As educators, we care a lot about the curriculum. We acknowledge that many factors are more important to what students learn than the precise contents of the curriculum. Nevertheless, we discuss the curriculum here and extra-curricular concerns in Section~\ref{other}.
Waterloo's Software Engineering program was designed in the 1990s, while the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the IEEE Computer Society were attempting to establish software engineering as a profession through their joint Software Engineering Coordinating Committee (SWECC); ACM Council distanced itself from SWECC in 2000 and took the position that software engineering should not be a licensed profession.
%https://dl.acm.org/doi/fullHtml/10.1145/581571.581602 %https://dl-acm-org.proxy.lib.uwaterloo.ca/doi/fullHtml/10.1145/581571.581602
As discussed in Section~\ref{history}, in the Canadian context, it appears that programs with ``engineering'' in the name need to be accreditable by the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board.
[what do we want to say about the original curriculum? Others ought to contribute here.]
To summarize the October 1999 proposal, the original curriculum contained mathematics (6 courses), natural science (2 courses), CS content, ECE content, and SE content. % write more
The SE core included the SE core from the SE option as well as 6 other specified courses: software project management, concurrency, system performance evaluation, networks, operating systems, and databases.
Let's talk about the SE core. As discussed above, SE degree programs, including UW's program, were created from an understanding of what SE was up to the 1990s. A full discussion of the changes in software engineering practice since then is well beyond the scope of this paper, but we'll discuss some points below.
% put these points here.
We reiterate from earlier work some important curricular design considerations in our context: we aimed for a 50/50 balance between ECE and CS in terms of the teaching load for SE, and we re-used existing courses when possible. In the past 20 years, we have eventually created some SE-specific courses, but this was only done when really needed, and with strong support from stakeholders.
In the Waterloo context, the BSE program can be thought of as a constrained version of the Bachelor of Computer Science (BCS) curriculum built on top of an engineering core. Compared to the BCS, SE additionally requires students to take core Software Engineering courses and lower-division Computer Engineering courses, as well as meet engineering accreditation requirements. This results in a program that includes 3.5 more courses than a BCS---43.5 versus 40 over 8 academic semesters.
At the moment, the BSE meets all technical (CS/math) course requirements for the BCS except that the BCS requires two statistics courses while the BSE requires one. Interestingly, at the time of the BSE's creation, CE also required zero statistics and now requires two courses as well. Additionally, the BSE includes circuits and computer organization from ECE as taken by Computer Engineering students in their first three terms. As for non-technical requirements, the BSE also requires fewer humanities/social sciences courses and does not require a so-called depth chain\footnote{SE used to satisfy the depth chain requirements with the circuits/hardware sequence, but no longer does following an ECE course reordering.}---three courses that are linked by prerequisites.
So, what does the BSE include? In terms of core CS, it includes standard CS 1 and CS 2 courses in first year; SE teaches them in C/C++ rather than Racket/C as for BCS students. It also includes the 5-course second-year CS core (how compilation works; data structures; logic and computation; software engineering principles) as well as third-year algorithms. Non-core CS courses that are required for SE include user interfaces, concurrency, and databases.
Software Engineering is unique among programs at Waterloo in that it requires applicants to present proof of programming experience prior to admission. The implication for SE is that CS 1 doesn't teach introductory programming concepts, but does teach how these concepts are realized in C.
Software engineering courses now include the three-course sequence in requirements, design, and testing. Other courses are feedback control and a three-course design project sequence. In first year, there is a half-credit course introducing students to the engineering profession as well as including a small open-ended project. % write more about SE 101 & its evolution below
Over the past 20 years, the SE core has evolved. We highlight important changes below.
The original design of the three-course SE sequence included a project which consisted of developing software for a Private Branch Exchange (PBX) system. This project became defunct by 2008; over the same interval, Software Engineering aligned with all other Waterloo Engineering programs in including an open-ended capstone project, discussed below. The SE capstone project spans three semesters.
We have removed a number of the original Software Engineering courses, in particular Software Project Management. We removed Software Project Management because its content didn't align with student experience during workterms, which was generally much more agile. I believe the plan was to incorporate project management concepts into the FYDP, but I don't know what really happened in the longer term.
