Cw comp1108 78_mo233_20141120_200330_1415

DEVELOPING OF NATIONAL CAREER GUIDANCE FOR ZAMBIAN MINISTRY OF
EDUCATION USING DSS
OWEN MUSENGE MUZI 000793120
UNIVERSITY OF GREENWICH (C) 2014 PROJECT REPORT
1
University of Greenwich
Final year computer programming project Report
2014
BSc H COMPUTERING (St3)-Zambia-UG
Project Name: ‘Developing of National Career
Guidance for Zambian’s ministry of education
using DSS (Decision support system)’.
Click here for the working system http://stuweb.cms.gre.ac.uk/~mo233/careergrz/index.htm
Student Name: Owen Musenge Muzi 000793120
Supervisors: Dr. Jere and Mr. Mfune
A formal report for a dissertation that will be submitted in partial fulfilment of
the University of Greenwich Bachelor of Science Degree in
Computing

EDUCATION USING DSS
2
Abstraction
This report shows the creation of a system that will help education sector in Zambia. The system will
help users to know their careers and how to archive their goal of becoming what one wishes for and
what suits them.
The report shows the introduction of the proposed system. The report will address the many challenges
the people are facing in terms of career guidance. It will show the many efforts the government is doing
through the ministry of education.
The ministry of education is the ministry that looks at the affairs of education in the country of Zambia.
They control the primary schools, secondary schools, colleges and universities.
In accordance with the provisions of the technical education, vocational and entrepreneurship training
(TEVET) act number 13 of 1998 part IV section twenty. Technical education, vocational and
entrepreneurship training authority (TEVETA) has being also given that power to control and monitor
some of the training institutions. So most of the training institutions in this system are those registered
with technical education, vocational and entrepreneurship training authority (TEVETA) and Ministry of
Education.
Working with the psychological service department of the ministry of education and technical
education, vocational and entrepreneurship training authority (TEVETA) we came up with the system
which is a web-based called National career guidance system. This system will help ministry of education
and technical education, vocational and entrepreneurship training authority (TEVETA) to show to the
public all the training institutions that are in Zambia. This will also help pupils, school leavers and the
general public to know the training institutions that are in Zambia what courses or programs do they
offer what qualifications anyone should have to be admitted at those institutions.
This system will be used to store all the training institutions in Zambia. These are the universities,
teachers training college and Technical Education, Vocational and Entrepreneurship Training Authority
(TEVETA) registered institutions.

EDUCATION USING DSS
3
User can interact with the system and the system will be able to guide them through so that they know
the broader career area they fall in. The system will be able to show them all the programs in that
broader career and the training institutions in Zambia that offer those.
This web base system will enable the technical education, vocational and entrepreneurship training
authority (TEVETA) to show all the training institutions that are registered with them. Ministry of
education will also list all universities and teachers training colleges.
This web base system will also show all the programs and courses that are offered in the training
institutions and universities that are in Zambia.
The system will enable the psychological service department of the ministry of education capture the
needed data elements from users through the collection process, analysis report generation and storage
of data information for occupational career interest inventory purposes easily and accurately.

EDUCATION USING DSS
4
Declaration
I Owen Muzi do hereby declare that this project is my own work, that to the best of my knowledge it has
been presented for academic purpose. To my knowledge all referenced information has been duly
acknowledged.
Author Owen Muzi
Supervisors: Dr. Jere and Mr. Mfune

EDUCATION USING DSS
5
Dedications
This project is dedicated to my wife Bernadette M Muzi and my daughter Noël K Muzi.
It would have been difficult for me to have an achievement without their love and support.

EDUCATION USING DSS
6
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the Ministry and Education (career guidance department) and Technical Education,
Vocational and Entrepreneurship training Authority (TEVETA) management for allowing me to carry out
this project with maximum support from them. Thanks to the team for the tireless effort in attending to
my queries despite they busy schedules in their offices.
To my supervisors Dr. Jere and Mr. Mfune who supported and supervised me from the time I started
doing my project.
Apart from the above individuals, I would like to thank my fellow students who gave me timely advice
and assistance in making my project a success.
Above all to God and the management and lecturers of ZCAS for the effective lecturing.

