Outreachy Launches Round with 30 Participants

[Karen M. Sandler]

URL:     https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/may/28/outreachy-launch/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/conservancy/status/603943127838253056
pump.io: https://identi.ca/conservancy/note/c_g1zvZiQ_KFNbDLbw19xQ

             Outreachy Launches Round with 30 Participants
      Now Officially a Software Freedom Conservancy Member Project

Outreachy, a diversity program launched by the GNOME Foundation under
the name Outreach Program for Women, launched its current internship
round under the umbrella of Software Freedom Conservancy. This week, 30
participants begin their internships with 15 free and open source
software organizations, including longtime participating organizations
the Linux kernel, Wikimedia, Mozilla and GNOME and newcomers to the
program Ceph and GStreamer. In addition, three applicants who applied
for both Outreachy and Google Summer of Code (GSoC) were accepted for
GSoC with organizations participating in both programs; and one more
applicant was accepted for the OpenDaylight Internship Program.

This round of the program — the first under the Outreachy name — has a
long list of sponsors. Intel has sponsored the program at the "Ceiling
Smasher" level, the first time in the program's history to have a
sponsor at the top level. Red Hat joins this round as an "Equalizer"
sponsor, in addition to being a supporting partner of Outreachy.

This round signifies the successful transition of Outreachy to
Conservancy. As the program moved to Conservancy, Sarah Sharp who has
been a key organizer of the Linux kernel's participation has been
appointed to the top organizing committee for Outreachy. Sarah serves in
this role together with Marina Zhurakhinskaya and Karen Sandler,
Conservancy's Executive Director. The GNOME Foundation remains a partner
of the program, providing technical infrastructure. GNOME also remains a
participant in Outreachy.

One of the metrics for Outreachy's success has been the extent to which
many former participants have become involved in supporting Outreachy
itself. This round, three Outreachy graduates became organization
coordinators with three different organizations. Two of those graduates
are also serving as Outreachy mentors. "With each subsequent round of
Outreachy, we're seeing more graduates become speakers at important
conferences, and find related employment," said Karen Sandler. "We're
excited to see Outreachy make a tangible impact in free and open
software communities and provide real opportunities for our
participants."