My apologies, I sent this to the wrong list (damned autocomplete) please ignore (or pick it up on d...@community.apache.org if you are interested)
On 25 June 2012 13:15, Ross Gardler <rgard...@opendirective.com> wrote: > Some may recall that I kept promising the arrival of students from an > EU Commission project on a GSoC style pilot in formal education. This > was a very long way from successful but there was zero impact on our > projects since we asked PMCs to mark GSoC level projects as "mentor". > This enabled us to provide a list of suitable projects for the > students without PMCs needing to do additional work. > > I've now been approached by another EU Commission project proposal > team that wants to do something similar, but this time with students > doing the work as part of their assessed coursework (i.e. they have a > strong motivation for doing the work). Another, big difference this > time is that one of the partner organisations has ASF committers (2 > of) and there are three open source savvy commercial organisations on > the bid (DISCLOSURE: one of them is my little consultancy company). > > Given the way these proposals get written, there is a very tight > deadline on this (2 days). I got a first draft of the proposal this > weekend and I am now satisfied that what is being asked of associate > partners is acceptable (i.e we won't be responsible for students > education). However, there isn't enough time for a proper discuss then > vote process. I'm therefore running these in parallel. > > If anyone has *any* serious concerns about rushing like this please > vote -1 and I'll go back to plan B which is simply to highlight my > engagement with the ASF as an individual. Note that I will not be > voting given the obvious conflict of interest. However, if the funding > is approved I will be taking full responsibility for all aspects of > administration within the ASF (and other associate partners). Note I > have also notified board@ and will cancel the vote if the board raises > a concern. > > In terms of deliverables from the project think of GSoC where the > students get credits towards their degree rather than cash (Semester > of Code rather than Summer of Code). If successful the project will > provide a "manual" for other universities wishing to offer such real > world experience to their students. > > Our PMCs will choose to offer mentors based on the quality of student > applications - if there are no students that look interesting we have > no further commitments. > > Here is the text of the letter of intent I propose to sign if the > ComDev PMC approves: > > ---- start copied text --- > > The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) provides support for the Apache > community of open-source software projects. That community provide > software products for the public good. The ASF is made up of over 100 > top level projects that cover a wide range of technologies. Chances > are that if anyone is looking for a rewarding experience in Open > Source, you are going to find it here. > > The Apache projects are defined by collaborative consensus based > processes, an open, pragmatic software license and a desire to create > high quality software that leads the way in its field. We are > recognized as one of the most influential software organisations of > our time and are often seen as the "gold standard" of open source > software development. > > We have participated in the Google Summer of Code programme since its > inception and continue to mentor around 40 students per year. We have > had great success with this programme with some of our earliest > students still working with us. > > The OSKA project has the potential to extend the benefits of the > Google Summer of Code programme into formal education whilst still > allowing our communities to work alongside students in real world open > source projects. As a voluntary organisation we cannot guarantee that > students will succeed, but we can provide an environment in which any > sufficiently able > student will find our projects supportive and educational. We look > forward to extending our Google Summer of Code efforts to support the > OSKA trial. > > -- > Ross Gardler (@rgardler) > Programme Leader (Open Development) > OpenDirective http://opendirective.com -- Ross Gardler (@rgardler) Programme Leader (Open Development) OpenDirective http://opendirective.com
