GSOC 2015 Update

[Ed Cable]

Hi everyone,

Unfortunately we did not get selected for Google Summer of Code this year. I was quite disappointed and surprised given our strong track record with 100% pass rates the past two years, the strong personal rapport we had built with the Google Open Source Programs team, their continued sponsorship of our events like our Global Summit, and how we do serve as a good case study for the program and are one of the few HFOSS projects.

I've forwarded the reply from Stephanie requesting feedback on our application. It seems like we simply couldn't make the cut based on 1/3 less orgs being selected and the continued need to add new orgs (37 this year).  We've done all we could in terms of actual participation in the program so we'll work to strengthen our application next year and improve our ideas list and mentor commitment. 

All that being said, GSOC was a major source of external contribution for our community and we want to try and make up for that lost effort.  We would like to harness the energy and enthusiasm of our mentors and channel it towards other students. It's been very effective for us to have this structure and deliverable of an end to end project so we'd like to still have a formal intern program. Unfortunately we have missed the deadline for GNOME Outreachy program.

Our biggest challenge (apart from finding budget for the interns) will be recruiting a pool of talent as rich as that of GSOC. Markus has already come up with a catchy name for the program: MSAP 2015 - Mifos Semester Against Poverty. I'd like to have a call to do a retrospective on how we can improve our application and get selected next year and how we can do outreach to potential students. Related to both improving our GSOC app and how we can better utilize students, in general, I want to make this commitment to mentoring something that we're doing year-round and not just getting ready for when GSOC rolls up. Here are some thoughts on engaging with students.

1) Reaching out to students at universities where we've had students or mentors in past

2) Trying to engage with students that have already reached out to us...

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Stephanie Taylor <stta...@google.com>
Date: Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 2:34 PM
Subject: Re: Feedback on our GSOC Application
To: Ed Cable <edc...@mifos.org>
Cc: Google Open Source Programs Office <ospo...@gmail.com>, Carol Smith <car...@google.com>, Cat Allman <all...@google.com>

Hi Ed,

As you probably know, we have to make hard decisions each year with our organization selection, and we had the same situation this year as we only accepted 140 orgs (which is about 1/3 of the orgs that applied). We try to accept a good number of new orgs each year to help spread the GSoC love around and that also means that we have to let some of the orgs that have been participating for a couple of years take a year off every now and then.

This has nothing to with the situation with Mohammed, honestly it didn't even cross my mind when we in our team discussions last week.

I hope you'll apply again in the future! We still think you guys are doing great work and appreciate what an amazing job you did with GSoC in 2013 and 2014 and with GCI in 2014.

Best,

Stephanie

Stephanie Taylor |

Open Source Programs, Google |

stta...@google.com |

650-214-1656

On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 11:03 AM, Ed Cable <edc...@mifos.org> wrote:

Hello Carol and team,

I know you all don't have time for direct feedback for everyone but was hoping you could shine some light on our application for the program this year. We've tried to establish a strong track record with the program and were very surprised to receive our rejection.

We'd like to know how we can improve for the future because we didn't change anything in the format of our application or ideas list and simply tried to build off of our past successes, lessons learned and continue to follow what we thought was a successful GSOC model for us.

I do hope that the issue with Mohammed during GCI isn't what has hurt our application because we ran a successful GCI and were quite disappointed too in the how the situation ended up with his reception of the news.

Thanks,

Ed

--

Ed Cable

Mifos Community Manager

Director of Community Programs, Mifos Initiative

edc...@mifos.org | Skype: edcable | Mobile: 484.477.8649

Collectively Creating a World of 3 Billion Maries | http://openmf.org  

Note: As of Jan 1, 2014 my email has changed from edcable@openmf.org to edcable@mifos.org. Please update your address book accordingly.