Some new changes for the next Outreachy cycle beginning in the December
2021 round. Note that invoices for participating communities are not
impacted until the December 2022 round.
-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: [Outreachy] Good news! Changes to Outreachy
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2021 10:59:36 -0800
From: Sage Sharp - Outreachy Organizer <organizers(a)outreachy.org>
Reply-To: Sage Sharp - Outreachy Organizer <organizers(a)outreachy.org>
To: mentors(a)lists.outreachy.org
Hi Outreachy mentors and coordinators,
We are pleased to announce some significant changes that the Outreachy
organizational team been working on for a long time.
Outreachy will be changing the intern stipend, hourly participation
requirements, payment schedule, and intern feedback schedule.
These changes will take effect for the December 2021 cohort, and be in
place for all future intern cohorts.
Summary of the changes:
- Interns will be paid $7,000 USD total
- Interns will
only be required to participate in the internship for
30 hours/week
- Interns will be paid in two payments (by Jan 20 and by Mar 4)
- Internship feedback will be collected 4 times during the internship
- Internships can be extended during any of the four feedback check
points
Policy change details
---
The biggest change is that interns will now be paid $7,000 USD total.
We are not increasing the amount we are invoicing sponsors for the
December 2021 cohort or the May 2022 cohort.
We will be working with communities and sponsors to discuss changes to
our sponsorship levels and internship costs. We are targeting the
December 2022 cohort for changes to the sponsorship costs to take place.
This allows a full year for communities and sponsors to plan and have
discussions with us about their concerns.
The payment schedule will change so that interns will be paid in 2
payments instead of 3 payments. Interns will be paid a $3,000 initial
stipend b
y January 20, 2022, and a $4,000 final stipend by March 4, 2022.
We expect the new payment schedule will be advantageous to interns, as
they will be paid more money earlier in the internship. The increased
internship stipend will apply for all Outreachy interns around the world.
Outreachy is also making changes to how many hours per week we expect
interns to be putting effort into the internship. We will now only
require all interns to participate 30 hours per week. During the
pandemic, we reduced the hourly requirements in this way for anyone who
was impacted by the pandemic. We found the change resulted in successful
internships, and we want to make the change permanent for all interns.
We're also increasing the number of times that we collect internship
feedback. Intern and mentor feedback will now be collected 4 times
during the internship. Two of the feedback check points will be
associated with the two payments. While this does add to the mentor
res
ponsibilities, the additional two feedback points will allow
Outreachy organizers to help Outreachy organizers effectively support
both interns and mentors.
We hope that these changes help Outreachy continue to sustainably grow
the number of interns we accept each cohort! We so appreciate your work
as an Outreachy mentor, it's making a real difference! We are also
grateful to all of our donors, grantmakers and sponsors, who have made
it possible to make these much needed changes to the program.
If you have any questions or concerns about these changes, please read
the details below. Then privately email <organizers(a)outreachy.org> or
reply to the mentor mailing list.
Detailed Schedule
---
The full feedback and payment schedule will be updated on the Outreachy
website in the coming weeks. In the meantime, please reference the
detailed schedule below:
Dec 6 - Internship starts
Dec 13 - Feedback #1 due - used to determine whether to pay the initial
p
ayment
Jan 10 - Feedback #2 due
Jan 20 - Initial payment sent by this date
Jan 31 - Feedback #3 due - used to determine whether to pay the final
payment
Feb 21 - Feedback #4 due
Mar 4 - Internship ends
Mar 4 - Final payment sent by this date
Background
---
Outreachy is a diversity initiative of the Software Freedom Conservancy.
Outreachy interns are self-employed contractors for Conservancy.
Conservancy collects tax paperwork and payment information for all
Outreachy interns. Conservancy also handles payments to all interns.
Why is three payments an issue?
---
Conservancy staff and Outreachy organizers have been looking at our
estimated number of interns going forward both excitement and worry. We
expect the program to keep growing, but even at the current level, it is
very challenging to pay interns three payments. The process for paying
interns is manual and time-consuming, and our staff is small.
The staff time it takes to pay interns will be
greatly reduced by
switching to two payments from three payments. If Outreachy accepts 70
interns per cohort, switching to two payments means Conservancy
processes 280 intern payments per year, instead of 420.
Communication to applicants
---
All interns accepted to the December 2021 cohort will receive an email
explaining the payment schedule changes. That email will ask applicants
to contact us if the payment schedule would cause a financial hardship.
We will also create a blog post explaining the changes. We will also
email the Outreachy announcement mailing list.
What about fraud?
---
Another popular internship program has seen a number of interns who
become non-responsive after receiving the initial $500 USD intern
stipend. For people in lower-socioeconomic countries, $500 is a lot of
money. Some of that program's interns submit an application, and then
stop working after receiving the first payment.
Outreachy has only had one known case that
is similar. One intern
stopped communicating during the first two weeks of the internship. The
mentor communicated the issue to Outreachy organizers, and we delayed
paying intern's initial payment while the issue was discussed.
After the intern continued to miss meetings and not answer emails, the
internship was terminated. The intern was not paid their initial
stipend, and the mentor chose another applicant to work with.
While this type of fraud has been rare for Outreachy in the past, we are
making plans to support communities, should the situation occur.
What if fraud happens?
---
If we find cases of fraud after making changes to the payment schedule,
Outreachy organizers will support communities who are impacted.
If an applicant stops communicating during the first 1-3 weeks of the
internship, Outreachy organizers will work with mentors who wish to pick
another intern. The new internship will then be extended by the same
number of weeks.
If a
n intern stops communicating after receiving the initial payment,
and we suspect fraud, Outreachy will credit the community half of the
initial payment ($1,500) for a future internship cohort. We feel this is
fair, since the mentor plays a major role in which interns Outreachy
selects, and has a hand in making sure the applicant is invested in the
project during the contribution period.
Unfortunately, if an intern stops communicating after week 4, there will
not be time for mentors to pick another intern. Internships can only be
extended by up to five weeks, and it would be too risky to set up a new
internship in week 5.
Why have 4 feedback checkpoints?
---
In order to pay interns two payment stipends, Outreachy organizers need
to collect feedback in week 2 and in week 9.
We felt the two check points were too far apart (seven weeks) for
Outreachy organizers to support interns and mentors, should issues
arise. Outreachy organizers have noticed that int
ernships tend to run
into problems in week 5 or 6. We wanted to add another feedback point in
between the week 2 and week 9 feedback.
Collecting feedback in week 5 is not great during the December cohort.
Collecting feedback in week 5 means the feedback would be due on January
3 for the December cohort. Outreachy organizers felt that was too soon
after end-of-year holidays. Therefore, we decided to collect feedback in
week 6.
We also decided to add a feedback point in week 12 of the internship, so
that we could collect final thoughts on the experience.
Questions? Concerns?
---
Phew, that was a lot! Apologies for the long email. We know these are
some major changes, and we wanted to be transparent about why we were
making them.
If you have any concerns about these changes, please let us know by
privately replying to <organizers(a)outreachy.org> or by replying to the
mentor mailing list.
Sage Sharp, Outreachy Organizer
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