Abstract:

Learning about operations and supply chain management (SCM) is fundamental for the later professional career of students in the context of Information Systems (IS) and beyond. However, related courses often are limited to basic concepts and methodologies. Practice-oriented elements regarding the application of ERP systems and modelling of reality-like business processes rarely are included. In the students’ later practice in the world of works, this lack of understanding often leads to insufficient descriptions of business processes and therefore, to incomplete definitions and implementations of ERP-systems . The major reason for this gap between academic education and demands from the industry lays in the concept that academia must provide sustainable education on all levels; in this sense, particular application systems might basically change with emerging new technologies. At the University of Duisburg-Essen, we established two innovative approaches with the purpose to fill this gap without contradicting the claim for sustainability.

In the first example, we briefly introduce our regular lecture on Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). This course follows a fully constructivist approach and leads the students to applied knowledge about ERP and SCM as well as to developing academic competences and soft skills for their future jobs. In a second example of innovative scholarship in ERP and SCM, we introduce the extra-curricular Internet-based program erp4students. In this program, the students, first, achieve the basic understanding of theoretical concepts behind ERP and SCM. Subsequently, they are confronted with a number of case studies, in which they are demanded to transfer real-world problems into SAP. We chose SAP as exemplary ERP-application because of its outstanding role in the industry.

Finally, we subsume the lessons learned from both, the standard ERP course and the extracurricular study program erp4students.

Keywords:

Enterprise Resource Planning, e-learning, Technology Enhanced Learning, Bologna, ERP, SAP, extracurricular program, erp4students.