[Technical Initiative Funding Request]: OpenSSF Mentorship winter/spring cycle '27 pilot

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Valutazione

Difficoltà
5/5
Tempo stimato
Più di una settimana
Idoneità per principianti
8/100
Tipo di issue
Funzionalità
Chiarezza
Abbastanza chiara
Stato di attività
Attiva
Ambito
security

Direzione di ricerca

This is a funding request form for an OpenSSF mentorship pilot, not a code change, and it names no files, tests or entry points. A newcomer would start by reading the linked LFX mentorship documentation for administrator and mentor responsibilities. The request is complete when the Technical Advisory Council reviews and decides on the funding, which is a governance decision rather than a patch.

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Descrizione

administration For Review gitvote gitvote/closed gitvote/passed TI Funding Request
Technical Initiative

BEAR WG

Lifecycle Phase

Incubating

Funding amount

$60,000 ($6k per mentee)

Problem Statement

Hands-on experience and contributions to OSS projects are a major advantage for obtaining a job in SWE and/or cybersecurity. At the same time, mentoring and coaching experiences are increasingly viewed as important leadership skills in tech jobs. Programs like the LFX Mentorship are one way to offer these experiences and opportunities.

Who does this affect?

Students and individuals from underrepresented groups often do not have the expertise to start their own projects or the resources for relevant coursework to boost the skills they need to enter the cybersecurity workforce. Cybersecurity/OSS professionals may not be able to easily find opportunities to mentor and coach others in the field through their employer, or may wish to broaden the scope of their experience.

Have there been previous attempts to resolve the problem?

The WG has successfully run two OpenSSF Mentorship programs in the summer cycles of 2025 and 2026. This is a request to pilot a winter/spring program cycle in early 2027, in addition to the yearly summer cycle. If funded, this would allow us to extend the program to more projects and bring in more potential long-term contributors to OpenSSF. Starting in summer 2026, we also reserve a number of mentee positions for first-time contributors, folks who do not have prior OSS contributions and/or mentorship experience. Continuously improving, we hope to extend the scope of mentorship contributions beyond software to other important project needs like documentation and project management.

See the 2026 summer mentorship showcase and blog post.

Why should it be tackled now and by this TI?

A core goal of the BEAR WG is to empower underrepresented individuals seeking opportunities in the cybersecurity workforce. The OpenSSF is well positioned to address this issue by participating in the LFX mentorship program as a sponsor. Further, the healthy number of OpenSSF TIs can offer a variety of opportunities by offering mentoring by experts in the field. The inaugural OpenSSF Mentorship Program in 2025 was a major success, with the second iteration during summer 2026 seeing double the participation of projects and mentees supported. Notably, several projects are recurring participants, and former mentees have stepped up as project maintainers and co-mentors themselves!

There have been several requests for more mentorship opportunities in OpenSSF, as well as expanding our reach to partner organizations like Codefy (tech education and advocacy for Native Americans), so the BEAR WG would like to keep this great momentum going into 2027.

Give an idea of what is required to make the funding initiative happen

The participating TIs need to identify concrete contributions that a mentee can accomplish within the 12-week span of the mentorship. A TI may propose more than one mentorship project, if supporting more than one mentee. Each committed TI needs to have at least one available maintainer to serve as mentor in the November 2026-April 2027 timeframe for one or more mentorship projects. We have commitments or strong interest from the following TIs (twice the number of summer 2026!):

  • Minder (1 mentee)
  • OSS-CRS (2)
  • Gemara (1-2)
  • SCI WG (1-2)
  • Privateer (1-2)
  • gittuf (1)
  • Zarf (1-2)
  • Darnit (1)
  • Scorecard (1-2)
  • BOMHort (1)
  • BEAR WG (2)
What is going to be needed to deliver this funding initiative?
  • The Program Administrator:
    • Registers project mentors
    • Enrolls TIs’ projects into LFX
  • Project Mentors:
    • Write project summaries (to be reviewed by OpenSSF and LF)
    • Review and select mentee applications
    • Work with mentees during the 12-week span of the program
  • More details on responsibilities for the program administrator and mentors are in the LFX mentorship docs.
Are there tools or tech that still need to be produced to facilitate the funding initiative?

N/A

Give a summary of the requirements that contextualize the costs of the funding initiative

Administrators and project mentors are unpaid volunteers. The requested funds are intended to cover up to ten $6k mentee stipends (irrespective of mentee location).

Who is responsible for doing the work of this funding initiative?

The BEAR WG co-chairs

Who is accountable for doing the work of this funding initiative?

The individual project mentors

If the responsible or accountable parties are no longer available, what is the backup contact or plan?

The Program Admin

What license is this funding initiative being used under?

N/A

Code of Conduct
  • I agree to follow the OpenSSF's Code of Conduct
List the major milestones by date and identify the overall timeline within which the technical initiative plans to accomplish their goals. Any payments for services, sponsorships, etc., will require LF Legal and Financial review.

The OpenSSF Mentorship Winter/Spring cycle 2027 has the following timeline:

Tenative dates may be adjusted for the winter holidays.

  • Nov 5, 2026: Mentor signup deadline
  • Nov 5 - Nov 15: Write project descriptions review and revisions
  • Nov 16 - Nov 30: Mentee application period
  • (tentative) Dec 1 - Dec 15: Mentee application review
  • (tentative) Dec 16: Mentee accept/decline notifications sent
  • (tentative) Dec 16 - Jan 15, 2027: Mentee onboarding on LFX and project
  • Jan 18 - April 9: 12-week mentorship program
    Feb 26: First mentee evaluation due
    April 16: Final mentee evaluation due
    TBD: Mentee final presentation to the OpenSSF community (late April)
If this is a request for funding to issue a contract, then OpenSSF will issue that contract. Please provide a Statement of Work (SOW) that we may review. Any contracting action will take 4-6 weeks to issue.

N/A

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