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A system to match Modern Language Partners.


Michael Jarvis

05/05/2017

Supervised by Helen R Phillips; Moderated by George Theodorakopoulos

This is a real-world problem. The School of Modern Languages, Cardiff University each semester have approximately 400 students signed up as part of their language exchange programme. This programme offers the opportunity for a student studying a language to pair up with a native or fluent, speaker of that Language and vice versa. This matching process is currently undertaken manually and is very time consuming. They project would require a Computer Science students to work closely with the relevant staff within the School of Modern Languages with the aim of developing a system which could electronically match language partners in an effective and less time-consuming manner. Currently - Students sign up to be part of the programme by answering a BOS online survey tool, which collates the information into Excel files. Due to the time-consuming nature of the manual task, the only matching criteria the school is able to offer is a preference for a male, female, or either language partner. Where possible they also try to match students on similar degree programmes. The School hopes that with the development of this system additional matching criteria could be introduced. Due to the popularity of this programme the School has a set of specific criteria they use to give students priority. An example of the criteria is ???that priority will be given to students on Languages for All courses and to apply, you need to have completed two or more courses and be at a minimum of Elementary??? This criteria is mentioned in the introduction to the survey, but often people ignore this. But it does help me (in theory at least) to prioritise students. Ideally the computerised system should be able to filter and prioritises applicants. They have no specific request as to the programming language but they will expect the system to run on their staff machines with no additional software costs. Staff within the School of Modern Languages must be able to operate and maintain the system without the need for additional technical support. If you are interested in undertaking this project, please email me.


Initial Plan (30/01/2017) [Zip Archive]

Final Report (05/05/2017) [Zip Archive]

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