integration of project management components in ...

INTEGRATION OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT COMPONENTS IN UNDERGRADUATE INFORMATION SYSTEMS CURRICULA

Harry L. Reif, James Madison University* [email protected] James Madison University CIS/OM Program College of Business 309 Zane Showker Hall Harrisonburg, VA 22807 (540) 568-8122 (540) 569-3017 (fax)

Michel Mitri, James Madison University, [email protected]

INTEGRATION OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT COMPONENTS IN UNDERGRADUATE INFORMATION SYSTEMS CURRICULA

ABSTRACT This research presents information regarding how project management topics are integrated into information systems curricula. The IS ’97 and 2002 model curricula make certain recommendations for how this integration should be accomplished. We surveyed faculty to ascertain how project management coverage occurs in their courses. This paper presents the results of the survey, comparing actual practice with the expectations of the IS ’97 and 2002 model curricula, and highlighting discrepancies between the model and actual practice. Keywords: Project management, IS curriculum, Systems Analysis and Design. INTRODUCTION This research is the result of a preliminary examination of the level of adoption of the project management components contained in the IS’97 and 2002 model information systems (IS) curriculum. The model curriculum was generated by the major IS professional associations as a tool for aiding IS educators. The model describes eleven courses containing instructional components deemed necessary for all IS degree programs. Given that the model has existed for over five years (originated in 1997 and updated in 2002), it is reasonable to expect that the IS education community has had ample opportunity to study and embrace appropriate portions of the model into their degree programs. Yet, there is scant Page 1

evidence documenting the level of adoption of the model, and in particular project management (PM) elements of the model. This exploratory research is an initial step in documenting the level of adoption of the PM components of the model IS curriculum by IS educators and in identifying how educators are adopting the model’s recommendations regarding PM coverage. Faculty responses to these questions are aggregated and summarized for the reader. Observations are offered and discussed so that other researchers can participate in seeking answers to the important issues recognized and highlighted by this study.

A REVIEW OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT COVERAGE IN INFORMATION SYSTEMS CURRICULA This section presents an historical overview of how and why PM skills have been taught in collegiate IS curricula over the past few decades, culminating with an introduction to the PM content recommended in the IS ’97 and IS 2002 model curricula. PM as a discipline is not unique to IS. Instead, it encompasses a broad array of industry areas including aerospace, automotive, business management, construction, engineering, financial services, IS, pharmaceuticals and telecommunications [1]. The U.S.’s trillion dollar annual expenditure on information technology [8], the high rate of software project failures, and the frequent incidences of cost and schedule overruns [14] all provide strong motivation for applying sound PM principles to IS efforts. Research has shown that PM education and training can improve the

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success rate in IS deployment by alleviating problems inherent in administering project teams, improving communications among team members, and clarifying role fulfillment [15]. Nevertheless, surveys of industry and academic professional indicate a relatively low priority placed on PM skill training, at least compared to other personal and technical skills like interpersonal communications, team building, systems analysis, database design, and software development [5, 11, 13, 20]. Perhaps because of this perception of the relative unimportance of PM, there exists a significant discrepancy between the expectations of employers and the actual performance of entry-level employees with respect to PM skills [5]. While PM skills are not ranked among the most important of the technical and business skills for entry-level IT workers, they are consistently included as components of recommended collegiate IS curricula, from the earliest development of such curricula [3, 6] to the present day [9, 10, 11, 12, 13]. Educators approach the task of teaching IT-related PM skills in a variety of ways. These include working in teams to share practical PM experiences [4], using computerized simulation teaching models [19], incorporating PM skills into software development group project simulations [2], converting industry seminars into university PM courses [16], conducting roleplaying exercises involving application of PM techniques to fictitious software projects [21], and combining in-class and out-of-class exercises, team projects, and class presentations [17]. Each of these strategies seeks to provide students with genuine PM experiences through a variety of instructional techniques. Curriculum designers confront the conundrum of fitting a broad spectrum of topics into a limited number of credit hours. Trying to distribute PM content into the already overcrowded IS curriculum is one example. Recommendations for distribution of coverage range from including Page 3

