Departmental Workload Administration Using Group Forecasting in Universities

1 Dervis Z. Deniz, Eastern Mediterranean University, IT R&D Center, Dept. of Electrical & Electronic Eng., Gazimagusa, N. Cyprus, via Mersin-10, Turkey [email protected] 2 Mustafa Uyguroglu, Eastern Mediterranean University, Dept. of Electrical & Electronic Eng., Gazimagusa, N. Cyprus, via Mersin-10, Turkey [email protected] 3 Hakan Yavuz, (IT R&D Center), Telsim, North Cyprus, via Mersin-10, Turkey. Abstract  Workload assignment to departmental academic staff is an important activity that is based on the number of course groups necessary for a forthcoming semester. Knowledge of the numbers of students expected in each course is vital in determining the departmental teaching workload and achieving its planning and distribution. This knowledge leads to good resource planning and prevents any last minute changes to workload assignment of staff or opened course groups. Without such a facility, course group numbers may need to be changed based on student uptake or the lack of it. In this paper, a system developed for workload administration of a department is described. Experience with the system has shown that the effort in developing the system has been well worth it and its use has resulted in better utilization of academic staff resource as well as increase satisfaction of both the staff and students.