St. Louis University
To support the institutionalization of an Open Source Programs Office at Saint Louis University
This grant provides two years of continuing support for the Open Source Program Office (OSPO) at Saint Louis University (SLU), as part of the Sloan Foundation’s ongoing efforts to institutionalize support for open source software in the research enterprise. SLU has found particular success in integrating open source into the student experience. Their key innovation has been in developing support for faculty-driven open source research software through a scaffolded system of paid graduate (masters) students who mentor undergraduate students participating in a capstone Computer Science class. In 2023, every graduating undergraduate Computer Science major at SLU engaged substantively with open source software development through this program. Grant funds will be used to continue these core activities as well as to expand and institutionalize the OSPO inside SLU. Planned activities include transitioning the training for graduate students in practical open-source skills to a for-credit capstone/educational requirement. The leadership team also plans to develop revenue streams from both faculty-driven external grants and industry partnerships, and to develop a reserve fund to buffer against the ups and downs of external funding.