Project – Formulate and implementation of a computer-based result management system for secondary schools

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION 

1.1  Background to the Study

The major goal of this study is to use a computerized system to improve and automate the management and declaration of students’ outcomes. As basic education in developing countries like Nigeria embrace information and communication technologies, they employ it in transforming their record keeping and information management operations. Particularly, student’s computer-based result management system is one of the key information systems that readily attract the attention of most basic education (Eludire, 2020; Añulika, et al. 2019; Nikam, & Jadhav, 2019 and Ghatge, & Bhoite, 2021). While the upper basic  section of the basic education in developed countries already have well established students computer-based result management systems, their counterparts in the developing countries are having series of adhoc and standalone result management systems that provide only some basic elements of students computer-based result management system.

Equally, majority of the students computer-based result management system do not have    web interfaces and others do not integrate well with the other basic education-wide information system. The major challenge is that the upper basic management outsource the development of such computer-based result management system without proper understanding of the essential functionalities and compatibility issues the computer-based result management system should afford to the school (Aron, et al. 2020; Bennett, & Rajlich, 2020; Hawthorne, & Perry, 2019 and Keil, et al. 2021).

In this study, a sample of computer-based result management system design is presented. The Computer-Based Result Management System (CRMS) is a web-based tool that primarily focuses on delivering results to students and teachers. The students checks their separate outcomes using their school registered recognition ids, as well as their grades and terms percentages. It is easy for students to retrieve their results through the college website, and it is easier for class to assess the pass and fail rates of a given subject. Student, Subjects, and Result are the three components that make up the system.

A detailed functional decomposition of the system is presented along with use case diagram. Also, the participatory software development methodology (Siew, et al. 2021; Simonsen, & Robertson, 2019; Ferrario, et al. 2019; Spinuzzi, 2020 and Bano, & Zowghi, 2019) used in the system development is presented. Such development approach will afford the system stakeholders in the university to participate effectively in the design process even when the software is outsourced. Numerous screenshots of the developed computer-based result management system is presented to further demonstrate the possible interface features the need to be built into such computer-based result management system.

1.2  Statement of the Problem

A Computer-Based Result Management System is a set of software programs that is designed to control the institution’s practically using public secondary school in Port Harcourt, storage, management and retrieval of data (Result) in a database. Computer-Based Result Management System is categorized according to their data structures or types. The current paper-based result management system is plagued with several issues. Firstly, the manual entry of data is susceptible to human errors, leading to incorrect results. Secondly, the storage of physical records poses a significant challenge in terms of space, organization, and retrieval. Additionally, the process of generating reports and analyzing data is tedious and time-consuming. Lastly, the lack of transparency and limited accessibility hinders effective collaboration among stakeholders. It was based on the stated challenges the researcher choose to design and implement a computer-based result management system, which minimizes all the problems mentioned.

1.3  Aim and Objectives of the Study

To develop a system that can prevent unauthorized access or mutilation of the results of the students, thereby maintaining data integrity.

The aim of the study is to formulate and implement a computer-based result management system for secondary school. While the specific objectives are:

1. To design an interface-user friendly system.
2. To design a system that can facilitate the generation of adhoc query.
3. To design a system that ensures reliability and transparency in the creation and computation of result.
4. To implement a result oriented system for upper basic education in Port Harcourt.

1.4  Significance of the Study

With the dynamic changes and growth in information technology, the study offers numerous benefits to institutions and organizations that deals on result information management.

Manual method of computation will no longer be there again because it will be done by the computer with the help of the computerized information System. Because of the easy to use nature of the computer-based result management System, any institutions can easily buy it to make use of it.

Researcher will find the topic interesting for further study purposes to expand the scope of the study.

The study will be a source of literature on the topic for authors, researchers and students in the field of computer science.

1.5  Scope of the Study

Computer-Based Result Management System is a web-based system, meaning that the Performance of the system will also be automated. It uses PHP language for development. This system is interacting with database through MySQL.

1.6  Limitation of the Study

The study will be limited to the designing a Computer-Base Result Management System using the PHP programming language and Code Igniter Framework and MySQL database. It is important to mention here that time was a major constraint in the course of fact finding. It is also wise to mention here that some information that was needed to work with was not collected because of the unwillingness of the staff to review such information.

1.7  Project Layout

The project layout for this study include chapter one which gave the introductory and background to the study, chapter two which discussed the literature review, chapter three explaining the system, analysis and design of the program, chapter four explaining the system implementation and chapter five had the summary, conclusion, recommendations, contribution to knowledge and suggestions for further studies

1.8  Definition of Terms

Administrator: It is defined as a person whose responsibilities are to be in charge of a database administration

Basic Education: It is defined as the early childhood care and development education.

Computer-Based Result: It is defined as a result generated from a structured database system.

Database: It is defined as an organized collection of structured information, or data, typically stored electronically in a computer system

Data Structure: It is defined as a specialized format for organizing, processing, retrieving and storing data. 

Data Type: It is defined as a classification of data which tells the compiler or interpreter how the programmer intends to use the data.

Home: It is defined as the homepage of the computer-based result management system 

Result: It is defined as the generated termly result of a student from the computer-based result management system.

Result Management System: It is defined as a system that helps to streamline the examination process.

Student: It is seen as a person formally engaged in learning, especially one enrolled in a school or college.

Subjects: It is defined as a thing that is being discussed or studied in any institution.

Upper Basic Education: It is seen as the class from junior secondary to senior secondary in educational settings in Nigeria.

Project – Formulate and implementation of a computer-based result management system for secondary schools