An Investigation of Requirements Engineering Teaching in Higher Education in Switzerland

Requirements Engineering (RE) has emerged as an independent discipline in recent decades and is no longer considered a peripheral topic in software engineering. However, teaching this discipline to students poses challenges for educators in higher education, as it requires developing soft skills, decision-making abilities, practical application knowledge, and providing theoretical content. This Ph.D. project aims to develop a comprehensive understanding of RE teaching and investigate how Swiss universities address these challenges to produce “industry-ready” students. The study will use an Exploratory Sequential Mixed Methods Design involving interviews with RE lecturers and analysis of module descriptions to gather information on curricula, degree programs, subject integration, prerequisites, and instructional approaches. An online questionnaire will assess former students' perception of the RE course, suitable prerequisites, and instructional methods. Examining the collected data will reveal potential relationships between prerequisites, instructional approaches, and students' comprehension of RE. Text mining will be employed to compare industry needs with university curricula, analyzing Swiss job advertisements for RE positions to gain insights into desired skills and certifications. By analyzing the collected data, potential relationships between prerequisites, instructional approaches, and students' comprehension of RE will be examined. The findings may enhance teaching approaches in Requirements Engineering Education (REE) in Switzerland and beyond.