EDUCATION USING DSS
7
ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS
CGC career guidance and counseling
CM career management
DANIDA Danish international development agency
FAWE Forum for African women education
HIV Human immunodeficiency virus
HOD Heads of department
ICT Information Communication Technology
MOE Ministry of education
NCDG National career development guideline
SCG School career guidance
TSC Teachers service commission
UNESCO United national educational scientific education and cultural organization
UNICEF United Nationals international children education funds
USA United States of America
CSS Cascading Style Sheet
XHTML Extensible hyper-text mark-up language
HTML Hypertext Mark-up Language
IDE Integrated development environment
JAD Joint application development

EDUCATION USING DSS
8
RAD Rapid Application Development
XML Extensible Mark-up Language
DSS Decision support system

EDUCATION USING DSS
9
CHAPTER 1: Introduction
1.1 Overview
The Ministry of Education of the Republic of Zambia is one of the most widespread and largest
government ministries. It has several department affiliated organizations and institutions.
It is the main provider of formal education. The formal education system of Zambia has a 7, 5, 4 year
structure.
Seven years of primary education, four years of lower and three years of upper primary. There are five
years of secondary education, two years at junior and three years at senior secondary levels. An average
university degree takes four years to complete.
1.2 MISSION STATEMENT.
The mission statement of the ministry of education as spelt out in the policy document is to guide the
provision of education for all Zambians so that they are able to pursue knowledge and skills, manifest
excellence in performance and moral uprightness, defend democratic ideals, and accept and value other
persons on the basis of their personal worth and dignity, irrespective of gender, religion, ethnic origin or
any other discriminatory characteristic.
1.3 Function of the MoE,
MoE has a lot of department units and related organization but the author is Interested in the school
guidance services unit. This is the unit that deals with career guidance in public schools all over the
country. Despite the efforts from government to support the provision of career guidance in public
schools there is still a big gap in Zambia, you will find that one public school will have one career
guidance master against 5,000 pupils this has lead to having a lot of school leavers who do not know
what career suits them. The proposed system (online career guidance system) intends to address
problems in choosing careers.
1.4 BACKGRAUND

EDUCATION USING DSS
10
This project came about after seeing how difficult it is for people in Zambia to choose a career, courses
and a college or a university after finishing their high school. Many people in Zambia do not know the all
programmes offered in Zambia. There are many colleges and universities, public and private that are
coming up in Zambia so a system like the proposed system is very much needed to store and display all
these colleges and universities, the courses they offer and the provinces they are in to the general
public.
1.5 AIMS
The aim of the project is to solve the problems faced by the young people in choosing a career and a
university or college to go to after high school, the other aim is to display to the general public the all
universities and colleges in Zambia, what they offer and provinces they are in.
1.6 JUSTIFICATION OF PROJECT
The ministry of education will be given a better, effective way, of career guiding the members of the
public. The system will be used as a tool in decision making (the choosing of careers) this will help the
nation to train right people in correct careers, people who are passionate about a particular career.
1.7 PROJECT SCOPE
The ministry of education is the largest ministry in terms of physical presence in Zambia. For the
proposed system to give access to all Zambians the system will have the following:
-Centralized computer database
-Provision of accurate statistical information
-Support the career guidance unit in the ministry of education
1.8 PROBLEM DEFINITION
The problem of career guidance is a very big problem in Zambia very few pupils’ are guided on which
career to go for, which career will match their abilities, physical abilities metal abilities and they passion.
There are a lot of people in Zambia who have chosen career that they do not like at all. This is so
because they do not have the knowledge on all career, courses, college or universities, so whatever they
parents say will be finals.

EDUCATION USING DSS
11
Most people in Zambia do not know which career area they fall in, is it mechanical? Computational?
Social service? Clerical? Or outdoor?
Most school in Zambia have one career guidance master against 1000 pupils in a particular school, some
school don’t every have any one to take up the role of the career master, also very few pupils go there
for help, in Zambia we do not have much local contents when it comes to the internet contents. It is the
cry of many Zambians to have local contents.
The current system used in school is a paper based system all are printed on paper.
1.10 SOLUTION TO PROBLEM
The problem of lack of proper career guidance by many Zambians can be address with the designing and
implementing of national career guidance for Zambians ministry of education using DSS (decision
support system).
This system will help a lot in deciding which career to go for.
1.11 REPORT ROAD MAP
Chapter1: introduction of the ministry of education
This chapter deals with the introduction of the MoE it also gives the background problem statement.
Chapter 2: Literature review
This chapter deals what I have leant, read and researched from other literature relation to this project
Chapter3: project objectives activities and methods
This chapter looks at research methodologies and the development of soft wore methodologies which
can be used and the one recommended for my project
Chapter 4: review of similar existing system.
This chapter deals with similar system that existing in the world.
Chaper5: system analysis

