This fall, a group of IST students set out to answer what many companies likely would consider a $64,000 question: Can an automated process be created that can improve the chances an IT project will be successful?
“Projects can fail for a lot of reasons,” said Kevin Hudish, one of a five-member team investigating success and failure criteria for Computer Aid, Inc., of Allentown. “Building a process that targets those can improve projects’ success rates.”
Hudish’s project, still underway in early December, was part of IST 443: IT Professional Services, a course which teamed students up with corporate partners to tackle actual problems.
Other student-corporate projects included providing a .NET dashboard for monitoring the company’s network resources for IT consulting firm Vis.align in West Chester, Pa.; developing an integrated system for subcontractor monitoring and invoicing for BAE Systems in McLean, Va.; and evaluating whether the U.S. Marine Corps can use a Web Services Remote Portal to integrate information from a variety of systems for parts and equipment maintenance.
Between IST 443 and IST 421, 15 teams of IST students had projects with companies this fall, said Brian Cameron, assistant professor, who taught the classes and organized the projects. Requirements included the basics of all projects: detailed project plans, weekly conference calls or videoconferences, a host of deliverables and project presentations often to corporate brass.
Aside from giving students real-world experience, the projects have an additional benefit: typically one member of every team will be offered an internship or full-time position with the company involved in that team’s project, Cameron said.
Josh Rex, a senior, admitted he knew nothing about Web Services standards before the fall semester began. Now he knows the technology—and more.
“This has shown me that I can take something I have never encountered and learn it,” Rex said. “Managing a project is not something you can learn in a textbook.”
Starting in fall 2005, classes such as IST 443 will become part of the IST Consulting Theme Track, a block of three courses which will prepare students to be IT consultants and project leaders.
