Prathivadi, Abhinav – Database Project Design [Inf 257] 1

Abhinav Prathivadi
Prof. Ray Larson
Sep 25th, 2008
Personal Database Project Design

Throughout the history of the Internet, the communications platform has produced many

revolutions and has impacted other industries surrounding it by largely creating a level

playing field. The academia has changed in profound ways in the last decade and the

Internet has been pivotal in revolutionizing the way students have exchanged

information, ideas and the interaction between teachers and students. A challenging task

many people from the academia face is the approach towards Internet many schools and

universities have taken over the last few years, automating most of their processes

including student data and billing for students. The most important aspect of student data

is the transcript (the grades associated with it) and an online integration of student grades

and courses within an e-grade book is the purpose of this project and in the process

streamline the accessibility and build an application to scale over many universities.

This grade book is designed to streamline the process of entering and managing grades

from a student as well as a teacher perspective. With a form based reporting system and

tabulation of data online, updates to students and parents is very effective and convenient

method of reporting grades. The purpose of this paper is to design a robust back-end

capable of sustaining large amounts of data load as the grading processes of many

universities and schools are time and data intensive work. By focusing on flexible and

easy data entry into the gradebook, a lot of time is saved that can be productively put in

other aspects of classroom interaction. Although the various entities have been

documented (see next few pages) changes are inevitable as bottlenecks will be noticed
Prathivadi, Abhinav – Database Project Design [Inf 257] 2

and optimized to a high level of efficiency in the coming months. The idea of starting off

with a rough sketch of the system helps shape the direction of the database system, and

by gradually exploring different aspects of grading, various perspectives will emerge and

subsequently the gradebook will evolve eventually to a scalable solution for universities

to use.

Students in many Universities and colleges are eager to know their grades almost

immediately after submitting their assignment and the graders are overwhelmed with

paperwork amounting to hundreds of papers per assignment per class. Although the

amount of work is considerably swifter compared to the traditional calculator approach

teachers used to take a decade back, the prospect of a web based grade book is exciting

because of the potential communication platform it can setup between students and

teachers.

Although numerous grade books exist online, most of them are “downloadable”

desktop grade book software that has become a pain for the users to use, as web based

products are kicking into the industry. With the advent of Google Docs, Windows Office

Live, etc. the academia has largely migrated to a web based software world where

collaboration and search for information is moving predominantly online. The student –

teacher collaboration outside the class room involves the management of numerous

assignments and exams and to organize the grades has been a challenge for many years.

The academia has developed over a period of time various in-house database systems like

bSpace, etc, but an integrated free solution for teachers, students and schools of all sizes

and domains is non existent and this project hopes to fill that gap and build a scalable and

sustainable solution for an online gradebook system.

Prathivadi, Abhinav – Database Project Design [Inf 257] 3

Data Dictionary
The entities involved in the database are

Table: Students
*Student_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: student id associated with each student. It is unique per
student and is a primary key

first_name Type: varchar (25) Example: {abhinav, adam, john,

mark}
Description: first name of the student

last_name Type: varchar (25) Example: {prathivadi, smith,

henderson}
Description: last name of the student

school_name Type: varchar (75) Example: {Temecula Valley High

School}
Description: name of the school

gender Type: varchar (1) Example: {0 OR 1 = > Male or

Female}
Description: gender of the student

date_of_birth Type: date (mm/dd/yyyy) Example: {11/7/1988}

Description: date of birth of the student

graduation_date Type: date (mm/yyyy) Example: {5/2010}

Description: graduation date from high school, college , etc

Table: Student_Logins
*Student_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: student id associated with each student. It is unique per
student and is a primary key

username Type: varchar(14) Example: {aprathivadi,

jacksmith45, etc}
Description: the username associated with the student’s account
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password Type: varchar (50) Example:

{aksjd81247897asdh18724, etc}
Description: stores MD5 hash of the password the user set while
registration

Table: Teacher_Logins
*Teacher_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: teacher id associated with each teacher. It is unique per
teacher and is a primary key

username Type: varchar(14) Example: {MacArthur, Allenworth,

etc}
Description: the username associated with the teacher’s account

password Type: varchar (50) Example: {aui18279104756, etc}

Description: stores MD5 hash of the password the user set while
registration

Table: Teachers
*Teacher_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: teacher id associated with each teacher. It is unique per
teacher and is a primary key

school_name Type: varchar (75) Example: {Temecula Valley High

School}
Description: name of the school

firstName Type: varchar (25) Example: {Jack, Mark, David, etc}

Description: first name of the teacher

lastName Type: varchar (25) Example: {Bauer, Heggerbond,

Antopi}
Description: last name of the teacher

gender Type: varchar (1) Example: {0 OR 1 = > Male or

Female}
Description: gender of the teacher

email Type: varchar (50) Example: {aprathivadi@gmail.com,

etc}
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Description: email of the teacher

date_of_birth Type: date/time Example: {5/1/75}

(mm/dd/yyyy)
Description: date of birth of the teacher

Table: Assignments
*Assgn_id Type: int (auto-incremen) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: id of the assignment (unique – primary key)

name Type: varchar (100) Example: {Inf 257 Database

Deisng, etc}
Description: name of the assignment

description Type: text (500) Example: {This assignment covers

what we did in class up till the
midterm, etc }
Description: description of the assignment

dueDate Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {11/5/2008 12:03:45,etc }

hh:mm:ss
Description: due date of the assignment

Class_id Type: int Example: {1,2,3….}

Description: the class this assignment is associated with

Table: Classes
*Class_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: class id associated with each class. It is unique per
class and is a primary key

title Type: varchar (75) Example: {Database Management}

Description: The title of the class

Teacher_id Type: int (5) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….

∞}
Description: teacher id associated with the class

start Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {8/5/2008 5:32:1}

hh:mm:ss
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Description: time the class started

end Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {4/5/2009 5:32:1}

hh:mm:ss
Description: time the class ended

Table: Student_Grades
G_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: grade entry id; unique for each entry of an assignment

*Assgn_id Type: int Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….

∞}
Description: assignment id this grade is related to

Student_id Type: int Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….

∞}
Description: student this grade is being entered for

as_maxScore Type: int Example: {100,200,50,75}

Description: max score of the assignment

as_score Type: int Example: {89,156,45,70}

Description: the score this student received for the assignment

as_comments Type: text (500) Example: {“excellent work and

quality. good job”}
Description: comments associated with this student’s performance
in this assignment

Table: Student_Attendance
*Class_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: id of the course (unique for each class)

*Student_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….

∞}
Description: id of the student

date Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {11/5/2008 12:03:45,etc }

Prathivadi, Abhinav – Database Project Design [Inf 257] 7

hh:mm:ss
Description: date this entry was updated/added

status Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {11/5/2008 12:03:45,etc }

hh:mm:ss
Description: status of the student (Present, Absent, Tardy)

comments Type: text (500) Example: {11/5/2008 12:03:45,etc }

Description: comments about the student’s attendance; reserved for
things such as detention, unruly behavior or any other notes

Table: Class_Enrollment
Student_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….
∞}
Description: student id associated with each student. It is unique per
student and is a primary key

Class_id Type: int (auto-increment) Example: {1,2,3…123,124,125….

∞}
Description: class id is associated with the class the student is
enrolled in

status Type: varchar (20) Example: {Enrolled, Wait-Listed,

Dropped}
Description: stores the status of the student’s enrollment; can vary
depending on the class size allowed, etc

date Type: mm/dd/yyyy Example: {11/5/2008 12:03:45,etc }

hh:mm:ss
Description: date this entry was updated/added

* - primary key
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ER Diagram of Gradebook