Oh, and one point I forgot to mention. The application period for organizations opens October 22. So we should decide by then if we want to apply. For those going to the mentor summit, that is right after the summit, so I recommend you go to the session on GCI at the summit.
Aaron Meurer On Mon, Sep 24, 2012 at 1:01 PM, Aaron Meurer <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi everyone. > > Google has announced again that they are running Google Code In, and > has invited mentoring organizations to participate. For those of you > who did not help out last year, Google Code In is a contest run by > Google in the (northern hemisphere) winter months for 13-17 year-olds. > Several organizations create tasks suitable for such an audience, and > the mid- to high-school students compete to see who can complete the > most tasks. Unlike GSoC, there is no pairing of mentors to students; > rather, there is a group of mentors for each org who can accept > students' work, and assist them. > > Last year, we participated, and it was pretty successful. Aside from > tons of bug and documentation fixes in the main SymPy code base, the > contest lead to many improvements to SymPy Live, including the current > design, the mobile version, tab completion, and the history. > > So the question is, do we want to apply to participate again this > year? The basic problem is one of manpower. Participating requires a > lot of effort on the part of the mentors. Unlike GSoC, the students > require a lot more hand holding. So we should only do it if enough > people are willing to help out. The contest runs from November 26 to > January 14. There is more information at > http://www.google-melange.com/gci/homepage/google/gci2012, > particularly the "Rules" and "FAQ" link. See also > http://code.google.com/p/google-code-in/wiki/GCIMentorInformation2012 > for some information on what we will have to do with regard to > creating tasks. > > For those who helped out last year, you'll be glad to hear that they > made some important changes to the rules of the contest this year. In > particular, quoting from Stephanie Taylor's email to the mentor list: > > - The point system has been overhauled and now every task is worth one > point. The 5 students with the highest number of completed tasks with > your org will be the pool from which you, the mentoring org, will > choose your 2 Grand Prize winners based on the overall complete body > of work of those 5 students. > > - There will be 10 Mentoring Orgs for a total of 20 Grand Prize > Winners (compared to 10 last year). > > - Translation tasks will no longer be a part of the Google Code-in > contest, either as its own category or as a part of documentation > efforts. > > - If students want to go for the Grand Prize they will work > predominantly with one org and will hopefully become involved with the > community of that org and will stay long after the GCI contest is > over. > > - Students will not earn cash prizes for their work. They will earn > certificates and t-shirts and then they can go for the grand prize if > they wish. > > - The contest was shortened by a week at the beginning of the contest > period so it will now start after the Thanksgiving holidays in the > USA. > > So I for one am really liking these overhauled rules. I think that > this should solve most, if not all, of the issues that we had with the > program last year. > > I think the only issue for us then with regards to applying or not is, > as I said, if we have enough manpower to handle mentoring the > students. If you think you can help for at least some time period > between November 26 to January 14, please let me know here, so I can > get a feel for if we should apply or not. The requirements for being > a mentor are minimal. If you have contributed to SymPy before, and > (obviously) if you don't plan to participate in GCI as a student, then > you are probably OK to help out. We basically just need people to > review the massive amount code that comes in in a timely manner. > > Aaron Meurer -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "sympy" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sympy?hl=en.
