Faculty Contact Information:
| I can be contacted using the e-mail address at the top of this syllabus or via your personal study group within the Web Tycho (WT) classroom. Each student will be assigned a pesonal study group within the WT classroom. This study group has each student and the instructor as members. We can use this group to communicate separately from the rest of the class on issues regarding the course. | |
Consultation:
| I am always available for consultation via e-mail and the WT personal study group. | |
Required Texts and Readings:
| Rob, P., and Coronel, C. (2004). Database Systems: Design, Implementation, and Management (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Thompson Course Technology. | |
Supplementary Readings:
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The standard for papers in the graduate program is the APA style. All participants in this course and all graduate INSS, MGMT, PUAD, and ECON courses should have a copy of the style guide:
American Psychological Association. (2001). Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 5th Edition. Washington DC: Author. All graduate students should be prepared to utilize the UMUC online library at http://www.umuc.edu/library/. The library contains a large number of full text academic journals that are free of charge and immediately available. The library homepage also contains a number of links related to improving students' research and writing skills. | |
Recommended Journals:
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Publications of the various professional societies (such as ACM -- the Association for Computing Machinery, the IEEE Computing Society, and the various management professional societies) are strongly recommended. In addition, there are many trade journals (such as eWEEK) that MIS professionals should become familiar with, many of these being published both weekly and on-line. | |
Course Description:
| 3 semester hours credit. (Formerly INSS 550.) Prerequisite: Either INSS 510, INSS 520, INSS 530, INSS 620, INSS 630, or permission of the Program Director. Examines database concepts and practices as they relate to business environments. Various database structures including relational and object-oriented are discussed. Concepts of distributed database architecture are explored. Design, development, and implementation of databases are examined. Organizational issues concerning the implementation of databases and the role of data in the decision-making process are examined. Decision support system architecture is reviewed with emphasis on the database component. Issues of intelligent databases are discussed. A database project is required. | |
Course Goals:
Upon completion of the course, participants should:
1. Understand and apply database concepts and practices
2. Understand relational and object-oriented database models, and how they compare to "traditional" models such as hierarchical and network.
3. Design and implement a relational database.
4. Understand and discuss issues associated with Internet database development. | |
Course Objectives:
At the conclusion of this course the student will be able to:
1. Describe, compare, and use tools of database design development and implementation, such as: Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERD), Relational schema, Table normalization, Structured Query Language (SQL), and ANSI/SPARC 3-level architecture - subschemas.
2. Discuss the advantages and issues of distributed database architecture and two- and three- tier database architectures,
3. Concurrency control and transaction management, .
4. Compare and contrast approaches to Security of databases
5. Define organizational issues and the responsibilities associated with database administration.
6. Discuss the role of data and information in decision making, and techniques such as data mining and data warehousing as used for decision support. | |
Grading Information:
Grades for this course will be assigned as follows:
A 90% +
B 80 – 89%
C 70 – 79%
F Below 70%
Please note that Bowie State University does not use "D" for graduate students. The grade F(a) is used to designate academic failure. F(n) is used to designate failure for non-completion. Grades of Incomplete or Withdrawal are governed by UMUC-Europe policies. For further details, please refer to the UMUC-Europe Graduate Catalog, available in your local Education Center or online at http://www.ed.umuc.edu/general_info/publications/catalogs. | |
Course Requirements:
Graduate school at the masters level focuses on helping students obtain the education needed for success as professionals in their chosen fields. Thus, UMUC-Europe Graduate Programs and Bowie State University share the common goals of promoting excellence in academic scholarship through thoughtful inquiry and the skillful application of knowledge and theory for the betterment of society.
In order to maximize your graduate educational experience in general and this course in particular, you are required to:
10% - Participate in online conferences and discussions
30% - Complete small database design project
10% - Implement your database design using a DBMS (i.e. MS Access)
25% - Complete an online open book/notes midterm examination
25% - Complete an online open book/notes final examination
Important note: Resubmission of course work from previous classes
(whether or not taken at UMUC, UMUC-Europe or BSU), partially or in its entirety, is not acceptable in this course and will result in an
automatic failure on the assignment. Additionally, I check each assignment (programs and papers) turned in to see if it has been copied from the Internet or other sources. I consider this to be cheating. Cheating is not acceptable in this course and will result in at least an automatic failure for the assignment. In more severe cases, it may also result in an automatic failure for the course. | |
Description of Course Requirements:
Participate in classroom discussions: You are expected to engage in the online conferences. Usually this requires the student to log into the classroom five to six times per week for about a half an hour per session. Each week's conferences will have numerous informational topics as well as one or two mini assignments. In the mini assignments, students will be asked questions on various real-world, textbook, and case-study topics, which they are required to answer to receive participation points.
