Humboldt University Berlin, University of Novi Sad, University of Plovdiv, University of Skopje, University of Belgrade, University of Niš, University of Kragujevac Version: Oct. 23, 2003 (D Sep. 22, 2003) DAAD Project “Joint Course on Software Engineering” Project management course - Experience from the first year Mirjana Ivanović, Zoran Putnik, University of Novi Sad

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 2 Course Organization  IV year students of Business Informatics, 14 students  VIII semester, 2 hrs lecture, 1 hr exercises  Exam and final mark: Practical assignment in MS Project Questionnaire of 20 different kinds of questions (multiple-choice, short answers, …) 4 Thematic questions (detailed description and explanation expected)

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 3 Content of Course Lectures  Introduction (117 slides)  IT management ( )  CMM and process improvement (51)  Cost estimation and COCOMO (71)  Software measurement and metrics (51)  Planning (43+36)  Using tools - Microsoft project (65, Exercise)  Ethical issues (87)

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 4 Organization of Exercises  Haven’t start at the beginning of the semester (a month later). Why? We were promised a complete free version of CA PM software (CA, Budapest) Mentioned software is complete, high-quality, “project management software system”  Having no information about CA software, we switched to MS Project. It was first presented theoretically at a 3-hour class On another 3-hour class, it is presented “practically” (using representative examples) After that, students had 4 hours of practical work, to gain experience with MS Project  Finally, students were given a software project that they have to manage using MS Project, in a classroom, or at home  This project served as written part of the exam

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 5 Final Exam Results  Of 14 students, 12 successfully finished their practical assignment.  Marks: 7 – once 8 – eight times 9 – three times  Of 12 students eligible for oral part of exam, 11 attended examination, each one passing both tests, marks 6 – 10.  Each of 11 students accepted offered final mark.

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 6 Students Opinion – Questionnaire  Effort:  Attendance % %  Postprocessing [lectures] Hours  Postprocessing [assignments] Hours  Contents:  Amount of knowledge 5 - Too much 1- Too few  Contents 5 - Too easy 1 - Too difficult  Course well structured 5 - Very well 1 - Unstructured

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 7 Students Opinion – Questionnaire  Needed pre-knowledge?:  SE + English.  Experience.  Not too much - just basics of everything  Which topics in Serbian?:  Lectures in Serbian slides in English  All  None

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 8 Students Opinion – Questionnaire  Style of the lectures:  Lecturer familiar 5 -Very well 1 -Not so much  Lectures well prepared 5 -Very well 1 -Not so much  Lecturer engaged 5 -Very well 1 -Not so much  Willingness to answer students' questions 5 -Very well 1 -Not so much  Presentation 5 -Too fast 1 -Too slow  Presentation style encourage to follow the lecture 5 -Very well 1 -Not so much  Remarks

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 9 Students Opinion – Questionnaire  Using media  Amount of info on 5 - Very well 1 - Not so much slides adequate  Slides well structured 5 - Very well 1 - Not so much and clearly organized  Remarks

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 10 Students Opinion – Questionnaire  Benefit of the course:  New things learned 5 – Much 1 -Not so much  Contents useful 5 –Completely 1 -Not so much  Overall rank of the course 5 - Very well 1 - Bad  Remarks  Assignments:  Difficulty 5 -Too high1 -Too low  Motivating 5 -Very much1 -Not so much  General remarks

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 11 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Effort:  Attendance % %  Postprocessing [lectures] Hours  Postprocessing [assignments] Hours Students attended 50% of the lectures on the average, and it took them ½ hour post-processing time for lecture and 2 hours for the assignment.

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 12 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Contents:  Amount of knowledge 5 - Too much 1- Too few  Contents 5 - Too easy 1 - Too difficult  Course well structured 5 - Very well 1 – Unstructured Students assessed that they received “perfect amount” of knowledge, “almost perfect” content, but the structure of the course was just “average”.

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 13 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Needed pre-knowledge?:  SE + English (5x)  Experience.  Not too much - just basics of everything Needed pre-knowledge was assessed usually as “nothing”, “a little bit of everything”, “experience”, and with 40% of students as “Software Engineering + English language”

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 14 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Which topics in Serbian?:  Lectures in Serbian slides in English  All  None Even more – 75% of students said that they would prefer ALL of the lectures in Serbian.

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 15 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results Considering the style of the lecture, marks were (ranging from 5 – very well, to 1 – not so much): Lecturer familiar with lessons4.00(3.77) Lecturer well prepared3.50(3.36) Lecturer engaged3.64(3.54) Willing to answer questions4.92(4.93) Speed of presentation3.33(3.21) Style encouraging2.92(2.64) Marks given in brackets are average marks, including 2 students with a veeeery looow attendance rate. Yet – those 2 students gave only written comments: “…lectures were easier to follow while given on a blackboard” and “monotonous and difficult to follow. Need for translations required too many stops.”

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 16 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Usage of slides as media received average marks “amount of info adequate” = 3.14 “slides well structured and clearly organized” = 3.29  So did the assignments “difficulty to solve” = 2.36 (5 – too difficult, 1 – to easy) “motivating” = 3.14 (5 – very much, 1 – not so much) The only written comment was that “there was too much text, and important things were not stressed visibly enough”

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 17 Students Opinion – Questionnaire Results  Considering the overall comments of the course, they were usually of the following type: “Everything OK. Everything according to curriculum. Good and useful. Very useful” but also: “Pure theory, not connected to real life. Lack of practical lessons evident. Not connected to students’ experiences (?)”  Average marks 5 = Very well 1 = Bad New things learned3.25(3.07) Contents useful3.75(3.57) Overall rank3.83(3.57)

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 18 Lecturer’s Opinion Positive  Good and representative material (topics) selected and prepared  Prepared slides, Acceptable quality  Acceptable level of familiarity Negative  A lot of different sources – overlapping parts of different units, further (maybe better) topic selection and refinement is needed  Static structure of slides, too much text, important things could be better emphasized  More assignments are needed, deeper involvement of students

DAAD project „Joint Course on Software Engineering“ © 19 Conclusion  Prepared presentations for most important topics in SPM domain  Further improvement is (needed) expected  Questionnaire results are satisfied (even extremely positive, for the first time)  Better and more student-oriented organization of practical work and exercises (work in real environment)  More assignments