FWD: Software Engineering Students & Open Source development

[Theodoros G. Karounos]

A hello to all at this list!

We are currently piloting an "open" approach for the course
"Introduction to Software Engineering" (ISE) at Aristotle University
in Greece, aimed at bringing together Aristotle students, students
from fellow universities, open source practitioners and anyone else
interested in SE.

To facilitate the students entrance to open source projects we are now
trying to organize some live events for Jan / Feb 2008 (chats, video
sessions or pod casts at ustream) that would introduce the students to
some aspects relevant to working in open source environments.

Therefore I wondered if anyone here might be interested in chairing
one of those live events and to talk (A) about a open source project
he/she is engaged at and provide some information on experiences and
challenges, ways to contribute to it, etc and (B) about a more generic
topic relevant for "newbies" (e.g. "understanding the code", etc).

For this ISE course we set up an experimental open learning space (
http://www.netgeners.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=39&Itemid=92
) to facilitate the students work and to provide a central meeting
point for the different stakeholders.

What we would like to achieve with this is to bring together open
source development & software engineering education – means to create
a win / win scenario by allowing students to gain practical skills
(plus some soft skills) meanwhile contributing to an open source
project.

The ISE course has app. 160 students per semester and the students are
supposed to carry out a project work within a open source project,
contributing to this open source project in one out of three ways: 1.
to identify (and fix) bugs, 2. to contribute to the code, or 3. to
draft / improve the requirement specification documentation.

In the case you would know people from other open source projects that
might also be interested in chairing a live event I would be glad if
you could circulate this mail.

Hope someone here might find this of interest!

Tips or hints to similar initiatives are more than welcome!

Best Regards

Andreas Meiszner
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With kind regards,
Mit freundlichen Grüßen
Com os melhores cumprimentos

Andreas  Meiszner
______________________________
Institute of Educational Technology

The Open University
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA
United Kingdom

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