Cécile Péraire
Teaching Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering
Cécile Péraire has more than 25 years of software engineering experience working in both industry and academia. She earned her Ph.D. in computer science from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland). Following a postdoctoral research fellowship at SRI International and Hewlett Packard, she worked at Rational and IBM, where she held various roles covering the many facets of software development.
Péraire is a teaching professor at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE). She is the recipient of the CMU College of Engineering Dean’s Early Career Fellowship Award, as well as the CMU College of Engineering Philip L. Dowd Fellowship Award for co-founding the distinctive Master of Software Engineering program offered in Silicon Valley, California. Péraire has published and taught extensively in her areas of specialization. She has a passion for innovation in practices and tools that enable teams to more effectively develop and deliver software-intensive systems, including how AI can be responsibly leveraged through effective governance.
Teaching
Her teaching philosophy developed through her teaching experience in both industry and academia. It is based on the premise that students learn best when they are active participants in the learning process and that the journey to mastery requires practice. She encourages active learning and practice by creating opportunities for problem-solving and critical thinking in the context of classroom discussions, in-class exercises, and projects of realistic complexity. She values and encourages collaboration and teamwork that are key ingredients of success in the software industry. Furthermore, she aims to instill social and ethical responsibility in students by proposing projects that tackle some of the world’s most pressing problems and encouraging students to consider the social and ethical impact of their work.
Throughout her career, Péraire has taught 16 different undergraduate, graduate, and industry courses (most of them several times) at EPFL, HP, Rational, IBM, and CMU. She has contributed to the design of many of these courses. She currently teaches the following courses at CMU:
18652 - Foundations of Software Engineering
18658 - Software Requirements and Interaction Design
18659 - Software Engineering Methods
Details are available on the SE Core Courses page.
Education
1998 Ph.D., Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL)
1993 MA, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL)
Media mentions
CMU Engineering
Software engineering and education
Cécile Péraire shows just how much of an impact you can make when you follow your passions.
Péraire published in new engineering reference book
ECE/CMU-SV’s Cécile Péraire contributed a chapter to a new reference book, Rethinking Productivity in Software Engineering. In the chapter, “Removing Software Development Waste to Improve Productivity,” Péraire and her colleagues describe a study analyzing different kinds of waste found in a software development company and give recommendations for waste removal strategies.
Jama Software
Péraire teams up with Jama Software to teach MS-SE program
ECE/CMU-SV’s Cecile Péraire has chosen to pair with Jama Software for teaching her courses within CMU’s software engineering master’s degree program.
CMU-SV
Péraire and Erdogmus advance flipped classroom format
CMU-SV’s Cécile Péraire and Hakan Erdogmus used the flipped classroom format in their Foundations of Software Engineering Class, one of the first times it was used for a graduate software engineering class. They wrote two papers on the experience, discussing issues of videos, lectures, co-instruction, and student motivation.
CMU Silicon Valley
CMU professors advance flipped classroom format
Cécile Péraire and Hakan Erdogmus, professors at CMU Silicon Valley, use the “flipped classroom” format to teach a graduate Foundations of Software Engineering class (FSE). They wrote two papers about their experience, sharing the struggles and triumphs they faced as they worked toward a more efficient, helpful classroom model.
CMU Silicon Valley
CMU-SV’s Top 10 of 2018
We are counting down to the new year with CMU-SV’s top 10 of 2018, celebrating novel projects, awards, and research wins from this past year.
CMU Engineering
The 2018 Dean’s Early Career Fellows
Eight young CMU faculty receive awards for their outstanding contributions to the university.