In 2002 the College of Computing Sciences at NJIT introduced a completely new designed senior
project Capstone course, utilizing projects from industry, faculty and students
as the basis for team-oriented projects. In these projects, student teams analyze, diagnose
and model system requirements to produce well-engineered and well-documented
software products.
The regular 491 or 492 course is offered as a
one semester and may be extended to two-semester program during the Fall, Spring and Summer semesters. This course is intended to provide
senior Computer Science, Information systems and information technology majors real world experience in software engineering and
interdisciplinary problem solving prior to graduation. This course is
team-based in which project mangers and team members are carefully and collaboratively selected to suit the task at hand. Course director/instructor solicit a revised selection of industry and real world
projects from a broad array of sponsors.
Students work in teams of four to six in their
senior project semester (approximately 14 weeks) on the analysis, design,
implementation, testing and documentation of the software product or the
solution they are to develop. Each student is expected to spend approximately
nine hours per week on the project on average.
The skills
mastered and experience acquired in a real world project provide effective use
of education and add substantial value to a student’s job qualifications.
Results are measurable and tangible. It is also an opportunity for industry to
evaluate potential hires; establish strong ties between industry and the
university and faculty that may result into research and consulting benefits to
the sponsor in fields of interest. Students in the Capstone project have also
been involved in many training and collaborative workshops, We have started recently the entrepreneurship track
and students are being well-trained in intellectual property standards and
business start-up strategies.
1-During the early part of the semester, students choose
one of the proposed projects to implement
2-Students
form teams starting from project manager selection by instructor to team members selection by project managers .
3-Teams devise
a plan for solving the business case using information technology
4-Teams work on task analysis, feasibility studies, cost-benefit
estimations and risk assessment .Secondly , they begin requirements
gathering , requirements writing and mapping . Thirdly, teamsarchitect
system design models,front-end design and back-end design. All these phases
are done in parallel with formal presentations of deliverables to the client/sponsor and class in an evolutionary fashion
using prototypes.
5-Subsequently,
each team implements its plan, periodically reporting to the client/sponsor and instructor to present the progress of their
work and solicit advice on problems in implementation.
6-By the end of the semester teams deliver their final products and documentation
to sponsor and instructor alike
In the spring 2005 semester, more than 50 project requests were
made from more than 40 companies. This is the largest number of industry-sponsors in one single semester
Example of projects sponsors include but not limited to : McKesson,
Honey Well, PSE&G, CIT, Saint Clair Health System , Johnson and Johnson ,State of NJ governor’s office ,Newark public Library , Newark Housing
authority , Rutgers university,National Guard , Buyers ,NASA ,NSF and tens of
other businesses and research institutions
Clearly
, sponsors and projects diversity demonstrate the broad array of interest
in our capstone program .Projects dealt with many kinds of business problems
and application areas from entertainment to finance to health to education to the public sector needs. The capstone program
also offers strong support and training to students who wish to become entrepreneurs.
Additionally, our entrepreneurship well-supported track that evolved
over the timegenerated at least 4 outstanding success stories.
Progress in the Capstone program has demonstrated
its value and expandability. In Fall2002, the program had a total of 22 groups carrying
out 22 senior projects. By Spring2003, there were 34 teams in the core courses, 10 teams in an advanced
curriculum and 2 supportive research teams. Of the Fall2002 senior projects, 15 (or 68.2%) were externally
sponsored. In the Spring2003, 26 (or 76.5%) had external sponsors. Currently, 100% of capstone
projects are sponsored (Internally and/or externally).
After two
years of the capstone experience, more than 200 teams have completed more than 122 full-scale projects and 200 semester-long
projects in which many have multi-phases and some have involved multi-team structures.
By the end of Fall 2004 , the capstone program was able to establish
project-based relationships with more than 91 sponsors in which more than 82%
are external business or organizations to NJIT .Our sponsors list include 6Fortune 500 companies, 51 medium to small to largesize companies across the tri state area , 8
sponsors from New Jerseycolleges and
universities , 5 public services departments or agencies at the city , state or
national levelsand 7 unique projects
sponsored from NJIT faculty. We expect 35-40 teams (200 students) to be
available for new projects by Spring2005.
