ISA Examination Policy

In the BYUH School of Computing, the IS Department uses various assessment examinations to measure student progress and to verify that teachers are successful in their teaching activities. This web page explains the policies related to the ISA exam.

The ISA (Information Systems Analyst) exam is designed to be an exit exam for IS'2002-compliant IS curricula. As an exit exam, it measures skills that should exist at the time of graduation.

On the ISA exam, a score of 50% indicates performance at an adequate level for graduation. A score of 70% indicates performance at a superior level. A score of 25% indicates performance at a random guessing level.

The full ISA exam is three hours long and consists of about 260 questions, each with four answers to choose from. The BYUH IS department uses the ISA exam divided into to two 90-minute parts.

Part I covers people skills and project management skills. These skills are generally taught in IS 307 (systems analysis and design) and IS 330 (management information systems). Both IS 307 and IS 330 require an ISA Part I score of 40% or higher to pass the class, and a Part I score of 50% or higher to earn an A.

What this means is that if you take IS 307 or 330 and you get a perfect score on every task EXCEPT the ISA, and you get only 39% on the ISA, then you will fail the class. This is a department standard. Similarly if you get a score of only 49%, you cannot receive a higher grade than B+. This is a department standard.

Part I uses a large amount of business vocabulary which should be learned in class, and sometimes proves challenging for ESL (English as a Second Language) students. Generally business students have a very easy time with this test, and the IS students have a more difficult time because of the business vocabulary. If you are unfamiliar with business vocabulary, you are advised to study it and become familiar with it before seriously taking the ISA.

Part II covers technical skills. These skills are generally taught in IS 220 (linux), IS 240 (web pages), IS 254 (hardware and operating systems), IS 280 (networking), IS 350 (database), CS 101 (programming), and CS 201 (web programming). Because the material is distributed across a number of courses, these courses do not have an ISA Part II requirement. However, before students can register for the IS capstone courses, IS 409 and IS 410, they must earn a score of 40% on Part II.

IS 400 (IS proficiency) is a special, zero-credit course that students pass by earning an ISA score of 40% on Part I, 40% on Part II, and 45% average on parts I and II. Once you have achieved this score, the IS academic advisor (currently Rachel Kalama) will insert IS 400 into your transcript. Starting Fall 2007, IS 400 is a prerequisite for IS 409 and IS 410.

IS 409 and IS 410 also require ISA exam performance at the completion of the course. Before taking either class, students must have scores in the 40% range or higher, as verified by passing IS 400. At the end of the semester these performance levels must be demonstrated again.

For classes that require the ISA exam as an exit requirement, the exam is typically given in class.

Students are also allowed to take the exam, either part, on their own by contacting the IS department systems administrator, Scott Mikolyski, in GCB 117. Students can schedule a time to take the exam under Bro Mikolyski's supervision. Students must wait one month between successive attempts at each exam.

If you have additional questions that you don't see covered here, please communicate with Bro Colton so he can update this document with answers to your questions.