Public Lab has received support for students to work on Public Lab software projects via [Google's Summer of Code program](https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com) -- 2017 is our fourth great year of open source coding! In 2017 we also joined the [Rails Girls Summer of Code](https://railsgirlssummerofcode.org/) program. 

This is a key way that we are able to develop our collaborative platform (this site) as well as [other Public Lab coding projects](/wiki/developers).

2017's program has wrapped up; [Rails Girls Summer of Code ends at the end of September. Please see (and update) our [Ideas page](/wiki/gsoc-ideas) to start preparing for 2018 -- it's never too early!

### Links

* [GSoC Ideas Page](/wiki/gsoc-ideas)
* [GSOC 2016](/wiki/gsoc-2016) program, projects, students and mentors
* [GSOC 2015](/wiki/gsoc-2015) program (application only), projects, students and mentors
* [GSoC 2014](/wiki/gsoc-2014) program, projects, students and mentors
* [GSoC 2013](/wiki/gsoc-2013) program
* [GSoC 2013 mentors & proposals](http://publiclab.org/wiki/gsoc-2013-mentors-and-student-proposals)

### Updates

[updates:soc]


****

## Questions

[questions:soc]

## Activities

[activities:soc]

****

### Mentoring

What does it mean to be a mentor? Mentors basically check in with a student once per week roughly from May-August, and offer some project management guidance... the [plots-dev list](/wiki/developers) can provide code-specific input so we share the burden of specific technical support. 

We do occasional chat or skype sessions, and mentors rely on each other quite a bit, on the plots-gsoc list. Students often need project and time management guidance more than code guidance, and also need to be occasionally reminded to ask for input on the community lists when they get into trouble. 

https://flossmanuals.net/GSoCMentoring/ also has a lot of resources on mentoring. 

### Resources:

Mentor "guidebook": http://en.flossmanuals.net/GSoCMentoring/what-makes-a-good-mentor/