ICCIT Curriculum

Mapping Tool
User Research

Faizah Balogun
 User Research

Survey
Link - https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/QWCBQFD

The survey dispersed consists of 10 questions intended to gather perspectives of students within
the ICCIT program about the implementation of a Curriculum Mapping Tool.

Results

1. Most respondents of the survey are

in either first or second year. That
means their input is especially
important as they will be the main users
of the ICCIT Curriculum Mapping Tool
when it becomes available.

2. Most respondents knew which

courses they would need to take to fulfill
their program requirements, however,
22.35% of respondents were not sure of
their program requirements which is a
surprisingly high number and it shows
that an ICCIT Curriculum Mapping Tool
could potentially bridge the gap between
the students who do know and do not
know which courses to take.
 3. Over 60% of respondents
were using official tools from
UTM to plan and select their
courses, including the UTM
Timetable, UTM Academic
Calendar, and ACORN. Very
few respondents were using
third-party tools such as Griddy
or Semester.ly which means that
if ICCIT were to offer an official
Curriculum Mapping Tool and
advertise it well, many students
would use it to plan their
courses. A significant number
(34.12%) of respondents had
guidance from friends and
professors on which courses to
take, so it would be useful if our
ICCIT Curriculum Mapping
Tool had ratings and reviews for courses and professors from students who have taken
specific courses in the past, as well as an Amazon-style Q&A section.

4. Over 90% of students were

using either desktop or laptop to
select courses while 55.29% of
students were using a smartphone
to select courses. This means that
while it is important for the ICCIT
Curriculum Mapping Tool to be
mobile-friendly, the desktop
experience has a higher priority.
 5. On average, students rated
their satisfaction with currently
available course planning and
selection tools to be 6/10, which
demonstrates that the ICCIT
needs to create a more user-
friendly all-in-one curriculum
mapping tool that will have a
much better user experience than
what is currently available.

6. Students have cited many

issues with current tools such as
random refreshing of the page,
having to sign back in too many
times, lack of accessibility on
mobile devices, confusing or
unappealing visuals, as well as
poor organization, lack of “mind
map” visualization features, and
difficulty of finding specific
program requirements. Only
17.65% of the respondents did
not have issues with current
tools. We are hoping that our
ICCIT Curriculum Mapping
Tool will reduce the number of
students who do not have any
issues with course planning.

7. Students have shown a lot of

interest in an ICCIT Curriculum
Mapping Tool. The average interest
level is 7.8/10. We are confident that
many students would make use of an
ICCIT Curriculum Mapping Tool
when it becomes available.
Almost 60% of respondents are not interested or planning to do international exchange, however,
the number of respondents who would be interested in international exchange if they had a
curriculum mapping tool that outlines the specific courses at international institutions that would
fulfill CCIT course requirements is over 70%.
Interviews
We conducted both formal and informal interviews with staff and students to gather their take on
the development of a mapping tool. The results from both respondents were positive and geared
towards the feasibility of such a tool.
*Respondents will be distinguished as either Faculty or Student for privacy purposes

Faculty
Challenges -
• Many courses and difficulty planning with prerequisites especially with 3rd and fourth year
courses
• Suggestion to plan courses - look at it from a top down approach in order to lead to a career path
• Gives students an idea of what courses to take to get into a career path
• Takes the guess work out of things
• Suggestion to create a template for course planning - a visual doc to show the logic of how
courses lead to another
• Benefit to faculty - can chart to see for student, as a quick way to see the path ways (a bigger
picture of everything)
• Students may meet with faculty and ask more focused questions - bridges the communication
gap, sometimes students may not know what questions to ask
• Exchange - the reason why people may not get transfer credits is because there is no alignment
with certain courses