a separate PM course [7] to covering of PM content in the systems analysis and design (SAD) course [18] to a distribution of PM topics across multiple courses in the major. The IS ’97 and IS 2002 curricula, the pre-eminent models guiding most IS programs today, combine all three approaches. The IS 97 and 2002 models include some PM coverage within most courses. Not unsurprisingly, there is a heavier emphasis in the more advanced courses. PM coverage peaks during the suggested advanced programming (or software engineering) course and culminates, during the final semester of the program, in a capstone PM course. In the following section we examine the major components of the IS ’97 and 2002 curricula, focusing on how these models implement PM coverage. IS ’97 AND 2002 MODEL CURRICULUM COURSES AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT LEARNING UNITS The IS’97 Model Curriculum for IS education [10] consists of a core of eleven courses, together, encompass 127 learning units. Although this was updated in 2002 [13], our study was already underway at the time, so the survey and results are based on IS ’97 learning units (with the addition of the E-Commerce course units introduced in IS 2002). The IS’97 and IS’02 course names and a brief description of each course are included as Appendix A. Each of the eleven IS’97 Model Curriculum’s courses and 127 Learning Units were reviewed and a map depicting where PM related Learning Units were included in each of the Model Courses was created. Eleven PM-related learning units were identified. This mapping is depicted in Table 1.

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Learning Unit Description

IS’97 Learning Unit #

Objective Number

Project planning, selection of appropriate process model; project scheduling and milestones

3.7.1

1

Project organization management, principles, concept and issues

3.7.2

2

Work breakdown structures and scheduling

3.7.3

3

Project staffing considerations: e.g., matrix mgt., human factors, team...

3.7.4

4

Project control: planning, cost estimation, resource allocation, software technologies...

3.7.5

5

Managing multiple projects

3.7.6

6

Management concerns; stress and time management

3.7.7

7

Scoping and scope control

3.7.11

8

Project tracking: e.g., PERT, Gantt

3.7.14

9

Project close-down...

3.7.15

10

Software project management: scoping, scheduling, configuration management

3.10.7

11

4

Table 1 - Mapping of IS’97 Learning Unit Descriptions to Survey Objectives

As indicated in the previous section, the IS’97 model curriculum intersperses coverage of the PM learning units throughout multiple courses, with heavier emphasis in the more advanced courses and culminating in a capstone PM course. The coverage espoused by the model is illustrated in Table 2.

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PM Objectives Courses Knowledge Work Software Toolkit Personal Software Productivity

1

2

3

5

6

7

8

9

10

X

11

X

X X

Fundamentals of IS IS Theory and Practice IT Hardware and System Software Programming, Data Files and Object Structures Analysis and Logical Design Networks and Telecommunications Physical Design and Implementation with DBMS Physical Design in Emerging Environments Project Management and Practice

4

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X X

X

X

X

X

X

X X

X X

X

X

Table 2 - Mapping of IS’97 Learning Unit Objectives to Courses

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY In constructing and disseminating our survey, we considered several factors. First, we recognized that universities use their own course titles and sequences, and that these often do not coincide with IS’97 or ‘02 models. Second was the challenge of locating and listing all IS department heads, and a recognition that department heads may not have detailed knowledge of the specific content covered in individual courses. On the other hand, faculty members actually Page 6

teaching the courses would be more likely to have intimate knowledge of the specific topics they covered in class. In addition, it was convenient to make use of an existing email list of faculty subscribers to the IS World list server for the purposes of survey dissemination. Thus, our approach was to allow faculty to self-report information regarding which learning objectives were covered in particular courses. Therefore the survey obtained information about whether PM objectives are covered in the courses taught by individual faculty respondents. However, as a preliminary study, our survey did not obtain information about programs or curricula as a whole, nor did it ask questions regarding the level or depth of coverage of these learning objectives in their courses. Future research efforts can focus on these issues. At the time of the survey, the IS ’02 model was under construction. Therefore, we decided that information regarding proposed IS’02 course E-Business Strategy, Architecture and Design would be solicited and that information regarding IS’97 course Physical Design and Implementation with a Programming Environment would be expanded to reflect the expected orientation towards a distributed web development environment. These were the principal changes between IS ’97 and IS ’02. In order to maximize response rate, we attempted to make the survey as easy as possible to use. We developed a short on-line web survey that took faculty approximately five minutes to complete. The data collected during the survey provided us with demographic information about each faculty respondent, their institution, the courses that they taught, and the PM related learning units covered in each of their courses.

