Scheduling of examination terms based on past experience

A faculty with a few thousand students, two fields of study and a few hundred subjects/specialisations faced the problem of how to devise their examination schedule. The aim of the examination schedule was to maximally disperse the examination terms as perceived by the students. A mixed-integer model turned out to be too complex, and therefore a genetic algorithm was applied. The achieved results were satisfactory enough to be accepted in the current academic year.