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Professional Issues

Assessed Coursework 2010/11

For this assignment you are asked to write a report, in English, of between 1,500 and 2,000 words on the following topic:

Last year the National Audit Office of the UK government produced a report entitled The National Offender Management Information System. The report summary identifies 16 key findings that identify some of the reasons for the perceived failure of the system. The report also makes 5 recommendations. You should read the report since it is the main source for your essay. You need only read the main body of the report. The appendices also provide useful background to the case. You will also need to search for useful additional information on the system failure. One academic study of a system intended to carry out a similar task is: A Chronicling System for Children's Social Work: Learning from the ICS Failure.

Assignment:

You should choose one of the report recommendations to concentrate on. Your essay should comprise:

• An explanation of the circumstances that caused the recommendation to be included in the report. This should be readable by a non-expert in this area. In particular you should take care to explain all the technical terms you use. In writing this part carefully identify any background knowledge you assume and provide a brief overview of the assumed knowledge in your report.
• Suggest how it might be possible to improve the delivery of NOMIS in your chosen recommendation area. For this you might need to provide some analysis of the causes of the problem and what might be done to change those causal factors. If you do not believe this is possible, suggest how the management of the project could proceed.
• Review the behaviour of the contractors and other professionals involved in your choice of recommendation with respect to the BCS Code of Practice (and Code of Conduct if necessary). Provide three or four examples of good compliance and breaches of the code in the recommendation area you are considering.
• Provide a brief update on the situation relating to the recommendation you have chosen. Has anything changed since the date of the NAO report? What positive changes have taken place? What negative changes have taken place? This will require some research to see what has been done to address the recommendations of the report.

In writing your assignment you may quote text from appropriate sources but you must attribute these quotations either in footnotes or by reference to a list of documents in a bibliography at the end of your essay. Submission of the completed essay will be via the turnitin system. The system will be configured so you can test draft essays to check whether the system identifies some of your text as an unattributed quotation. This means your essay will be stored in the turnitin system. Details of how to submit your essay will be issued shortly. The University statment on turnitin is:

The plagiarism detection service is an online service that enables institutions and staff to carry out electronic comparison of students' work against electronic sources including other students' work.

The service is managed by The University of Northumbria on behalf of the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and is available to all UK tertiary education institutions by subscription.

The plagiarism detection service works by executing searches of the world wide web, and extensive databases of reference material, as well as content previously submitted by other users.

Each new submission is compared with all the existing information.

The software makes no decisions as to whether a student has plagiarised, it simply highlights sections of text that are duplicated in other sources. All work will continue to be reviewed by the course tutor.

Once work has been submitted to the system it becomes part of the ever growing database of material against which subsequent submissions are checked.

The software is used as a tool to highlight any instance where there is a possible case of plagiarism. Passages copied directly or very closely from existing sources will be identified by the software and both the original and the potential copy will be displayed for the tutor to view. Where any direct quotations are relevant and appropriately referenced, the course tutor will be able to see this and will continue to consider the next highlighted case. There is an on-line demonstration of the system available at https://www.submit.ac.uk/

The marking feedback sheet that provides the outline marking scheme for the essay should help you direct your efforts. The main sections of the scheme cover: your ability accurately to summarise a complex situation, your analysis of that situation, your recommendations for how the situation might be improved and your use of evidence to support your analysis.

Up to one week before the final deadline I will comment on draft versions of your essays if you submit them to me. I will try to turn them round in 48 hours. In the final week before the deadline I will not provide feedback on draft essays.

You should try to ensure your document is clear and easy to read. You may like to consider the following:

• Syntax: Are grammar, spelling, and punctuation correct? Does every pronoun have a referent?
• Style: Do sentences read smoothly? Are sentences unambiguous? Do paragraphs hang together? Is jargon kept to a minimum? Are examples used well? Does the writing address its audience?
• Structure: Is it well organised? Have you used structuring mechanisms like section headings, bulleted lists etc. Are terms defined before they are used? Do the important points stand out? Are all relevant points covered?

Submission deadline

The deadline for this assignment is 1600 on Thursday 25 November. You should submit your essay to turnitin before that time. The essay should take you 15-20 hours to complete so please try to get it finished and submitted soon. Graded essays will be returned by 9 December 2010.