[Outreachy reports] · September 6, 2020 · 3 min read

Outreachy report #12: August 2020

Delayed opening

It’s been a while since the opening of an application period was so stressful, but we made it through. While Sage made sure new changes to the codebase were merged as soon as possible, I had the chance to ping communities directly to let them know we would be open for applications soon and invite them to participate in this round. Most of them confirmed their intention to sign up and followed through, one of them signed up without needing a ping, and one of them replied saying they wouldn’t have the time to participate due to COVID-19 constraints.

Sage and I had a few conversations about how to improve the application review workflow (and avoid repetitive strain injury from reviewing thousands of applications). These changes are now live and I’m quite confident they will improve our review practices significantly.

Promotion

In addition to participating in #OutreachyChat, I saw an increase in requests to speak in both public and private events about the program. I received an invitation to become a curator for a week on a project about free and open source software makers, but ultimately decided to schedule my participation to next year to align it with our summer round schedule.

One of our interns requested an interview with an Outreachy organizer, and I’m planning on following up with her this week. Some Brazilian communities have approached me as well, and I’m doing my best to reply their inquiries during the initial application period to encourage Brazil residents to apply.

Looking back

If you follow this series of reports closely, you may have noticed that they’re no longer called “Outreachy helper reports”. This change may seem small, but it’s really important to me and I would like to take a moment to talk about it.

Back in 2018 Outreachy’s application system became more complex from a round to another and the amount of hours required to go through all applications increased dramatically. I was hired alongside Bethany to help Outreachy with its newfound great influx of applications. Almost two years later, under the wonderful mentorship of Sage, I’ve started taking a more active role beyond reviewing applications — and I stopped being a helper and became an organizer.

What’s in a name? A sense of identity and belonging. A strong feeling of recognition and validation.

I’m so grateful for the support I’ve always found in Outreachy and I’m glad that almost two years ago I’ve made the decision to apply to that job posting.