This was a major project for an artificial intelligence class I took as part of my Graduate Certificate in Applied Statistics due four years ago. quite possibly one of my favorite classes. Dr. Daniela Inclezan was an excellent instructor. The project focused on an issue I dealt with alot, funding college. In a way, laying it all out helped me really see the difficulties I came through and get beyond the judgment I faced to get through it.

Due October 27th, 2015

I will create an academic scholarship eligibility program.

The Program will determine which scholarship opportunities students are eligible for. Each Scholarship will have requirements of age, level of education and citizenship. The scholarship will also have a target degree. Each student will have characteristics of age, level of education attained, target degree and citizenship. For students to be eligible for a scholarship they must meet or exceed all the eligibility requirements for that scholarship. The students will also only target the scholarships that can be used for the target degree they seek.

Students and scholarships will be objects ex. student(leno) and scholarship(gerace).

Level of education will be an ordered series education(hs< bsc< msc< phd<pstd) hs=high school diploma, bsc= bahelors of science, msc=masters of science, phd=doctorate, pstd=post doctorate work). If a student has achieved a certain level of education, it will be assumed they have achieved all levels of education below that level as well.

Age of students will be represented as a number (age at last birthday).
Age of eligibility for scholarships will be represented as a minimum number.

Citizenship will be the student’s country of citizenship. For this program, it will be assumed that a person can have multiple citizenship status. If a student does not claim citizenship of a country, it will be assumed that they are not citizens of that country.

Each scholarship will be available to students of certain countries. Scholarships may or may not be available to citizens of multiple countries. If a scholarship is not stated as available to a student of a certain country it will be assumed those countries are not eligible.

When queried, the program should respond with which scholarships the student is eligible for.

I feel ASP is a good choice for this type of reasoning because it can help students to quickly make the decision about which scholarships to apply for, without them needing to go to each scholarship’s website.

My decision tree would follow this format:

1: Student wants to pursue a degree at level X>
which scholarships can be used for study at level X? [returns list of scholarships for level X]

=lvlXscholarships

2: Which level X scholarships is the student eligible for based on citizenship? [returns subset of scholarships based on target degree and citizenship]

=citizenscholarships

3:which citizenshipscholarships is the student old enough for? [returns subset of scholarships based on target degree, citizenship and age] = agescholarships

4: Which scholarships does the student have the prerequisites for? Returns subset of agescholarships that the student would have the academic prerequisites for.

=targetScholarship list. These are the scholarships the student should pursue.