Distance learning for laboratory practical work in microcontrollers

This paper presents a simple and relatively straightforward solution to the problems of equity in laboratory practical exposure between distance-education students and their traditional, on-campus, fellow cohort. This system has been implemented for the past five years in a university that is amongst the leaders in distance education delivery and has proved to be extremely successful and very well accepted by all students. While the intention was to allow distance education students easy access to the required laboratory practical content of the course, the solution found has proved to have many advantages for the on-campus students. Although this specific implementation is based upon microcontroller technology units in an engineering degree course, the methodology is easily transferable to other disciplines and courses.

Authenticity in assessment : reflecting undergraduate study and professional practice

The literature suggests that assessment is a powerful tool for influencing student study habits. It is also recognized that there is a tension between traditional forms of assessment and newer forms of assessment that offer a more authentic representation of practice, but are more complex and expensive to administer. The international trend in undergraduate engineering course accreditation to move to demonstration of attainment of graduate attributes poses new challenges in assessment of learning. A case study based on integrating assessment practices across the year levels of an engineering management studies stream in an undergraduate course is presented. Key features of the assessment portfolio include: the use of assessment in the first year as a foundational tool to establish student study habits and skills; the evolution of assessment tasks by the fourth year to reflect the world of professional practice and to allow students to demonstrate their integration of knowledge and skills; the weighting of assessment tasks to indicate the value attached to particular tasks; the structured inclusion of group work; a concern for student and staff workloads; the recognition of student diversity, in particular the needs of off-campus and mature-age students; and the matching of assessment tasks to professional accreditation requirements.

Fuzzy logic based metric in software testing

How to provide cost-effective strategies for Software Testing has been one of the research focuses in Software Engineering for a long time. Many researchers in Software Engineering have addressed the effectiveness and quality metric of Software Testing, and many interesting results have been obtained. However, one issue of paramount importance in software testing – the intrinsic imprecise and uncertain relationships within testing metrics – is left unaddressed. To this end, a new quality and effectiveness measurement based on fuzzy logic is proposed. The software quality features and analogy-based reasoning are discussed, which can deal with quality and effectiveness consistency between different test projects. Experimental results are also provided to verify the proposed measurement.

Graduate evaluation of engineering management studies at Deakin University

Australia has long recognised the importance of the inclusion of management studies in undergraduate engineering courses. A survey of recent graduates of the engineering programs at Deakin University was undertaken to evaluate the effectiveness of the management studies in those programs. The survey respondents suggest that those management skills most highly valued by graduates were generic professional practice skills, and that more opportunities to develop these skills in undergraduate studies would be beneficial. Survey respondents suggested the inclusion in the course of more ‘real world’ examples of engineering management.

Foundation software engineering practices for capstone projects and beyond

This paper outlines an introductory course in software engineering undertaken by computing students at Deakin University. The course focuses on areas of that are often not emphasized in introductory software engineering. These areas include formal problem solving, management of software development, communication, and working in groups. The approach includes the application of concepts in a collaborative group setting. Enhancements to the course have been made over a number of semesters and evidence suggests that our overall approach is working. The skills acquired by students taking this course can be applied to later courses in software engineering, particularly the capstone project course, and to professional life

Engineering education down under : distance teaching at Deakin University, Australia

Deakin University in Australia is one of the leading providers of distance education in the South Pacific region. The School of Engineering offers four-year professional engineering-degree programs and three-year technologist programs. The over 600 total students studying engineering at Deakin fall into four categories:

• 18-19 year-old students fresh from high school, who largely study on-campus,
• older students in the technical workforce, seeking a university degree to upgrade their qualifications,
• industry-based students studying in university-industry partnership programs,
• overseas students studying either on-campus, or off-campus through education partners in Malaysia and Singapore.

Geographically these students form a very wide student base. The study programs are designed to produce multi-skilled, broadly focused engineers and technologists with multi-disciplinary technical competence, and the ability to take a systems approach to design and operational performance. A team of around 25 academic staff deliver courses in seven different majors in the general fields of manufacturing, environmental engineering, mechatronics, and computer systems. We discuss here the history of the School, its teaching philosophy, and its unique methods in delivering engineering education to a widely scattered student body.

Understanding requirements engineering process: a challenge for practice and education

Reviews of the state of the professional practice in Requirements Engineering (RE) stress that the RE process is both complex and hard to describe, and suggest there is a significant difference between competent and "approved" practice. "Approved" practice is reflected by (in all likelihood, in fact, has its genesis in) RE education, so that the knowledge and skills taught to students do not match the knowledge and skills required and applied by competent practitioners.

A new understanding of the RE process has emerged from our recent study. RE is revealed as inherently creative, involving cycles of building and major reconstruction of the models developed, significantly different from the systematic and smoothly incremental process generally described in the literature. The process is better characterised as highly creative, opportunistic and insight driven. This mismatch between approved and actual practice provides a challenge to RE education - RE requires insight and creativity as well as technical knowledge. Traditional learning models applied to RE focus, however, on notation and prescribed processes acquired through repetition. We argue that traditional learning models fail to support the learning required for RE and propose both a new model based on cognitive flexibility and a framework for RE education to support this model.

