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A project to support underrepresented groups in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) subjects is being carried out at the Department of Computer Science at the Technical University of Nuremberg Georg Simon Ohm (TH GSO). This project intends to counteract the shortage of specialists in the STEM occupations by supporting underrepresented student groups (i.e. students with a migration background, from non-academic households, female students, and single parents) before, during and after their studies. To this end, digitization measures in STEM studies should be evaluated and carried out at the TH GSO Nuremberg. The entire life cycle plays a decisive role in this, starting with the choice of the students' course of study, through their university or college studies, to entry into the labor market, and is included in this research project. Specific digital prototypes will be developed as supporting measures. The identification of underrepresented groups of students in STEM subjects is the starting point of this project. At the beginning of the student life cycle, the identified groups should be provided with information about STEM fields to support their choices of study subjects. For this purpose, some digital advisory tools will be developed. To prevent them from breaking-off their studies, influencing factors have to be identified. Knowing these factors, an early-warning system will be developed. This system should identify students who are at risk of failing and propose supporting measures to them at an early stage. At the end of their studies, they should be assisted in their choice of a suitable job and in applying for jobs with digital tools. [For the complete proceedings, see ED608557.]

Due to increasing digitization in all aspects of life, the demand for qualified software development professionals continues to increase. Students from underrepresented groups, such as first generation students from non-academic families, minorities, single parents and women represent an underutilized pool of untapped potential talent. The question arises as to which unique perspectives computer science graduates from underrepresented groups can bring to software development companies. In addition to programming skills, non-technical competencies, such as foreign language abilities, intercultural communication, creativity, conflict management, team-building and organizational skills are vital for success in diverse, international project teams. A large job market database for new graduates, developed for a consortium of universities in Bavaria, Germany, is analyzed using machine learning tools. Career competencies desired by recruiting companies are compared to potential advantages offered by computer science graduates from underrepresented groups. [For the complete proceedings, see ED608557.]

A novel course concept to enable master's degree students to acquire research skills is described as an experience report. A hybrid, inquiry-based format was developed to simulate each phase of writing and presenting a research paper at a scientific conference. Students self-organized into groups to conduct each phase of the research process to conduct a research project for a scientific topic, bionic computation. Weekly group meetings with the instructor were conducted via video conference. Students learned to formulate research questions, write abstracts, acquire experimental data and evaluate open-source libraries and tools to build their own experimental models. An in-house, mini-conference was held in person, in which each group held a presentation of their work. At the end of the semester, a retrospective was held to reflect on students' experiences and summarize the lessons they have learned. After the course, slight majority of the students stated that they could imagine writing a paper about their master's theses and taking part in a real conference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent revolution in chatbot technology based on artificial intelligence poses new problems in education. These machine learning systems have the ability to convincingly mimic human intelligence to an extent which makes it difficult to differentiate between answers generated by the chatbot versus answers written by a human expert. Not only news articles and essays, but also answers to homework assignments and even computer code can be generated with relatively little effort by using a generative AI chatbot. For instructors at institutions of higher education, ignoring these possibilities is not a realistic option. This paper presents an overview of the available relevant literature. Critical questions for instructors of computer science are raised. Experiences in an undergraduate course on databases are described. Initial lessons learned and resulting possibilities on how to integrate chatbot technology into teaching methods are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The importance of intercultural communication skills required for global software engineering has become increasingly more important due to the current pandemic. Cooperative, digital classes conducted simultaneously in two different countries can help students learn the intercultural communication skills necessary to work effectively with team members from different cultures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A project to support underrepresented groups in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) subjects is being carried out at the Department of Computer Science at the Technical University of Nuremberg Georg Simon Ohm (TH GSO). This project intends to counteract the shortage of specialists in the STEM occupations by supporting underrepresented student groups (i.e. students with a migration background, from non-academic households, female students, and single parents) before, during and after their studies. To this end, digitization measures in STEM studies should be evaluated and carried out at the TH GSO Nuremberg. The entire life cycle plays a decisive role in this, starting with the choice of the students' course of study, through their university or college studies, to entry into the labor market, and is included in this research project. Specific digital prototypes will be developed as supporting measures. The identification of underrepresented groups of students in STEM subjects is the starting point of this project. At the beginning of the student life cycle, the identified groups should be provided with information about STEM fields to support their choices of study subjects. For this purpose, some digital advisory tools will be developed. To prevent them from breaking-off their studies, influencing factors have to be identified. Knowing these factors, an early-warning system will be developed. This system should identify students who are at risk of failing and propose supporting measures to them at an early stage. At the end of their studies, they should be assisted in their choice of a suitable job and in applying for jobs with digital tools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to increasing digitization in all aspects of life, the demand for qualified software development professionals continues to increase. Students from underrepresented groups, such as first generation students from non-academic families, minorities, single parents and women represent an underutilized pool of untapped potential talent. The question arises as to which unique perspectives computer science graduates from underrepresented groups can bring to software development companies. In addition to programming skills, non-technical competencies, such as foreign language abilities, intercultural communication, creativity, conflict management, team-building and organizational skills are vital for success in diverse, international project teams. A large job market database for new graduates, developed for a consortium of universities in Bavaria, Germany, is analyzed using machine learning tools. Career competencies desired by recruiting companies are compared to potential advantages offered by computer science graduates from underrepresented groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]