Business Information Technology with a Foundation Year - BSc (Hons) *

In the Business Information Modelling module you’ll develop the practical skills to analyse the information needs of business systems and develop conceptual models of the information needs of different types of organizations. The module provides the link between the Socio-Technical Systems and Information Retrieval modules, providing the business information foundation for subsequent years of the programme.

Information technology (IT) is ubiquitous in organizations capturing, creating and communicating data between internal business systems and enabling global communication between external parties such as suppliers and customers. The module starts by focusing on two fundamental questions that underpin IT: What is information? and why do organizations need information? The specific information that an organization needs is then explored in this module together with the source and characteristics of the data needed to provide that information. Structured approaches to analysing and designing information systems are outlined, introducing different ways of modelling and communicating the business information needs.

In the modern business environment, the use of data to generate information to improve business processes, generate sales, reduce costs and generally give the customer a more engaging experience is becoming more important than ever. Having the people with the skills and knowledge to process this data to maximise its benefits is essential.

This module aims to provide you with the essential skills, knowledge and confidence to be able to manage the processing of data to generate useful information. Information storage and retrieval is a vitally important aspect of IT that is found in every business in the world; as such, this module provides you with extremely useful transferable skills. The module introduces you to information retrieval skills and knowledge of the fundamentals of information storage. Once mastered, these skills will provide you with a firm foundation for higher-level academic study or a rewarding IT career.

How can an organization provide authorised users access to data on demand without compromising data security?

This module gives students the opportunity to learn and critically reflect on the skills required in networked and information systems. This module builds on the knowledge and underpinning theory of networking systems and reviews the requirements from within an information systems engineering context.

This module uses interactive lab sessions to introduce knowledge and skills relevant to network and information systems and communication architecture. Other Lab sessions will introduce principles and techniques for information communication within a network, and ensuring effective communication.

This module will give you an ability to respond to a critical brief to find practical solutions to problems, evaluate and respond to the opportunities and challenges of interdisciplinary approaches to the realisation of a task, and respond flexibly and imaginatively to a set, or group-determined brief within a fixed timescale.

This module, along with the ‘Application Development’ module, completes the family of the systems modules in the first year of study; in it, you will explore the technical skills required to develop the information systems you modelled in Socio-Technical Systems and Business Information Modelling.

The module focuses on various technologies relating to the design and development of systems to meet the information needs of a business. In this module, you will analyse, design and implement an application to specific web standards.

In the practical sessions, you will design innovative applications to capture and process information. A design and evaluation test strategy will ensure that you deliver creative, quality applications that meet the appropriate professional standards.

The module will also develop your skills, knowledge and experience of key practical techniques within the application design industry; this will give you a wide range of transferable skills in planning and evaluating.

The ability to provide information by designing innovative applications is essential to drive innovation and growth in the modern global organisation. This module is intended to introduce you to current development tools and techniques, providing the skills required to develop applications that meet the rapidly changing needs of organisations.

The module will explore the key internet technologies, protocols and programming languages required to create working applications that meet the user’s requirements. You will take part in lab sessions, applying programming principles to solve problems. You will develop interactive applications involving both server-side and client-side data processing. Through a programming challenge, you’ll develop a workable software solution to capture and process information.

This module, alongside "Application Design" completes the family of the "Systems" modules in the first year of study. This module also provides a grounding for you to develop your skills further in the Year 2 modules "Application Systems" and "Information Technology Innovation".

This module aims to equip you with the relevant skills and knowledge which are required for the role of the IT professional. It will provide you with an understanding of the general principles and concepts underlying ethical theories and their relevance to IT.

We will examine the role of different ethical theories and explore the relationship between theory and practice within computing and business contexts. The module will familiarise you with different ethical theories relevant to the IT business. The module will also help you to appreciate the inter-relationships of different perspectives in ethical theory which contribute to the area of business.

This module will also provide opportunities to develop critical and reflective skills, as well as extending and improving competence in group work, communication, self-efficacy and the organisational skills that are required in both the employment sector and continued academic pathways should you wish to pursue a Masters or Doctorate.

This module will provide you with a thorough grounding in all aspects of conceptual data modelling, relational theory and relational algebra, CASE tools for designing a database and its interface, database design and normalization. It also looks at the SQLPlus tool for querying data in a relational database system. The module will make use of practical sessions to practice database design theory and apply the techniques to producing a high-quality database design.

