The Uses of Software Agents in Education
Steven Spurling
City College of San Francisco
I checked Current CCSF
information from Rio
Current Enrollment
Current Enrollment
Registration Outcomes and
Impacted Classes
English Classes Closed
8.9% of English 1A registration
attempts received a Closed
Message
Staff Received a List of Students
asking for information about their
program
This list went to Teacher
Preparation Staff
Here are all of the Departments
that Received Information About
Student Queries
Students were also sent automatic
Messages from Departments they
had requested information of
Here’s the Email from the Career
Center
VPN
Virtual Private Network
Run your computer and monitor
dataflow from Brazil (or anywhere else)
Software Agents
• Scheduled software programs that can
monitor the production database and send
information to people, websites or other
programs.
Schedule Tasks through Windows XP
Jobs that Can Be Done
•
•
•
•
Update Website
Send Tailored Messages
Update Warehouse or other database.
Alert Other software programs (agents) when a
condition or conditions have been triggered.
– An earthquake triggers a program that goes to the
geographical website to pick up the richter scale
reading, and then based upon the severity sends
emails campus wide or if less severe sends an email
to the Office of the Dean of Buildings and Grounds.
Email with override priority.
The Jobs that Can Be Done Via
Tailored Messaging
•
For Students
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Identify students closed out of classes in the current semester and encourage or direct them
to enroll in these courses in the next semester.
Identify students placed into classes who have not enrolled in the courses they placed into,
and encourage them to see a counselor or register for the classes they have not yet taken.
Identify students close to or fulfilling requirements for a certificate or degree and alert them to
the need to apply for graduation. Direct them to the appropriate office, and even provide
them a list of courses they have successfully completed and/or ones remaining to take.
Identify students who have fulfilled or are approaching fulfillment of the requirements for
transfer to a four-year institution and direct them to the transfer center.
Identify students who are repeating a course for the first time and alert them to any
restrictions that may apply in the future if they cannot successfully complete the course.
Identify students who are taking one of a set of concurrent courses in ESL or English, and
alert them to the need to take all courses in the concurrent set.
Identify students at midterm with failing grades and alert them to the availability, places and
times of tutoring.
Identify students by zip code and alert them to classes in locations close to their home.
Jobs That Can Be Done Via
Tailored Messaging
• For Faculty
– Email credit instructors when grades are due. Check, via
software, every three days and send out reminder emails until
banner has instructor grade sheets on record.
– Email noncredit instructors reminding them of the need for their
bi-weekly attendance records. Email late instructors reminders.
– During the registration period, email department chairs of closedcourses, their locations, days and times. Include the number of
attempted but closed registrations.
– As soon as new sections have been opened, email all students
closed out of the course of the availability, location and time of
the new section.
Jobs that can be done via Tailored
Messaging
• For Administrators and Staff
• CC emails on closed courses that Department Chairs
receive to the office of instruction.
• Automatically email the Provost nightly during
registration the discrepancy numbers between students
applying to CCSF versus those enrolling at CCSF. The
same can be done with students taking placement
testing versus those enrolling.
• Email the Dean of Instruction a list of pre and post
census 1 drops and withdraws of sections meeting a
certain minimum percentage drop (i.e. 25%).
Summary of Advantages
• Parcel out the catalog and send it to students on a needto-know basis.
• Wedge the information in the small gap between the
need to make a decision and the decision itself.
• Inform decision making and make small redirections in
educational behavior.
• Even if only a very small percent of behavior is changed,
the sum effect over many people and many years will be
huge.
• In terms of numbers, students make the most decisions.
• Once the software is written and scheduled it is cost
free.
Results So Far at CCSF
• Emailed ESL students who were closed out of
classes last fall to notify them of classes
available this spring.
• Emailed ESL students who took the placement
test and failed to enroll in a class.
• Emailed a contact group of online students
about the availability of Tele-courses.
• RESULTS: No increase in enrollment in any of
these areas.
What you Need
• Transparent access to the production
database from your PC.
• SAS or another program that will allow you
to schedule tasks to access the
mainframe, crunch the numbers and send
the output to websites, people or other
software agents.
• A website, a data warehouse, email
addresses.
Details
• Transparent access in the oracle world,
think sql.net and tnsnames.ora
• Email through windows XP, install internet
information Services, and set up the smtp
(simple mail transfer protocol) so that your
PC operates as a virtual web server.
Here’s How to set up a Virtual Web
Server on your PC
The important Point
Data Processes are more important and
will have longer lasting consequences
than the point-in-time reports, memo’s,
meetings and discussions we have today.
Data processes are about making
decisions far into the future not just
decisions today.
The analogy to water
• We are carrying buckets of information to our
peers and superiors in the institution. We walk
up to the information lake, dip our buckets in and
schlep it down to the people who need it.
• We should be BUILDING the data reservoirs
and DIGGING the data channels to IRRIGATE
the institutional decision making process for
decades to come.
The Reservoir
• The warehouse is not enough. It is no
more sufficient than a reservoir without a
way of getting water to the city. TANKER
TRUCKS are not cost effective.
