[Campus-columbia-staff] intro email for organizers and mentors at Columbia event this Saturday!

[Zachary Newman]

Hey all!

Looking forward to Saturday.

I'm quite good with git so I'd be happy to help out there. The only project
I'm really involved in right now is in OCaml so I don't think most
participants would be able to get involved :) but I'd rank myself as pretty
competent at most of the skills you've listed so I can help out there.

Cheers,
Zack

P.S. I should be around for the morning and then some, but not the whole
day.
On Nov 13, 2014 4:55 PM, "Shauna Gordon-McKeon" <shaunagm at gmail.com> wrote:

> CC'ing in our two additional mentors!  Welcome aboard, Zachs.  :)
>
> On Thu, Nov 13, 2014 at 2:41 PM, Shauna Gordon-McKeon <shaunagm at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> Thank you for volunteering for the Open Source Comes to Campus event on
>> Saturday, November 15th at Columbia!  I wanted to send out a quick email to
>> introduce you all to each other and open up a space for you to talk and ask
>> questions about the event.  I’ve also added you all to our mailing list,
>> campus-columbia-staff at lists.openhatch.org, where we’ll be discussing
>> things, coordinating, etc going forward.  You should have gotten a
>> notification - if you didn’t, check your spam folder.
>>
>> So, introductions: I’m Shauna, and I’ll be helping remotely with the
>> event in the lead up to Saturday as well as on Saturday as well.  Feel free
>> to send me emails, or ping me on IRC (I’m “shauna” on Freenode).  Nate
>> Brennand is the student organizer for this event, and he’ll be present on
>> the day of the event.  He’s your goto person for logistical questions like
>> “How do I find the room?”  (From my experience last year: you’ll want to
>> ask this question ahead of time!)  We’ve also got some great mentors lined
>> up: Alex, Travis, Ben and Nik.  Please feel free to introduce yourselves!
>> Also: we’re looking for one more mentor, so if you know someone who’d like
>> to join us, feel free to invite them.
>>
>> Now, I’ve got some questions for you, to help figure out who is doing
>> what on the day of the event.  I’m assigning people to tasks on this
>> sheet
>> <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qupzW_7stDkuB9ArLXLO6oiIx5dtlZDbMIJ8-UxdkNE/edit?usp=sharing>
>> - please go take a look!  I’ve made some tentative assignments based on
>> email conversations and sign up forms, but please feel free to add or
>> remove yourself from roles as you feel comfortable.  Perhaps helpful will
>> be explanations of different activities
>> <https://openhatch.org/wiki/Open_Source_Comes_to_Campus/Curriculum>.
>> You can also email me with any questions you have!
>>
>> Some highlights from that sheet:
>>
>>
>>    -
>>
>>    One person to present our communications tools lecture.  Nik, I’ve
>>    assigned this to you.
>>    -
>>
>>    People to talk about open source careers.  It looks like Nik is the
>>    only one with paid experience in open source.  Nik, would you feel
>>    comfortable leading a general discussion?  I can also arrange for people to
>>    join the discussion remotely, including folks who have done GSoC or OPW -
>>    it’s great to highlight those opportunities as things that students can do
>>    in the near term.  Nik, let me know what you’re comfortable with.
>>    -
>>
>>    Four people who feel comfortable enough with git to lead a small
>>    group of students through our git activity.  I’ve tentatively assigned this
>>    to Alex, Travis, Ben and Nate, since Nik is already doing so many things
>>    for us.  :)
>>    -
>>
>>    Projects for folks to work on during the contributions period. Right
>>    now all I’ve got is Travis helping students triage Python tickets, which
>>    should be awesome.  Nik, did you have a project you wanted to help students
>>    contribute to?  Other options are:
>>    -
>>
>>       Help students contribute to a recommended project:
>>       https://openhatch.org/wiki/Recommended_Projects
>>       -
>>
>>       Help students learn a specific type of task, either: improving
>>       project accessibility
>>       <http://openhatch.github.io/open-source-comes-to-campus/lessons/newcomer-tasks/accessibility/#/>,
>>       improving project setup instructions
>>       <http://openhatch.github.io/open-source-comes-to-campus/lessons/newcomer-tasks/setup/#/>,
>>       cleaning issue trackers
>>       <https://openhatch.org/wiki/Open_Source_Comes_to_Campus/Newcomer_Tasks/Issue_Tracker_Cleaning>,
>>       translating software
>>       <https://openhatch.org/wiki/Translate_software>.
>>
>> The important thing here is not being an expert in the project so much as
>> helping students figure out “what to do next”.  This is absolutely 90% of
>> the reason students get discouraged - because they’re not sure what the
>> next step is and they don’t want to ask for help.  Being present, working
>> with them, and helping them brainstorm how to fix problems and find answers
>> is way more important than knowing the project intimately.  The latter
>> helps you finish contributions, which is great, but the former is what
>> helps students have a good time and stay involved.  :)
>>
>> Long email, sorry!  Let me know if you have any questions, and if you can
>> respond to this as soon as possible so I can take steps to make sure
>> everything’s covered, that’d be great.
>>
>> best,
>> Shauna
>>
>
>
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