Grants Awarded for Python in Education

The Python Software Foundation has been asked about Python in education quite a bit recently. People have asked, “Is there an official curriculum we can use?”, “Are there online resources?”, “Are there efforts happening to improve Python on mobile?”, and so on.

9 years ago we instituted the Education Summit at PyCon US where educators as well as students work together on initiatives and obstacles. Earlier this year we decided we needed to do more. In November of 2018, the PSF created the Python in Education Board Committee and it was tasked with finding initiatives to fund to help improve the presence of Python in education.

In January of this year, the Python in Education Board Committee launched a “request for ideas” phase taking suggestions from the community on what we should focus our funding on. After the RFI period, we came up with 3 areas of education we wanted to focus on and asked to receive grant proposals on the following: resources (curriculums, evaluations, studies, multidisciplinary projects), localization (primarily translations), and mobile (development on mobile devices).

We are happy to publish more details on the grants the PSF approved from this initiative!

Beeware

The BeeWare Project wants to make it possible for all Python developers to write native apps for desktop and mobile platforms. Most desktop operating systems and iOS are supported already, but Android needs attention. Since Android users outnumber other mobile OS users worldwide by over 3 to 1, we determined it is important to fund this project. Beeware was awarded a $50,000 grant to help improve Python on Android. Phase one will be starting soon with this set of goals:

1. A port of the CPython runtime to Android, delivered as a binary library ready to install into an Android project.
2. A JNI-based library for bridging between the Android runtime and the CPython runtime.
3. A template for a Gradle project that can be used to deploy Python code on Android devices. 

Beeware announced that they are looking for contractors to help with the work. Check out their blog post for more information.

Python in Education Website

Educational resources are in demand.  The PSF awarded a grant of $12,000 USD to Meg Ray, to work on creating a Python in Education website where we can curate educational information from all over the world. Meg will begin by collecting resources and after auditing the shared information, she will work on organizing it on an official PSF webpage. This work will begin in October of 2019 so please keep an eye out for updates via tweets and blogs!

Friendly-tracebacks

Lastly is a project called friendly-tracebacks. This project is not in need of financial support but is asking the PSF to help publicize it.  Friendly-traceback aims to provide simplified tracebacks translated into as many languages as possible. The project maintainer is looking for volunteers to help with tasks such as documenting possible SyntaxError use cases and documenting exceptions that haven't already been covered. Read more on their blog for the full call to action from the maintainer.

We hope to continue this initiative yearly! Companies that are passionate about supporting Python in Education should get in touch; we can't continue our work without your support!  As a non-profit organization, the PSF depends on sponsorships and donations to support the Python community.

Donate to the PSF: https://www.python.org/psf/donations/
Sponsor the PSF: https://www.python.org/psf/sponsorship/

Felipe de Morais: 2019 Q2 Community Service Award Winner

Pythonistas everywhere benefit when our community reflects the many backgrounds and experiences of Python’s users. However it can be challenging to participate in the community when there are no local user groups or harder yet if groups do exist but you do not feel represented in them. After learning that a friend was experiencing gender descrimination at work, Felipe de Morais of Porto Alegre, Brazil, decided to start Django Girls Porto Alegre. By starting this group, women like his friend who were facing similar challenges could have a community to call their own.

Since Django Girls Porto Alegre took off in 2015, it has become one of the most active Django Girls groups in the world. Inspired by Django Girls and PyLadies, Felipe also started AfroPython, an initiative to empower Black people through technology. Additionally, Felipe contributes to Operação Serenata de Amor, an open source project that monitors public spending by politicians. For this work the PSF is pleased to award Felipe de Morais with the Q2 2019 Community Service Award:

RESOLVED, that the Python Software Foundation award the Q2 2019 Community Service Award to Felipe de Morais for his work towards facilitating the growth of the Python Brazilian community by organizing workshops, contributing to open source code that benefits the Brazilian people and for setting an example for all community organizers.

Felipe grew up in Rio De Janeiro where he earned a graduate degree in Computer Science and later moved to Porto Alegre in southern Brazil. With a strong desire to be part of a community, Felipe traveled to IT-related Meetup groups but longed for more accessible means to network and teach. Python was his go-to language for its simplicity and ease, and he loved to teach the language to help other people along in their careers. It is no surprise that the groups he’s started have both a Python and inclusivity focus.

When asked about his motivation for starting Python groups, Felipe says that that he simply gets great joy out of helping people. “I've seen people starting their work life because the workshop unlocked this career path for them,'' he says. “The most important part of it is the relationships made along the way, which make a great support system for a lot of people making positive life changes.”

AfroPython 2017

Renata D'Avila, a Django Girls Porto Alegre organizer, met Felipe 2016 at a Hackerspace event and the two have kept in touch ever since. “He is one of the people behind one of the biggest Django Girls workshop ever organized.” she recalls, “Django Girls Porto Alegre 2017 had about 180 people involved, among participants, mentors, and organizers.” However the event, as most events do, encountered some bumps in the road. As lunchtime rolled around and the planned caterers never showed up, Felipe raced across campus and resolved the issue, returning to the event with enough food for everyone. “That was one of the greatest achievements of that huge workshop,” says Renata, “that everyone could eat and that the schedule for the workshop was kept without people even knowing about how much effort it took to make it work.”