EDUCATION USING DSS
12
This chapter looks at the system requirements.
Chapter 6: system design
This is the blue print of the system
Chapter 7: development and implementation of system
This chapter deals with the programming of the system
Chapter 8: system testing
The chapter deals with the testing processes the system will undergo
Chapter 9: legal social professional and ethical issues.
This chapter deals with the legal and ethical issues that may affect the project.
Chapter 10: summary and presentation of results.
This chapter deals with the conclusion of the report. It also offers the lessons learnt in the course of the
execution of the project.
REFERENCES
This shows and acknowledges all the books, journals and websites resources materials used in the
development of the system
Appendix A
Project proposal
Appendix B
Requirement specification
Appendix C
Design document
Appendix E

EDUCATION USING DSS
13
User manual
Appendix F:
Maintenance manual
Appendix G:
Source code
Appendix H:
List of figures

EDUCATION USING DSS
14
Chapter 2 literature review
2.1 Introductions
This chapter deals of the literature regarding the creation of the national career guidance for the
republic of Zambia ministry of education using the decision support system
It further explains what a DSS decision support system is the different technologies that can be used to
create the system the front end (end user or client side ) technologies and the back end (server side)
technologies used are highlighted here data base technologies and programming tools used dealt with
in chapter 2.
2.2 The functions of the ministry of education.
The ministry of education of the republic of Zambia is one of the most widespread and largest
government ministries. It has several departments, affiliated organisations and institutions.
It is the main provider of formal education. The formal education system of Zambia has a 7-5-4 year
structure: seven years of primary education, five years of secondary education.
An average university degree takes four years to complete.
provision of education for all Zambian so that they are able to pursue knowledge and skills, manifest
Departments, units and related organisations:
i. Accounts and audit
ii. Administration
iii. Bursaries committee
iv. Continuing education
v. Curriculum development centre

EDUCATION USING DSS
15
vi. Education broadcasting services
vii. Examinations council of Zambia
viii. Hubert young hostel
ix. Human resources development
x. Human resources management
xi. Inspectorate
xii. Ministry of education procurement and supplies unit
xiii. Ministry of science, technology and vocational training
xiv. Ministry of youth sport and child development
xv. National science centre
xvi. Planning unit
xvii. School guidance services (the department I am developing the project for)
xviii. Teacher education
xix. Teaching service commission
xx. University of Zambia
xxi. Zambia library service
xxii. Zambia national commission for UNESCO
xxiii. Zambia education projects implementation unit
xxiv. Zambia tender board
From the functions of the ministry of education we can see that the ministry has a mandate to make
sure the people of Zambia a guided in terms of making a decision in choosing their careers. The
researcher/developer of the system did a literature review on the status of career guidance first in
Zambia and in the world.
In Zambia the study found that schools had different programmes for the implementation of career
guidance, this schools are school in the urban areas very little is being done the rural areas, study also
found that career guidance teachers were available but not adequate and not adequately empowered
with career guidance skills, knowledge and effective career guidance services. The career guidance
resources were available in some schools but inadequate and out of data (out dated). The challenges
facing the implementation of career guidance in public schools were found to be the inadequacy of
career guidance teachers and overloading these teachers with academic class work and inadequate
information in different careers. Based on these findings the researcher recommends the decision
support system be implemented.

EDUCATION USING DSS
16
This system should be an online system, coordinated by a guidance service unit in the ministry of
education.
Literature reviews’ in other countries, career guidance is the process of helping individuals (young or
old) to make career decision based on evidences of abilities interest ,skills ,attitudes and economical
activities of the area or country (OECD,2004).
Such career guidance activities may be found in schools universities, colleges, in public employment
services, in voluntary community based programs and in print e.g books or ICT based. Students in the
USA have high ambition, expecting to be highly educated and have professional careers, yet research
has found that many do not develop a coherent plan for achieving their goals. Almost two –thirds of
high school graduates enter post secondary education but more than a third of those leave within two
years without earning any degree probably all because they were not guided. Career guidance is vitally
important for today’s student who are more than ever motivated but directionless (Schneider and
Stevenson,1999).
The place of career guidance in education system has been of great concern in many countries.
2.3 Front End Technologies
Front end technologies these are technologies which directly interact with user. These technologies
operate on the clients’ side on the application. There are several technologies which are used to develop
front end or user interfaces below are the technologies the developer has used and the reasons for
using them.
HTML 4
HTML is the hypertext markup language used as the standard for the creation of internet pages.
Historical the desire to have text printed in specific format meant that original manuscripts had to be
‘’marked up’’ with annotation to indicate to the book printer how sections of text should be laid out.
This annotation had to be concise and needed to be understood both by the printer and the text
originator (Mike McGrath, 2007). TIM burners – lee become a director of the W3C and the version of the
W3C HTML standard is the HTML 4 .01 and that is what is used throughout the development of this
project.

