Chairs: Marcela Melara, Yesenia Yser and Jay White
The DEI WG continues our mission to increase representation and strengthen the overall effectiveness of the cybersecurity workforce. The WG continues to see relatively low regular attendance in meetings (5 attendees on avg), we are seeing increased engagement on Slack.
Over the past quarter, we've made progress in these areas:
- Our monthly Community Office Hours have been regularly attracting 10+ attendees (on average).
- Our meeting and Office Hours recordings are available on YouTube, improving access.
- We held a panel discussion at the Grace Hopper Conference '24.
Our Community Office Hours are a monthly event in which a panel of industry experts discuss a specific topic relevant to the WG's mission. Each month, we aim to host diverse speakers that represent different underrepresented groups, elevating different voices and connecting different communities.
Since July, our Community Office Hours series has focused on topics especially relevant to newcomers to OSS and the cybersecurity industry:
- July 25: Getting Started in OSS and Cybersecurity (recording TBA)
- Speakers: Yesenia Yser, Marcela Melara; Moderator: CRob
- Aug 22: Submitting to a CFP
- Speakers: Lori Lorusso, Katherine Druckman, Khahil White; Moderator: Yesenia Yser
- Sep 26: Finding Mentors and Community in OSS/Cybersecurity
- Speakers: Ijeoma Onwuka, Santiago Torres Arias; Moderator: Marcela Melara
- Oct 31: How to Effectively Pitch Your Ideas
- Speakers: Fatima Alam, Jeneba Wint; Moderator: Ijeoma Onwuka
We are planning one more Community Office Hour before the end of 2024 continuing our theme of newcomer-oriented topics:
- Dec 5: How to Grow Your Brand
We are also in the process of documenting Office Hour recaps to enhance our YouTube videos and/or be submitted as blog posts.
Looking ahead to 2025, we plan to continue our series in January with a discussion on neurodiversity in OSS.
We welcome topic and speaker suggestions for the upcoming year!
Members of the OpenSSF DEI WG community host panel discussions at major industry conferences to raise awareness about the WG and to engage with folks beyond the OpenSSF. A primary goal of the discussions is for panelists to share their experiences and advice for newcomers to the OSS and cybersecurity space.
Our most recent panel discussion, titled "Discover yourself through open source software security" was presented at the Grace Hopper Conference 2024 in October. This session aimed to empower, educate, and inspire, providing attendees with actionable insights to thrive in open source communities.
Panelists: Tabatha DiDomenico, Glenda Gracia, Annika Peterson, Yesenia Yser.
Moderator: Chujiao Ma
The panel of open source advocates discussed each panelist's unique experiences of engaging with open-source projects, the challenges they faced, the milestones they achieved, and their substantial contributions to enhancing security in open-source software. The panelists also shared how their contributions have helped grow their skills and careers.
The panelists represented industry organizations, participants in The Linux Foundation mentorship program, as well as contributors to open source via their daily role or in the volunteer space. Originally, the panel was set to be in person, however, the panel was moved into a virtual space due to Hurricane Milton, making it impossible for most panelists to travel.
Our panel discussions in 2024 have been well-received, so we intend to continue presenting the WG's activities at major industry conferences in 2025.
We have an number of new activities the WG would like to focus on in 2025:
- Tip of the Month: This will be a monthly series of social media posts, in which we highlight a specific OpenSSF community member and a career or tech tip they would like to share with the OpenSSF and beyond.
While we had initially intended to begin this activity in August, the WG has decided to delay this activity to 2025 due to a number of factors.
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Mentorship: Ahead of summer 2025, the WG is seeking collaboration with other OpenSSF TIs to enroll in the LFX mentorship program. This will expose new and future contributors to OpenSSF efforts while also advancing our efforts. As part of this activity, the WG will likely also apply for funds to sponsor these mentorships.
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Inclusive Contributing Guidelines: There have been a few asks to the TAC regarding the attraction and retention of maintainers. Working together with other OpenSSF TIs, we aim to develop a small and approachable set of contributing guidelines that focus on clear directions for project newcomers and practices that facilitate different types of contributions. The end goal is for our software and spec TIs to adopt these guidelines as part of their lifecycle requirements.
The DEI WG intends to drive these activities, but need's the TAC's help in engaging other TIs in our mentorship and contributing guidelines activities.
At this point, can the TAC assist with outreach to stakeholders of a few projects/TIs that would be interested in these activities?
Beyond the upcoming work, we always appreciate the TAC's support in amplifying the activities of this WG.