Spreadsheet as a means to support a timetable scheduling process with reference to the example of a course entitled “education of specialists in the field of management of post-mining areas in the Polish-Czech borderland”

This article addresses a concept of spreadsheet application to support a timetable scheduling process for a sample educational course. Based on the analysis performed, it was assumed that the tool in question should ensure ongoing verification of correctness of the timetable being planned. It should guarantee the timetable completeness for every group of students, conformity between the hours envisaged in the timetable and the number of hours assigned to tutors as well as general principles of the course. In specific cases, it should also verify the right sequence of individual types of classes, correct scheduling of classes assumed to be conducted in parallel and – when explicitly imposed by specific requirements – correct allocation of classes to appropriate rooms. A detailed analysis of the problem enabled making a suggestion of an entity constituting the basis of the solution being designed. This structure has been depicted in the applicable ERD diagram. For individual entities and their attributes, general characteristics have been provided. Also the manner in which the structure proposed is to be implemented in a spreadsheet has been discussed. The author has also described individual solutions ensuring integrity of the data stored with the tool as well as solutions enabling the functionality envisaged to be achieved. The tool proposed for these purposes has been developed by means of basic MS Excel mechanisms and functions, without the necessity for any macros being registered or a code being manually created using the Visual Basic for Applications programming language. The solution proposed corresponds to a concept according to which smart organisations function.