A summer-study intensive computer science practicum

Educating students for employment in computer science involves much more than teaching computer programming skills. Students must know how to apply those skills to real problems. Also, the student needs generic skills that include teamwork, communication, project management, independent thinking, and creative problem solving. Integration of these skills is required so that students can work on a team, communicate about, plan, implement and report on a programming project. But integration and practical application are difficult to teach in ordinary classroom situations. In this paper we describe an intensive 6-week summer course in which each team of students completely develops a project for a real client. The project is the framework upon which the student learns to apply and integrate knowledge learned in regular classes.