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The main informational pages of the survey are shown in Figure 1. One page inquires about the IS courses that the respondent has taught within the past 24 months. This information is used to generate a customized matrix, page four, showing each of the courses that the faculty member taught coupled with a list of the IS’97 learning units associated with each course. Respondents were asked to indicate whether or not each learning unit was covered in each of their courses.

Figure 1 – Main information pages of web survey instrument.

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RESULTS As discussed above, the survey was administered using a web site. IS faculty throughout the U.S. were contacted via email using an email database provided by IS World. The IS World database contains over 2,500 faculty names and email addresses. An email message was sent to listserv members teaching at higher education institutions soliciting their participating in the survey. Although a large number of the email solicitations were returned due to invalid email addresses, a total of 239 faculty respondents completed the web-based survey. Respondents typically taught multiple courses in their programs and provided information regarding their coverage of PM topics in all the courses they had taught during the two-year period preceding the survey.

Table 3 presents the results of the survey. Each row shows the percentage of faculty members who reported coverage of PM objectives (see Table 2) in a course. The table includes all courses of the IS 2002 model curriculum plus three additional course categories that we added as a result of courses reported by survey respondents using the “Other IS Courses with PM content” survey response option: DSS/AI/Knowledge Management, IT Management and Business Reengineering, and a generic “Other” category.

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% Faculty Covering PM Objectives in IS Classes Classes Productivity Software

Obj.1

Obj.2

Obj.3

Obj.4

Obj.5

Obj.6

Obj.7

Obj.8

Obj.9

Obj.10

Obj.11

24

24

7

5

7

12

10

7

7

0

7

Intro IS

28

48

17

28

21

8

29

19

19

6

18

E-Business

45

61

20

31

41

12

20

24

12

8

33

Advanced IS

46

62

31

49

38

41

36

31

21

13

33

Hardware/Op Sys

8

17

8

8

25

8

8

0

17

0

0

Intro Programming

15

28

23

5

3

3

10

18

3

5

15

Network

18

41

15

21

35

21

26

35

15

9

12

Systems Analysis

76

91

74

71

76

26

49

74

76

48

68

Database Advanced Pgm or Web Development

27

60

16

22

20

7

16

27

9

5

20

36

48

32

20

8

24

20

36

16

0

24

Project Management DSS/AI/Knowledge Management IT Management or Business Process Redesign Other (seminars, industry-specific courses, special topics, etc.)

55

97

97

94

100

76

80

95

97

92

92

21

50

29

43

21

14

7

21

29

7

21

50

63

31

56

44

34

47

44

34

28

41

30

20

70

37

43

43

27

33

30

30

27

Table 3 – Percent of Faculty PM coverage by course and learning objective.

Table 3 shows that PM topics are covered to some extent in every course category. Table 4 summarizes the course-wise comparison of PM coverage breadth reported by the survey respondents. Normal font courses correspond to the courses recommended in IS 2002’s model curriculum. Italicized course name entries indicate courses that were not included in the IS 2002 model curriculum.

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Course Title Productivity Software Introduction to IS Advanced IS Hardware and Operation Systems E-Business Introductory Programming Advanced Programming or Web Development Networking Database Systems Analysis Project Management DSS/AI/Knowledge Management IT Management or Business Process Redesign Other (seminars, industry-specific courses, special topics, etc.) • • • • •

Faculty Teaching this Course 42 96 39 12 49 39 25 34 55 127 66 14 32 30

Breadth of Project Management Coverage * Very Light Light Moderate Very Light Moderate Light Light Light Light Very Heavy Very Heavy Light Moderate Moderate

* KEY to Breadth of Project Management Coverage Ratings Very Heavy = 5 or more objectives with 70% or higher coverage Heavy = 5 or more objectives with 50% or higher coverage Moderate = 5 or more objectives with 30% or higher coverage Light = 5 or more objectives with 10% or higher coverage Very Light = less than 5 objectives with 10% or higher coverage Table 4 - Comparison of Project Management Topic Coverage by Course

Productivity Software, Introduction to IS, Hardware, Programming, Networking, Database, and DSS courses were all rated as light or very light in terms of breadth of PM topic coverage. Advanced IS, E-Business, Information Technology Management and the “Other” category all rated as moderate breadth of PM coverage. SAD and PM both rated as very heavy in breadth of PM coverage.

