Challenges toward teaching international standards in higher education institutions

Today the need for software to solve problems in different industrial domains has become more evident. This need brings an excellent opportunity for software development organizations (SDOs) and a great responsibility to deliver software with the quality required by the customer. In this context, using quality standards in SDOs is an increasingly evident need. However, the implementation of standards is more difficult as smaller the SDO is (e.g., very small entities) due to the lack of experience and dedicated resources for this purpose. Among the characteristics that hinder the implementation of standards, this article highlights the lack of engineers with the skills required to work under international standards. This article shows a study of a sample of 30 professors to identify the challenges they face in teaching standards in higher education institutions. The results of this research pretend to support the development of resources and strategies that promote the teaching of standards as a fundamental part of careers related to software development.