Linking Communication and Software Design Courses for Professional Development in Computer Science
http://wac.colostate.edu/llad/v3n2/williamson.pdf

Williamson, William J. and Philip H. Sweany
LLAD
1999

Abstract:

Although many programs require one or more project-based course for their majors, most students never get to work with a real client on a project that will be used outside the classroom setting. We felt strongly that students would benefit more from both their communication and their software design courses if they could somehow connect their efforts across traditional curricular boundaries and work with a real audiences and purposes. And in fact, this is what we found—students understood the relationship between their technical and communication responsibilities much more fully in both classes than either of us had experienced in these same courses prior to linking them.