incorporating quality assurance processes into requirements analysis education
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.
quality assurance software quality evaluation learning effectiveness it education conceptual modelling