User:SDSAIMS/sandbox

CityU AIMS

Introduction
AIMS is the Administrative Information Management System developed for the City University of Hong Kong as a multifunctional platform to handle various managerial affairs regarded to the university.

Launched in 1the academic year 1998/99, AIMS had only few functions and just available for students at that time. As time goes on, many more functions have been developed and expanded in order to cater for different needs of students, staff and departments. Up to now, there are numerous functions with application system varying from student, human resources, financial to alumni. Other remarkable functions include course registration, registration for student residence and events, etc.

AIMS 3.1

In July 2002, the management board endorsed the implementation of a Software Asset Management Scheme in the university in order to comply with the Copyright Ordinance. Two application systems have been developed for the implementation of the scheme, which are the Software Inventory System and the software-scanning tool, named SAMScan. The Software Inventory System was developed to assist different departments to manage their software inventory that applied in the AIMS and the licensing information. For SAMScan, it is made to all staff for assessing the actual software that is used on each PC.

AIMS 7.0

In order to facilitate the daily work of all staff and students, a new remarkable version of AIMS was launched in mid-April 2006 with a new look and feel. There is a substantial avoid such words change of the layout and the menu items were better again avoid words that pass a partial judgment structured and organized from the users’ perspective. The AIMS 7.0 also provides a search function and s sitemap. Full and partial keyword search are both supported in the search function. Users can easily locate a menu item and invoke the functions directly.

AIMS 8.1.1 The AIMS 8.1.1 is the new version of the AIMS system released in january 2010. This new version include an enhanced timeout mechanism and a much improved look and feel. The menu layout has also been changed conforming to the University standards and with terminology following the common best practice.

AIMS 8.5 onwards The AIMS 8.5 is the latest version of the AIMS system.

Personal Data for Communication
It is an information storing feature, allowing users to express their personal contents including address, telephone numbers, email, emergency contact and so on. The authorized stuffs in City University can connect students easily if necessary.

Change Security Question (for resetting your password)
To allay concerns about privacy, Aims enables users to choose their own privacy settings and change their security questions regularly for improving safety of account. Aims users have had the ability to reset the forgotten password themselves by supplying this information, without calling for assistance.

Scholarships and Financial Aid Records
Information related to scholarships and financial aids can be obtained online, with simple processes.

University Services Enquiry
Different services are provided base on the level of study.The information of services on CSC (Computing Services Centre), LIB (Library) or SDS (Student Development Services), for examples, printing qouta, material loan period, student education services, etc can be enquired here.

Use of Personal Data in Direct Marketing
Students’ personal data are intended to be used on the means of contact (name, address, telephone number, email address, etc.) in direct marketing of classes of services, products and subjects. The options of “AGREE” or “DISAGREE” can be viewed and modified by the users using this function.

My Status
All status information of student and declaration upon enrolment are integrated here. It also enables students fullfill the online tutorial and quiz of University requirement on academic honesty.

My Academic Record / My Advisor, Mentor and Mentees / My examination
The total numbers of credit compeleted, GPA, information of advisor and examination timetable are displayed online.

My Finance
Users are able to apply for deferral of tuition payment while having financial difficulties.Checking account balances, due date or tuition fees information are also available.

My application
Students have the ability to transfer the credit ,exempt the course or withdraw from studies by filling in these application.

Add or Drop classes
Students can, using a function called “master class schedule”, look for classes suiting their interests in their studies. Hence using the “add or drop classes” function, students can register or drop classes according to their needs.

Weekly schedule and Detailed schedule
Students can check their weekly timetable via this function. A detailed schedule could so be viewed in case additional information is needed. (E.g. The department providing the course)

Exceed Maximum Study Load/Reduced Study Load applications
Students who have specific needs to apply for exceeding/reducing their study loads can use this function.

Campus Internship/Work Scheme
As there are campus internship and work scheme, which allow students work for City University, students can register a job here.

Confirmation of Attending Congregation
This function is currently not available.

JobPlus Vacancies
This is a job vacancy system for CityU full-time students on part-time, temporary, summer and graduate posts. JobPlus provides updated information on the job details and application procedures to facilitate your job search. All full-time students can use this function to seek a job and there are different categories of job nature for students to.

Learning and Study Strategies Inventory (LASSI)
LASSI is a questionaire which measure the students’ necessity to improve their learning strategies. In order to help students to improve, some courses and supporting resources are available.

Notebook Ownership Scheme for Students (NOSS) Application
This is an application system for students eligible for NOSS Scheme to apply for the subsidy of $1,000 from the University after they have purchased any of the approved models of notebook computers from the Digital Technology Festival (DTF) 2014.

In-house Student Development Course Catalogue
In an attempt to improve student’s abilities in different areas other than academic, courses and talks are available for students to register.

Outbound Student Exchange Application
City University provides lots of chances for students exchange to different universities and application can be done by this function.

Scholarship and Financial Aid Catalogue
This function is for searching the scholarship and financial aid provided by City University or other organizations.

Student Locker
All on campus regular students regardless of their mode of study or the funding sources of their programmes, except research postgraduate students, are eligible to apply for the use of a locker and join the annual random lot draw for locker allocation and lockers are registered by this function.

Student Notebook Computer Long Term Loan Scheme
Loan is provided for students purchasing notebook and students can register there.

Student Residence
This is an application system for undergraduate students, postgraduate students and exchange students.

Study Plan
This section allows student using AIMS to have a grasp of their current requirements of study, their registered course and furthermore, a plan in their further studies. Below are brief descriptions of the related functions.

Degree Works
Students of City University can access an organized report form of their current progress in their studies.

Degree Evaluation
For students with no Degree Works, their report would be presented here.

CAPP Report
An old version of Degree Evaluation.

Indicate Choice of Majors
In late semester B during a student’s first year of study, students would be allowed to indicate their choice of majors as provided by the college they are studying in. There would be two period assigned for majors allocation. The first one would be for students at the top 20% of the overall academic standings. The second one would be for the remaining 80% students.

Majors Allocation Result
After the application period of the choice of major, students can check the allocation result via this function.

Statistical Data for Majors Allocation Exercise.
Students can view the statistical data for the majors allocated last year. They can obtain valuable information such as the cut-off point of top 20% major’s allocation, the number of intake in each majors etc.

Add/Drop of Minors
In semester B during a student’s first year of study, students are allowed to, besides declaring their choice of majors, add or drop their choice of minors.

Change of Home Major
Students who wish to change their home major could use this function during the application period, which is different each year. For this year, the application period is from 3 November 2014 to 20 November 2014.

Switching of Majors between Colleges/Schools
Also known as “Internal Transfer”, Students who wish to switch their major between colleges/schools could use this function during the application period. Same with the period of change of home major, it varies each year.

Re-schedule Enrolment Appointment
This is function that help students to change to enrolment timing session.

Photo Upload for Student ID Card
New students need to upload a photo, which will be printed on the Student ID Card, via this function.

Student Orientation Programme
Students can apply orientation programmes via this function.

Learning and Study Strategies Inventory (LASSI)
Same as the above.

Questionnaire for Students with Disabilities
Students with Disabilities need to fill in this questionnaire in order to allow City University to provide special services

Problems
The effectiveness of the AIMS is always generally be well recognized by different users of the City University of Hong Kong. Yet there still are controversial problems appeared.

The most popular issue is that the course registration function of the system. Quite a lot of students find the system of course registration cannot afford the massive usage by the students. Many students were rejected by the server when they logging into the system. As a result, some students cannot register their preferred courses.

Some students also think that the layout and design of the system is not user friendly enough. They think more pictures should be added into the system.