EDUCATION USING DSS
17
Cascading style sheets
(CSS) offers a powerful way of presenting information to user in structured documents. The CSS
operates on the client side the CSS enables developers to develop a stylish web application
Hyper text transfer protocol
The HTTP is a generic object-oriented, stateless protocol used to transfer web pages through the
internet. The developers uses it to develop a stylish web application.
Hyper text transfer protocol
The HTTP is the protocol used to transfer web pages through the internet .it defines how clients
communicate to servers. HTTP is a generic object-oriented, stateless protocol to transmit information
between client and servers (burners-lee 1992).
Java script:
This is a client side technology which runs in the browser it is stored as part of HTML documents. Java
scripts enable the processing of data on the clients side faster.
2.4 Back End Technologies (Server Side)
-hypertext preprocessor PHP
Is a server side language in the development of this career guidance dynamic and interactive web
application project? This programming language is used because it is an HTML embedded scripting
language.
It is a server side scripting language that is easier to lean and user friendly.
Other languages which were looked at are c ≠ ,java AJAX, Perl ,CVB script but PHP was chosen and used
because it is a popular open source scripting language that is supported by many web servers including
apache HTTP server and Microsoft’s internet information server and is the preferred Linux web scripting
language.

EDUCATION USING DSS
18
2.5 Database Management System
Collection of logically related data and its description is called a database (Connolly and Begg, 2010). A
software system that enables users to define, creates, maintains and control access to the database is a
database management system. (Connolly and Begg, 2010). There are various enterprises databases
management systems on the market. The common ones are: Microsoft SQL server developed by
Microsoft, oracle database by oracle, DB2 database software made by IBM, Prostgre SQL an open source
object-relational database system and MySQL the most popular open source SQL database management
system it is developed, distributed and supported by oracle corporation. This is the database
management system that will be used in the development of the project here.
2.6 Programming Tools
Dreamweaver is one of the tools that will be used in the developing of this project.
Dreamweaver is a piece of software by adobe that is used in the development of websites.
Dreamweaver is used to create online applications. It is the HTML editor. It is also a CSS (cascading style
sheet) editor
There are so many tools in the market e.g visual studio, net beans, eclipse and notepad. But
Dreamweaver was chosen because it is very user friendly with 3 development views name
Code view- used to view the code of the website.
Design view – used to view the layout of the website.
Design and code view – used to view both code and layout.
2.7 Summary
This area highlights some of the steps other people made, organization have made in developing the
career guidance system and learn from their expertise on how to go about my project. It also includes
the books that were read to help in the developing the career guidance. It will help to see the strengths
and weakness of the systems and how to produce a system that will meet acceptable standards. This
area of study helps to have a broader understanding of this topic.
Chapter 3 – project objectives, activities and methods

EDUCATION USING DSS
19
This chapter will explain the different objective and activities, methods and findings which will be carried
out. This development methodology that will be used in the development of software.
And the justification for the methodology selected.
3.1 To analyze the current system used in schools
Activities
Hold interviews in 5 different schools, interviews with 2 teachers from each school. Interview with the
members of staff from MoE career guidance units,
Deliverables
User requirement and specification document
Methods
The interviews was conducted in 5 schools namely Kabulonga boys, Kabulonga girls, munali boys ,
munali girls and Lusaka high school. 2 teachers from each school mentioned above was also interviewed
and observed as they career guided their pupils. A total of 50 pupils were interviewed from all the 5
schools.
Findings
After interviews the finding were that very few pupils go to the career guidance master for help. Most
pupils were ignorant about what they would like to be after high schools.
The teachers given the roles of career guidance in school complained of outdated resources and
inadequate of resources too,
3.2 To review similar systems
Activities
Consulting with staffs at MOE career guidance units, searching the internet to check any existing system
in our country and other countries, reading literature on the similar system and checking previous
projects done at ZCAS if a system this type of project was developed in previous years

EDUCATION USING DSS
20
Deliverables
Section of the report
Methods
Interviews with staffs at MOE career guidance unit, surfing the internet, going to the libraries to read
any literature on career guidance.
Findings
There is very little system available on career guidance. And that that exists motivates pupils with
salaries only. Most of them are manual methods were pupils’ site one on one with teachers, counselors
or psychologists.
3.3 To select a methodology
Activities
Search the internet for different system development methodologies. Read different literatures from
the library about the different existing system development methodologies.
Deliverables
A section of a report
Methods
Surfing the internet, reading different books and journals on the development methodologies
Finding
After a comprehensive research there are a lot of system development methodologies that the author
came across. The system development methodologies are many and some are not in use today because
the business environment has changed. In this chapter the selected methodology will be explained,
advantages and disadvantages are highlighted too.
3.4 To design and implement a new system
Activities