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DISCUSSION The purpose of this study was to identify how project management topics are being covered in IS curricula across the country. The IS ’97 model provided IS educators with a prescription for integrating PM topics into undergraduate IS curricula. Our survey measures from a practicing perspective, how IS educators have applied the IS ’97 model’s prescription to their individual programs. The survey findings coincided in many respects with the expectations of IS ‘97. For example, advanced courses tended to have heavier PM coverage than introductory courses. In addition, PM tended to be emphasized more thoroughly in managerial courses than in technical courses. However, one point of discrepancy was identified.

Specifically, many SAD courses were found to have very heavy PM content coverage across all objectives. This is contrary to the IS ‘97 expectations, which places a smaller emphasis on PM coverage in the SAD course. Although the course and scope descriptions in IS ’97 include discussion of PM coverage, only two PM learning unit objectives are included in IS ‘97’s SAD course (see Table 2). The IS 2002 model curriculum also discusses PM in the SAD course, but again assigns few actual PM learning objectives to this course.

In the following paragraphs, we propose potential explanations for the extensive coverage of PM topics in SAD courses. Specifically, we argue that the SAD course serves as a surrogate PM course in lieu of an actual PM course in many IS curricula. Survey responses indicate that, in the absence of dedicated PM courses, primary coverage of most PM topics occurs in the SAD course.

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Clearly, many faculty respondents recognized the importance of PM. Although our survey did not seek opinions on the importance of PM to the IS curriculum, several respondents offered comments nonetheless. One instructor stated: “PM is important, and many businesses that recruit students, especially undergrad students, want to see this in the curriculum.” However, a dedicated PM course is a luxury many IS programs either cannot afford or choose not to implement. As one respondent commented: “…I think that PM does not receive enough attention in ours and, and I’m sure that you will find, in most Computer IS programs.” This opinion was echoed by a second respondent: “I also believe that universities neglect PM as a topic, a discipline and a focus for teaching MIS and Computer Science.”

Faculty who recognize the importance of PM coverage may find it necessary to include PM education in an alternative course, such as SAD, that is already present in curriculum. One faculty respondent commented: “Over the years I have incorporated project management topics into our one semester systems analysis course. This took place out of necessity since the students in this course are required to complete a systems analysis consulting project and since we do not currently offer a project management course.” Another respondent said: “Unfortunately, our curriculum does not provide a separate PM course at this time. SAD covers a great deal of material and the students are only introduced to many of the PM concepts and tools.” One respondent indicated that the Systems Analysis course is the natural location for PM topics, stating: “I suggest that you will find project management only in Systems Analysis and Design since it does not fit in most other topics.”

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A likely explanation for the lack of standalone PM courses in IS programs is the limited number of credit hours that universities are allowed to devote to a student’s major coursework. For example, most IS programs are offered in business schools; therefore IS majors are also business majors. The AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) requires that half of all the coursework completed by business majors must be completed in general education classes outside of the College of Business. Of the remaining half, AACSB requires significant coverage of non-major business areas (accounting, finance, production, marketing, and management). Thus, only 25% of an IS major’s coursework can consist of IS related classes. For a typical 120-credit collegiate career, this leaves 30 credits (or ten courses) that IS majors can take in their major.

The limited credit-hour availability must be distributed amongst a wide variety of courses, such as the eleven recommended by IS ’97, which represent 33 credits in most curricula. IS 2002 has modified some of the individual courses, but still recommends and eleven-course (33 credit) curriculum. Most CIS/MIS programs offer students elective options within the major, thus reducing the number of required major credits that can be imposed. Furthermore, IS departments may reason that students are receiving management training from other business areas (such as the management department), leading IS curriculum developers to sacrifice PM as a required course in the major. Therefore, out of necessity, the PM learning objectives are incorporated into the SAD course in many curricula.

