Say I have a database similar to the following:

Table student_info:

id    name
111   jon
112   dan
113   david
...

and table scores:

item_id    student_id    score
01         111           37
02         111           45
01         112           55
02         112           44
01         113           66
02         113           45
...

Is it possible to do a mysql query to generate the following table?:

Student_Name  ITEM_1_SCORE  ITEM_2_SCORE
jon           37            45
dan           55            44
david         66            45
...

If so, what would the syntax be? I don't know if this is a join operation or something else?

thanks.

If you have only two values for item_id, then it is fine to hard code values. Example

SELECT  a.Name AS Student_Name,
        MAX(CASE WHEN item_id = '01' THEN b.score END) Item_1_Score,
        MAX(CASE WHEN item_id = '02' THEN b.score END) Item_2_Score
FROM    student_info a
        LEFT JOIN scores b
            ON a.id = b.student_ID
GROUP   BY a.Name

• SQLFiddle Demo

Otherwise, when you have unknow number of scores, a Dynamic SQL is much prefered.

SELECT  GROUP_CONCAT(DISTINCT
        CONCAT('MAX(CASE WHEN item_id = ''',
               item_id,
               ''' THEN Score END) AS ',
               CONCAT('`Item_', item_id, '_Score`')
               )) INTO @sql
FROM scores;

SET @sql = CONCAT('SELECT   a.Name AS Student_Name, ', @sql, '
                    FROM    student_info a
                            LEFT JOIN scores b
                                ON a.id = b.student_ID
                    GROUP   BY a.Name');

PREPARE stmt FROM @sql;
EXECUTE stmt;
DEALLOCATE PREPARE stmt;

Both queries will OUTPUT the same

╔══════════════╦══════════════╦══════════════╗
║ STUDENT_NAME ║ ITEM_1_SCORE ║ ITEM_2_SCORE ║
╠══════════════╬══════════════╬══════════════╣
║ dan          ║           55 ║           44 ║
║ david        ║           66 ║           45 ║
║ jon          ║           37 ║           45 ║
╚══════════════╩══════════════╩══════════════╝