ISECON 2011
A Decade Review of a Masters-Level
Real-World-Projects Capstone Course
Charles Tappert and Allen StixPace University, New York
ISECON 2011
Real-World Student Projects
Conducted in capstone courses for 10 years
Student teams build real-world computer information systems for actual customers
Project systems serve the community internal university community at Pace greater university community external non-profit local community
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Real-World Student Projects (cont)
Real-world projects are a stellar learning experience for students
Win-win situation for all Students Customers Instructors and other involved faculty School of CSIS University
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Migrate to Online Format
Migrated from traditional face-to-face format to online format in Fall 2006
To be progressive Technology for online courses adequate Online preferred by employed students –
no scheduling conflicts & no commuting To expand the population of students
beyond the greater NYC area
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Challenges of Online Format
Uncertainties of how traditional course methods port to the online environment and what new methods might be required
Teams lacking co-presence require higher level of organizational and process skills
No weekly classroom meetings as safety net for teams’ interaction and functioning
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Team Projects – Categories
Project CategoryNumberProjects
ProjectSemesters
ProjectRelated
Pubs
OffshootPubs
Web Applications 21 25 21
Pervasive Systems 15 25 18
PC Applications 11 18 13
Artificial Intelligence 9 11 12
Pattern Recognition 9 12 34 19
Biometric Systems 32 35 39 19
Quality Assurance 5 9 5 5
Totals 102 135 142 43
Table 1. Summary of projects and publications.
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Team Projects – Sources
Project Source Number
Faculty Ideas or Research 42
Student Ideas or Research 36
External Community 13
Internal University Needs 11
Totals 102
Table 2. Project sources.
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Team Projects – Publication Types
Publication Type Number
External Conference Papers 53
Journal Articles 7
Book Chapters 2
Doctoral Dissertations 17
Masters Theses 4
Internal Conference Papers 98
Internal Technical Reports 4
Totals 185
Table 3. Publication categories.
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Team Projects – Examples
Course website “Projects” page Spring 2011
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Team Website
Project title and description Project members and customers All deliverables posted
Weekly status reports Midterm & final presentation slides User manual Technical paper
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Team Project – Example Website
Team Projects – Example Systems
Handwriting Forgery Quiz System Rare Coin Grading System Keystroke Biometric Experimental Sy
stem
Biometric Authentication
A robot identifies a suspect, from the movie “Minority Report.”
Man
Wo
man
Train
Test
Train
Test
Left Right
Iris Authentication: Data
Iris Authentication: Image Processing
Fingerprint Verification
Each person has a unique face?
Face Recognition
?Query
Face DB
Face Recognition: System
Inspirational Portrait of Individuality
Face Recognition: National Security
Speaker Individuality: “My name is …”
“My name is” from Two Different Speakers
Speaker Individuality
“My name is” divided into seven sound units.
Speaker Individuality
biomouse Fingerprint scanner
Digital
Camera
LCD Pen
tabletMicrophone
Multi-modality Biometric Authentication
Embeded & Hybrid User Verification system
System that requires user verification
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Issues/Solutions Stemmingfrom Scattered Teams
Project stakeholder communication Issue – communication gets difficult
For example, scattered team members more likely to feel isolated and want to communicate directly with instructor or customer
Solution Communication between team and instructor/customer
must be through team leader Email distribution lists for whole class and for each team Project team leaders must be local to facilitate
communication/meetings with instructor and customers Course website provides central source of course
information Blackboard discussion forum for each project (see below)
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Issues/Solutions Stemmingfrom Scattered Teams (cont)
How to handle quizzes, deliverables, etc. Issue – classroom meetings not available Solution – use Blackboard educational
software Quizzes Collecting digital deliverables Discussion forums
Forum for archiving instructor email Forum for student introductions Forum for textbook and other course material Forum for each team project
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Issues/Solutions Stemmingfrom Scattered Teams (cont)
Provide some face-to-face interaction Issue – no weekly classroom meetings Solution – three classroom meetings for
local students/customers1. Near beginning of course
1. Face-to-face introductions, nature of course, specifics of course, student team project meetings
2. Midterm1. Project status presentations
3. End of semester1. Final project presentations
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Current Assessment of Online Students
Individual quizzes (20%) Blackboard educational software system
Team initial assignment (10%) Students learn to function as a team
Team project midterm checkpoint (20%) Team project final checkpoint (20%) Team technical paper (30%) Strong emphasis on projects
No midterm/final exams (used in two-semester course)
ISECON 2011
Team Member Self and Peer Evaluations
Issue – lack of classroom meetings makes it difficult to determine individual team members’ contribution to the project work
Peer evaluations critical for distributed teams
Some minimal team member/customer contact
Some minimal team member/instructor contact
Literature indicates Various granularity levels in peer
evaluations Some automated systems reported
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Team Member Self and Peer Evaluations
Three times during the semester After initial assignment to learn the process At the midterm checkpoint At the final end-of-semester checkpoint
Process for a graded team event First assign a team grade Adjust individual grades up/down based on
self/peer, customer, and instructor evaluations
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Example Team Peer Evaluationand Grade Chart (4 member
team)
Team Member
Eval 1 Eval 2 Eval 3 Eval 4 Summary
Grade
1 + = + ++ + + + + 93
2 = = – – – – – – 79
3 – = + – – 83
4 = = – + = 85
Average = = = = = 85
+/- 2% for each summary +/- sign, showing only peer evaluations.
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Pedagogical Course Evaluations
Issue – lack of classroom meetings makes it difficult for instructor to determine relative value of the course methodologies
Solution – semester-end survey (Survey Monkey)
Procedures/methods that worked well, or did not work well, and why
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Pedagogical Customer Evaluations
Issue – instructor is often not aware of the quality of team-customers interactions
Solution – semester-end survey Obtain student feedback on customer
interaction Were customer requirements clear? Was amount of contact/interaction adequate? Was help on the project work appropriate?
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Case Study - Agile Methodology Extreme Programming (XP)
First rigorous test of XP method Instructor posted deliverables on that
project’s page on the course website Deliverables intended as ~2-week duration
Results Instructor overestimated ability of team Often had to provide pseudo code However, first deliverable caused team
frustration Re-running experiment of previous team Not possible because not documented properly
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Conclusions
Over five year’s experience in face-to-face mode
Over five year’s experience in online mode
Techniques for managing and assessing distributed teams have been successful and they continue to evolve
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