Challenging Architects in Education: the Smart Environments Integration Project

Abstract

Abstract.Educating systems engineers is a challenge. Most attention in literature is on educating systems engineers on the job; after completion of an educational program at university. Architecting is even more difficult because it encompasses dealing with uncertainty, answering a very open problem and integrating disciplines. While on the job training remains important in developing systems engineers and architects, we present in this paper an effort to start this training already in university. We present systems design and engineering as embedded in a university program. The design of, and experiences with, an individual student project aimed at practicing systems architecting is treated. This involves the set-up of the project, students' results and their experiences.