Charles Boisvert MSc, PGCE
Senior Lecturer
Summary
I am a Senior Lecturer in Business Computing, where I teach relational databases in several courses and lead two modules on the subject.
About
I also teach MSc students on using databases for the Web with an introduction to the limits of relational databases, to ensure the students understand the criticisms and alternatives that exist to these systems.
I maintain a number of tools to improve the students' understanding of these concepts, particularly an SQL workbook and animated materials that are widely used to teach the subject.
Teaching
School of Computing and Digital Technologies
College of Business, Technology and Engineering
- Database Systems
Research
I am currently involved in two strands of research. One is Computing Education, in which I create and evaluate tools, resources, and practices to improve the teaching of computing. These include, for instance, the eL-CID animations (Boisvert, 2009) or the programme of visits to schools (Adshead et al. 2015).
The second is Open Data, which offers a host of science and engineering challenges.
I am currently collaborating with the Better With Data Society, a social enterprise, to develop further tools to facilitate public contributions to improve the quality of open data.
Collaborators:
- Better With Data Society
- Computing in Schools
Publications
Key Publications
Boisvert, C., Roast, C., & Uruchurtu, E. (2019). Open Piping: Towards an Open Visual Workflow Environment. End-User Development : 7th International Symposium, IS-EUD 2019, Hatfield, UK, July 10–12, 2019, Proceedings, 11553 (11553), 183-190. http://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-24781-2_14
Boisvert, C. (2019). Teaching relational database fundamentals: a lack-of-progress report. Proceedings of the 3rd Conference on Computing Education Practice - CEP '19. http://doi.org/10.1145/3294016.3294031
Boisvert, C., Domdouzis, K., & License, J. (2018). A comparative analysis of student SQL and relational database knowledge using automated grading tools. Simposio Internacional de Informática Educativa (SIIE) 2018. http://doi.org/10.1109/SIIE.2018.8586684
Love, M., Boisvert, C., Uruchurtu, E., & Ibbotson, I. (2016). Nifty with data: can a business intelligence analysis sourced from open data form a nifty assignment? In ITiCSE '16 : Proceedings of the 2016 ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education. ACM
Adshead, D., Boisvert, C., Love, D., & Spencer, P. (2015). Changing culture : educating the next computer scientists. ACM Proceedings - Annual Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education, 33-38. http://doi.org/10.1145/2729094.2742610
Korhonen, A., Naps, T., Boisvert, C., Crescenzi, P., Karavirta, V., Mannila, L., ... Shaffer, C.A. (2013). Requirements and design strategies for open source interactive computer science ebooks. ITiCSE-WGR 2013 - Proceedings of the ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education, 53-72. http://doi.org/10.1145/2543882.2543886
Boisvert, C.R. (2009). A visualisation tool for the programming process. Proceedings of the 14th annual ACM SIGCSE conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education, 328-332. http://doi.org/10.1145/1562877.1562976
Boisvert, C. (2006). Web animation to communicate iterative development. Proceedings of the 11th annual SIGCSE conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education, 173-177. http://doi.org/10.1145/1140124.1140171
Conference papers
Boisvert, C. (2021). Improving the Usability of Visual Functional Programming Tools. In PPIG 2021 32nd Annual Workshop, Online, 21 June 2021 - 25 June 2021. https://www.ppig.org/papers/2021-ppig-32nd-dc-boisvert/
Boisvert, C. (2021). An Iterative Development Pattern to Learn Notional Machine and Programming Practices. In PPIG 2021, Virtual, 21 June 2021 - 25 June 2021. https://www.ppig.org/papers/
Boisvert, C. (2021). Machine Notionnelle et Pratiques de la Programmation: Mieux Apprendre avec le Développement Progressif. In EIAH'2021, 7 June 2021 - 11 June 2021. Association des Technologies de l’Information pour l’Education et la Formation: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03241694
Boisvert, C., Roast, C., & Uruchurtu, E. (2021). Designing an Open Visual Workflow Environment. In PPIG 2020, Online, 30 November 2020 - 2020. https://ppig.org/papers/2020-ppig-31st-boisvert/
Boisvert, C., Domdouzis, K., & Love, M. (2017). Un Environnement visuel de programmation par flux de donn´ees pour soutenir l’apprentissage de la science des donn´ees. In Atelier "Apprentissage de la pensée informatique de la maternelle à l’Université : recherches, pratiques et méthodes", Environnements Informatiques pour l'Apprentissage Humain (EIAH 2017) Conférence, Strasbourg, France, 6 June 2017 - 9 June 2017.
Boisvert, C., Domdouzis, K., & Love, M. (2017). An Open Workflow Environment to Support Learning Data Science. In Apprentissage Instrumente de l’Informatique, ORPHEE Rendez-Vous, Font-Romeu, France, 30 January 2017 - 2 February 2017.
Boisvert, C. (2004). eL-CID. ACM SIGCSE Bulletin, 36 (3), 253. http://doi.org/10.1145/1026487.1008085
Boisvert, C. Supporting program development comprehension by visualising iterative design. Proceedings. Eighth International Conference on Information Visualisation, 2004. IV 2004, 717-722. http://doi.org/10.1109/iv.2004.1320221
Boisvert, C. Patterns for Entity-Relationship database concepts. ITiCSE'17 - Proceedings of the 2017 conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education.
Reports
Djelil, F., Boisvert, C., Peter, Y., Secq, Y., Broisin, J., & De La Higuera, C. (2017). Vers une massification de l’apprentissage instrumenté de l’informatique, et une intégration des instruments et de leur évaluation. Orphée, reseau de l'e-éducation. http://atief.fr/content/grands-challenges
Presentations
Boisvert, C., Domdouzis, K., & Love, M. (n.d.). An Open Workflow Environment to Support Learning Data Science. Presented at: Apprentissage Instrumente de l’Informatique, Font-Romeu (France), 2017
Other publications
Domdouzis, K., & Boisvert, C. (2017). Normalise and ER discussion. YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfquX_q7lCM