Teaching a multicultural perspective in software engineering

Globalization of thought refers to the development of ideas and judgments to accurately account for multiculturalism. Within software engineering, it is important that students understand that when planning a product, designers must keep the scope of the project in mind. Many products have a worldwide effect; product planning must take into account the needs, desires, and cultural mores of societies that will be impacted. In the globalization lecture delivered within undergraduate software engineering courses, the students were prompted with different discussion questions involving products that were successful in the American market, yet failed in a foreign market. Students thought mainly of politically correct rationale as a means of explaining why the products were not globally successful. While the students began to develop an understanding of what globalization meant and its effect on product design during the lecture, afterwards they failed to incorporate this knowledge into their subsequent software designs. To help students develop an appropriate understanding, the pedagological theory of backward design was used to develop a curriculum that helped pupils build an understanding of multiculturalism and apply it to product design.