Re-engineering the MIS Capstone Course: Continuously Improving the Learning Process

Over a three year period, I applied the theories of Total Quality (TQ), specifically, Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) and Continuous Improvement (CI) to improve a course syllabus based upon my observations of the student learning process (in a MSMIS Capstone project course in which each student re-engineers a process from their workplace). In the first year, I made the observations personally. During the last two years, I have had students look back on their semester-long learning experience and submit a re-engineered syllabus (in the form of a take-home final). Rather than radically re-engineering the syllabus, student submissions exemplify recommendations of improvements. Not only does the magnitude of the input vastly improve the syllabus, but students gain experience with CI. This experience, in addition to their BPR projects, enable them to better understand the differences between BPR and CI. A sample syllabus and reference list are included with a discussion of the process