To test this assertion we sought to discover whether faculty who teach SAD courses are more likely to cover PM topics if they are not also teaching PM courses. If this is found to be the case, Page 14

it is consistent with the supposition that SAD is indeed a surrogate PM course for these faculty. Following this line of reasoning, faculty teaching both SAD and PM courses would be less likely to cover PM topics in their SAD course, as alluded to by one respondent’s comments “We spend a complete semester on project management and therefore try to minimize the amount of time spent on the subject in the SA&D course.”

The survey results corroborate the supposition that SAD courses serve as surrogate PM courses. Figure 2 compares the number of faculty teaching each of the eleven PM survey objectives in their SAD courses based upon whether or not they were also teaching a PM course. For the vast majority of PM objectives, coverage in the SAD course is heavier for faculty not teaching a separate PM course. The only exceptions are objective 1, 8, and 11, where coverage is essentially equal between the two faculty categories.

Figure 2 - Faculty teaching only SAD vs. faculty teaching both SAD and PM

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To test these results for statistical significance we examined overall trends of PM coverage in SAD courses. The average number of objectives covered by SAD faculty teaching a separate PM course were compared with the average number of objectives covered by SAD faculty not teaching a separate PM course. Faculty teaching SAD and not PM courses covered an average of 7.73 PM topics in SAD. By contrast, faculty teaching both SAD and PM courses covered an average of only 6.21 PM topics in the SAD course. We conducted both a Mann-Whitney nonparametric statistical test and an independent-samples T-Test on these averages. Both showed significance at the .01 level. Thus, the statistical analysis supports the assertion that SAD courses are serving as substitute PM courses when PM courses are not available, at least at an aggregate level.

Next, we identified which objectives are most often substituted in the SAD course in lieu of a PM course. For this, we conducted chi-square tests for each PM objective. The results are shown in Table 5. Statistical significance at the .01 level is observed for objectives 3 and 5. Significance at the .05 level was observed for objectives 2, 4, and 7. A weak significance at the 0.1 level was observed for objective 9. The other objectives showed no significant difference between faculty teaching a separate PM course and those who did not.

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Objective Number

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Learning Unit Description Project planning, selection of appropriate process model; project scheduling and milestones Project organization management, principles, concept and issues Work breakdown structures and scheduling Project staffing considerations: e.g., matrix mgt., human factors, team... Project control: planning, cost estimation, resource allocation, software technologies... Managing multiple projects Management concerns; stress and time management Scoping and scope control Project tracking: e.g., PERT, Gantt Project close-down... Software project management: scoping, scheduling, configuration management

2-Tailed Significance

1-Tailed Significance

1.00

.600

.042

.031

.003

.002

.018

.011

.000

.000

.270

.147

.035

.025

1.00 .115 .247

.560 .075 .143

1.00

.542

Table 5 - Chi-square tests for Project Management Course Objectives substituted in Systems Analysis courses

These results imply that, in the absence of explicit PM coursework, faculty consider it important to include work breakdown structures and schedules, project control considerations, cost estimation, resource allocation, project organization, staffing considerations and human/team factors, stress and time management (and perhaps graphical tools such as PERT and Gantt) in the SAD course. When these topics are covered in a separate PM course, they receive lighter coverage in the SAD course.

There is much less distinction between SAD faculty who teach separate PM courses vs. those that do not in the coverage of project planning and process model selection, multiple PM, scoping and scope control, project close-down, and applications of PM techniques to software projects. This data can be interpreted in more depth by viewing the graph in Figure 2. Project planning, process model selection, scope control, and PM application to software projects seem Page 17

to be considered too important to sacrifice from the SAD course even if they are covered in a separate PM course. Managing multiple projects and project close-down issues were not considered important components of SAD courses regardless of whether or not they were covered in separate PM courses.

Note that the apparently widespread use of SAD as a surrogate PM course runs counter to the expectations of the framers of IS’97. Although PM is described as a component of the systems analysis course in these model curricula, the explicit inclusion of PM objectives in IS’97’s description of the SAD course is limited to scoping and software PM. This is in contrast to courses such as Database and Physical Program Design and Implementation (advanced programming). IS’97’s model curriculum includes far wider breadth of explicitly defined PM objectives in these courses. Our survey findings contradict this expectation, indicating only light PM coverage in these courses, as evidenced by Table 4 and Figures 3 and 4.

