An Integer Programming Formulation for University Course Timetabling

Abstract

The university timetabling problem is defined as the process of assigning lessons of university courses to specific time periods throughout the five working days of the week and to specific classrooms suitable for the number of students registered and the needs of each course. A university timetabling problem is modeled, in this paper, as an optimization problem using 0-1 decision variables and other auxiliary variables. The model provides constraints for a large number of different rules and regulations that exist in academic environments, ensuring the absence of collisions between courses, teachers and classrooms. The real case of a Department and some instances from the literature are presented along with its solution as resulted from the presented ILP formulation.