Use of Community Service-Learning Projects in Graduate Software Engineering Curricula

For the past 20 years, Seattle University´s Master of Software Engineering program has incorporated industry sponsored projects into its capstone course sequence. Starting in 2005 the program was expanded to leverage projects that would cut across the themes presented in various courses to enable students to experience continuity and a common pedagogical application in various topics. The projects are community-based project that utilize real customers in our local community, primarily from the non-profit sector. This paper explores our successes and setbacks in incorporating these case study projects throughout our curriculum.