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| Enrollment Prerequisite Audits |
When a student registers for a course at Penn State the registration process does not check to see if the student has the necessary course prerequisites. Penn State's operational mainframe does not have the computing power necessary to check enrollment prerequisites during the very busy drop/add process.
Several years ago our Dean for Undergraduate Studies expressed an interest in implementing a system that would identify those students who scheduled courses for which they have not completed the necessary prerequisites. A system was developed that accessed mainframe data in the evening hours and downloaded this data to a personal computer (PC) for analysis. The PC then analyzed the student records and identified students who did not meet course preparation requirements.
Not all courses are checked by this system. As of Fall 2002, two-hundred and fifty-four (254) courses were checked involving approximately four-thousand five-hundred enrollments.
Curriculum coordinators in each department edit prerequisite criteria via the college intranet. Then, each day during the free drop/add period, they can do a prerequisite audit of courses offered by their department. The prerequisite audits are provided to faculty. It is the responsibility of faculty to meet with and discuss possible remedies. Faculty members are pleased with the information they receive. As a result of the this system, the College of Engineering has experienced a gradual decline in the number of students scheduling courses for which they are unprepared. |
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