Session F4G 0-7803-8552-7/04/$20.00 © 2004 IEEE October 20 – 23, 2004, Savannah, GA 34 th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference F4G-1 On Becoming A Winning Student Team: Placing Third In An International Design Competition Margaret R. Heil 1 , Robert J. Fornaro 2 , Nathan D. Green 3 , Jeremy W. Maness 4 & Whitmel H. Webb IV 5 1 Margaret R. Heil, NCSU, Computer Science Department, Senior Design Center, Associate Director, Raleigh, NC 27695, heil@csc.ncsu.edu 2 Robert J. Fornaro, NCSU, Computer Science Department, Senior Design Center, Director, Raleigh, NC 27695, fornaro@ncsu.edu 3 Nathan D. Green, Computer Specialist, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Washington, DC 20002, nathan@nathangreen.com 4 Jeremy W. Maness, Software Developer, SmartPath, Morrisville, NC 27560, jeremy.maness@smartpath.com 5 Whitmel H. Webb IV, Development Programmer, Hydrill Inc., Raleigh, NC 27612, buckwebb@buckwebb.com Abstract – In the Senior Design Center of the Computer Science Department at North Carolina State University, a model has been outlined that uses teaming as a framework to support professional communication and software development process to improve student project performance. The model described above was used as the basis to form a team of computer science students who entered the IEEE Computer Society International Design Competition (CSIDC 2003). The theme of CSIDC 2003 was Added Value: Turning Computers Into Systems. The NC State student team created "Diet Download," a system that uses a bar code scanner coupled with a PDA to assist a person with following a diet plan as he or she does grocery shopping. This paper describes the experience of the CSIDC 2003 student team on their journey from the formation of their team to their third place finish in this worldwide competition. Index Terms – Capstone Courses, Teams, Undergraduate Computer Science Education, IEEE Computer Society International Design Competition (CSIDC). INTRODUCTION At North Carolina State University (NCSU), the Department of Computer Science (CSC) has established a Senior Design Center with the mission of integrating technical projects, teaming, professional communication skills (writing and presenting), and a software development process into an undergraduate capstone design course. The Center’s approach has evolved from 10 years experience in offering a 15-week capstone senior design project course, CSC 492. The Senior Design Center was established in 1994 to facilitate interaction between the Computer Science Department and North Carolina industry for the purpose of providing computer science seniors realistic project experiences. CSC 492 is team taught by the Director of the Senior Design Center, a professor of computer science, and by the Associate Director/Team Coordinator of the Senior Design Center, a certified team specialist/technical communicator. Since 20+ unique teams are formed each semester, the Center also provides students with a technical mentor and an extended staff to assist students with team coordination, technical communication instruction, and laboratory support. Additionally, industrial sponsors and provide projects and a contact engineer. The instructors of CSC 492 assume that students enter the course with a core knowledge of computer science and software engineering, as well as some experience with technical writing and speaking (via prerequisites for the capstone course). The intent of the senior design course is to emphasize software development process, professional communication, and teaming. It has been the experience of the Center staff that the best results are produced when a team shares a common vision and goal, when each individual of the team finds the best way that he or she can contribute to that vision and goal, and further, when each person on the team is able to encourage other team members to similarly contribute. This philosophy was expressed at the most recent NCSU CSC Department graduation by Mr. Gerhard Pilcher, CEO of H.B. Rowe & Co., Mount Airy, NC. Pilcher advised our graduates to recognize their own talents, use them to achieve lifetime goals, and look for these talents in other people [8]. Our approach is to foster this attitude by providing formal team training to students enrolled in CSC 492. At the beginning of the Spring 2003 semester, a team of four students came together to work on the IEEE Computer Society International Design Competition (CSIDC) offered to them as a senior design project in CSC 492. The theme of the 2003 competition was “Added Value: Turning Computers Into Systems” [2]. Competing student teams were required to submit written interim and final reports to the competition describing their system. The top ten teams from around the world were invited to compete in Washington DC as finalists. The NCSU team placed third at this competition. The CSIDC strongly believes that effective teamwork optimizes innovativeness and product realization, and the judges expect to see that competing students have bought into this idea [1]. In previous works related to the NCSU CSC Senior Design Center activities, we have reported on the added value of providing teaming instruction, of monitoring student teamwork, and of establishing an environment where open, frequent communication occurs among instructors, students, and industrial sponsors [3, 4, 6]. This paper explores the journey taken by this winning CSIDC student team as they prepared for various course and competition milestones. It describes how teaming elements fueled the software development process that lead to the creation of the team’s product. We also discuss elements of the communication components (i.e., formal written