EDUCATION USING DSS
21
Select software, prepare the computer that will be used, read literature of different programming
languages, and write a system design manual.
Deliverable
A section of a report
Methods
Research on different design system and draw creative user interface
Findings
There are system development of software design namely; top – down and bottom – up design. Creative
is also needed here.
3.5 To design and implement a database system
Activities
Select the database management system appropriate for the environment, draw up ERD, normalize the
tables, create database.
Deliverables
Database design document and full developed and normalized database.
Methods
Reading literature on database, solving normalization issues, leaning the chosen DBMS.
Findings
There are different DBMS but MySQL will be used for this project. Databases are very important part of
any application.
3.6 To evaluate the new system
Activities
Draw up test plan, carry out testing correct any errors and retest. Consult with pupils and teachers.

EDUCATION USING DSS
22
Deliverables
Full working new system
Test plan and test results
Methods
Black box and white box testing
Findings
Testing is very important to achieve a full good and working system. Planning helps in the smooth
running of the new project.
Chapter 4 – review of the similar existing system
4.1. Introduction
This chapter highlights the different system that the author came across in the course of research and
development period which are similar to new system been implemented. I will look on weaknesses and
or shortcoming of these similar systems. The existing system are not in Zambia but elsewhere in the
other countries. They namely;
4.2 Occupational matcher in India
4.3 Career path in USA
4.4 Course Finder India
In India there is a similar system called course finder it just helps in finding courses which are in India.
In Zambia, ministry of education through the department School guidance services (the department I am
developing the project for) has a manual system and it does not represent the people of Zambia because
it is used by few selected pupils from few selected schools in Lusaka. This manual system is where
teachers are chosen to be career masters in a particular school.
4.5 Current system

EDUCATION USING DSS
23
The current system involves physical storage information of institutions that are in Zambia and courses
or programs that these institutions offer. The teachers are given the task of career guidance at that
particular school.
The problems come from the collection, updating the information and some pupils do want to go and
talk to teachers one on one, these teachers who are given the task of career guidance.
4.6 Limitations of the current system
The current system has constraints and weaknesses. These limitations make the system unreliable and
inaccurate the following are the limitation.
As can be seen from the procedures involved in the career guidance process, career guidance teachers
need to attend to many pupils at that particular school. Teachers are humans they get tire and have
different moods.
The career guidance does not benefit the majority people of Zambia. This is another issue because not
all schools have career masters.
The other problem that (TEVETA) face was the issue of displaying to the public all the institutions
registered with them. Collecting and keeping record of training institutions in Zambia and courses or
programs that these institutions offer.
The system that is in Zambia for career guidance is a manual one. Usually parents or any teacher from
school talk to the pupils on which career to choose based on these teacher or parents judgment and
experience in life. This can lead to wrongly judgment because the teacher or parents can be prejudice
about other careers.
Other limitation is per school only one teacher is chosen as the career guidance. Usually schools have
more than 1000 pupils which is much for one teacher to handle. Also some pupils will not be free to go
to these teachers be may they are not in good term with that particular teacher.

EDUCATION USING DSS
24
Chapter 5
5.1 Success criteria
This section outlines what the career guidance system managers controllers and makers want the
system to perform. It will highlight in details requirements of the project based on the information
gathered.
5.2 Proposed system
The career guidance system is a system that has been proposed and will be developed to address
limitation raised about. This system is based on the requirement from the schools and ministry of
education.
The system will collect processes and generates timely reports about users. The system will provide
information to users for decision making about which career and college or university to choose.
The following are some of the features of the new system:
The system will only allow authorized people to interact with the system’s details through the use of the
passwords.
Each user will be given a unique identifications number which will be used to search for scores, courses,
colleges or university.
Module in the system will be integrated to some extent so that only variable details can be inputted to
the system.
The system will also be able to generate reports.
There will be no use of out of date information as opposed to a traditional way using collected data.
5.3 Objective of career guiders system.
The following are the objective of the career guidance system:
-To integrate (TEVETA) and ministry of education Zambia training institutions.

