Aligning software engineering teaching strategies and practices with industrial needs

article

Metrôlho, José Carlos
Ribeiro, Fernando Reinaldo
Graça, Paula
Mourato, Ana
Figueiredo, David
Vilarinho, Hugo

MDPI

METRÔLHO, José Carlos [et al.] (2022) - Aligning software engineering teaching strategies and practices with industrial needs. Computation. Vol. 10(8):129. DOI https://doi.org/10.3390/computation10080129.

2079-3197

Aligning software engineering teaching strategies and practices with industrial needs

Agile software development
Computer science education
Industrial needs
Product development
Software engineering
Software development management

2022-11-22T09:43:38Z
2022-11-22T09:43:38Z
2022

Several approaches have been proposed to reduce the gap between software engineering education and the needs and practices of the software industry. Many of them aim to promote a more active learning attitude in students and provide them with more realistic experiences, thus recreating industry software development environments and collaborative development and, in some cases, with the involvement of companies mainly acting as potential customers. Since many degree courses typically offer separate subjects to teach requirements engineering, analysis and design, coding, or validation, the integration of all these phases normally necessitates experience in a project context and is usually carried out in a final year project. The approach described in this article benefits from the close involvement of a software house company which goes beyond the common involvement of a potential customer. Students are integrated into distributed teams comprising students, teachers and IT professionals. Teams follow the agile Scrum methodology and use the OutSystems low-code development platform providing students with the experience of an almost real scenario. The results show that this approach complements the knowledge and practice acquired in course subjects, develops the students’ technical and non-technical skills, such as commitment, teamwork, and communication, and initiates them in the methodologies and development strategies used in these companies. The feedback from the teachers involved, software companies and students was very positive.
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

openAccess

eng