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Incorporating quality assurance processes into requirements analysis education

Published:30 June 2003Publication History

ABSTRACT

The traditional thrust of software quality assurance has been to use "brute force" testing at the end of development. However quality assurance in the early phases of development is an order of magnitude more cost effective than testing done at the end of development. This paper describes the introduction of quality reviews as a learning activity into an undergraduate requirements analysis course, and evaluates the effectiveness of this in improving learning. In the absence of any standard instrument for evaluating learning effectiveness, we developed a survey instrument called the Learning Effectiveness Survey. Using this instrument, learning effectiveness is evaluated in the context of the learning goals of the course (short term learning), and in the context of the broader educational programme and future working life (long term learning). It also provides feedback on the learning intervention and how it can be improved. While the intervention was moderately successful in its first application, a great deal was learned about how it could be improved next time.

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              • Published in

                cover image ACM Conferences
                ITiCSE '03: Proceedings of the 8th annual conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education
                June 2003
                291 pages
                ISBN:1581136722
                DOI:10.1145/961511
                • cover image ACM SIGCSE Bulletin
                  ACM SIGCSE Bulletin  Volume 35, Issue 3
                  Proceedings of the 8th annual conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education
                  September 2003
                  277 pages
                  ISSN:0097-8418
                  DOI:10.1145/961290
                  Issue’s Table of Contents

                Copyright © 2003 ACM

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                Publication History

                • Published: 30 June 2003

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