EDUCATION USING DSS
25
-To support the career guidance of Zambia.
-To provide information to the user about the institutions that are in Zambia and the programs or
courses that are offered by the Zambians’ institutions.
Chapter 6 – System development methodology.
A standard process of analyzing, designing, implementing and maintaining an information system or as
described by Russo, 1995 “ System development methodology is a development methodology is a
means of improving the management and control of the software development process, structuring and
simplifying the process and standardizing the framework.”
Development a system using a system development methodology improves system development
productivity and quality.
There are many methodologies e.g.
-Classical waterfall
-Incremental model
-Prototyping (rap)
-Extreme programming (test driven)
-Rational unified process (OO design)
Because of the business environment today this changes every time and it changes fast. Methodologies
have evolved. The dynamic system development consortiums (DSDM) were encouraged to take up RAD
development techniques in a structured & systematic way. As the result RAD is popular today and it has
evolved so much. DSDM provides discipline to the RAD method. DSDM being an agile framework
meaning when developing software, users must be very much involved.
After research the author decided to use DSDM Atern framework, a rebranded name for RAD DSDM.
This methodology allows collaborative. The beautiful thing about this methodology it encourages a lot of
collaborative, continues collaborative users, stakeholders, programmers e.t.c
DSDM Atern address the most common failure of information system project, including exceeding
budgets, not reaching deadlines, and lack of user take part and top management commitment. DSDM
Atern would be an appropriate method to use for this project because pupils and teachers must give the

EDUCATION USING DSS
26
feedback to developers so that the system is useful and user friendly. DSDM has eight (8) principles that
can help with the change of mindset and attitude. These are:
-Focus on the business needs
-Finish the project on time
-Communicate often and clearly
-Demonstrate control
-Develop iteratively
-Collaborate
-Never compromise quality issues
-Build the project incrementally from the strong foundation
The methodologies used to come up with the requirement through the design stage are as follows:
6.1 Prototyping (Rapid Applications Development)
The above methodology is used when Problem is not well understood then building and evaluating a
prototype can help define the problem.
Either to
Explore the requirements of the system
Explore the technical feasibility of the system
There are two type of prototyping namely Throw away prototyping vs. evolutionary prototyping
Evolutionary prototyping will be used for this project.
The prototype is not discarded but evolves into the final product
Should use a planned series of releases

EDUCATION USING DSS
27
Components designed and implemented in Release 1 may change a little in Release 2 but should have
settled down (converged) by Release 3.
Feeds back into requirements capture
PHP and MySQL technologies will be used
PHP language offers many facilities to help in exploring some of the techniques that the author used in
developing the career guidance system. According to Kevin yanks ‘’Build your own database driven
website using PHP and MySQL, 3nd edition PHP and MySQL are good for developing database driven
web pages.’’
In practice there is overlap and iteration between these stages

EDUCATION USING DSS
28
Chapter 7 – system analysis
7.1 Record review
The document were looked at and analyzed from career guidance offices from 2 different schools to see
what records of the user and how difficult it is to collect and store these records.
7.2 Research results
Feedback was given by the pupils, member of staff from ministry of education and TEVETA. Also the
problems they face in the use of the traditional system which is the exiting system. The following are
some answers and feedback which was got from the research:
“It is my first time hearing such a career guidance system and so far it seems interesting hope it will be
implemented so that it benefits the pupils. “Said Lloyd lusaka high school and a 16 year old charity
tembo said “she does not know most universities and colleges apart from university of Zambia,
copperbelt university and Evelyn hone college the rest she does not know them” the grade 12 of
kabulonga high school who intends to study anything related to medicine said he does not know many
colleges or university offering what he wants to study. He said he wants to study pharmacy or bio-
chemistry

EDUCATION USING DSS
29
Chapter 8
8.1 System design
The document has been written based on the requirement specification documents. It outlines how the
proposed system was implemented and describes in details the data elements being used how the
structure of the data is displayed.
8.2 Scope and objectives of this chapter
This section describes in details the structure of the system, the data and system design. Also it
describes the logical design of the system and the database with the aid of tables and diagrams.
8.3 Database design
The database will consist of files records, with each record made up of a number of fields where the
data will be entered. The database contains tables which have been normalized and are properly related
to each other. Since each table is related to another by a key field records will be linked together based
on matching data in the key fields. The tables in the database are:
9 Recommendations
Ministry of should adopt this system because it will help a lot of young people who don’t know what
career to go in and which college or university to go to. This system will benefit the education sector, the
community and the nation at large.

