Department of Information Science and Technology

Overview

Medium to large sized organizations that have countless offices and operations scattered about usually have numerous database systems from which upper-level administration would like reports in a combined fashion. In order to make appropriate decisions, upper-level administration of an organization needs to draw the data together from different systems in order to get a crisper picture of the status and performance of an organization. This is the role of the data warehouse. The data warehouse can be a powerful strategic tool to help upper-level administration evaluate data and predict trends for the organization. Data warehouses are essential for development of organizational scorecards, dashboards and other tools that provide a picture of  how an organization is performing. People capable of creating and maintaining such a data warehouse are needed, but the in-depth education necessary for these people is available in only a few places.

The Graduate Certificate in Data Warehouses focuses on the technologies that allow an organization to make effective business decisions based on operational data pulled together from many different sources inside an organization. The target audience consists of any individual who would manage any type of IT professionals, database administrators, business analysts, and any person who would need to understand the technologies behind a successful data warehouse and the capabilities of those technologies. This certificate may also be of importance to people responsible for the design and development of software that performs data retrieval or business analysis.

Missouri S&T's IT department has been in the data warehouse business for over 20 years. The first hand experiences of those 20 years are incorporated in the data warehouse course taught in this certificate program.

This is one of two such programs in the United States. The other program is offered at University of California-Irvine Extension.

Graduate Certificate in Data Warehouses

A graduate level student may receive a Graduate Certificate in Data Warehouses from the Information Science and Technology department at Missouri S&T by completing four courses.

Two of the courses are required:

• ERP Systems Design & Implementation (IST 346)
• Essentials of Data Warehouses (IST 444

Choose two of the following electives:

• Database Applications in Business (IST 343)
• Use of Business Intelligence (IST 345)
• Information Network Analysis (IST 443)
• Database Marketing (IST 445)
• Building the Data Warehouse (IST448)
• Managerial Decision-Making (EMgt 313)
• Management Information Systems (EMgt 333)
• Data Mining & Knowledge Discovery (CS 404)
• Web Data Management & XML (CS 412)

Entrance into IST M.S. Graduate Program:

A student who completes a Graduate Certificate at Missouri S&T, having earned a grade of "B" or better in each of the certificate courses, may be admitted to the M.S. program in Information Science & Technology. The normal application process will be followed, but the minimum undergraduate GPA and GRE score requirement will be waived. Normal course prerequisites still apply.

Curriculum

Graduate Certificate in Data Warehouses Courses
 
Required: (each of these is a three-credit course)
 
IST 346: ERP Systems Design & Implementation

A technical overview of Enterprise Resource Planning Systems and their impact on organizations. SAP is introduced to illustrate the concepts, fundamentals, framework, general information technology context, the technological infrastructure, and integration of business enterprise-wide applications.

IST 444: Essentials of Data Warehouses

This course presents the topic of data warehouses and the value to the organization. It takes the student from the database platform to structuring a data warehouse environment. Focus is placed on simplicity and addressing the user community needs.

Prerequisite: IST 223 or CS 304 or equivalent relational database experience.

Elective (choose one):
 
IST 343: Database Applications in Business

Design, development and implementation of application software typical to the modern business environment utilizing popular commercial database management systems such as Oracle and Access. Focus on business case modeling, requirement analysis, database design, and implementation challenges, Project oriented.

Prerequisite: IST 243 or database experience.

IST 345: Use of Business Intelligence

Designs, methods and tools for creating low and high fidelity prototypes of information technology systems. Different prototyping approaches are examined as part of the iterative design cycle that is commonly used for developing usable information technologies.

Prerequisite: IST 346

IST 443: Information Network Analysis

Focus is on applied analysis of complex information networks in the form of web and text systems. Topics include web system link analysis, text mining, consensus analysis, collaborative filtering, recommended systems. Uses interactive data analysis tools such as SAS.

Prerequisite: Database and Statistics Familiarity.

IST 445: Database Marketing

Methods & concepts used in database marketing, such as 1) predictive modeling techniques (e.g., regression, decision trees, cluster analysis) and 2) standard processes for mapping business objectives to data mining goals to produce a deployable marketing model. Cover metrics like lifetime value of a customer and ROI; several application areas.

Prerequisite: Statistic understanding, programming understanding, familiarity with spreadsheets.

IST 448: Building

Data modeling and processes needed to populate a data warehouse; tradeoffs among several models and tools; technical issues that are faced, such as security, schemas, web access, other reporting techniques.

Prerequisite: IST 444.

EMgt 313: Managerial Decision-Making

Individual and group decision making processes and principles for engineers and technical managers with emphasis on the limitations of human rationality and the roles of social influence and organization contexts; principles and skills of negotiation.

EMgt 333: Management Information Systems

Study of the operational and managerial information needs of an organization. Emphasis is on the information needed throughout an organization and on information systems to meet those needs.

CS 404: Data Mining & Knowledge Discovery

Data mining and knowledge discovery utilizes both classical and new algorithms, such as machine learning and neural networks, to discover previously unknown relationships in data. Key data mining issues to be addressed include knowledge representation and knowledge acquisition (automated learning).

Prerequisite: CS304 or 347, Stat 215.

CS 412: Web Data Management & XML

Management of semi-structured data models and XML, query languages such as Xquery, XML indexing, and mapping of XML data to other data models and vice-versa, XML views and schema management, advanced topics include change-detection, web mining and security of SML data.

Prerequisite: CS 238 or 304 or equivalent.

Planned Regular Schedule For Required Courses

Fall Semester

ERP System Design & Implementation (IST 346)

Essentials of Data Warehouses (IST 444)

Spring Semester

ERP System Design & Implementation (IST 346)

Essentials of Data Warehouses (IST 444)

Contact

Information Science and Technology
101 Fulton Hall
1870 Miner Circle
Rolla, MO 65409
Phone: 573-341-4184
Email: ist@mst.edu