PARTICIPATION IN SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: A MULTI-DIMENSIONAL APPROACH

Much of the current literature on participation in the workplace pay especial attention to the educative dividend of these experiences. Particularly, software development projects are described as places where knowledge is constantly built and where people learn through participation. However, much measures of participation in this context are based on knowledge contributions and the number of code lines. In this paper we explore the components of the learning environments existing in the projects of the software development centers that the University of the Informatics Sciences (UCI, according to its acronym in Spanish) of Cuba have. The focus of the study is placed on the participation of the students in these places as learning environments, and it was conducted through a 3-stages methodology. In the first stage, we studied related literature, in order to extract the dimensions of contemporary participation and specifically of participation in software development environments. A model of ten indicators related to the three main dimensions: the tasks, the individuals and the project. It was developed essentially based on the works of Carillo (2014) and Kelty et al. (2015). In the second stage, we readdressed the study to the components of learning environments in general and participation within; and we deepen on the fundamentals of software development and also on its components. As a result, we introduced as the main dimensions the concepts Interaction and Interactivity, and the previous three were treated as sub-dimensions and adapted to the five factors existing in a software development context: People, Process, Project, Product and Methods. We assume the Interaction as based on the interrelation of the student with the people in the Project, shaped by the roles they play, and the experience and the identity they achieve. Interactivity, in the other hand, is assumed as determined by the interrelation of the students with the tasks they play as part of the Process; with the resources, procedures and spaces of the Project; and with the Product and the Methods developed and adopted in it. Both concepts are adopted as mediated by the Tools that the Project use and the Tools the students prefer to communicate with others and to organize his/her learning. The previous ten indicators were mainly maintained, but reordered to associate them to the new sub-dimensions. In the third stage we conducted a semi-structured interview, in order to reflect in the model, the particularities of the participation of the students in software development internships in the projects of the UCI. Twelve individuals were interviewed, mostly software developers, students and mentors of students in their internships. We intended to know how they perceive the participation of the students in those projects. Therefore, the script was prepared taking into account the ten indicators of the model, but we allowed them to freely express their points of view, in order to extract any new possible indicator for the model. As a result, the descriptions of the indicators were adjusted using the common terms of the context. Furthermore, a new indicator was included, associated to the sub-dimension Project: the certification of the experience. Another study is being carried out, to validate this model and to design a scale to measure the participation in software development learning environments, for students of the UCI projects.