On the Presence of Green and Sustainable Software Engineering in Higher Education Curricula

Abstract

Nowadays, software is pervasive in our everyday lives. Its sustainability and environmental impact have become major factors to be considered in the development of software systems. Millennials-the newer generation of university studentsare particularly keen to learn about and contribute to a more sustainable and green society. The need for training on green and sustainable topics in software engineering has been reflected in a number of recent studies. The goal of this paper is to get a first understanding of what is the current state of teaching sustainability in the software engineering community, what are the motivations behind the current state of teaching, and what can be done to improve it. To this end, we report the findings from a targeted survey of 33 academics on the presence of green and sustainable software engineering in higher education. The major findings from the collected data suggest that sustainability is under-represented in the curricula, while the current focus of teaching is on energy efficiency delivered through a fact-based approach. The reasons vary from lack of awareness, teaching material and suitable technologies, to the high effort required to teach sustainability. Finally, we provide recommendations for educators willing to teach sustainability in software engineering that can help to suit millennial students needs.

The future of software engineering: Visions of 2025 and beyond

“…In fact, another study on sustainable software engineering among academics found that there is very little in the software engineering curriculum about sustainability, the main focus being energy efficiency that is taught in a fact-based manner [23]. A researcher, however, argues that these approaches are insufficient since software changes constantly and as such ethics in software engineering must be relational and contextual [22].…”

Sustainable Software Engineering:A Perspective of Individual Sustainability

“…Several researchers have also highlighted the need to devise techniques and practices to support sustainable software engineering and also recommended various practices which can be used during software engineering life cycle to develop sustainable software [1], [12], [22]- [24], [30] Numerous researchers have shown their effort to incorporate the sustainability into software engineering curricula and highlight the competencies of software engineers mandatory for successful sustainable software engineering [3], [19], [28], [31].…”

Software Sustainability from A User Perspective A Case Study of A Developing Country (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia)

“…There are qualitative investigations such as [10], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23] and [24] and other quantitative studies such as [11], [25], [26], [27], [28] and [29], and mixed methods studies [30] and [31], all focusing on software sustainability from different perspectives e.g. Green.…”

“…The scale examines the importance of software sustainability, which shows that it is vital; however, the middling percentage reflects the uncertainties about respondents understanding of software sustainability. Sustainability can be hard to relate to unless further information is provided [29]. Another study reports software sustainability is not a major concern for users [25].…”