Scrum2Kanban: Integrating Kanban and Scrum in a University Software Engineering Capstone Course

Using university capstone courses to teach agile software development methodologies has become commonplace, as agile methods have gained support in professional software development. This usually means students are introduced to and work with the currently most popular agile methodology: Scrum. However, as the agile methods employed in the industry change and are adapted to different contexts, university courses must follow suit. A prime example of this is the Kanban method, which has recently gathered attention in the industry. In this paper, we describe a capstone course design, which adds the hands-on learning of the lean principles advocated by Kanban into a capstone project run with Scrum. This both ensures that students are aware of recent process frameworks and ideas as well as gain a more thorough overview of how agile methods can be employed in practice. We describe the details of the course and analyze the participating students' perceptions as well as our observations. We analyze the development artifacts, created by students during the course in respect to the two different development methodologies. We further present a summary of the lessons learned as well as recommendations for future similar courses. The survey conducted at the end of the course revealed an overwhelmingly positive attitude of students towards the integration of Kanban into the course

Beyond Surveys: Analyzing Software Development Artifacts to Assess Teaching Efforts

This Innovative Practice Full Paper presents an approach of using software development artifacts to gauge student behavior and the effectiveness of changes to curriculum design. There is an ongoing need to adapt university courses to changing requirements and shifts in industry. As an educator it is therefore vital to have access to methods, with which to ascertain the effects of curriculum design changes. In this paper, we present our approach of analyzing software repositories in order to gauge student behavior during project work. We evaluate this approach in a case study of a university undergraduate software development course teaching agile development methodologies. Surveys revealed positive attitudes towards the course and the change of employed development methodology from Scrum to Kanban. However, surveys were not usable to ascertain the degree to which students had adapted their workflows and whether they had done so in accordance with course goals. Therefore, we analyzed students' software repository data, which represents information that can be collected by educators to reveal insights into learning successes and detailed student behavior. We analyze the software repositories created during the last five courses, and evaluate differences in workflows between Kanban and Scrum usage

Involving External Stakeholders in Project Courses

Problem: The involvement of external stakeholders in capstone projects and project courses is desirable due to its potential positive effects on the students. Capstone projects particularly profit from the inclusion of an industrial partner to make the project relevant and help students acquire professional skills. In addition, an increasing push towards education that is aligned with industry and incorporates industrial partners can be observed. However, the involvement of external stakeholders in teaching moments can create friction and could, in the worst case, lead to frustration of all involved parties. Contribution: We developed a model that allows analysing the involvement of external stakeholders in university courses both in a retrospective fashion, to gain insights from past course instances, and in a constructive fashion, to plan the involvement of external stakeholders. Key Concepts: The conceptual model and the accompanying guideline guide the teachers in their analysis of stakeholder involvement. The model is comprised of several activities (define, execute, and evaluate the collaboration). The guideline provides questions that the teachers should answer for each of these activities. In the constructive use, the model allows teachers to define an action plan based on an analysis of potential stakeholders and the pedagogical objectives. In the retrospective use, the model allows teachers to identify issues that appeared during the project and their underlying causes. Drawing from ideas of the reflective practitioner, the model contains an emphasis on reflection and interpretation of the observations made by the teacher and other groups involved in the courses. Key Lessons: Applying the model retrospectively to a total of eight courses shows that it is possible to reveal hitherto implicit risks and assumptions and to gain a better insight into the interaction...Comment: Abstract shortened since arxiv.org limits length of abstracts. See paper/pdf for full abstract. Paper is forthcoming, accepted August 2017. Arxiv version 2 corrects misspelled author nam

Information technology team projects in higher education: an international viewpoint

It is common to find final or near final year undergraduate Information Technology students undertaking a substantial development project; a project where the students have the opportunity to be fully involved in the analysis, design, and development of an information technology service or product. This involvement has been catalyzed and prepared for during their previous studies where the students have been told and shown how to develop similar systems. It is the belief that only through this ‘real’ project do they get the chance to experience something similar to what is expected of them when they embark on their chosen profession; that is, as an information technology professional. The high value of ‘near real life’ educational experience is recognized by many universities across the globe. The aim of this paper is to present examples from three countries - Australia, United Kingdom and South Africa, of the delivery of these team, capstone or industrial experience projects; their curricula and management processes. Academics from institutions in each of the countries share experiences, challenges and pitfalls encountered during the delivery of these information technology projects within their institutions. An overview of each institution’s strategies is provided and highlights specific issues such as the selection of projects, allocation of teams to projects, legal requirements, assessment methods, challenges and benefits. The pedagogies presented here are not exhaustive; however, the three institutions do have in common the implementation of a combination of constructivism with a community of practice approach in delivering the project unit. The three universities recognize the need for industrial experience and learning of applied skills, and therefore make these projects a compulsory part of the curriculum. The projects tend to be real life business problems which are solved over a period of two semesters, and in the case of Cape Town it could be two consecutive years of two semesters each. These projects tend to involve practical development (for example databases and web sites). The process of project-to-team allocation is generally similar in all cases. Despite their differences, team work related problems are quite similar in all three cases presented, and seem to appear as a result of team work complexity, and the number of stakeholders involved. The intention of this paper is not to propose solutions to these problems (as these would be context dependent), but to draw the attention to the main problem categories for similar schemes, these are; • project selection, • management of students, • management of academic staff, • student team motivation, • equality and diversity, • passengers, and • assessment. Furthermore, it is not the intention of the authors to portray one approach as better than another, however, the approaches are representative of how team projects are being delivered across the globe, and in particular, in the contributing institutions. It is hoped that the assimilation and dissemination of information regarding the various approaches presented will nurture further discussion, and open communication across the globe with the view to enhancing the teaching and learning experience of such projects

Walking Through the Method Zoo: Does Higher Education Really Meet Software Industry Demands?

