COMPUTERIZED VOTING SYSTEM OF THE STUDENT COUNCIL ORGANIZATION OF REDEEMING GRACE LEARNING CENTER

Acknowledgement
Foremost, the researchers would like to express the sincere gratitude to all those people who give their time to help in making this thesis study.

Abstract
This project was founded and created to replace the existing manual voting system of Redeeming Grace Learning Center (RGLC) that had produced inconvenience not only to the voters but also to the election facilitators. The researchers goal was to develop a secure, fast, accurate, user-friendly system for a small scale election. The researchers used the methodology called V-model because it fits the way they conduct their research. Computerized voting systems are widely used in elections. This paper describes using a computerized voting system as the basis for a project in an Information Technology course. Through the formulation of this system the students are indeed confident that the whole electoral process will not only be fast and quick but most of all accurate and precise.

Chapter I
A computerized voting system comprising single or multiple voting stations for controlling and being a voting station simultaneously.

(http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6799723.html)

In present generation, people became more literate especially with the use of computers. Technologies emerged to introduce many different ways of advancement. Computer machines are of these. Computers now in existence are the most powerful machines than can almost do anything in peoples lives. Hence, the proponent has decided to propose a system to improve the existing manual voting system. The proponent aims to convert the existing manual system of RGLC into a computerized voting system that will help them to lessen the time of their voting process. It also provides security for the voter and the system both internal and external.

Statement of the Problem

1. A manual voting requires an accurate count of votes in able to know the results of the winning candidate after the voting process. The results of manual voting came into question due to several factors regarding human error and miscount of votes. How to ensure the accuracy in counting of votes in voting system of Redeeming Grace Learning Center in order to be more reliable? (see figure 1)

Figure 1. Fish Bone Diagram

2. Many of the traditional problems faced in manual voting revolve around security issues. Tallying and transmission of result are the root of unintended errors. How to secure the integrity of the votes of the student? (see figure 2)

Figure 2. Fish Bone Diagram

3. It takes a lot of time in voting manually because the student needs to write down their chosen candidate, and it is hassle for the teachers/administrator to count the votes of the student one by one. Hence, it is very time consuming. How to lessen the time of gathering of the results without counting manually? (see figure 2)

Figure 3. Fish Bone Diagram

Significance of the Study

The proposed system will help the Redeeming Grace Learning Center in their voting system and will lead them to the development of their Student Council Organization in conducting an election. It will also give convenience to those people who will use the proposed system like the students and especially to the facilitators in terms of time consumption, reliability issues and hassles. The study can also help in the part of the researchers to boost insights and information in developing a system for their future studies. The proposed study will also benefits and help the future researcher as their guide in conducting a research about voting system of an organization, and how to develop software.

Objectives of the Study

General Objectives: This project was founded and created to replace the existing manual voting system that had produced inconvenience not only to the voters but also to the election facilitators. Our goal was to develop a secure, fast, accurate, user-friendly system for a small scale election. Specific Objectives: candidate applications.

accomplishment reports.

Time and Place of Study

The study commenced on August 2012 until the first week of October 2012 in the Cavite State University-College of Business and Entrepreneurship, Imus Cavite (CvSU-CBE). Interview was conducted at Redeeming Grace Learning Center in Bacoor, Cavite.

Scope and Limitation of the Study

The system is designed with a user security access level and it is responsible of determining the authenticity of the voter by his/her given student id number and password. Student that officially registered as voter can only vote once. The system would be responsible for counting the votes and has the capability to release required reports regarding the list of voters, candidates and canvassing of results. The system is designed solely for the student council election of Redeeming Grace Learning Center and could append instantly voters and candidates. It is not applicable in other student council election because the running positions were not the same. a

Operational Definition of Terms

Candidate - one that aspires to or is nominated or qualified for running in a certain position. The candidate must be a student from RGLC. Canvass- to examine in detail; specifically : to examine (votes) officially for authenticity. Computerized- To enter, process, or store (information) in a computer or system of computers. Context Diagram(level 0 dataflow diagram)- A data flow diagram that document the system's boundaries by highlighting its sources and destinations. Data Flow- Data in motion. Data Flow Diagram- A logical model of the flow of data through a system.

Database - is the container were the files will be stored. Entity Relationship Diagram- is an abstract way to describe a database. Nomination - is part of the process of selecting a candidate. Normalization- is the process of organizing the fields and tables of a relational database to minimize redundancy and dependency. Technology - is the scientific method and or materials used to achieve a commercial industrial objective.

