare and print course subject outlines,h) Record final gradesi) Recruit and hire needed new adjunct lecturers.j) Schedule classesk) Schedule finalsl) Staff classes5/6Each of these processes may have a substantial cost. If we assume that summer isnegligible,• Then, a quarter system has three sessions while the semester system has twosessions,• Therefore, a university will need to incur the costs of these processes three times ayear in a quarter systems, but only two times a year in a semester system.Intuitively, it may seem more economical to go for a semester system than a quarter systems.However, this has to be proven ( it is part of your task).C. Your taskA major university in your city has been using the quarter system. Recently this universityhas raised significantly the tuition fee. The president of the university has been consideringswitching to a semester-based curriculum. He asked your consulting company to prepare abusiness report on the possibility of a switch to semesters.The report you are to produce should determine if the switch will constitute acompetitive advantage for this university.The following is a list of actions that will help you in your task:1. Expand the above table of pros and cons. You may use a search engine like Google,or refer to recent academic publications (from either 2014 or 2015).2. Enrich the above list business processes involved in starting a new term (some crucialactivities may be missing)o Examples are processes to develop the roster of classes, to staff classes, andto enroll students.o Name as many more of the processes required as you can.3. Pick three processes from your list and explain their sources of cost.4. List and describe five factors that you think could be keeping a university that is on aquarter system from converting to a semester system. You must justify yourchoices. Base you analysis on:• Porter’s competitive forces model• Porter’s value chain model• Porter’s strategies for competitive advantages5. What are the competitive forces that face the university? Which ones can be linkedto the semester-quarter system?6. Analyze the value chain model of the university.• Map the different business processes to Porter’s value chain model.• Identify which if any of its main activites are impacted or can impact thechoice of quarter/semester.7. Similarly consider strategies the university can use for competitive advantages. Howcan the choice of quarter/semester impact a completive advantage or disadvantage?8. Using the results you gathered from tasks (1) to (7), produce a business report thatwill advise the university president whether to switch to a semester curriculum ornot. The report should document and justify all your finding.Hint:• Keep in mind that asides from the sheer cost of these processes, the views ofstudents and lecturers are crucial. Justify their importance. What is the role ofstudents in Porter’s models? What is the role of lecturers in Porter’s models?• Hence, you should conduct surveys for both students and lecturers about thetopic.6/6

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