AM: I seem to remember that a new ECE faculty member (Todd Veldhuizen???) developed Software Project Management and the students didn't mind it but it had to go make room for FYDP. Todd (if I've got the name correct) went off to industry after a short time at Waterloo.
CC: I vaguely remember that the students didn't mind it because Todd taught it. The topic, if not the actual content, was meant to be merged into FYDP.
% todo ^^^, I think also integrate with other discussions on agile
% get some context from previous directors here, this predates me. The course was taught in 2008.
% I think CS 457 doesn't exist anymore because the instructor retired. % "I'm pretty sure Jimmy Wong taught this. When he retired there was nobody to teach it, nor did anyone what to continue with it." - CC
We have changed the order of the three-course sequence to start in the first term of third year and with testing, progressing to design and then requirements. As industry goes, this sequence now reflects more agile methodologies.
% somewhere we should talk about requirements, and also about architecture. That somewhere is probably a "discussion" part of this section.
% Spencer Dobrik: "Also I would like to be the one SE student feedback that says architecture and reqs are super important for early stage companies. But you never realize the value of you join a 500+ person company and they've already figured everything out"
We moved databases from third year to second year. Many students had already seen a substantial amount of database content through co-op jobs and were finding that our databases course was too late in the curriculum.
The three-course SE sequence had started with courses that mirrored the CS/ECE versions of these courses. Over time, these courses have diverged, as we explain below.
The design course for CS students includes a substantial project, which is not appropriate for SE students also doing their capstone design project. Another point of contention among SE students is overlap between the second year software engineering course and the design course; students feel like they learn design patterns too many times. The design course is also supposed to be about software architectures.
The non-SE version of the course on software testing, quality assurance, and maintenance has also diverged as it has been taught by a more formal methods-focussed faculty member.
For the past 10 years, the capstone project has been a key part of the Software Engineering curriculum. Our goal has been that students create something that they are proud of. Perhaps the key difficulty is that this is the first significant time where our students, who are quite used to meeting requirements, are given a green-field task and not told what to do.
- 3 terms over 20 calendar months
- due to co-op
- longer than most capstone projects
- more time to chew the fat
- synergy with SE464 and SE463
- formative assessments
- peer assessments
- handbook = collection of learning activities (approx. 100)
- select activities appropriate to your team or project
- project selection
- teamwork
- creative
- planning
- conceptual
- requirements
- design
- testing
- user
- reflective
- communication
- different results rubrics:
- new product
- research
- advanced technology
- FOSS patch
- consultant
- startups:
- dynalist.io
- tutturu.tv
- other?
- papers:
- Manifold 1
- Manifold 2
- Whyness
- Jimmy Lin
- heartbeat/radiant
- not too many really ... not an interest for most students ...
- other successes
- UWFlow
- symposium day
- Cyberbullying project: There was a group that was working on a project that invited others to judge people. That couldn't possibly lead to cyberbullying. Derek was telling them that and their classmates told them that. They were like "look no one tells you honest feedback about yourself" (true), "let's fix that! With anonymous comments!"
One of the fundamental tradeoffs in designing a program such as Software Engineering is the limited amount of curriculum space available. Indeed, the first SE curriculum listed 40.5 courses. However, the truth is that the content we try to put into SE doesn't fit into 40 courses, and the current number of 43.5 is more honest with respect to the size of the curriculum.
There are a number of cases where we attempted to compress material into fewer courses than would be natural: electricity and magnetism plus circuits, algorithms, and probability plus statistics. Statistics is still compressed while circuits and electricity and magnetism have uncompressed.
\paragraph{Circuits.} The following fake-equality depicts the situation:
[ 126 + 141 = 124 + 140 + 106. ]
Less glibly, SE was launched with ECE 126 as a 1.5-weight course combining electrostatics, magnetism, and electronics, along with SE 141, teaching digital circuits and systems. ECE 126 was apparently quite punishing and picked up the moniker ``electrodeath'' from students. Both SE and ECE moved to the current system where the same content is now taught in three courses: digital circuits, linear circuits, and electricity and magnetism. (The electricity and magnetism course for SE students is still difficult and its necessity comes up for discussion every few years.)
