Assessing the participatory design of a project-based course on computer network applications

Abstract

New teaching methodologies which foster student involvement, such as project-based learning, are nowadays part of the study curriculum of many engineering schools. Project-based learning courses, however, often build upon other previously taught technical courses, where the technical content for the project to be developed is studied. That type of course design focuses on building the transversal capabilities of students, and the technical challenges of the project are the mean to acquire these non-technical skills. In this paper, we present and assess a project-based course on computer network applications of a computer science school, which has been designed to improve within the same course both the transversal and technical skills of the students. The proposition of interest is that the course not only aims to train the students’ transversal skills by a group work project, but also to practise new technical topics and technologies. We argue that the key element of the proposed course design is that each student project group defines with the instructor the project they would like to develop in the course. We present first the design of the course and then an assessment with questionnaires, which were conducted over two semesters with the students enrolled in the course. The obtained results indicate that the students achieved both technical and transversal skills, while the instructors need to be flexible to adapt to diverse technical topics of the proposed projects.