Software engineering educators are continually challenged by rapidly evolving concepts, technologies, and industry demands. Due to the omnipresence of software in a digitalized society, higher education institutions (HEIs) have to educate the students such that they learn how to learn, and that they are equipped with a profound basic knowledge and with latest knowledge about modern software and system development. Since industry demands change constantly, HEIs are challenged in meeting such current and future demands in a timely manner. This paper analyzes the current state of practice in software engineering education. Specifically, we want to compare contemporary education with industrial practice to understand if frameworks, methods and practices for software and system development taught at HEIs reflect industrial practice. For this, we conducted an online survey and collected information about 67 software engineering courses. Our findings show that development approaches taught at HEIs quite closely reflect industrial practice. We also found that the choice of what process to teach is sometimes driven by the wish to make a course successful. Especially when this happens for project courses, it could be beneficial to put more emphasis on building learning sequences with other courses

Applying Agile Project Management to Art Museums: A Proposal for Implementing a Generalist Scrum Master

This capstone project examines organizational change, along with its challenges, through case studies in museums and businesses in the private sector, subsequently providing a possible solution for museums to adapt to the current global market economy through the use of Agile Project Management (Agile). I cite recent case studies of art museums implementing Agile for digital product development. This project proposal aims to introduce Agile outside of digital departments, including Exhibitions and Education, with the goal of developing better visitor-centered offerings from museums. This may be achieved through the proposal of a job description for a new museum position of Generalist Scrum Master, along with a three-year strategy of implementing Agile Project Management across various museum departments, including digital, exhibitions, and education

A Case Study of Teamwork and Project Success in a Comprehensive Capstone Course

Teamwork is essential in agile software development projects. Therefore, software engineering students who participate in a software engineering capstone course involving teamwork are better prepared for the industry. This study investigated student teams over three years in a comprehensive capstone course offered by the University of Oslo. The collaboration between the students involved in the course changed from in person in 2019 to virtual in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we aimed to explore the differences in teamwork and the effect on project success when the student teams collaborated in person versus virtually. A mixed-methods case study was conducted. The quantitative data consisted of surveys representing 126 student teams and 595 individual respondents. The qualitative data included eight semi-structured interviews. The results indicate that the student teams in such software engineering capstone courses perform well even when collaborating virtually, but they are less satisfied than they are when in person. The student teams found it hard to motivate themselves when they suddenly had to work virtually. Still, the motivation increased when they found ways to collaborate and make the project case exciting. The teams found adequate collaboration tools and managed to carry out the teamwork virtually. Even though it was harder to work virtually, project success was not significantly affected. The student teams that performed well also used virtual collaboration proficiently

Opiskelijoiden valmistaminen työelämään yliopiston sisäisen ohjelmisto-startupin avulla

Tertiary education aims to prepare computer science students for the working life. While much of the technical principles are covered in lower-level courses, team-based capstone projects are a common way to provide students hands-on experience and teach soft skills. Although such courses help students to gain some of the relevant skills, it is difficult to simulate in a course context what work in a professional software engineering team really is about. Our goal is to understand ways tertiary education institutions prepare students for the working life in software engineering. Firstly, we do this by focusing on the mechanisms that software engineering capstones use to simulate work-life. A literature review of 85 primary studies was conducted for this overview. Secondly, we present a more novel way of teaching industry-relevant skills in an university-lead internal software startup. A case study of such a startup, Software Development Academy (SDA), is presented, along with the experiences of both students and faculty involved in it. Finally, we look into how these approaches might differ. Results indicate that capstone courses differ greatly in ways they are organized. Most often students are divided in teams of 4–6 and get assigned with software projects that the teams then develop from an idea to a robust proof-of-concept. In contrast, students employed in the SDA develop production-level software in exchange for a salary for university clients. Students regarded SDA as a highly relevant and fairly irreplaceable educational experience. Working with production-quality software and having a wide range of responsibilities was perceived integral in giving a thorough skill set for the future. In conclusion, capstones and the internal startup both aim to prepare students for the work-life in software engineering. Capstones do it by simulating professional software engineering in a one-semester experience in a course environment. The internal startup adds a touch of realism to this by being actual work in a relatively safe university context

An Alliance-Based Term Project in Software Quality Courses: a Lesson Learned

Software testing education has become important in the field of software engineering education. In the previous software quality assurance course, students were asked to form teams to complete a term project. By working on term projects, students can learn programming skills and test skills in a practical way. However, from the experience of the last 3 years, we found that students only did unit testing and system performance testing well but did poorly in integration testing. In addition, students do not yet have the concept of system decomposition and integration, even though it is important during software development. In this paper we report our improvements to software testing course design - an alliance-based approach. In the term project, students are organized into teams and many teams are grouped into alliances. Each alliance has a team of masters building game platforms for others. The master team must define the application interface to interact with other gaming teams, and they must perform integration tests based on the defined interface. In this paper we report our experiences and student feedback on the educational approach