Faculty
• “growing pains” - based on how all the courses relate to each other , but not know how they relate
with each other
• new program and working out the kinks
• DEM - issues on working out with the curriculum - how the courses flow together from 1st to 4th
year (one tiny change has major implications elsewhere)
• considering logistics in general or - considering budget, hiring, etc.
• Decisions made in committee form
• Professors not ever get to see programs for what it is - no idea what its like to be a DEM/CCT
student
• little snapshot - incomplete information
• Only get to hear back from students based on student feedback (bad) - when there’s a disruption
• Compared UT to UofT -
• UTM students put self in any course, staff have to look through people that have entered
even without prerequisites
• UT has a rigid registration system, limited admission staff. Students cannot enrol in
courses w/o prerequisites
• In general terms - this tool will be useful
• a challenge is that can it keep up with the changes that are made - decision making process in
waves - minor and major program changes
• Can’t disclose changes coming - until they show up
• Account for the changes and the costs
• Student ‘culture of involvement’ -
• guiding each other and giving advice. Use of a review system
• Student Recommendation thoughts -
 • Readjusting course description , it is not accurate all the time for what’s
happening in the class
• talk to the profs that are teaching the classes over and over again
• The professor’s job is to teach, not show up in evaluations
• critique the way things have been laid out/structured
• course evaluation - provide relevant info
• no one teaches how (systematically) - how to evaluate something effectively
• take time to figure out how to evaluate, consider how it should be structured
• Likert scale, Position the user on how to think about it before they evaluate it
(pre-planned comments, survey type response)

Student
Suggestions for use -
• Factor in actual time and date of when the courses will be taken
• Recommend the courses - through filling out a survey + search bar and key words

Student
Key comments -
• Valuable in terms of having present streams/careers
• Applicable and useful because it can tell you timing
• More organized
• Interested in courses but not have necessary prerequisites
• Personality test to suggest what courses to take
• Summer abroad experience, broaden horizons, opens mind up to all opportunities. Builds
collaboration and connection
• Will give students the structure you end up looking for through CCIT journey to learn what
you’re passionate about
• ‘Culture of timing’ beyond a fourth/fifth year - hard to do everything with the requirements
• more time enables students to position themselves with professional level courses to help
you launch into your career
• remove stigma of a 5th year
Suggestion for tool -
• Including student advice (maybe from course evaluations)
• Past student work (e.g. examples of final projects)
• Testimonials

Faculty
• The timetable as it is, is a very useful tool. Nothing wrong with it
o We need something more complex
o “If I'm in a specific program, I want a timetable planned in order to complete the
program”
o UTM Timetable already does a good job
o Students need something of when all the courses are offered
o They need to know about conflicts
o “E-tools” – feature for the academic advisors
o See timetable, conflicts, issues, can plan an event, shows all the classes
 o UTM timetable allows you to develop a mock timetable
o What we should develop is a guide that shows key requirements first then elective
options
o There needs to be a tool where students can build courses that are related to the topic of
interest
§ Ex- Social media marketing so have courses grouped that indicate that career
path
§ What are the prerequisites for all the courses they need? Make sure that is readily
available
o Develop a better understanding on various options that are available
o Provide a better roadmap of what courses students need to take if they had a specific
interest in a certain area
• A great need for a platform like this. Older platforms are outdated
o The ICCIT departments haven’t been assisted into connecting the dots according to their
interests
o We don’t really have a system in place. We have many different resources. No
coordinated resource or effort in order to help students to understand their expectations.
o The goal is to keep students on track to graduate within 4 years.
• A resource like this would be excellent and students will always have questions. So they will
always be in touch with faculty because they want a better understanding of everything. Will help
with the busy life-schedules.
o The platform will complement the advising process.
• Other departments should implement the same process or attempt to develop the same platform,
simply because it will enhance the processes that are in place.
o Efficiency is key.
• Students ask faculty members (Profs) for assistance who teach specific courses, to help them with
their entire career plans. It is not fair to ask profs about everything within a students’ academic
goals because the prof simply doesn’t have the expertise to assist them with something that is
outside the realm of their specific courses.
o Other faculty members are always trying to be helpful, but having a platform will assist
them in providing sound and constructive advice.
• Academic calendar for St. George (computer science) is an excellent example of a useful resource