More structure and predictability in scheduling is a success

By Tina Ellehuus Larsen, tila@sdu.dk, 1/31/2022

The principles were the result of a lengthy co-creation process that many employees, both scientific staff and technical/administrative staff, departments and faculty administration contributed to in 2019 and 2020. The departments have now evaluated the new scheduling, and the evaluation is predominantly positive.

Statements such as: "The whole process has generally worked well", "the schedule is clearly more solid", and "communication between the departments and the scheduler have been good" testify that the new scheduling has been well received at departments and among the teachers.

Vice Dean Poul Nielsen was at the forefront of the co-creation process, and he is very pleased that the new scheduling has proven to work so well:

- With the new scheduling, we wanted to ensure that both students and staff experienced greater uniformity from week to week and fewer changes to the schedule after it was posted. And we have succeeded in doing that!

According to Poul Nielsen, the individual student has generally gained more predictability and stability in the schedule, while still managing to maintain a certain flexibility for our teachers using a model for overbooking.

- Obviously, there are still things that we are working to improve, such as the system of overbooking and weeks with many lab exercises, and we must of course solve these issues. Still, I think we have come an incredible distance in a short time, and we should praise everyone involved for their goodwill and positive approach. We in the faculty management are incredibly happy about that, concludes Poul Nielsen.

Scheduler Lisbeth Mortensen says that she is pleased with the positive feedback in the evaluation of the new way of scheduling:

- I have mostly been met with satisfaction with the new scheduling. In the autumn, we ran the first full semester with the new scheduling, and throughout, the communication with both teachers and the other colleagues at the departments was really good.

Lisbeth Mortensen also emphasizes that it is an advantage for the students that the class composition now has a more fixed structure, as the students can be in the same class for all courses.

- My work has also become much easier, as I make a lot fewer scheduling changes now than before. This year, I finished the distribution of students in their classes before Christmas, which I do not think I have ever tried before. The whole scheduling process is also characterized by much more calmness, and it is absolutely amazing to experience this after 18 years as a scheduler , she says with a smile.