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Piggyback onto a larger conference §

Pattern Summary §

Build the visibility of an academic OSPO by attaching typical conference activities (e.g. talks, workshops, meetups) to a larger event that addresses similar interests and themes.

Problem / Challenge §

An academic OSPO lacks the community size or resources to host its own standalone conference or summit.

Pattern Category §

  • Building University OSS Community
  • OSS Education & Skills
  • Raising awareness
  • Sharing OSS Best Practices
  • Supporting OSS development
  • Working with Tech Transfer / External Partners

Context §

A small academic OSPO has been established within a university.

While there is a growing interest in open source among students, faculty and staff, the community is still in its early stages and remains relatively small.

Forces §

The OSPO’s budget and staff time is constrained.

There is not enough local interest to justify a standalone event.

Larger conferences or summits with relevant audiences take place on campus or within the same city or region.

Solution §

Identify a well-aligned larger event (e.g. a regional tech conference, academic symposium, or open source summit) and propose a co-located session, track, or ‘mini-summit’. This could take the form of a panel, workshop, hackathon or project showcase.

Co-ordinate with the host organizers to secure a time slot and venue space. Leverage their infrastructure, promotion channels and attendee base.

Resulting Context §

The OSPO gains exposure, establishes credibility, and fosters partnerships - all without the heavy burden of organizing a full-scale event.

Participation in the larger event also facilitates recruitment and alignment with broader community trends.

Additional Learning from SnT Technology Transfer Office §

We wanted to run a summit for open source but we’re a very small community. The population of Luxembourg is 600,000 people. However, there are plenty of open source users.

We piggybacked onto a much wider larger conference and held a dedicated track for OSPOs.

This helped us a lot because the wider conference is well organized.

It’s very important to do some research on the audience who attend the wider conference you’re joining up with. This is important for your keynote speaker and also for the other speakers and activities you’re planning.

Additional Learning from the GW Open Source Program Office §

We have piggybacked with groups internal and external to our university to share expenses and resources and to amplify our open source voice.

We hosted a semi-annual 3-day Research Software Engineering workshop that is run by URSSI. We paid for lunches and provided space and volunteer technical assistants from our library staff for the event. As a result, 20 GW students, staff and faculty were able to attend in addition to the 35 other attendees from all over the US.

Additional Learning from the Georgia Tech Open Source Program Office §

We’ve held a yearly summit for the past two years. In our first year, we piggybacked onto another conference hosted by a very closely related group, the Scientific Software Center. It was particularly useful as it brought the OSPO and our work to a much wider audience - people who weren’t solely focused on open source.

Additional Learning from the Vermont Research Open Source Program Office (VERSO) §

We regularly co-organize or provide a supporting role in larger events in order to bring content about open source and our OSPO’s activities to a wider audience. We facilitate a range of activities from speaking, organising talks, hosting tracks on open source to organizing presentations/workshops from external organizations.

At a smaller scale, we hold OSPO talks with local meet up groups where OSPO staff speak about our activities.

Known Instances §

References §

Contributors & Acknowledgement §

In alphabetical order

  • Bethany Philbrick, University of Madison-Wisconsin
  • Ciara Flanagan, https://orcid.org/0009-0005-3153-7673
  • David Lippert, George Washington University, https://orcid.org/0009-0003-6444-9595
  • Fang Liu, Georgia Institute of Technology, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3383-2191
  • Jacek Plucinski, l’Université du Luxembourg
  • Jeff Young, Georgia Institute of Technology,, https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9841-4057
  • Kendall Fortney, University of Vermont, https://orcid.org/0009-0006-3898-0771