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Marist is a private, nonprofit, Roman Catholic, college preparatory, coeducational day school for
students in Grades 7-12. Their Campus Ministry provides students with personal volunteer
retreat opportunities and experiences in community service.

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Currently, Marist sponsors a Volunteer Outreach Program that provides volunteer services at
sites throughout the community. Each student at Marist is required to volunteer their time in the
program for a certain amount of hours each semester. The program director Karen Shanahan, is
responsible for cataloging all of the sites and maintaining records of each student and the amount
of hours they have volunteered. At the present time, Mrs Shanahan uses little slips of paper as
her only means of documentation. This has become a very tedious process as there are more
than 1000 students enrolled at Marist.

The objective of this team project was to implement a DBMS that would allow Mrs. Shanahan to
catalog each volunteer site and maintain a record of each student's participation in the program.

Throughout the Systems Development Life Cycle we produced the following

deliverables:

p Baseline Project Plan

p System Requirements Report
p System Models Report
p Systems Design Report
p System Implementation Plan

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General Project Information
Project Name: Marist School Outreach Program
Sponsor: Marist School
Problem/Opportunity Statement
Increased opportunity to serve community
Increased need for comprehensive cataloging of service projects
The school's desire to us their resources more efficiently
Project Objectives

To enable the Outreach Coordinator flexibility in scheduling

To keep track of students service activity
To track service sites and potential service sites

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 Project Description

A new Database Management System will be designed installed

and maintained. This database will provide tracking for existing
and potential service sights as well as student activity. The
database will provide information about the sights and the amount
of service students have performed compared to requisite hours of
service. Opportunity for the Outreach Program to grow and
encompass more locations as well as more volunteers.
Business Benefits

Improved record keeping

Improved information tracking
Improved public image
New marketing channels

Project Deliverables:
Marist School Outreach Program DBMS
Estimated Project Duration: 2 months

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After reviewing the planning process, it is recommended that the Marist School
Outreach Program DBMS be developed. The costs that will be incurred will not
exceed the benefits that will be enjoyed by the company and its community once
the installation and training is complete.

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a. Low End Solution:
i. Maintain the current paper system

b. High End Solution:

i. Contract outside service to design, install and train new DBMS
ii. Outsource training of current employee to design new DBMS

c. Recommended Solution:

The Low End Solution is more than adequate for Marist School Outreach
Program, considering what the director has accomplished using her current
paper shuffling method. Having the current offer of volunteer personnel as
well as donated equipment should not be overlooked. Another advantage
is the flexibility this new system will provide for someone coming off the
streets to be able to run the Outreach Program, should that need arise.

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a. The completed Database Management System will provide all users
the information needed to succeed in offering the best available coverage
for the volunteer lists as well as the volunteer sights.

b. Maintenance will be performed on a yearly basis by volunteers from the

schools faculty.

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One of the benefits of choosing this project is the fact that costs will be kept at a
minimum. All necessary PC hardware and software is being donated from the
Parents Club at Marist School. The fact that this project will be spared much of
the major costs, such as PC equipment, makes the project quite feasible. Marist
School is a large private school, but has a set budget for each school year. This
would be a problem for this project if it were not for the fact that donations are
being made. The school¶s budget did not take into consideration this project. The
DBMS project will not have to cut into Marist¶s budget for this school year, and
in turn it will leave the budget for other projects that will require major costs.

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There are several technical risk factors associated with this project. One of the
project team¶s concerns is that the donated equipment will not be powerful
enough to support the proposed DBMS. Each PC that will be integrated into the
network will have certain requirements, such as an allotted amount of memory for
the DBMS and the speed that the machine operates at. End Users will not want to
operate a terminal that does not have a quick response and takes minutes to load
programs such as the DBMS. Another important concern is that the DBMS will
need to be user friendly. Many of the End Users for this DBMS will have little or
no computer or technology knowledge. The project team will have to take this
fact into consideration when designing the DBMS. Key- strokes should be easy,
display screens should be easy to read, reports and forms should be easily
accessible, etc.« The possibility of future upgrades is also a technical concern.
Marist will have to keep up with the fast paced technology world and make the
necessary hardware and software upgrades. The school should factor this into
future budget plans in order to keep the DBMS functional and compatible with
other programs.

