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Agile Development of Cross-University Digital Education Ecosystems

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Systems, Software and Services Process Improvement (EuroSPI 2021)

Abstract

Agile methodology for software development and IT projects has developed into more complex, hybrid project management frameworks – notably the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe). This allows the agile management of complex IT portfolios or development programmes which require methodology which goes beyond the single-project-single-team scope of e.g. the basic Scrum approach. The SAFe methodology claims to be the right approach for lean enterprises. But this still assumes that it is implemented in a single organization with stable organizational setups and team structures and with professional staff. In contrast, we apply SAFe in a typical distributed and loose environment of an Open Source development project. Instead of a dedicated team, the involved staff is organized in an informal, open community of practice (OpenCoP) where participants join and leave and where staff contributes only certain amounts of time with a limited commitment. In addition, we deal with a university led IT programme which involves students as developers with limited experience and competence in professional project work. This paper presents the case study of the development of a Digital Education Ecosystem (DEE) for a Virtual Master School. The members of this Master School (including the students) are the co-developers and the users of the DEE. They form an OpenCoP which develops a customized IT system for their own needs. Applying SAFe in such an environment is new and challenging. This paper describes first experiences in this field.

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Acknowledgement

This research is partly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) within the DAAD Strategic Partnership “European Partnership for Project and Innovation Management (EuroPIM)”, (grant agreement number: Projekt-ID 57172312), and the DAAD IMKD Project “Managing the Digital Transformation – Digital Education Ecosystem (ManDEE)”, (grant agreement number: Projekt-ID 57542858).

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Correspondence to Carsten Wolff .

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Wolff, C., Reimann, C., Mikhieieva, O., Mikhaylova, E. (2021). Agile Development of Cross-University Digital Education Ecosystems. In: Yilmaz, M., Clarke, P., Messnarz, R., Reiner, M. (eds) Systems, Software and Services Process Improvement. EuroSPI 2021. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1442. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-85521-5_51

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-85521-5_51

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-85520-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-85521-5

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