Furthermore, unlike with the SAD course, there is no significant difference in coverage of PM topics of the Advanced Programming and Database courses between instructors who also teach a separate PM course vs. those that do not; i.e. there is little indication that these courses serve as substitute PM courses.

Mann Whitney tests showed no significant difference in distribution of

overall coverage between faculty teaching separate PM courses vs. those that did not. Chi square tests on individual PM objectives found a significant difference at the .05 level only for objective 3 (work breakdown structures and scheduling) in the Advanced Programming course.

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A confounding factor may have been introduced by naming the course category “Advanced Programming or Web Development” in the survey instead of using IS’97’s suggested course title, “Physical Design and Implementation with Programming Environments.” The course description emphasizes software construction and object-oriented/event-driven programming. The model curriculum also emphasizes coverage of quality assurance, documentation, user training, PM, and programming in this course. Possible confusion, given what is implied in the course title names, may invalidate a direct comparison between “Advanced Programming” and “Physical Design and Implementation in a Programming Environment”.

Some IS curricula use the title “Software Engineering” for the course described in IS’97 as “Physical Design”. Only two survey respondents reported teaching a Software Engineering course. One of these respondents reported covering ten of the eleven PM objectives; the other respondent reported coverage of six PM objectives. While a sample size of two is inconclusive, it may be the case that Software Engineering courses following Systems Analysis courses place heavy emphasis on PM techniques.

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Figure 3 - Comparison of Faculty Teaching Advanced Programming and Project Management

Figure 4 - Comparison of Faculty Teaching Advanced Programming and Database

Nevertheless, analysis of the data indicates that in most cases, the SAD class is unique in serving as a substitute PM course when IS programs do not offer a standalone PM course in their curricula. Contrary to the expectations and intentions of IS 97’s curriculum developers, most database courses do not include significant PM coverage. Nor is there significant PM coverage in advanced programming and web development courses. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that PM coverage may be more evident in 2nd-semester design courses such as software engineering.

Since our survey was conducted, the IS ’97 model was updated to IS 2002. The primary change between IS ’97 and IS 2002 was to merge two introductory courses into a single Productivity Software course, and to include a new course in E-Business [13]. In addition, the course formerly titled “Physical Design and Implementation in Programming Environments” was changed to “Physical Design and Implementation in Emerging Environments.” The updated course emphasizes rapid application development and web-based systems. In terms of distribution of

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PM learning units, IS 2002 assigns fewer learning unit objectives to introductory courses than was done in IS ’97. For the SAD course description, IS 2002 includes more frequent use of PM terms than was the case in IS ’97, which may reflect a recognition by the framers of IS 2002 that SAD courses are sometimes serving as surrogate PM courses. However, as was the case in IS ‘97’s SAD course, the number of specific PM learning unit objectives assigned to IS 2002’s SAD course is still limited. CONCLUSIONS This research examined the level of adoption by IS faculty of the major PM components contained in the IS’97 Model curriculum. It is important to acknowledge that since this research began the committee updating the IS’97 model has released an updated IS 2002 Model Curriculum. While the models are very similar, the discussion and conclusions offered in this research are based on survey data collected using objectives of the IS ’97 model. We anticipate updating our survey data based upon the IS 2002 model once faculty have had the opportunity to examine and make changes to their instruction based upon the update model. As fellow IS professionals, the authors are grateful to the many individuals who have contributed to both models. The results of this research provide important information to the models’ authors and to IS educators regarding the level of adoption of the courses suggested in the models, and regarding the methods that educators are using to incorporate PM-related learning objectives into their curriculums. Our study finds that IS educators have adopted the PM-related learning objectives included in the IS’97 Model, although not necessarily in prescribed course content and sequencing contained in the Model. We found evidence that when a separate PM course is not available, the IS ’97 Page 21

model’s PM learning objectives are being covered extensively in the SAD course. In this sense the SAD course serves as a surrogate PM course in many IS programs. When a separate PM course is available, the majority of PM learning objectives are covered in the PM course, and the SAD course provides secondary, but lighter, PM coverage.

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