The technical risk of this project is indeed present, as is in any other technology
related project. However, with the project team fully aware of these risks, the
project should be able to be successfully completed with little or no concern of
such risks. The risk involved with this project is considered moderate but under
control.

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Currently at Marist School one individual, the Outreach Coordinator, maintains
the Outreach program. This individual has no access to computer equipment; all
data and information gathered concerning this program is on paper. Converting all
paperwork to electronic data will greatly enhance the Coordinator¶s capabilities as
well as others involved with the program. All data will be stored in the proposed
DBMS, allowing for easy flow among data. It will greatly reduce data
redundancy; currently data is stored over and over on paper each day. Paperwork
will no longer have to be filed away in space hogging file cabinets. Other program
volunteers and employees will have PC terminals to enter data into forms and
reports. The Coordinator can then manipulate this data with the ease of the
DBMS. Forms can be re-printed each day with different information and reports
can be run to combine this data. The proposed DBMS will be an operational
advantage to the Coordinator, who will no longer have to maintain stacks of
paperwork and dated file cabinets full of old paperwork.

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The scheduled completion date of this project is December 15, 2001. Factors that
will contribute to meeting the completion date are the project team¶s capability to
implement the DBMS in the allotted time and the training that will be necessary
for the use of the DBMS. The Coordinator will need adequate time to be trained
for the use of the system, so the design and implementation of the project will
have to be completed before training can begin. The DBMS should be completed
in time to allow for 3 full days of training at Marist. Three days will allow for
proper training and potential questions regarding the system to be made and
answered. The design of the DBMS will be completed on November 21, 2001.
This will allow for ample time for project testing, potential problem corrections,
and setting up and running the DBMS at Marist School.

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Each member of the team will participate and complete project tasks throughout
each phase of the Systems Development Life Cycle. The responsibilities of each
team member are as follows:

a. Project Manager

Erik Friebolin will serve as the Project Manager, his responsibilities will
include, directing the team, controlling the project scope, monitoring
issues and instituting change control.

b. Business Area Expert, Trainer

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 Marlene Topping will serve as the Business Area Expert and Trainer for
the project. As an employee of the organization for which the system will
be designed, Marlene will be relied upon to provide concise and accurate
knowledge. Upon completion of the project, Marlene will assume the role
of Trainer. Her duties will then be to develop the curriculum, create
support materials and properly train all users of the system.

c. Document Architect, Object Architect

Elisabeth Bruce will serve as the Document Architect and Object

Architect. Elisabeth will be responsible for creating all documentation
needed to support the system. In addition, her duties as object architect
will require her to create the object models and ensure that they are
complete and traceable.

d. Database Architect, Object Developer

Larry Nelson will serve as the Database Architect and Object Developer.
He will be responsible for building and designing the database from the
object models created by the Object Architect.

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The project team will use several methods of communication. The primary
method used will be group meetings. These meetings are to be held at the end of
class each Monday and Wednesday. As the project nears completion, it might be
necessary for the team to meet once or twice outside of class. The secondary
form of communication will be through electronic mail or facsimile. Using this
type of communication will allow team members to share documents when group
meetings are not possible. The final method by which the team will communicate
will be through use of the telephone. Each member of the team has provided his
or her home and cellular telephone numbers. All correspondence to the client will
be done via written progress reports after each phase of development.

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In the event that a team member feels that changes need to be made to the
direction or objectives of the project, that individual will need to notify the project
manager. The project manager will then present this information to the other
members of the group for discussion. If the request(s) are determined to be
feasible and the team believes that they will result in added value, the decision
will be put to a vote.

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Any issues relevant to the project that arise during the planning phase should be

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 first presented to the project manager who will then in turn present them to the
team.