\paragraph{Statistics.} CS students (and indeed all math students at Waterloo) take two second-year courses, one on probability and one on statistics. SE students take a single course, ``Statistics for Software Engineering'', which contains the highlights from the courses as taken by math students. This course is taught by statisticians. As mentioned above, CE students now also two courses in probability and statistics, taught by ECE faculty. We would like to incorporate more statistics in the curriculum, but adding something requires subtracting something as well.
Our statistics instructor, Surya Banarjee, reports:
STAT 206 is one of my favourite courses to teach, and a requirement for SE students. It combines two distinct halves: Probability (the part that most students enjoy because it resembles most math courses in its deductive approach), and Statistical Inference (enjoyed less, possibly because (a) the material is rushed due to time constraints, and (b) the inductive nature of the subject). Both, however, are very useful in general.
\paragraph{Algorithms.} When SE was introduced, CS had recently moved from one to two algorithms courses, while ECE had (and still has) one algorithms course. (A second algorithms course is an extremely popular elective for CE students.) SE started with an SE-specific course based on the single CS algorithms course, taught by ECE faculty. Around 2010, it moved to using the two CS algorithms courses.
\paragraph{Miscellaneous changes.} SE used to require a Technical Presentation Milestone. We removed it to reduce excess degree requirements, with the rationale that a majority of students take a course in Public Speaking in any case.
Another important change is the introduction of an SE-specific operating systems course taught by ECE. It covers similar material to the new ECE operating systems course; however, SE students have more experience with writing software. It is lower-level than the CS operating systems course and involves writing code that runs directly on hardware. Students report that this course is the first time that they work in teams and write software that interoperates according to specifications.
% We should write this following para better and incorporate feedback from videogame labs. Feedback control has been in the curriculum since the beginning and, like E&M, its role in the curriculum often discussed. Our rationale is bthat if anyone is qualified to work on cyberphysical systems, it should be our graduates. In practice, however, many of our graduates never design a controller. Alumni have reported that understanding feedback control has been useful in understanding software phenomena that would otherwise have been mysterious. We have also recently revised the lab to be more appealing to students by incorporating video game development applications.
We mention feedback control here, though, because we have added an SE-specific math course to support it: differential-equations-and-signals-and-systems. Like so many other SE courses, that course combines the highlights of two courses, in this case differential equations and signals-and-systems. It provides the necessary knowledge for our feedback control course.
\paragraph{Natural science.} Beyond E&M, there are additional two issues with science in the SE curriculum: the selection and the quantity. The CEAB specifically requires engineering students to study chemistry and physics, so we include a first-year course, ``chemistry for engineers'', in second year. Students do not appreciate the inclusion of this course, although they also report that it is not very challenging for them. Initially, we had hoped to require fewer science courses, but were required to designate two science electives (in addition to the 2 physics and 1 chemistry course) to meet accreditation requirements.
\paragraph{Shrinking the program.} Having added 3 courses over the program's history, we had ended up at 44.5 courses, which exceeds normal workload for a CS student in 5 of the 8 terms. In 2014, we loosened the rules on types of electives, and in 2019, we reduced the number of electives by 1. In the current program, there are 3 linkage electives (societal issues, humanities and social science, and communications); 2 science electives (required for accreditation); 3 advanced technical electives; and two unrestricted electives.
- what electives do SE students take? resources/courses-taken-by-se-students.md
[It's probably not that interesting that SE students take engineering calculus rather than math calculus. On the other hand, when MATH 135 was introduced, we switched SE from CO 103 (for engineers) to MATH 135, and we added MATH 239.]
initial: MATH 115, MATH 137, MATH 138, CO 103, [SE 112] now: MATH 115, MATH 117, MATH 135, MATH 119, MATH 213, MATH 239, [SE 212]
- which version of fundamental math courses? how much fundamental math?
(students essentially never choose SE to do the three-course sequence)
- formal methods
- AI
- stats
- physics
- humanities/social impact, comms