Additionally, each student will participate in an individual database design project. The database design will be a small business problem requiring a database solution just as we will discuss in class. This design will be worth 30% of your total grade. You will then implement your design using a DBMS, such as MS Access, MySQL, etc. The implementation will be worth 10% of your total grade. | |
Course Schedule:
Course Schedule:
This schedule presents 14 units or modules, with each unit corresponding to a regular three-hour weekday meeting, a half-day on weekends, or a full week of DE.
All chapter references are to the course text.
Week 1 (4 - 10 September 2006)
- Introductions
- Review of syllabus
- Clarification of goals, objectives and requirements
- Orientation to subject - Database Systems
- Database Project Assigned
- Read chapter 1 of the text prior to class
Week 2 (11 - 17 September 2006)
- Data Models
- Read chapter 2 of the text prior to class
Week 3 (18 - 24 September 2006)
- The Relational Database Model
- Read chapter 3 of the text prior to class
Week 4 (25 September - 1 October 2006)
- Entity Relationship (ER) Modeling
- Read chapter 4 of the text prior to class.
Week 5 (2 - 8 October 2006)
- Database Normalization
- Read chapter 5 of the text prior to class.
- Turn in CLDP ER diagrams, business rules, and fully normalized table designs.
Week 6 (9 - 15 October 2006)
- Structured Query Language (SQL) and Advanced SQL
- Read chapters 6 and 7 of the text prior to class.
Week 7 (16 - 22 October 2006)
- Online Open Book/Notes Midterm Examination (Ch 1 - 7)
- Turn in database dsgin ER diagrams, business rules, and table designs to be used in database implementation.
Week 8 (23 - 29 October 2006)
Week 9 (30 October - 5 November 2006)
- Database Design Life Cycle
- Read chapter 8 of the text prior to class.
- Turn in list of queries to be used in database implementation.
- Turn design of database reports and Input Forms/Menus
Week 10 (6 - 12 November 2006)
- Transaction Management and Concurrency Control
- Distributed Database Management Systems
- Read chapters 9 and 10 of the text prior to class.
Week 11 (13 - 19 November 2006)
- Object-Oriented Databases
- Read chapter 11 of the text prior to class
Week 12 (20 - 26 November 2006)
- Data Warehousing and Database Administration
- Read chapters 12 and 15 of the text prior to class
Week 13 (27 November - 3 December 2006)
- Comprehensive Online Open Book/Notes Final Examination
- Final Database Implementation Projects due
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Academic Policies:
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The University has a license agreement with Turnitin.com, a service that helps prevent plagiarism from internet resources. I may be using this service in this class by either requiring students to submit their papers electronically to Turnitin.com or by submitting questionable text on behalf of a student. If you or I submit part or all of your paper, it will be stored by Turnitin.com in their database throughout the term of the University's contract with Turnitin.com. If you object to this temporary storage of your paper, you must let me know no later than two weeks after the start of this class. Please Note: If you object to the storage of your paper on Turnitin.com, I may utilize other services to check your work for plagiarism The official university policy on Plagiarism and Academic Dishonesty can be found at http://www.umuc.edu/policy/aa15025.shtml. Section I.C. states: "Faculty may determine if the resubmission of course work from previous classes (whether or not taken at UMUC), partially or in its entirety, is acceptable when assigning a grade on that piece of course work. Faculty must provide this information in their written syllabi. If the resubmission of course work is deemed to be unacceptable, a charge may not be brought under this Policy and will be handled as indicated in the written syllabi."
Please refer to Description of Course Requirements for specific information on how resubmissions will be treated in this course and to the UMUC-Europe Graduate Catalog for information on the following:
Academic Integrity
Course Load
Exception to Policy
Grade Appeal Process
Make-up Examinations
Nondiscrimination
Students with Disabilities
Code of Civility
Hard copies of the catalog are available at your local Education Center. | |
Faculty Bio:
James Helton is a Senior software developer and analyst working for Lockheed Martion Corporation. He has been the software project lead or architect for several medium to large size information systems projects. He has also worked in software development with databases as well as a database manager.
He has taught undergraduate computer science and information systems management courses for the University of Maryland since 2001, and Graduate courses for Bowie State University since 2002. He has an undergraduate degree in Computer Information Systems and a Master's degree in M.I.S. | |