Adjusting the instruction of the personal software process to improve student participation

No customer is fully satisfied unless they receive a product that does what they want, and they receive it when they want it, defect-free and at an agreed upon price. To address all four of these requirements, Watts Humphrey, at the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), developed the personal software process (PSP), which applies proven quality principles to the work of individual software engineers. PSP was initially taught to practicing software engineers in industry and to graduate students. Earlier this year, Humphrey published a new text, suitable for the beginning software engineering student. This text outlines a process for managing and producing high quality software, reducing the mathematical and statistical rigor of the original PSP, but maintaining a solid base of disciplined practices and an overriding quality philosophy. This paper describes how the PSP has been incorporated into the undergraduate computer science courses at the University of Utah, USA. It highlights how instruction has been adapted to improve student participation, retention and utilization of the material