Computer systems "conference" for teaching communication skills

In an effort to improve the communication skills of students, many universities are requiring computer science educators to include writing and speaking components in their courses. This paper describes an alternative to the classic term paper assignment. A "student conference" approach has been successfully employed in a junior-level computer systems course for five semesters. Each student performs an implementation and experimental study, then writes a research-style technical paper on this work. Students also participate in an anonymous review process, revise their own papers, and make oral presentations of their work. The structure of this conference approach, representative assignments, and observations are presented.