Outreachy

Fedora is participating in the Outreachy round running from May to August 2021.

What is Outreachy

outreachy logo

Outreachy is an internship program for people from group underrepresented in free and open source software, including women internationally and underrepresented people of color in the U.S. Our goal is to increase participation in Fedora. Please see the main page with program details for the general information, such as timeline, background information, eligibility, requirements, and the application form.

This page contains information about Fedora’s participation Outreachy. Please feel free to contact us via the mailing list below for clarifications and more information. You can also use the IRC channel.

Student Information

We are yet to select the participants for 2021, please stay posted to the mailing list summer-coding@lists.fedoraproject.org for announcements regarding the selections and about the information regarding the projects. You can read the accepted project for this year at ideas.

Why spend your summer working on FOSS?

When you work in the open on free software, you create a body of work that follows you for the rest of your life. Rather than a coding assignment done by thousands of other students and relegated to the bottom of the drawer at semester’s end, working in FOSS is a chance to contribute to a living project.

Working in FOSS gives you a chance to:

  • Work with real-world, large codebases.

  • Collaborate with real engineers and other professionals.

  • Contribute to something meaningful while learning and earning.

  • Learn tools and processes that are just like what you are going to use if you work in technology after graduation.

  • Make friends and contacts around the globe.

  • Attract attention that can lead to an internship or job after graduation.

  • Create lifetime connections and associations.

If you are new to the Fedora Project, the following material will help you to get started.

Student Responsibilities

You are the key ingredient for your project’s success. This project is important to you, your mentor, and the entire Fedora Community.

Your responsibilities include:

  • Communicating early and often with your mentor.

  • Blogging every week about what you’re learning, how you’re doing, challenges and successes. This is key way to keep the entire Fedora Community informed.

  • Working with your mentor on realistic achievable milestones that provide for regular deliverables and feedback.

  • Attending the brief student calls, as announced

  • Being accountable for your success and your actions

Mentor Information

If you are contacted directly by a student, we encourage you to reply and include the mailing list and/or IRC channel to keep the process transparent and to ensure the inquiry is able to be answered by more people than just you.

How to Propose a Project

If you want to mentor a specific project, think carefully about several things:

  1. Do you have enough time to work on this with the student during the entire project. You will be helping someone else when they get stuck. You don’t want to become a blocker because you’re busy.

  2. It is harder to find success when you are completely certain of how an idea needs to be implemented; finding a student with the skills and interest to implement a specific solution is a lot harder than finding a student with enough skills to respond to a use case need. Also, students learn more when they help design and guide the project. In other words, provide guidance and direction but let the student do some of the "driving."

  3. Where you can have looser ideas, you may be able to find a student who works as a sort-of intern who can implement a solution to a use case you have. In past experiences, students going after a use case are more likely to get somewhere with self-direction and support from you.

  4. Who can help you? Try to find a second mentor for the project.

If you’re interested in working with a student on a specific project you should post your idea to the Mentored Projects Issue Tracker. Your issue should be tagged Outreachy and use the Outreachy - Proposed Project template. We strongly encourage you to find a second person to help with mentoring and to solicit feedback on your proposal

Can I be a Mentor Without a Project?

Yes! You can either:

  • Work with a student who brings an idea to your sub-project. This requires a different level of communication throughout the project, but can be the most rewarding.

  • Be a general mentor. This is a person who works with all students regardless of their project. To become a general mentor please open an issue in the Mentored Projects Issue Tracker offering your help. Please ask for tagging the issue with the Outreachy label.

Mentor Responsibilities

You are an essential part of the student’s success, the project’s success, and the success for the Fedora Project.

Your responsibilities include:

  • Being an interface for an identified sub-project or SIG in Fedora.

  • Helping students communicate with the overall project and any upstream.

  • Helping the student plan realistic achievable milestones that provide for regular deliverables and feedback.

  • Regular communication with your student. This means you must be regularly available for the entire project. If you take a holiday you need to know early and help your student be ready for your brief absence.

  • Attending a brief mentors call, as scheduled.

  • Be the final, accountable person for deciding if the student is successful or not. This is responsibility akin to being a professor or boss.

  • Read about mentor and their responsiblity in the Outreachy mentor page

General Mentors

The general mentors for this round of Outreachy are

Communication

Administration

In order to get questions answered or obtain more information related to this year’s Outreachy with Fedora, please contact the administrators or ask on the Outreachy list.

  1. Marie Nordin

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