A Real-time Application to Predict and Notify Students about the Present and Future Availability of Workspaces on a University Campus

The many responsibilities of students require that they access and utilize information about workspaces to facilitate time management. Workspaces such as computer labs, classrooms, and study areas have varying availability. At the University of the West Indies - Cave Hill Campus (UWICHC), students do not have a means of knowing in advance if these areas are unavailable other than to visit the space. If the space is unavailable, the student would have lost time. In addition, an initial survey of the opinions of 100 UWICHC students showed that 72% of the respondents found when a non-class participant entered a room where they were having a class, the activity distracted either them or the instructor. In this paper, we present a system which assesses the availability status of the room and makes a real-time occupancy indicator available to students on and off campus. This indicator avoids cases where a non-class participant interrupts an ongoing class. Additionally, students can query the system for a prediction or estimation on what the status of the space will be on a given day and time based on past conditions. In our survey, 91% of the respondents believed that having a system that relayed real-time or predictive information about class availability would help them, and therefore allow more time for productive activities. We also present an analysis of the use of the system and how students perceived the usefulness of the system in operation.