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Sustainability is a topic of increasing interest. The United Nations has released a list of 17 goals for sustainable development for the global community. Blockchain is a recent technological innovation that shows great promise in changing industries. In this paper, we look specifically at smart grids and supply chain management systems as areas where sustainable technological innovation can happen. To identify software engineering aspects of blockchain in smart grids and supply chain management, we start upon online libraries focusing on engineering and information technology, and we opted for the methodology of systematic mapping studies in software engineering. The search strategy identified 535 papers, of which 60 were identified as main studies for our mapping. To the best of the authors' knowledge, no previous similar studies exist. Results of the study show that the research connecting blockchain technology to smart grids and supply chain management systems is still young. None of the techniques or systems have yet been implemented in a real life setting. As such, more work has to be done before we can look at the actual implications of putting such technologies into use. Software engineering practices could prove to be very useful in the process of development. We propose that future studies can focus on bringing the technologies closer to real life implementations, as well as how to involve the end users in the development of the blockchain-based systems.

Context: Software startups are software-intensive early phase companies with high growth rates. Previous researchers regarded startups' time to market as short and decisive in establishing the product/service success. This led to shortcuts in software engineering decisions. Researchers in previous investigations documented a high accumulation of technical debt (TD) in early startup phases. However, we found little evidence in the literature concerning TD when startups transition to the growth phase. Aim: Our goal was to evaluate how the transition from early to growth phases affects TD perception in software startups. Methodology: We conducted a pilot study guided by semi-structured interviews from multiple software startup cases. Results: We identified the four following dimensions: (1) managing, (2) accepting, (3) avoiding, and (4) ignoring TD. Contribution: Our study will allow practitioners to address TD in growth-phase software startups. Future researchers can benefit from our findings by conducting exploratory studies and providing educated recommendations.

We have been teaching an experiential-based course for fist year master students. In the last two years, we have added to the course external activities such as Hackathon and Bootcamp. These external activities helped students internalize how important are soft skills and involvement of external stakeholders to succeed in developing relevant startup projects. This year, we wanted to evaluate if students were getting what we declared. We conducted a survey on students perception of different dimensions: soft skills challenges (teamwork, communication with stakeholders, presentation, negotiation, and innovation), technical challenges and project management (PM) challenges, before and at the end of the Bootcamp days. We found out that the mean values regarding soft skill challenges and project management vary, while values regarding technical challenge have not changed before and after Bootcamp. The overall outcomes of the study contribute to conceptualizing an early model integrating student startup formation with course learning outcomes.

Contemporary approaches and trends in software engineering courses have been continuously updated over the last four decades. Adaptation to industry needs is crucial for future educational purposes and vice versa. Tech startups have become a driving force in the economy and a major industry trend. The goal of this paper is first to critically assess how contemporary industry trends and in particular, tech startups have influenced the updating of software engineering curricula. The second goal is to evaluate the contribution of industry and in particular, tech startups, processes and models in present learning approaches. The third goal addresses how stakeholders have helped in the infusion of industry trends and in particular, in tech startup approaches in academia. This study is a systematic literature mapping. A total of 138 papers were selected based on education goals, research, and contribution type. Of the primary education topics, 78% were related to teaching strategies, 9% to globalization and training methods, and less than 5% to tech startup and industry innovation. Common stakeholders accounting for the change are students, researchers, and lecturers and project managers, product owners, customers, and clients from industry. This study showed that industrial models or methods involving Agile and Scrum have been widely adopted. Less investigated areas that have recently become common industry trends, such as tech startup models adopting lean methodology, require further attention and might create opportunities for updating the curricula. We discuss future model possibilities for exploiting tech startups as a means for renewing future capstone courses. Index Terms-software engineering courses, teaching approaches, mapping study, tech startups