USER PARTICIPATION AND PARTICIPATORY DESIGN - TOPICS IN COMPUTING EDUCATION

User participation and participatory design (PD) have not yet been top ics of central interest in the context of formal education for computi ng professionals. This article addresses this subject. It takes its st arting point in the ongoing curriculum debate and discusses how mathem atical- and engineering-based approaches and traditional system-develo pment training contribute to education in computer science and informa tics. All these approaches have shortcomings as they each relate mainl y to a technical-oriented paradigm, which pays little attention to oth er vital aspects of computing, namely organizational, social, and poli tical ones. Therefore, the curriculum debate is widened and it is argu ed why user participation and PD (as approaches that deal with these i ssues) should be part of a comprehensive computing education. An examp le of an actual course program and the description of one particular c ourse demonstrate how these subjects can be integrated in computer sci ence and system development education.