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IAB402 – IS Consulting – 2023 S1
Mini-Proposal | Assignment 1
DUE – WEEK 7 via Canvas
[due by Friday 21 April 2023 @ 11:59 PM (23:59)]
20% = 15% Proposal + 5% (Peer & Tutor Review)
Write a 5 page (maximum) Mini-Proposal for the following Consulting Engagement
We write to invite your consulting firm to submit a brief proposal outlining your proposed approach to
identify and detail a feasible means of equitably examining mixed on-campus and online students.
Technology University of Queensland (TUQ) are a major player in the international online education
market. Headquartered in Brisbane, Australia, TUQ revenues have grown exponentially, exceeding $110M
in 2021, this rapid growth no doubt aided by COVID.
TUQ has historically wrestled with many of the same issues associated with effective examination of
students as have other online higher education institutions. In 2022 TUQ opened their first physical campus
in Edmonton, a Brisbane suburb. The resultant mix of on-campus and online students enrolled together in
subjects, has engendered new issues.
A key problem we struggle with is how to cost-effectively (for both students and TUQ) and equitably
examine a mix of both on-campus and online students enrolled in the same subject. We seek to ensure that
no cohort of students is either advantaged or disadvantaged by the examination approach employed.
While it is possible to physically invigilate exams on-campus for those students who are enrolled locally,
many on-campus students perceive this tighter control (relative to online students) as inequitable. They
suggest that online students, who are less visible, can have access to materials inaccessible to on-campus
students. One approach is to have overseas students travel to a local examination centre to be examined
and physically invigilated. Yet, this can be a substantial inconvenience for the overseas student (testing
centres may be a significant distance from many students), and does entail related costs (money, time …)
for both the student and for TUQ (e.g., funding the testing centres). Such an approach is particularly
questionable for smaller quizzes, where the costs remain just as high, but for a smaller value activity.
Cara Gee, CIO TUQ knows you from QUT. She is aware that your small consulting company has
experience designing and introducing systems in universities. And while she is not convinced the solution
to the problem is necessarily heavily IT-based (perhaps it is), she knows that your group has broad
knowledge of university operations, and she demands that whatever solution is proposed, it must align with
existing organisational subsystems, procedures, and culture. She also recognises there may be no perfect
solution and that the ultimate solution arrived at may have to be a compromise.
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Your proposal should emphasize how you will go about identifying a solution to the problem. Once this
solution-identification-and-description project is completed by the chosen consulting team (it is a
competitive bid; TUQ is inviting several other firms to also propose), TUQ will decide whether and how to
proceed with implementation.
Other Instructions:
• You must work in your confirmed consulting groups.
• Ensure that all the people in your group are properly identified on the Cover Page.
• Submission: This assignment is to be submitted via Canvas in week 7, as a PDF file, by a
nominated group member.
• No Covering Letter is to be submitted! (or it will be included in the 5-page limit)
• No appendices are to be attached (or they will be included in the 5-page limit)
o EXCEPTION: Where the appendix document(s) at the end of the main body of the miniproposal compliments the costs/figures within your 5-page mini-proposal!
• The 5-page maximum limit does not include the following:
o Cover Page, Executive Summary, Table of Contents
o Statement of Work (template to be provided on Blackboard)
▪ Contribution by individual team members, signed off by whole team.