ITEC330 - Information Technology Capstone Project

Year

Credit points

Campus offering

Prerequisites

ITEC202 Data Analytics and Visualisation AND ITEC203 Introduction to Data Science and Machine Learning OR ITEC313 Advanced Programming Concepts

Incompatible

ITEC312 Information Technology Project Part A (Project Management) , ITEC322 Information Technology Project Part B (Software Engineering)

Unit rationale, description and aim

This capstone project unit provides practical experience in analysing, designing, developing, and testing a particular information technology project or in thoroughly investigating a particular area of information technology. The project is generally software-based, although sometimes it may involve investigation of a particular problem. It equips students with project management, software engineering, and communication and teamwork skills to prepare them for transition from study to professional practice in industry. It requires students to integrate and consolidate knowledge, attitudes and capabilities acquired in other units of study. The project work will involve project management, software development, documentation, and presentation.

The project has both team and individual work elements. A team of students will work together on the project, while each team member, while also involved in overall team-oriented responsibilities, will contribute to their team by employing the specialist capabilities. At the end of the project, students need to reflect on the project successes, difficulties faced in different phases, potential improvement in project delivery for the future, and the impact of the project processes and outcomes on subsidiarity and stewardship of resources. The primary aim of this unit is to empower students with core knowledge of project management and software development to become an informed and responsible IT professional and immediately successful when joining an organisation.

Learning outcomes

To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.

Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.

Explore the graduate capabilities.

On successful completion of this unit, students should be able to:

LO1 - Collaborate effectively within a team to design a project management plan for a real-life project including project planning and management of scope, schedule, risk, quality, communication and people (GA5, GA7)

LO2 - Design and develop a software system using appropriate software development frameworks and tools and technologies to ensure compliance with relevant standards (GA5, GA10)

LO3 - Prepare presentations to communicate outcomes and experiences of the project with audience using effective oral communication skills (GA5, GA9)

LO4 - Prepare a comprehensive project report summarising the project processes and outcomes by demonstrating written communication skills and responsibilities of respecting subsidiarity and stewardship of resources (GA3, GA5)

LO5 - Apply the knowledge and skills learned to assess their professional capabilities and choose the right career path (GA5, GA6)

Graduate attributes

GA3 - Apply ethical perspectives in informed decision making

GA5 - Demonstrate values, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession 

GA6 - Solve problems in a variety of settings taking local and international perspectives into account

GA7 - Work both autonomously and collaboratively 

GA9 - Demonstrate effective communication in oral and written English language and visual media 

GA10 - Utilise information and communication and other relevant technologies effectively.

Content

Topics will include:

• Essentials of IT project management
• Project planning
• Project scope management
• Project schedule management
• Project risk management
• Project quality management
• Project communication management
• Project people management
• Subsidiarity in project management
• Software lifecycle models
• Principles of software engineering
• Overview of software processes
• Software requirement engineering
• Software architectural design
• System design and modeling
• Software design and implementation
• Software testing
• User interface evaluation
• Software reuse and evolution
• Distributed software engineering
• Service-oriented software engineering 

Learning and teaching strategy and rationale

This unit is offered in different modes to cater for the learning needs and preferences of a range of participants and maximise effective participation for isolated and/or marginalised groups. These are: “Attendance” mode and “Online” mode.

Attendance Mode

In a weekly attendance mode, students will require face-to-face attendance in specific physical location/s. Students will have face-to-face interactions with lecturer(s) to further their achievement of the learning outcomes. This unit is structured with required upfront preparation before workshops, most students report that they spend an average of one hour preparing before the workshop and one or more hours after the workshop practicing and revising what was covered. The online learning platforms used in this unit provide multiple forms of preparatory and practice opportunities for students to prepare and revise.

Online Mode

This unit uses an active learning approach to support students in the exploration of knowledge essential to the discipline. Students are provided with asynchronous learning modules covering key concepts, principles, and technology stacks such as project management, software engineering, and development of web applications. Students are required to complete weekly tasks covered by these modules. Active learning opportunities provide students with opportunities to practice and apply their learning in situations similar to their future professions. This is specifically in the form of synchronous weekly 2-hour lab sessions where students are assisted to complete the development of software sprints for their project. Students receive regular and timely feedback on their learning, which includes information on their progress.

This unit has 20 credit points and students should anticipate undertaking 300 hours of study for this unit, including class attendance, readings, weekly tasks and labs, assessment preparation, and most importantly project development and completion.

Assessment strategy and rationale

A range of assessment procedures will be used to meet the unit learning outcomes and develop graduate attributes consistent with University assessment requirements. To pass this unit, students need to achieve an aggregate mark of 50%. 

Attendance mode

The first assessment is a project management plan. The aim of this assessment item is to test students’ critical ability to apply and synthesise their project management knowledge and skills in deeper levels. The second assessment item consists of a series of software sprint submissions and a final project presentation and demonstration of the developed system. This task requires students to demonstrate the final version of their project, reflect on their project journey, and evaluate their acquired skills throughout this project against the SFIA framework. The final assessment item is the project report. This task requires students to systematically document the details of development frameworks, technologies, and tools, all software processes involved, specification, design, testing and evaluation reports, and impact of the project processes/outcomes on subsidiary or stewardship of resources. All the assessment items require group work as collaborative work is common in the information technology industry and the capstone project aims to provide authentic learning experience so that students are prepared to transit into professional workplace. Peer assessment of group work will be adopted so that students will be marked based on the contributions to the group project. 

Online Mode

The first assessment consists of a series of weekly submissions that test students’ understanding of the asynchronous learning modules. The aim is to test students’ engagement with asynchronous online modules. The second assessment is a project management plan based on weekly submissions. The aim of this assessment item is to test students’ critical ability to apply and synthesise their project management knowledge and skills in deeper levels. The third assessment consists of a series of software sprint submissions and a recorded final project presentation and demonstration of the developed system. This task requires students to demonstrate the final version of their project, reflect on their project journey, and evaluate their acquired skills throughout this project against the SFIA framework. The final assessment item is the project report based on weekly submissions and software development. This task requires students to systematically document the details of development frameworks, technologies, and tools, all software processes involved, specification, design, testing and evaluation reports, and impact of the project processes/outcomes on subsidiary or stewardship of resources. All the assessment items require group work as collaborative work is common in the information technology industry and the capstone project aims to provide authentic learning experience so that students are prepared to transit into professional workplace. Peer assessment of group work will be adopted so that students will be marked based on the contributions to the group project. 

Overview of assessments

Attendance mode;

Online Mode

Representative texts and references

Summerville, I. 2015, Software Engineering, 10th edn, Pearson

Schwalbe, K 2018, Information technology project management, 9th edn, Cengage Learning, USA

Jones & Bartlett 2016, Essentials of Software Engineering, 4th edn, Cengage Learning, USA