The University of Otago
"When we approached Sybase about academic pricing and licensing it was like a breath of fresh air. Their helpfulness and understanding of the educational environment and the financial constraints under which we operate was very much appreciated."
Graham Copson
Technical Manager, Department of Information Science
University of Otago
Over the last five years, the decline in tertiary student enrolment numbers for information technology (IT)-based courses has been felt globally and is a key contributing factor to the current skills shortage. While the University of Otago has not been exempt, its information science undergraduate program continues to develop the next generation of IT managers in New Zealand. Business Advantage Key Benefits Sybase Technology Industry
Developing the Future IT Managers of New Zealand
Over the last five years, the decline in tertiary student enrollment numbers for information technology (IT)-based courses has been felt globally and is a key contributing factor to the current skills shortage.
While the University of Otago has not been exempt, its Information Science undergraduate program continues to develop the next generation of IT managers in New Zealand.
The University's Information Science graduates are highly sought after by IT industry employers in New Zealand for their experience building information systems for real clients using industry-leading software tools.
For IT solutions vendors such as Sybase educational involvement is intrinsically valuable, providing pre-workplace exposure to its solution suites while ensuring students have the tools required to develop these in-demand skills.
Sybase Supports Educational Institutions
Each year, Sybase Australia and New Zealand nominates a few key universities to participate in the Sybase Educational Licensing Program which involves a low cost program offered for teaching purposes only.
"When we approached Sybase about academic pricing and licensing it was like a breath of fresh air. Their helpfulness and understanding of the educational environment and the financial constraints under which we operate was very much appreciated," said Graham Copson, technical manager at the Department of Information Science at the University.
The program's established understanding of higher education sector requirements secured Sybase a place in the University's learning environment.
PowerDesigner Proves Model Learning Platform
The decision to use a particular solution for teaching purposes is not taken lightly. Not only does the solution have to match the teaching department and University's key learning objectives, but it should also reflect the environment that students can realistically expect to encounter when they graduate to the workforce.
"Anecdotally, through speaking to employers with whom our graduates have secured positions, we found they wanted graduates exposed to a high-end computer-aided software engineering (CASE) tool to enable them to understand all phases in the development of an information system rather than a focus on one tool for modeling and another for implementation," said Brendon Woodford, coordinator and primary lecturer for second- and third-year courses in the Information Science department.
Functionality limitations also drove the University to review its CASE tool. With modeling notation currently undergoing a process of evolution and refinement, the department needed a solution that, as the specifications changed, would emulate the latest version of the modeling notation available.
Sybase PowerDesigner – Easy and Scalable
The department policy ensures that software choices are driven by the needs of teaching staff and students, Sybase PowerDesigner quickly became a frontrunner for evaluation. Its support of multiple notations and easy-to-use interface proved to be key factors in the decision-making process.
The user interface was particularly critical to achieving the desired learning objectives.
"Ease of use and quality of the experience are important, particularly in the first year where we run a kind of a survey course which introduces students to a lot of things quickly and often quite superficially," said Andrew Long, coordinator and lecturer for the first-year e-business and information systems development courses.
As Copson explains, "We wanted a solid product and Sybase has a good name. It enables the lecturers and students to focus more on what we really care about – the modeling. The ability to scale Sybase PowerDesigner up or down depending on the class size is also tremendous."
Students Create Content and Delivery for Digital Music
First-year students at the University currently spend three weeks – between six and 12 hours of formal time – exposed to Sybase PowerDesigner. Those students who choose to major in information science work with Sybase PowerDesigner for an additional six to seven weeks in the second year, particularly for the purpose of analyzing the requirements for an information system and modeling them using an object-oriented approach.
One such second-year project involved the development of a number of object-oriented models for a music delivery project called the Digital Audio Streaming System (DASS).
The system enables music to be distributed wirelessly over the Internet to any organization, private home or vehicle through the use of real-time streaming and instantaneous downloads.
Students play the role of "junior developer" and are provided a collection of project requirements, source material and specifications prepared by another analyst. They specifically use Sybase PowerDesigner to model the content subsystem, which stores the recordings, and the delivery subsystem, which manages the payment gateway and music delivery.
PowerDesigner Skills Live On In the "Real World"
The solution is currently being implemented as part of the third-year curriculum for the first time.
"Sybase PowerDesigner comes into play for the third-year students right now. In the Information Systems and Development Project course, we'll be encouraging students to use the complete range of functionality in PowerDesigner to build a system that would eventually be implemented in the real world," said Woodford.
"Our experiences with Sybase PowerDesigner have been unreservedly positive in all aspects, such that we're now looking at the features available in the next version of PowerDesigner. We're excited about the possibilities of the new version and the capabilities it presents to us," said Copson.
Long adds, "Ultimately, we just want students to come away with a universal set of skills that they can take and apply to any environment they encounter, and Sybase supports that."