Incorporating Practical Computing Skills into a Supplemental CS2 Problem-solving Course

Abstract

where he has been teaching since 1996. He received his B.S. in electrical engineering from Caltech, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer and information science from The Ohio State University. His research interests include computer science education, software testing, software engineering, and programming languages. He is the project lead for Web-CAT, the most widely used open-source automated grading system in the world. Web-CAT is known for allowing instructors to grade students based on how well they test their own code. In addition, his research group has produced a number of other open-source tools used in classrooms at many other institutions. Currently, he is researching innovative for giving feedback to students as they work on assignments to provide a more welcoming experience for students, recognizing the effort they put in and the accomplishments they make as they work on solutions, rather than simply looking at whether the student has finished what is required. The goals of his research are to strengthen growth mindset beliefs while encouraging deliberate practice, self-checking, and skill improvement as students work.

Integrating DevOps to Enhance Student Experience in an Undergraduate Research Project

“…Historically, a large amount of self-learning has been necessary for students to acquire these practical computing skills. Recently, the Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech has begun to include more foundational skills such as Git and shell scripting into our First Year experience courses [13]. This has enabled students to transfer these skills to other co-curricular experiences such as Undergraduate Research and has prepared them to enter the workforce.…”