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Session 3661

Experiences Using Student Project to Create University Business Applications

Harry Koehnemann and Barbara D. Gannod Arizona State University East

Abstract

Engineers (both hardware and software) are continually developing and testing processes to create systems “better, faster, and cheaper.” A variety of software processes have been developed by the software enginnering community toward this end. Among these processes are eXtreme Programming (XP), Crystal, Feature Driven Development, and the Rational Unified Process (RUP).1 To be attractive to potential employers, students in computing fields that intend to become software developers should be exposed to and, ideally, have practical experience with modern software processes. This paper describes experiences in a software capstone course which teaches students the activities associated with two popular industry processes: XP and RUP. In particular, the course uses student projects to create applications used within the university. The unique aspect of the course that differentiates it from other software engineering capstone experiences is the emphasis on agile processes (primarily XP) and the use of software development tools (e.g. configuration management, automated testing, modeling) commonly used in industry.

Four university projects have been created to date. The first is a web application that supports an NSF funded curriculum development project. The second is a channel supported by the uPortal portal system that automates the department’s graduate admissions process and is deployed on the university’s IT portal system. The third is an application that integrates a Course Management System, Blackboard, with an outcomes based assessment tool, True Outcomes, to automate the importing of student information to better measure outcomes for ABET accreditation. The fourth project is a linguistics analysis tool that finds word usage patterns in media articles.

1 Introduction

One of the program characteristics that ABET expects in engineering and technology programs that it accredits is the inclusion of some type of experience that allows students to integrate diverse elements of their education.2 Most programs implement this integrating experience as a capstone course (or course sequence). A capstone experience is typically a culminating experience in the specific major that allows students to creatively apply principles and methods acquired throughout their education to a significant project having a professional focus. Ideally, the capstone experience should

Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Education

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Koehnemann, H., & Gannod, B. (2004, June), Experiences Using Student Projects To Create University Business Applications Paper presented at 2004 Annual Conference, Salt Lake City, Utah. 10.18260/1-2--13617