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In Latin America, there is a high demand for employees with knowledge of software engineering and information technology (IT). However, the region currently has an estimated shortage of almost 450,000 IT professionals, with a deficiency of more than 25,000 in Colombia alone.
Software development is one of the most valuable skills currently in the labor market, but Spanish-speaking students do not have sufficient training options in their own language that are flexible and of high quality to help them perform in this field.
Given this problem, Universidad de los Andes (Colombia) announced its intention to develop a Master’s Degree in Software Engineering in collaboration with Coursera as a response to reduce this skills gap in the Latin American region.
The online master’s degree in Software Engineering will be the first fully-online degree in software engineering from one of the best universities in Latin America and the first degree in Spanish on the Coursera platform.
“Businesses today need software engineers who can lead teams, coordinate complex projects, and bring new ideas to the forefront, but there aren’t enough qualified graduates in Latin America to help move the industry forward,” said Alfonso Reyes, Dean of the School of Engineering at Universidad de los Andes. “We are thrilled to partner with Coursera to develop our first online degree to empower students everywhere to pursue advanced roles in the field. The curriculum will be designed to meet the needs of the next generation of software engineers and address the skills deficit in Colombia and beyond.”
Expected to begin receiving admission applications by August 2020 and launch in 2021 after official approval from the Colombian Ministry of Education, this postgraduate program will be open to professionals of any discipline (it is not required to have a previous degree in computer science); however, those interested should have basic knowledge in programming and experience in software development.
“Software engineering is one of the most valuable positions in the current labor market, and this program will create more opportunities for students without a previous degree in computer science to succeed in this highly demanded field,” said Jeff Maggioncalda, Coursera CEO.
In addition to teaching the theoretical foundations, the program will also offer opportunities to work on projects and collaborate with industry leaders so that students can apply their new skills to real-world situations.
The master’s degree program will have four paths, as shown below. Each path will consist of four courses (two subjects per module) with a duration of 8 weeks each.*
Path 1 – Fundamentals: Essential software development practices, Software Design, Software Engineering for Web Applications, and Software Engineering for Mobile Applications.
Path 2 – Agile development teams: Agile Development Practices, Software Quality, Agile Software Architecture, and Cloud Computing.
Path 3: DevOps, Software Project Management, Software Lines and Reuse, and User Experience.
Path 4 – Deepening: Students can choose 4 courses from a set of alternatives such as Software Automation, Machine Learning for Software Engineering, Data Analysis and Visualization, Ecosystems and Software Factories, and Software Engineering for IoT.
This online master’s degree is aimed at people who want to:
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Design and build software-based solutions.
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Learn new technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence, and multi-device applications.
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Learn languages such as Python, Java, and Nodejs, as well as web development and mobile development frameworks.
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Participate effectively in high-performance Agile teams.
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Make use of automation to improve the productivity of development teams, create tools to automate tests, generate code, or automate deployments, among other tasks.
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Generate constant value to organizations without neglecting quality.
For more information about this program, visit: https://www.coursera.org/degrees/maestria-ingenieria-software-uniandes
* This structure may be subject to modifications.
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This article from Observatory of the Institute for the Future of Education may be shared under the terms of the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 
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