01 August 2012

Learning agile methods at Victoria University

This week the labs for Victoria University's Agile Methods course have started. The class of about seventy software engineering (and computer science) students is divided into teams, and have each chosen a development project to work on. Most projects have been provided by industry organisations who have some development work suitable for students.

The projects last about ten weeks. The teams get to work through the complete development process, starting with choosing their agile methodology, processes and tools, choosing the technology stack, and developing the high level road map and plan of what they're building. Most teams have chosen to use scrum, but there is at least one Kanban team. Each team showcases their work every two weeks to the class and customer.

As well as hands-on agile experience, the students get good experience in working as part of a team and delivering useful working software for real clients.

And the postgrad agile students get to play Agile Coach!