• You can write code that will allow data to
flow as easily and as freely as water
downhill.
Obstacles to Implementation of a
data Irrigation System
• The data control guru’s. NO you can’t
have access to the data.
– Because FERPA doesn’t allow it.
– Because you aren’t intelligent enough to use
it.
– Because you are going to slow down the
whole system.
– Because we don’t have the time or the people
to make it happen.
– Because, because, because.
The data flow system needs to be
done NOW.
• No excuses, make it a priority.
• Historical data from the warehouse,
current data from the data river itself.
• Dig the channels to branch the data off
and direct it to employees, offices and
students.
• Real time information to make real
decisions.
Data flow
• Is the most obvious way of increasing the
productivity and effectiveness of the
institution.
• Increases in the effectiveness of delivery
of instruction in the classroom are
problematical. Even with student learning
outcomes.
Principles
• Time is money. Dig the channels so you
don’t have to carry the water.
• Irrigate widely. Administrators, faculty,
staff and students. Irrigate up, down and
sideways.
• Encourage further data branches from
your sources.
• Allow drill downs to the record level
Drill Downs
•
•
•
•
•
•
Campus Data
School Data
Department Data
Course Data
Section Data
Person Data (teacher or student)
Principles Continued
• Encourage data owners to check their data at a
record level. Make the drill down as easy as
possible. THIS IS THE ONLY WAY DATA WILL
BE ACCURATE.
• Interface – Windows point and click. Banner
screens, unix and hard copy don’t hack it.
• Accessibility. Let everybody look at the data at
higher levels. If we are honest, what do we have
to hide?
Principles Continued
• Restrict access only at lower levels of data
for FERPA and Union reasons.
• Make your measures as clear as possible.
FTES/FTE not (FTES/FTE)*30 = load.
• Make historical and current data available.
• Intersect the decision making process i.e.
department chairs adding sections,
students nearing or at graduation.
Who to Market to?
• We don’t know who will be a new student,
but we know who our current and old
students are.
– The Amazon.com model.
• People who enrolled in English 1A, also enrolled
in Political Science 1, Sociology 1 and Psychology
26.
– The Eharmony.com model.
• Fill out this questionnaire and we will tell you what
courses you are compatible with.
Who to market to?
• Old students, come on back! We’ve got
some courses for you!
– Tired of that same old job? We’ve got
biotech, nanotech, and Diagnostic Medical
imaging. More fun, AND more money.
• The 2001, a Space Odyssey, model
– Hi Dave. I’ve missed you. Where have you
been? Why don’t you take some courses with
us again?
Why is the marketing important?
CCSF Credit Headcount
Headcount
35000
34000
33000
32000
CCSF Credit
Headcount
31000
30000
29000
28000
27000
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
Fall Term
2004
2005
Headcount by Student Status
Fall Term
Concurrent HS
New First
Time
Continuing
New Transfer
Returning
1999
293
17115
3635
4715
3877
2000
358
16786
3526
4406
5154
2001
571
17107
4116
4462
5718
2002
342
18980
3890
5132
5740
2003
269
19764
3281
4274
4983
2004
329
19732
3202
4323
4720
2005
274
19263
3197
4522
4783
-20%
1%
-18%
-12%
-17%
% Change 20022005
Jobs to Automate
• Faculty or staff want contact information on students in a
certain program, course or class in the current semester.
(How do you let them run the program from the web?)
• Faculty or staff want to track a certain group of students
through academic history to see where they started, how
far they got, what were their obstacles. Can this be
automated?
• The Office of Research wants to give an online survey to
students graduating. This can be automated, but do you
want to do it more than once? And if you do, can you
automate the results of the data collection and analysis
to administrators at specific times of the year to inform
their decision making?
Conclusions
• Decision-making is from conclusions
based on good data. The number of such
decisions depends on the time and
expense of making them.
• The system works best when multiple
decision makers use good data to make
good decisions in an on-going fashion.
THE BUCKET brigade is not cost effective.
THINK productivity.
Quotes from ‘The World is Flat’ by
Thomas Friedman
• ‘China in 2003 replaced Mexico as the
number two exporter to the United
States…No wonder a Mexican journalist
told me about the day he interviewed a
Chinese central bank official who told him
something about China’s relationship with
America that really rattled him: “First we
were afraid of the wolf, then we wanted to
dance with the wolf, and now we want to
be the wolf’. Pg 310.
• ‘The jobs are going to go where the besteducated workforce is with the most
competitive infrastructure and environment
for creativity and supportive government.
It is inevitable. And by definition those
people will have the best standard of
living.’ John Chambers, CEO of Cisco
Systems pg 323.
Consequences
• Survival of the fittest in the flat world. Our
data channels are better than your data
channels. Nah, nah, nuh, nah, nah.
• JUST DON’T dig the channels to empty
cities or toxic fields.
• Communicate, collaborate, automate,
reduce barriers. Sidestep those who stand
in the way.
• THERE IS NO TIME.
Me Receiving my Paycheck at
Ipanema Beach (I want my VPN)