Team Formation and Project Assignment − the dilemma of assigning students to project groups

Abstract

To meet the needs of globalization and change in higher education group work projects are increasingly used. However, there is many methods mentioned in literature to assign student teams but little guidance on how best to allocate students to groups with reference to the project itself.The experience over a decade of teaching an IT project course is shared with different team composition methods in the context of various project settings: first: teams and projects are self-selected, second: randomly assigned groups select the projects, and third: projects are selected individually followed by assigned team formation. The different methodologies are outlined in detail and the impact of the composition and assignment method on project results and individual learning progress and success is discussed.