This module will form the foundation for the Database Development and Implementation module in the second semester.

The module will also develop your skills, knowledge and experience of key techniques within the database design industry – more specifically practical skills. This will lead to wider intellectual and transferable skills in planning, synthesis, written communication and critical evaluation.

In the modern business environment, the use of databases to store and process information to improve business processes is becoming more important than ever. Having the people with the skills and knowledge to develop information systems is essential.

This module will provide you with a comprehensive introduction to a vitally important core IT topic – database technology – that is found in almost every IT installation in the world and as such provides an extremely useful set of transferable skills. The module introduces you to database implementation skills and knowledge, optimization, security and database administration. Once mastered, these database skills will provide a firm foundation for higher-level academic study or a rewarding IT career in the field of big data analytics or mainstream operational databases.

The rapid development of the Internet of Things, data networks and web technologies has led to new opportunities to explore how data can be collected and processed using IT applications. This module introduces students to data streams and how they can be integrated into applications. Examples of these applications can be seen in smart cities, where they monitor parking, noise and traffic congestion. You will explore a number of data streams and ways in which these can processed by applications, as well as the wider issues and implications involved in this process such as ethics and security.

The module consists of subject-specific lectures/tutorial sessions to introduce knowledge and skills relevant to research and project management philosophy, and lectures/laboratory sessions focused on the practical and technical skills involved in building systems for the "Internet of Things" using sensors and data analysis tools.

How can organizations and society harness the opportunities of emerging information technology?

The rate of advancement of information technology (IT) continually challenges organizations to assess the opportunities and risks that emerge from technology-driven change. The aim of this module is to encourage you to explore the latest developments in IT and understand the processes of IT innovation in order to formulate a proposal for your final project. There are three strands to the IT Innovation module: environmental scanning, theories of innovation and technological adoption, and problem formulation. You will be encouraged to explore a wide range of both academic and industry-based information sources to investigate the current and emerging technological landscape. Approaches to technology forecasting, the factors affecting whether organizations should adopt a ‘leader’ or ‘follower’ stance, and how organizations could apply technology will then be discussed. This will provide the basis for you to plan an individual project for a specific organization or industry.

Information, information systems (IS) and information technology (IT) are valuable organizational resources that must be effectively managed to help the organisation achieve its objectives. This module explores how to formulate a robust IS strategy that enables an organization to harness the value of its information resource to support attainment of the organization’s objectives.

A range of modelling tools are introduced in the module to explore both the internal strengths and weaknesses of the organization and the external opportunities and threats in the wider global environment. The module focuses on the role of IS in enabling organizations to leverage the value of knowledge management and business intelligence to maintain strategic advantage. The organization’s strategy needs to be directed and supported by IS and IT. This module discusses the role of the IS architecture in aligning the organization’s information resource with the strategic direction of the organization.

Data intelligence is the field of applying intelligent computational methods to data generated by organisations to inform the decision-making process. It is essential in the digital economy to make use of the data captured by and about business entities. Data can be modelled using descriptive models that help us better understand the customers and/or can be used to build predictive models that inform our decision making in all aspects of the business (for example, directed marketing through more accurately predicting those that will respond positively to marketing materials).

In this module, you will get hands-on experience of how to apply data intelligence techniques to construct descriptive and predictive models that will inform the organisation’s decision making. By the end of this module, you will be able to interpret the results generated by different data intelligence techniques, and consequently use these interpretations to recommend business decisions.

This module will investigate how to keep information secure without impeding legitimate access.

The module explores the information security principles that underpin the management of an organisation’s information systems. The module will look in detail at information security management architecture and design, risk management, business continuity, and embedding information security within the organisational culture for the longer term.

You will examine the key information security principles, concepts, theories, standards and frameworks. The module aims to provide you with a sound basis on which you can design and deliver information security strategies for implementing and managing an organisation’s information security requirements.

The purpose of this module is to enable you to undertake a sustained, in-depth and theoretically informed project exploring an area that is of personal interest to you. In conjunction with your supervisor, you will decide upon your topic which will take the form of a practical outcome with accompanying contextual material. The main consideration when choosing your topic is that it must be relevant to the programme you are studying and you should consider the relevance of this topic to your future academic or professional development.

At this level, you will be expected to work independently but you will receive additional one-to-one support from your supervisor, who will be familiar with your chosen topic area. As you progress on the module, extra support will be available and this may take the form of group seminars, workshops and online materials that will help in the development of your project.