AfroPython 2018

Amanda Vieira met Felipe at Django Girls Porto Alegre and later worked with him to create AfroPython. She says of his work in these groups, “He has always helped both in the organization of events and as a coach, encouraging more and more women to get started in the area [of tech].” He has even developed a nickname, she quips “In his workplace and with friends, he is known as Felipython for all his involvement with language and the community.”

In May of 2017 when Felipe was attending Python Sudeste, a regional Python event in southeastern Brazil, he met Jessica Temporal. Jessica had been working as a data scientist on a large political open-source project, Operação Serenata de Amor. Serenata analyzes open data from the Brazilian government and flags expenses made by elected politicians that might be unlawful. Jessica was organizing a sprint at the conference and Felipe jumped in to help. In addition to working on some important refactoring and code readability issues, “Felipe was significant in making the project more friendly to newcomers,'' she says. He continues to contribute to the project today.

Felipe (left) with Seranata founder Eduardo Cuducos (middle) and Seranata data scientist Jessica Temporal (right)

Though Django Girls Porto Alegre and AfroPython have taken off, Felipe has no plans to slow down. In addition to continuing to work on open source projects, he is on the organizing team for the first ever AfroPythonConf later this year, and will be a keynote speaker at Python Brazil 2019.

CSA Award Winner Felipe de Morais

In his free time, Felipe enjoys Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, playing video games that remind him of his childhood, watching anime, and helping friends with finances and investments.

PyPI Security Q4 2019 Request for Proposals period opens.

The Python Software Foundation Packaging Working Group has received a grant from Facebook Research to implement advanced security features for PyPI. These features include cryptographic signing of uploaded artifacts and the infrastructure necessary to implement automated detection of malicious files uploaded to the index.

The Python Package Index (PyPI) is a foundational component of the Python ecosystem and broader computer software and technology landscape. This project aims to improve the security and accessibility of PyPI for all users worldwide, whether they are direct users, like project maintainers and pip installers, or indirect users. The impact of this work will be highly visible and improve crucial features of the service.

We plan to begin the project in Quarter 4 of 2019. Because of the size of the project, funding has been allocated to secure one or more contractors to complete the development, testing, verification, and assist in the rollout of necessary features.

Timeline

Date	Milestone
September 25	Request for Proposal period opened.
October 21	Request for Proposal period closes.
October 29	Date proposals will have received a decision.
December 2	Contract work commences.

What is the Request for Proposals period?

A Request for Proposal (RFP) is a process intended to allow us (The Python Software Foundation) to collect proposals from potential contractors and select contractor(s) best suited to fulfill the specified work.

After the RFP period closes we will evaluate the received proposals based on the evaluation criteria, seek clarification from proposers as necessary, and select one or more contractors to complete the work specified in the scope.

The Request for Proposals period opens today, September 25th, 2019, and is scheduled to close October 21, 2019 AoE.

How do I submit a proposal?

First, please read the full contents of the Request for Proposals here!

You'll find the instructions for submission, evaluation criteria, as well as scope of the project there.

The Python Software Foundation has updated its Code of Conduct

The Python community values members who are accepting, helpful, and respectful: for many years, the Python Software Foundation (PSF) has had an organization-wide Code of Conduct that defines these values, and behaviors that we want to have in our community. The Foundation has also insisted for years that every event that we sponsor have a Code of Conduct in place.

But spaces where our community meets – online, or in person – need a Code of Conduct that does more than just emphasize our values. The PSF’s flagship conference, PyCon US, has had its own Code of Conduct – separate from the PSF Code of Conduct – for many years. The PyCon US Code of Conduct not only highlights our community’s values, but it also identified behaviors that are not acceptable at the conference, explained how to report violations, and included enforcement procedures.

The PSF Board approved a new organization-wide Code of Conduct and enforcement guidelines at the August 2019 board meeting, and reporting guidelines at the September 2019 board meeting, taking effect immediately.

Our new Code of Conduct brings together the statement of values defined in the former PSF Code of Conduct, and enforcement guidelines – proven through our experience at PyCon US – that the PSF can now apply to every space that we oversee.

It saves the PSF from having to enforce two Codes of Conduct: one for PyCon US, and another for our other spaces. In crafting the Code of Conduct, we undertook an intentional effort to account for the unique needs of an international community that spans all seven continents on Earth.

Community members will now know that if they’re participating in an online space, a project, or an event facilitated by the PSF they will be subject to the same Code of Conduct, and will be able to report incidents in the same way.

The process of defining the new Code of Conduct was led by the PSF’s Conduct Working Group, which the PSF established in 2018. The PSF worked with Sage Sharp of Otter Tech to produce the draft of the new Code of Conduct. Sage has previously worked on the Codes of Conduct for Open Source communities including the Data Carpentries, Elastic Search, and GNOME, and previously worked with the PSF on modernizing PyCon US’ Code of Conduct and incident response procedures. 

In the future, the Conduct Working Group will help the Board oversee the reporting and enforcement of Code of Conduct reports, following the enforcement guidelines that accompany the new Code of Conduct.

The Board thanks the Conduct Working Group, and Sage Sharp for their invaluable service in getting our new Code of Conduct in place.