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The members of Group #3 have undertaken a project that involves the creation of
a database application for the Volunteer Outreach Program at Marist School in
Atlanta, GA. A database is needed to track each of the volunteer sites, volunteers,
number of hours assigned to each work detail and possible volunteer sights.
Listed below are the entities and their attributes:

1. Volunteer - A volunteer is any student at Marist School who volunteers time at

a volunteer site. A volunteer has the following attributes:

Attributes:

Each volunteer will be uniquely identified by a volunteer identification number

(volunteer_ID). Personal information about the volunteer such as name, address,
telephone number, classification, hours earned, legal guardian will also be
maintained. Because many of the volunteer sites require students who can drive,
the database will also need to track students who have driver's licenses.

2. Volunteer Site - A volunteer site is a location at which the students

participating in the outreach program volunteer their time.

Attributes:

Each volunteer site will be identified by a volunteer site identification number

(volunteer_site_ID). The information that the database will need to maintain in
regards to the volunteer site include: the name of the contact person for the site,
site address, telephone number, the type of work required, the number of hours
required, the number of volunteers needed, distance from the Marist campus, the
Marist supervisor for the location, and the date that the site was serviced.

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Since there is no current system in place for the Outreach Program, the
implementation plan should be straight forward. We do not need to worry about
converting existing data into the new DBMS, or deal with issues regarding
cutovers. The only real issue was to ensure that correct up to date information was
entered into the DMBS system, which would allow the system to be functional
immediately.

Our first step was to compile accurate and current information from the program
director. We assisted her in compiling this information into a series of
spreadsheets that we could then cut and paste the information into the tables
within the DMBS. Due to the current ³paper system´, there was a considerable
amount of data redundancy and errors that had to be corrected before the tables
were truly accurate. This process proved to be the most time consuming
throughout the entire implementation process.

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 Marist decided that they would like to have the DBMS available from anywhere
within their network. Since all workstations already had copies of MS Access, this
made the deployment much easier. Once the tables were populated with correct
information, the DBMS system was installed on their main NT file server. This
would allow all clients on their local network to access the DBMS system to
update information and access reports. Finally, we had to touch every client to
provide a ³shortcut´ to the DBMS system, but fortunately the clients are clustered
together and this process was not too difficult.

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Listed below are the evaluation criteria that our group has used in order to
determine whether or not the DBMS was successful in all aspects of the project
scope.

· User Compatibility
· Ease of Operations
· Paperless Office
· Positive Feedback

After fully implementing the DBMS at Marist School and allowing time for
testing and training, the Outreach Director can now successfully use the DBMS in
place of all previous paper related forms, reports, and personal information. The
Director is completely knowledgeable at using the DBMS. The Director finds our
DBMS a ³user-friendly, easy way of storing information without all of the
paperwork´. The Director has high hopes that she will continue to learn more
about the system and perhaps be able to add to it in the near future. The forms are
easy to read, the reports are exactly what the Director needs in order to keep track
of volunteer hours, and there is n longer a use for the many file cabinets that are
busting at the seams in her office. The Director also reports that the students are
pleased with the new system. The students enjoy the fact that they can have
access to their information and are able to run a report to keep track of their
volunteer hours that have been earned. The Outreach Director is extremely happy
with the end results of our project. The DBMS has not experienced any down
time, and our team has devised a handbook for troubleshooting if a problem
should arise.

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The Marist School Outreach Program DBMS will have adequate ability to
maintain the system at regular intervals. The following areas will be specifically
addressed in this maintenance procedure.

1. User Compatibility will be handled through the use of user surveys. After
each user's initial input to system, they will be required to complete a survey

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 form. Once a significant number of surveys have been compiled, the information
will be assessed and the Project Team #3 will meet to review the results.

2. Ease of Operations will be primarily handled with the use of the training
manual which will be developed by Project Team #3 during the implementation
phase. This documentation may be revised according to the findings in #1.

3. Paperless office will be accomplished through the successful use of the

DBMS.

4. Positive Feedback will be provided via the survey form. If another survey is
required, the Project Team #3 will provide same during implementation period.

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