STEAM Camp - How It Works

How It Works

1. Each instructor runs an event in their local area - in the nearest suitable population center or venue
2. There is one instructor per event, and 2 if the number of registrants is 18 or more.
3. Each STEAM Camp is 9 days long and requires instructor to be there full time
4. We run 12 events at the same time in parallel - to collaborate on projects and share expertise.
5. Instructors work with OSE to prepare the curriculum - see specifics of curriculum at STEAM Camp 9 Day Curriculum. Current project for the 5 days is the Raspberry Pi tablet. All instructors work openly on the wiki and Google Presentations and using other open source tools to promote open source collaboration.
6. Each instructor provides relevant technology - most important because technology is the foundation of our product. Without technology, we could not substantiate practical development of open source products.
7. OSE coordinates this effort, and shares revenue 50/50 with each instructor based on the net revenue of the particular instructor's event. See STEAM Camp Finances
8. All curriculum and design is published as open source to promote rapid learning worlwide as a service to humanity. The intent is to make the curriculum available to anyone who wants to teach it, as an open educational resource.

Timeline

• See STEAM Camp Preparation
• OSE ships kits to instructors (for all participatns) 2 weeks prior to the event.
• Instructors reserve a suitable venue, and OSE pays for the venue
• Instructors present at the entire 9 day event from 9 AM to 6 PM each day.
• Instructors are paid in full upon completion of the event.
• All instructors cover a refundable $300 for a sample kit to build all the proejects from all other instructors. Refund is offered if kit is sent back to OSE after the STEAM Camp.

Time Commitment

1. 20-80 hours of time to prepare curriculum
2. Time to learn the curriculum of all the other instructors to present effectively and to lead the builds
3. 9 day time commitment during the event

Instructor Duties

1. Preparing curriculum and prototypes that will be used during the STEAM Camp. The level of completeness is such that the projects that we build will work, and that the curriculum/build procedures are teachable to the other instructors
2. Practice building of projects from other instructors, in order to teach these projects
3. Study of the material presented by the other instructors to teach their material effectively
4. Identifying, and securing with OSE's oversight - suitable a venue for the STEAM Camp
5. Shipping their curriculum to OSE for evaluation and approval, so that the technology can be spread to the other instructors
6. Assisting OSE in marketing by spreading the word through available channels
7. Meeting several times online to coordinate/learn/prepare curriculum with other instructors
8. Teaching during the 9 day camp
9. Releasing all design and work under a CC-BY-SA or other OSHWA and OSI-compliant open source license.

OSE Duties

1. Coordinating the development process of the STEAM Camp
2. Creating online presence at the main OSE website for registration and information
3. Marketing through OSE social media, email list, and other contract marketing
4. Approving and paying for the venue selected by the Instructor
5. Preparing publicity materials and social media assets for Instructors to use on their channels
6. Event posting of all events on Eventzilla
7. Shipping kits for as many registrants as sign up
8. Customer support for registrations

Links

• OSE Talent Search
• Blog post - https://www.opensourceecology.org/ospd-and-steam-camps/

Risk Share

In an entrepreneurial spirit, this is a risk-share endeavor. We develop the event together - so we are all resonsible for its success. Participating does not mean that OSE is guaranteeing success. We are all in it together to succeed - based on the promise that with each successive open source design and build - the whole program improves continuously. While the first 4 days may stabilize - the 5 project days will always keep pushing the limits of product improvement or new products. The end goal is commercial-grade product with distributed production. The more successful the event, everyone gets paid more in the 50/50 revenue share. The revenue share is 50/50 between an instructor and OSE for each individual event that the instructor runs. The products that we develop contribute to the Open Source Everything Store - open source product design and production engineering for the open source economy.

Larger Picture

OSE uses the STEAM Camps as a spring-board to develop and run Incentive Challenges as the preferred way to large-scale collaboration. The incentive challenges must be resourced sufficiently to deliver a working product - as a solid foundation for an enterprise. This means that the incentive challenge will be designed also to offer enterprise startup support.

The approach of running incentive challenges is based on OSE's learnings that typical open source product development effort is difficult to complete for reasons of contributor continuity and resources. Typical open source hardware projects rely on a heroic core team that does most of the work, due to the significant barriers to entry for mass participation in open hardware development. Volunteer turnover tends to be high. Thus, open source hardware has enjoyed only a limited level of success in terms of rapid, large-scale collaboration. And because taking projects from prototype to product requires a herculean effort - most open hardware remain as projects-in-development - not products. (Not to mention the enclosure of open source by many who get close to a final product). By injecting more resources into the development effort in the form of a well-funded incentive challenge, we aim to (1) break the participation barrier, and (2) assure product completion. The keys to success are a massive transformative purpose, and highly modular breakdown that allows many people to collaborate effectively in parallel.

In the STEAM Camp program, vetting of instructors is essentially self-executing. We select qualified open source developers as instructors - and their capacity is demonstrated by their ability to deliver their curriculum. This becomes evident via transparent loggin, the Kickoff Meeting, curriculum submission, and collaboration with the rest of the team. After OSE approves everyone's Curriculum Submission - we open the event on Eventzilla for registration. OSE's role is to maintain quality control standards in delivering events.