EDUCATION USING DSS
30
References
Eclipse Foundation (2013). Intellectual Property (IP) Management.
Available:http://ezinearticles.com/?What-Is-http://www.eclipse.org/org/#history. Last
Accessed Date: 02/09/2014.
English J (1997). The Java Programming Language.
Available:http://groups.engin.umd.umich.edu/CIS/course.des/cis400/java/java.html. Last
Accessed Date:29/08/2014.
Functional Requirements (n.d). Functional Requirements. Available:Functional
Requirements. Last Accessed Date: 11/09/2014
Training [Image] n.d. Retrieved September 26, 2014 from
http://www.orangehrmlive.com/img/training_sml.png
W3C (2013-04-02). Web Style Sheets. Available:http://www.w3.org/Style/. Last Accessed
Date:28/08/2014.
W3C (2013-04-02). What is XHTML?. Available:http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/. Last
Accessed Date:28/08/2014.
Westhead G (2011). What Is Dreamweaver?. Available:http://ezinearticles.com/?What-Is-
Dreamweaver?&id=5797166. Last Accessed Date:02/09/2014.

EDUCATION USING DSS
31
APPENDICES
APPENDIX A: PROJECT PROPOSAL
1.1 Introduction

EDUCATION USING DSS
32
The ministry of education of the republic of Zambia is one of the most widespread and largest
government ministries. It has several departments, affiliated organisations and institutions.
It is the main provider of formal education. The formal education system of Zambia has a 7-5-4 year
structure: seven years of primary education, five years of secondary education.
An average university degree takes four years to complete.
provision of education for all Zambian so that they are able to pursue knowledge and skills, manifest
Departments, units and related organisations:
i. Accounts and audit
ii. Administration
iii. Bursaries committee
iv. Continuing education
v. Curriculum development centre
vi. Education broadcasting services
vii. Examinations council of Zambia
viii. Hubert young hostel
ix. Human resources development
x. Human resources management
xi. Inspectorate
xii. Ministry of education procurement and supplies unit
xiii. Ministry of science, technology and vocational training
xiv. Ministry of youth sport and child development
xv. National science centre
xvi. Planning unit
xvii. School guidance services (the department I am developing the project for)
xviii. Teacher education
xix. Teaching service commission
xx. University of Zambia
xxi. Zambia library service

EDUCATION USING DSS
33
xxii. Zambia national commission for UNESCO
xxiii. Zambia education projects implementation unit
xxiv. Zambia tender board
This document is a project proposal it describes a proposed system called “Zambian national career
guidance system”.
This proposal is for the author’s final year computer programming project. Users will use the system to
see courses and which college or university offered them.
1.2 Background
This project came after seeing how difficult it is for people in Zambia to choose a career after finishing
their high school or secondary school.
After a research the author found out that the career guidance and counselling is available in Zambia but
not done properly and teachers to do the work were available in some schools but not adequately
empowered with career guidance skills, knowledge, and facilities to carry out effective career guidance
service. The author further found that career guidance and counselling resources were not available in
schools.
The challenges facing the implementation of proper career guidance and counselling in Zambia were to
be the inadequacy of career guidance and counselling resources, overloading of career guidance and
counselling teachers with academic class work and inadequate information on different career.
Based on these finding the author recommended that the proposed system to be implemented and
should be an online based system.
1.3 Problem statement

EDUCATION USING DSS
34
Career guidance and counselling is the process of helping individual, students to make career decisions
based on evidence of abilities, interest, skills, attitudes and economical activities of the place. Such
career guidance and counselling activities are most found in primary schools and secondary school.
In Zambia most people make these career decisions by admiring a person who is seemingly doing well in
the neighbourhoods.
The problem of lack of career guidance is a big problem in Zambia.
Before writing this proposal the author coductected some face to face interviews with pupils from
Kabulonga boys secondary school, teachers from Lusaka secondary school and members of staff from
TEVETA and ministry of education.
2. Aim
To career guide pupils.
3. Key Phrases
Career
PHP
HTML
Expert system
Decision support system
Selection
Ministry of Education
Universities
Colleges
Courses

EDUCATION USING DSS
35
4. Objectives
To design the proposed system using results derived from requirement specification
To build the system through coding as specified by the design stage
To carry out unit integration and system testing.
To install the system on the main computers to be used by people. Though out this country.
The proposed system will be the web based system. This will be able to interact with the user and show
him or her career path to follow.
See below the use case the user has to interact with.
Use case diagram
user expert
DSS
User interface Expert
interface

EDUCATION USING DSS
36
5. Courses Relevant to Project
Web Enterprise
E-commence
Database
Time line
Every project should have a time frame below is the timeline of this project.
No. Activity duration start _date finish_date
Analysis
1 Process of finding a solution for a given problem. 2 DAYS 10/08/2014 12/08/2014
2 Organise problems into well defined requirements to be built. 3 DAYS 20/08/2014 23/08/2014
3 Fact finding & Data collection 5 DAYS 21/08/2014 26/08/2014
4 write the proposal 10 DAYS 10/08/2014 20/08/2014
5 submit the proposal 1 1 DAYS 26/08/2014 27/08/2014
6 rewrite the final proposal 2 DAYS 28/08/2014 30/08/2014
7 resubmit the final proposal 1 DAYS 29/08/2014 30/08/2014
8 Requirements are further developed into prototypes. 10 DAYS 30/08/2014 09/09/2014
9 Client/User test the prototypes, give feedback. 2 DAYS 31/08/2014 02/09/2014
10 Use feedback to refine the prototype into actual system. 20 DAYS 01/09/2014 21/09/2014
11 Finalise Functional Requirements 7 DAYS 30/08/2014 05/09/2014

