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[edit] Introduction
There are more professors than ever hoping to teach the open source development process to their students -- but working in the open source world can be a daunting proposition. Professors themselves have only a limited amount of time to learn about open source, and are often unsure about how, exactly, to get started.
POSSE (Professors' Open Source Summer Experience) is designed for these professors. Sponsored by Red Hat, the POSSE program is a weeklong bootcamp that will immerse professors in open source projects. Participants spend a week of intensive participation in selected open source projects, led by professors with experience in teaching open source development, in partnership with community members who have deep experience and insight. By the end of the session, participants should have a much better understanding of the workings of open source projects, and a strong network of contacts to lean on as they begin to bring students into the open source world.
[edit] Events
[edit] Tentative POSSEs
POSSEs that are in discussion and various stages of planning, but have not opened registration or begun to publicize yet.
- POSSE California Design - sometime in June 2010
- A design-centered POSSE in the Boston area
- A POSSE in the Pittsburgh area (CMU/Allegheny)
- POSSE South Africa - Sometime past September 1st, 2010
- POSSE Manila 2010 in October 2010
- POSSE EMEA 2010 - Fall (Sep-Nov) 2010 sometime, date not set
[edit] Upcoming POSSEs
POSSEs that are actively marketing and soliciting participants - these are POSSEs for which all the planning details are complete, and are guaranteed to happen.
The individual event pages for each POSSE may not yet be complete.
- POSSE RIT - June 14-18, 2010 at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), Rochester, NY, USA
- POSSE Worcester State - June 7-11, 2010 at Worcester State College, Worcester, MA, USA
- POSSE California CS - Date being finalized, likely in August. At CMU Silicon Valley, Mountain View, California, USA
In early March 2010, we will issue an announcement/press release on the POSSEs that are scheduled to run in summer 2010 (June-Sep). Applications for all POSSEs will open on that date - it will be a rolling admissions setup - so that we can have the enrollment for each POSSE class set at least one month prior to the session.
[edit] Past POSSEs
- POSSE APAC - November 2009, Singapore (FOSS fundamentals and Computer Science focus)
- POSSE 2009 - July 2009, Raleigh, NC USA (Computer Science focus)
[edit] Get involved
If you like the idea of more professors teaching open source, we need your help! Check the list below if there's something you're interested in helping with; if you have ideas for something not on this list or are interested in helping out but don't know where to start, drop into the #teachingopensource-posse IRC channel on Freenode or email posse@teachingopensource.org and we'll find a way for you to get involved. We're looking for ideas, feedback, and input, and every question you ask helps us make the next POSSE even better, so please ask!
[edit] Work with a POSSE class during the 09-10 school year
We've got entire college classrooms full of active students looking for projects, and particularly need...
- Open source software projects that would like an entire university class of contributors for a whole semester, and can provide a dedicated liason and project mentors
- Open source contributors to serve as mentors, reviewers, and guides to student teams throughout the semester - help people join the project you work on!
- Users of open source software who need development support to help a tool better fit your needs - for instance, are you a teacher who needs a FIrefox plugin for your ESL students? A nonprofit organization that wants to distribute custom Fedora LiveCDs to your field offices? A student who'd like to be able to use TurtleArt to do geometry homework? Our classes need adventurous users who can give good, rapid feedback on their work throughout the semester.
If you're interested, join the mailing list and introduce yourself and what you're looking to help with, and we'll get back to you right away.
[edit] Attend a future POSSE
Are you a professor who can't make this year's POSSE, but would love to attend one in the future? Do you know a professor who should attend? Join the mailing list and introduce yourself and what you work on, and mention that you'd like to attend a future POSSE; discussions about upcoming POSSEs will be held on that list, and calls for planning and participation will be held there as well. If you only want to be notified when future POSSEs are scheduled and announced, email posse@teachingopensource.org with the subject line "Attend a future POSSE" and we will let you know when upcoming POSSE events are coming up.
When applications open for the Summer 2010 POSSEs, they will use the POSSE application template.
[edit] Organize your own POSSE
If you are interested in organizing or helping with a POSSE at your location during the summer of 2010, or are curious about what might be involved in such an undertaking, join the mailing list and send an email to the list with the subject "I'd like to plan a POSSE." In that email, introduce yourself and let us know when and where you're thinking of running your POSSE and what questions you have, and we'll be glad to talk with you about the process. There are also POSSE office hours on IRC you can drop by.
Commitment deadlines for Summer 2010:
- May 15 - Jun 01: the deadline is Feb 15, 2010.
- Jun 02 - Sep 01: the deadline is March 1, 2010.
- Sep 02 - Dec 01: the deadline is June 1, 2010.
By these dates, we need to know what POSSEs are going to be running in the next 3-6 months; not all details need to be absolutely finalized, but we need to be able to advertise a date, location, theme focus (if applicable - CS/Design/etc), and make sure that there will be POSSE Instructors and community members for a project available to teach at the POSSE.
[edit] Contact
For more information about POSSE, email us at posse@teachingopensource.org.
In the meantime, these resources may be helpful.
- Wiki: POSSE is using the TeachingOpenSource wiki space. Please feel free to edit any of these pages. If you're creating new pages, please prefix the page title with "POSSE".
- IRC: The channel on Freenode will be used for POSSE-specific IRC communication. Participants are encouraged to join the larger TeachingOpenSource community in the #teachingopensource as well.
- Mailing list: The Teaching Open Source mailing list is a good place for POSSE-related discussion.