Visual Basic - is the third-generation event-driven programming language and integrated development environment (IDE) from Microsoft. It is known for its COM programming model. VB is also considered a relatively easy to learn and use programming language, because of its graphical development features and BASIC heritage. Voting Area - This area pertains to the form inside the system. This is the area where the voting process happens.

Chapter II Review of Related Literature

The review of related literature for this thesis involves local and foreign literature either in books, previous school lessons, websites and other forms of media that helps us formulate in analyzing the system that is fitted for the school and its students.

Local Literature
College Student Council Voting System for Pangasinan State University BayambangCampus (Cayabyab,2008) The College Student Council Voting System was software designed primarily for developing election applications. It was simple software, because it managed to secure the ballots and performed quick counterbalance.

Lucky 3 Voting System Mindanao State University (Echavez, Garay, Ratunil 2010) Their voting system is composed of a well secured and user-friendly system that makes their Student Council reliable. Their system creates a more level playing field for political parties their candidates and it even gives a chance for independent candidates to take on veteran players, this ultimately leads to a more dynamic and vibrant student-politics in Mindanao State University. Inocencio V. Ferrer Memorial School of Fisheries Automated Voting System (Soledad, Lamis, Valenzuela 2010) Their voting system is seemingly simple, and its advantages scream out at you. If implemented without hitches, it allows for fast, virtually instantaneous tabulation of votes.

Foreign Literature
University of Leeds electronic voting system

(http://www.sddu.leeds.ac.uk/online_resources/evoting/)

The main advantage of interactive voting is that it supports instantaneous, anonymous (as well as known) interaction between the presenter and the audience. As a result, lectures become livelier, the presenter can easily stay aware of how well the audience has grasped the

ideas he or she has been communicating, and both the presenter and the audience can receive instant feedback from each other.

Trent University ayePoll On-line Voting System SoftworksDev Engineering Team (Bila, Cakalli, Harrington, Harrington, Rosco 2005) It is a web based system that facilitates the running of elections and surveys online. This system has been developed by SoftworksDev to simplify the process of organizing elections and make it convenient for voters to vote remotely from their home computers while taking into consideration security, anonymity and providing auditioning capabilities.

LSA Elections Computerized Voting System India (Tantia, Agrawal 2008) The council elections were carried out in a much smoother and modern way. They saved on time, effort, paper and whole lot of sweat. This was the first time in India that such a thing was done, and while being modern and user-friendly, it was also eco-friendly as it saved a lot of paper that would have been used up as ballot paper.

Chapter III

Methodology
A methodology will consist of phases, themselves consisting of sub-phases, which will guide the systems developers in their choice of techniques that might be appropriate at each stage of the project and also help them plan, manage, control and evaluate research. It is usually based on some philosophical view.

Research Design
Use case diagrams actually describe the usage of the system from the viewpoint of users (actors). Use cases can be also viewed as functionality that is accomplished through the interaction between system and actors.

Figure 4. Use Case model

System Design

Figure 5 V-Model of Computerized Voting System of the Student Council Organization Redeeming Grace Learning Center

The V model includes different phases requirement specification, software analysis, software design, coding, module testing, integration testing, implementation, operation, and maintenance. Each phases has an essential part in the development of the software starting from data gathering, designing the desired interface, coding of program up to testing and maintenance. After each stage was defined, the development precedes the new stage.

Data Gathering Procedure and Data Analysis

The first step before going to the testing proper is to make a request letter. Upon approval, the researchers retrieve the request letter. In administering the questionnaire, the researchers were use the time allotted for vacant to avoid distractions of class discussions. The administrator response was given enough time to answer the question.

After data gathering, the researchers now collected the given questionnaire and use it as their source of information to formulate the problem that RGLC encountered in their voting process. The study utilized first hand data and also second hand data.

Research Instrument
The researcher designs a self-administered questionnaire for the data gathering process to get qualitative data.

System Requirements
Software Requirements Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 Microsoft Access Hardware Requirements Pentium IV and above. At least 10MB available hard drive 128MB of RAM Keyboard Mouse Monitor

Figure 6 Context Flow Diagram

Level 10 Data Flow Diagram

Level 1 of level 3.0 Diagram

1st Normal Form

2nd Normal Form

tbladmin

tblcandidate

tblstudent

Figure 8 Normalization

Figure 9 Entity Relationship Diagram

Figure 10 Flow Chart

Figure 11 Gantt Chart