Lessons learned managing distributed software engineering courses
Reid Holmes, Michelle L. Craig, Karen L. Reid, Eleni Stroulia · 2014
We have run the Undergraduate Capstone Open Source Projects (UCOSP) program for ten terms over the past six years providing over 400 Canadian students from more than 30 schools the opportunity to be members of distributed software teams. UCOSP aims to provide students with real development experience enabling them to integrate lessons they have learned in the classroom with practical development experience while developing their technical communication skills. The UCOSP program has evolved over time as we have learned how to effectively manage a diverse set of students working on a large number of different projects. The goal of this paper is to provide an overview of the roles of the various stakeholders for distributed software engineering projects and the various lessons we have learned to make UCOSP an effective and positive learning experience.