EDUCATION USING DSS
37
12 DFD, ERD, Usecase, STD, ELH, Class Diagram, Story boards 2 DAYS 02/09/2014 04/09/2014
13 Database Design 10 DAYS 03/09/2014 13/09/2014
14 Normalisation (RDA) 5 DAYS 13/09/2014 18/09/2014
15 Classes of Users 1 DAYS 30/08/2014 31/08/2014
16 Group requirements for prototypes 1 DAYS 02/09/2014 03/09/2014
17 Website Design - HCI 20 DAYS 03/09/2014 23/09/2014
18 Non Functional requirements 2 DAYS 13/09/2014 15/09/2014
19 Security 3 DAYS 30/08/2014 02/09/2014
20 Backup 1 DAYS 02/09/2014 03/09/2014
21 Printing 2 DAYS 30/08/2014 01/09/2014
22 Volume of Data 4 DAYS 02/09/2014 06/09/2014
23 Reporting Facility 4 DAYS 03/09/2014 07/09/2014
Design
22 Starting to write the final report 10 DAYS 14/09/2014 24/09/2014
21 Interface with human 3 DAYS 24/09/2014 27/09/2014
22 Define Technical Architecture to be used for development and implementation. 2 DAY 04/10/2014 06/10/2014
24 Web-Database 7 DAYS 14/10/2014 21/10/2014
25 Proposed system layout 1 DAYS 24/10/2014 25/10/2014
26 Front-end to back-end connectivity 1 DAYS 25/09/2014 26/09/2014
27 Outline prototyping plan 4 DAYS 25/10/2014 29/10/2014
28 Mapped from requirements to prototype 6 DAYS 26/09/2014 31/10/2014
29 Screen Designs - HCI e.g. screen layouts, navigation, story boards 9 DAYS 27/10/2014 05/11/2014
30 Coding 30 DAYS 28/09/2014 27/10/2014
32 Merge the prototypes to form the complete system 5 DAYS 29/10/2014 01/11/2014
33 Configuration management 2 DAYS 30/10/2014 01/11/2014
34 User feedback 3 DAYS 31/10/2014 03/11/2014
Testing
36 Test System 2 DAYS 27/10/2014 29/10/2014
37 Test data 1 DAYS 29/10/2014 30/10/2014
38 Functional Testing 3 DAYS 31/10/2014 03/11/2014
39 Performance Testing 1 DAYS 02/11/2014 03/11/2014
40 Usability Testing 2 DAYS 04/11/2014 06/11/2014
41 Security 3 DAYS 06/11/2014 09/11/2014
Implementation
43 System cutover from the development environment to target environment 2 DAYS 02/11/2014 04/11/2014

EDUCATION USING DSS
38
44 Data Migration from the development environment to target environment 1 DAYS 03/11/2014 04/11/2014
45 User Manuals 10 DAYS 01/11/2014 09/11/2014
47 System Upload onto the host server 2 DAYS 05/11/2014 10/09/2014
48 Authorised/unauthorised access to system 1 DAYS 06/11/2014 07/11/2014
49 Risk Analysis 1 DAYS 07/11/2014 08/11/2014
55 Rewrite the final report 20 DAYS 08/10/2014 28/10/2014
56 submit the final report 1 DAYS 09/11/2014 10/09/2014
57 oral presentation of the project 1 DAYS 10/11/2014 11/09/2014
Conclusion and recommendation
From what has been outlined in the problem statement and scope, the author recommends that this
proposal should be approved for the benefit of the education sector, the community and the nation at
large.
This project proposal should be approved and the ministry of education should adopt this proposed
system because it will help a lot of young people who don’t know what career path to take.

Cw comp1108 78_mo233_20141120_200330_1415

Recommandé

Recommandé

Contenu connexe

Tendances

Tendances (20)

En vedette

En vedette (18)

Similaire à Cw comp1108 78_mo233_20141120_200330_1415

Similaire à Cw comp1108 78_mo233_20141120_200330_1415 (20)

Dernier

Dernier (20)

Cw comp1108 78_mo233_20141120_200330_1415