Exploring the cultural and social impacts on the requirements engineering processes-highlighting some problems challenging virtual team relationships with clients

Abstract:

Requirements engineering is a crucial phase in software development. Software development in a virtual domain adds another dimension to the process of requirements engineering. There has been growing interest in virtual teams, and more specifically in virtual software development. While structured software development methods are the obvious first choice for project managers to ensure a virtual software development team remains on track, the social and cultural aspects of requirements engineering cannot be ignored. These social aspects are especially important across different cultures, and have been shown to affect the success of an information system. The discussion in this paper is centred around the requirements engineering processes of a virtual team in a Thai Software House. This paper explains the issues and challenges of requirements engineering in a virtual domain from a social and cultural perspective. Project managers need to encourage a balance between structured methods and social aspects in requirements engineering for virtual team members. Cultural and social aspects influence the relationship between the virtual team and the client.

Evaluation of Australian undergraduate engineering management education for flexible delivery

This thesis examines issues in Australian undergraduate engineering management studies in the context of flexible learning delivery. It is proposed that, within an Australian context: a) the management skills and competencies required by graduate engineers can be determined and classified on a rational basis, permitting an educational focus on those elements most appropriate for graduates; and b) on-line and other computer-based technologies are a practical and effective method for the support of undergraduate engineering management studies. The doctoral project incorporates: • an examination of the nature of engineering management; • a review of the relevant literature establishing the importance of management studies in undergraduate engineering courses; • a review of historical and recent developments in Australian undergraduate engineering management studies; • an investigation of the management skills and competencies required by graduate engineers - based on original research; • an examination of flexible delivery of engineering education - based on professional practice experience; and • an evaluation of case studies of flexible delivery of engineering management education - based on original research and professional practice experience. A framework of ranked classified management skills is developed. Broadly, the ranking framework is generic professional skills, followed by general management skills and technical discipline specific management skills, followed by other professional discipline skills and theoretical skills. This framework provides a rational basis for design of undergraduate engineering management studies. This is supplemented by consideration of the management skills required for the future of engineering practice. It is concluded that undergraduate engineering management education is well suited to delivery and support by on-line and computer-based technology. Recent developments in improved access to the Internet, software systems for on-line collaboration and changes in copyright legislation to create a broad-based right to communication via on-line media have contributed to the facilitation of on-line delivery of teaching and learning. It is noted that though many on-line infrastructure issues have been satisfactorily resolved, higher level issues will emerge as being crucial, including the academic staff development and reward for operating in an online teaching environment and the financial sustainability of on-line development and delivery of courses.

Advanced virtual engineering educational program for engineering research and teaching excellence

In this paper, an advanced virtual engineering educational program developed at University of South Australia for both on-campus and off-shore students will be studied. This extensive training program is based on a comprehensive online tutorial and comprises both face-to-face and online learning. The program provides a tailored evaluation format to ensure that all postgraduate students, including course work and research students, will have appropriate exposure to updated learning skills and research resources. Although the internet (WWW) is the primary resource being used in this educational program, other resources such as video conference, video taping, and face-to-face lecturing have also played a role in promoting engineering teaching and research excellence. The feedback from students in recent years has been very encouraging, showing increased information literacy skills and improved researching abilities. As off campus class numbers have increased, further development of the program to meet their requirement has been a priority.

An advanced virtual engineering educational program for engineering research and teaching excellence.

In this paper, an advanced virtual program in engineering education developed at the University of South Australia for both on-campus and offshore students is described. This extensive training program is based on a comprehensive online tutorial and comprises both face-to-face and online learning. The program provides a tailored evaluation format to ensure that all postgraduate students, including those doing coursework and research, will have appropriate exposure to updated learning skills and research resources. Although the internet is the primary resource used in this educational program, other resources, such as videoconferencing, video-taping and face-to-face lecturing, have also played a role in promoting engineering teaching and research excellence. The feedback from students in recent years has been very encouraging, and students have shown increased information literacy skills and improved researching abilities. As off-campus class numbers have increased, further development of the program to meet their requirements has been a priority.

Toward new models of flexible education to enhance quality in Australian higher education

In this chapter we focus on models of flexible education as related to Australian higher education (with an argument that this is typical of developments worldwide). Moreover, Deakin University’s longstanding experience in flexible, online and distance education, as a case study of changes in Australian higher education, will be highlighted, with a particular emphasis on developments in teaching engineering and technology flexibly. To begin, we provide coverage of contemporary developments in quality enhancements in teaching and learning in Australian higher education arguing that flexible education is a key institutional response to external demands. The meanings of flexible education and blended learning are then considered and a contingency-based framework for designing flexible education outlined. The framework will consider models of flexible education design in the light of goals, the roles, needs and circumstances of teaching staff and learners, the changing technological environment, and the requirements of various external stakeholders. The focus will then move to course and unit concerns relating to flexible educational models of course design and operation as illustrated through the case of engineering and technology at Deakin. The final section will give some consideration to future directions in flexible education.

Engineering management studies as part of continuing engineering education

Engineering management is an important area of undergraduate preparation. With the introduction of engineering and technology degrees via flexible delivery, there are a growing number of mature age engineering students returning to study to upgrade their qualifications. These students offer a new and unique perspective on engineering management - they may have had significant practical experience as a manager/supervisor in an engineering environment. This paper reports on a survey undertaken to better understand the perceptions of mature age engineering students relating to engineering management. The engineering management competencies identified as most important by mature age engineering students are those that are practically orientated, most clearly associated with engineering and generic professional skills. Management competencies identified as less important by mature age students are those that are more theoretical and most clearly associated with other business functions or professional occupations.