Proposition on stipend differentiation

[Denis Obrezkov]

Hello, I have a proposition. Is it possible next year to differentiate a stipend based not on a location of a candidate but on a task's difficulty. Today we have a situation when one student for a hard task can receive 2.75 times less than another student for a quite easy task. It doesn't really motivate exceptional students from 3rd world countries to work on a hard task/participate in GSoC. Maybe this approach can be combined with the current policy on stipend differentiation. 

Nowadays, stipends allows a participant to work on a project without worries about finding a job or sponsoring his GSoC work. At the same time, some projects are quite easy and doesn't really require big time contribution. Other projects are harder and require a lot of time and sometimes a lot of additional equipment. So, I propose to differentiate stipends based on a difficulty of a project. It means that students with the most time-consuming and hard projects will have a proper compensation for their time and effort. 

[Joel Sherrill]

I don't speak for the Google OSPO but rating the difficulty of GSoC projects and GCI tasks is a non-starter. History with putting a difficulty rating on GCI tasks showed it doesn't work.

Difficulty is a subjective ranking of the mentors based on expectations of students. It turns out that what is easy for one student is incredibly difficult for another. It depends on experience and education level.

Lots of discussions have occurred on difficulty rating over the years. It is just my opinion but tieing it to the payment is only going to make another set of problems.

--joel

On Sun, Apr 29, 2018, 12:24 PM Denis Obrezkov <deniso...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello, I have a proposition. Is it possible next year to differentiate a stipend based not on a location of a candidate but on a task's difficulty. Today we have a situation when one student for a hard task can receive 2.75 times less than another student for a quite easy task. It doesn't really motivate exceptional students from 3rd world countries to work on a hard task/participate in GSoC. Maybe this approach can be combined with the current policy on stipend differentiation. 

Nowadays, stipends allows a participant to work on a project without worries about finding a job or sponsoring his GSoC work. At the same time, some projects are quite easy and doesn't really require big time contribution. Other projects are harder and require a lot of time and sometimes a lot of additional equipment. So, I propose to differentiate stipends based on a difficulty of a project. It means that students with the most time-consuming and hard projects will have a proper compensation for their time and effort. 

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[Alexandre Viau]

On 2018-04-29 07:24 AM, Denis Obrezkov wrote:

to differentiate stipends based on a difficulty of a project. It means that students with the most time-consuming and hard projects will have a proper compensation for their time and effort.

All projects should require a minimum of 30 hours per week[1].

If there are students putting in in less than that, then they are being dishonest.

If you put in 30 hours per week and finish your task before the end of GSOC, I am sure your mentor will be able to propose other areas where you could contribute or ways that you can improve your project.

If you put in way more than 30 hours per week, that is your choice, and it's a good thing if you can afford it, you will learn more.

Considering that everybody should be putting in about the same amount of time, it makes sense that everyone is paid the same.

Now, as for why hard tasks don't receive more money, I don't think that you understand the point of GSOC. In the industry, one could argue that it makes sense to pay more for people that produce more. However, in the case of GSOC, Google isn't only for your project, they are paying you so that you can learn.

You may produce more than a first year student but that isn't the point. Google pays you so that you have the time to sit down and learn to code instead of flipping burgers.

1. https://developers.google.com/open-source/gsoc/faq

-- 
Alexandre Viau
viau.al...@gmail.com

[Denis Obrezkov]

Hello Joel,

but the current differentiation is incredibly discriminating. I think you remember that last year there was a student from US who was expelled after the second deadline. Did he receive $3600? And our successful students from India received just $2400. You can ask one of your last year students and a GSoC 2018 RTEMS mentor what he thinks about this situation.

I have also found out that some smart people among fellow students in my lab decided not to participate because why some students from US would receive more money for muuuuch easier projects. They would like to participate if the stipends were equal in all countries, e.g. $2400, or if the stipends were maybe not equal but adequate to their effort. I think you can note the same picture in US - $6000 is not a serious compensation for a good student.

I don't speak for the Google OSPO but rating the difficulty of GSoC projects and GCI tasks is a non-starter. History with putting a difficulty rating on GCI tasks showed it doesn't work.

Difficulty is a subjective ranking of the mentors based on expectations of students. It turns out that what is easy for one student is incredibly difficult for another. It depends on experience and education level.

Lots of discussions have occurred on difficulty rating over the years. It is just my opinion but tieing it to the payment is only going to make another set of problems.

--joel

On Sun, Apr 29, 2018, 12:24 PM Denis Obrezkov <deniso...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello, I have a proposition. Is it possible next year to differentiate a stipend based not on a location of a candidate but on a task's difficulty. Today we have a situation when one student for a hard task can receive 2.75 times less than another student for a quite easy task. It doesn't really motivate exceptional students from 3rd world countries to work on a hard task/participate in GSoC. Maybe this approach can be combined with the current policy on stipend differentiation. 

Nowadays, stipends allows a participant to work on a project without worries about finding a job or sponsoring his GSoC work. At the same time, some projects are quite easy and doesn't really require big time contribution. Other projects are harder and require a lot of time and sometimes a lot of additional equipment. So, I propose to differentiate stipends based on a difficulty of a project. It means that students with the most time-consuming and hard projects will have a proper compensation for their time and effort. 

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[Denis Obrezkov]

It seems that the last sentence consists the main idea so I will answer
it. It would be great if "Google pays you so that you have the time to

sit down and learn to code

instead of flipping burgers.". At least, it sounds very good. But today, for example, I found out that some students are already very experienced developers and have worked/are workind in the industry. And Google's support answers that students may work during their GSoC internship. So, your point that Google pays people to allow them to learn to code is not true.
I did this proposition due to couple of reasons. First of all, it is obvious that Google tries to decrease amount of money spent on stipends (because the number of participants is not much higher and most of them are from India with only $2400 per a project). Secondly, as I said earlier, this system is very discriminative. Though, I partly agree with Joel, I think that situation can be changed.

--
Regards, Denis Obrezkov

[AA]

Denis, there is also the other theory that Google only wants to
compete with Internship offers in the same locality of where the
intern is from. A US intern gets more because all US interns in all
disciplines get more. When you talk about discrimination, do you also
call it discrimination when Google engineers in India get paid less
than their counterparts in the US, regardless from the load of work?

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[Joel Sherrill]

On Mon, Apr 30, 2018 at 4:24 AM, AA <ammou...@gmail.com> wrote:

Denis, there is also the other theory that Google only wants to
compete with Internship offers in the same locality of where the
intern is from. A US intern gets more because all US interns in all
disciplines get more. When you talk about discrimination, do you also
call it discrimination when Google engineers in India get paid less
than their counterparts in the US, regardless from the load of work?

This is the foundation of what is being done. There is a standard

pay/cost parity system they use. I found one from the World Bank

when I looked into this a few years ago.

You are looking at it that you are underpaid. One could also ask

is it fair to a student in the US or Switzerland that someone in another

country makes the equivalent of a years income for the same amount

of work? 

This is paying a competitive regional rate for the same work.

I'm not arguing about this. Only stating the facts of the program

Google has set up. 

Arguing about this is about as useful as wanting the schedule

to work for students in the summer hemisphere. Nothing is perfect

and you always have the option to not participate.

--joel

 

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[Praveen Velliengiri]

I don't think it is a good idea. The main motto of GSoC is to bring new students to open source community. The students will join GSoC not just to earn money but to express and develop their ideas. If Google differentiates the stipend amount based on the difficulty of the project then it demotivates many students. If the projects are easy and less time consuming then it's organization fault to bring such projects under GSoC.
I hope many will support my argument.
Thanks
Pree