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Bug 333705

Summary: Texas A&M University Eclipse Symposium
Product: Community Reporter: Austin Riddle <austin.riddle>
Component: FoE DisbursementsAssignee: Eclipse FOE Disbursements <foe-disbursements-inbox>
Status: RESOLVED FIXED QA Contact:
Severity: normal    
Priority: P3 CC: bhunt, bilnoski, bokowski, caniszczyk, elias, reysa, wayne.beaton
Version: unspecified   
Target Milestone: ---   
Hardware: PC   
OS: Windows 7   
Whiteboard:

Description Austin Riddle CLA 2011-01-06 16:57:16 EST
I would like to propose an Eclipse Symposium for Texas A&M University in College Station, TX.  

Mission: To expose students to the professional use of Eclipse in the university environment. 

Presentations would range from RT to IDE usage in various groups/centers.

The symposium would take place on a single day in a set of co-located classrooms on campus.

Funds would be used to advertise the event, provide food and beverages, and raffle Eclipse swag for attendees.
Comment 1 Wayne Beaton CLA 2011-01-07 14:43:39 EST
How much do you expect this will cost?

How will you advertise the event?

How many people do believe you can attract?

Is there any potential for additional sponsorship by local companies?
Comment 2 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-01-07 15:19:36 EST
(In reply to comment #1)
> How much do you expect this will cost?
> 
Since the presenters would be providing their time gratis, I expect the costs to be between $500-$1000.

> How will you advertise the event?
Texas A&M email lists.  The main source of attendees would probably be from the Computer Science Dept. so their email list would be instrumental.  But it is open and will be targeting all students.  Also the printing of flyers and signs (which with permission could include the Eclipse logo). And an Ad in the university newspaper.

> How many people do believe you can attract?

Target would be around 100. We might get a lot more depending on the date and time to work with student schedules.  When you offer free food to college students....you know how that goes.  This kind of thing is done frequently on campus so the students are used to attending events like this.

> 
> Is there any potential for additional sponsorship by local companies?

There might be, but that might be a step to far at this point.

My intent is to start with this as an expose and provide an opportunity for the students to see how Eclipse is used professionally and get to share with each other their experiences with Eclipse.  The real goal is to leave a great taste in their mouth about continuing to use Eclipse or using for the first time and seeing how many others use it or are interested.  If successful, we could try to make this an annual event and invite company sponsorship, etc.  The thing that the Eclipse Foundation does not have, but companies do are campus "ambassadors".  Those ambassadors are used by the companies to organize things like this to promote good PR to the impressionable minds in the university. It would be an interesting experiment to see how enthusiastic students are about Eclipse and how they contrast it to other solutions to their problems.
Comment 3 Boris Bokowski CLA 2011-02-14 23:13:43 EST
(In reply to comment #2)
> The thing
> that the Eclipse Foundation does not have, but companies do are campus
> "ambassadors".  Those ambassadors are used by the companies to organize things
> like this to promote good PR to the impressionable minds in the university. It
> would be an interesting experiment to see how enthusiastic students are about
> Eclipse and how they contrast it to other solutions to their problems.

Are you aware of the Eclipse Campus Ambassador Program? http://eclipse.org/campus/
Comment 4 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-02-15 09:26:08 EST
Funny, I have never seen a way to get to that URL from the main Eclipse page.  I certainly have never heard of or seen that page before.  Thanks for the "heads up".

(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #2)
> > The thing
> > that the Eclipse Foundation does not have, but companies do are campus
> > "ambassadors".  Those ambassadors are used by the companies to organize things
> > like this to promote good PR to the impressionable minds in the university. It
> > would be an interesting experiment to see how enthusiastic students are about
> > Eclipse and how they contrast it to other solutions to their problems.
> 
> Are you aware of the Eclipse Campus Ambassador Program?
> http://eclipse.org/campus/
Comment 5 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-02-15 09:29:51 EST
Interestingly, the Computer Science department at Texas A&M University used to promote Java much more in its curriculum, but since Bjarne Stroustrup became the department endowed chair, C++ has become the focus (imagine that!).
Comment 6 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-02-15 09:33:55 EST
I am withdrawing this bug because I think that although it would be an interesting and ecosystem building activity, I think that there should really be a more sustainable effort from the foundation to build Eclipse popularity at universities. Thanks for all the comments.
Comment 7 Chris Aniszczyk CLA 2011-02-15 09:48:29 EST
I like this request and think it reflects what FoE disbursements should be about. If you don't mind, I'd like to keep this open while we finalize our disbursement decisions.

Also, the venue is close to me so I'd selfishly like to participate :)
Comment 8 Wayne Beaton CLA 2011-02-15 09:54:32 EST
(In reply to comment #6)
> I am withdrawing this bug because I think that although it would be an
> interesting and ecosystem building activity, I think that there should really
> be a more sustainable effort from the foundation to build Eclipse popularity at
> universities. Thanks for all the comments.

I agree that a sustainable effort is what's needed. However, at the moment we're a little under-resourced in the events-planning area and I am excited by the prospect of using this event to help refine our idea of what an university event looks like. Based on the success of this event, I intend to encourage other universities to follow suit.

I apologize for letting this bug sit so long; we've been wrestling a bit to get our brain around the parameters for selecting winners here.
Comment 9 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-02-15 09:58:26 EST
lol...you are good at bringing a smile to people's faces. ;)
I too would also enjoy the venue.

(In reply to comment #7)
> I like this request and think it reflects what FoE disbursements should be
> about. If you don't mind, I'd like to keep this open while we finalize our
> disbursement decisions.
> 
> Also, the venue is close to me so I'd selfishly like to participate :)
Comment 10 Elias Volanakis CLA 2011-02-16 21:18:43 EST
If this goes ahead, I'm interested in participating in a meaningful way (assuming I get company approval). For example I'd be happy to give a RAP single-sourcing tutorial. I am also open for other ideas.
Comment 11 Wayne Beaton CLA 2011-02-23 10:56:25 EST
I'd like to move forward with this one. We have the unanimous support of the committer reps to grant $500 toward this event. Please start your more detailed planning and let us know when you need the money.
Comment 12 Bryan Hunt CLA 2011-02-23 11:00:24 EST
Being close to A&M, I might be available to give a demo of how to build a client / server applications using EMF, MongoDB, and Restlet.  I could also possibly demo the hardware test tool I'm working on for IBM.
Comment 13 John Reysa CLA 2011-02-25 08:43:05 EST
I graduated from A&M and work with Bryan Hunt (poster above). I could possibly demo some of the eclipse based tools we developed for microprocessor simulation.
Comment 14 Chris Aniszczyk CLA 2011-03-07 11:07:19 EST
Hey Austin, this request is approved.

Can you finalize on a date and when you due, contact the emo@eclipse.org to request funds when you need it?

When you have the date finalized, I'm sure you have some potential speakers that have requested interest on this bug.
Comment 15 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-03-07 11:17:58 EST
Thanks,

The planning is underway, I am just pulling to together the contacts for setting up the event. I will finalize a date when I find out when the location is available.


(In reply to comment #14)
> Hey Austin, this request is approved.
> 
> Can you finalize on a date and when you due, contact the emo@eclipse.org to
> request funds when you need it?
> 
> When you have the date finalized, I'm sure you have some potential speakers
> that have requested interest on this bug.
Comment 16 Austin Riddle CLA 2011-03-07 11:19:29 EST
Thanks to all who are interested in presenting.  I will get back to you on this bug about details when they come available.