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Open Research Community Accelerator (ORCA)

Pattern Theme / Category

  • OSS Sustainability
  • Education and Skills

OSPO Problem / Challenge

  • Academic funding constraints combined with high turnover in universities hinder the development of high quality open source ecosystems.
  • A lack of support and incentives for the maintenance of complex research software - with a significant amount of research software being open in name only and often abandoned after initial release.
  • Undergraduate students do not have a ‘real-world’ experience of software development and delivery at scale.

Context

In many universities, there may be a lack of formal research software support and educational programs to support open source software development.

This leads to an ongoing skills gap in creating and maintaining open source projects (e.g. project management, remote collaborative work, outreach, community engagement) amongst students.

The ‘pipeline’ of experienced contributors and maintainers for open source projects is regularly disrupted due to the transient nature of the student population.

Forces

Academic funding programs tend to favor new ideas and/or novel approaches over investing in or strengthening existing research or projects.

In general, funding programs have time constraints that remove support after a specific date. This creates barriers to sourcing long term funding of an open source project.

Faculty members are not incentivized to grow, and specifically maintain, complex research software without a grant funding long-term work - leading to a ‘single-use development mindset’.

Solution

  • Develop a student pipeline of new open source collaborators through a structured team-focused program and educational curriculum that teaches the specific skills needed for open source practices and also broader skills.

  • The program combines paid internships, volunteering and for credit work to collaborate on research translation projects and to develop open source solutions that create social impact and address community needs.

The solution below outlines basic core activities to consider:

Outreach to potential partners

  • Conduct outreach to potential partners in the university, local businesses and community organizations to gauge interest in participating.
  • A consultation exercise with potential partners may be necessary to determine ‘what works’ for partners; relevant open source research tools, and the type of training that will be most useful for the campus community.

Design of program

  • Design may be based on existing knowledge of similar internship programs and should also incorporate learning from consultation with partners.
  • Students (as opposed to faculty) define the tasks, design the work and negotiate with stakeholders.
  • The program may benefit from a student handbook covering expected codes of conduct and all university policies relevant to their internship.
  • If mentorship is a feature of the program, schedules should include space for teams to have regular mentoring sessions with their designated mentor (or mentors).
  • An accompanying program curriculum may also include classes, student assignments, coaching, team projects, self-directed tutorials in the form of open educational resources.
  • Design of curriculum should take into account the diverse range of projects and software that students may work on. The curriculum should also factor in other soft skills and broader skills that are vital to this work (e.g. project management, time management, design, intra-team communications, team work).
  • Regular supervision time for student team leaders, and/or the teams themselves should also be built into the program schedule.

Advertising to student population

  • A transparent selection process for candidates should be put in place.
  • Target the student cohort to advertise the internship program.
  • Student referrals may also be a useful recruitment tool.

Grading / evaluating students

Evaluation of students’ progress should account for the diversity of projects and the different requirements in terms of onboarding, learning, and contributions required. Completion of a project may be not possible within the program timeframe.

Students may be graded in a number of ways including:

  • Customer feedback.
  • Stakeholder feedback.
  • Mentor reviews.
  • Learning journals.
  • Self-evaluation.
  • 360 reviews (in the case of student teams).

Resulting Context

Students learn industry open source practices and become part of the pipeline supporting open source projects within the university ecosystem.

Faculty and community organizations are supported to translate their research into practical applications.

Students develop their occupational skills and have the opportunity to build new contacts with potential employers.

The program also presents opportunities for students to develop important soft skills in client communications, team work, project management and leadership.

Additional learning from the University of Vermont VERSO Open Source Program Office

The program's mission - to make a meaningful impact by using open source to add a real-world challenge - has had a huge impact on the quality of the work.

Our students have progressed from not knowing what open source is to creating a student club focused on open source. As of June 2024, three students have graduated with one progressing to work in our IT Department at UVM and another being hired by the organization they interned with (the Zoning Atlas project).

Our hope is that this will impact open source practices at a faculty level as engagement from the graduate program increases.

The program has also led to several speaking engagements about open source, research translation and innovation/entrepreneurship. This helps boost our engagement across a broader audience and build relationships with foundations interested in this kind of work.

Known Instances

Vermont Research Open Source Program Office (VERSO), University of Vermont

References

Contributor(s) & Acknowledgment