The Carpentries Australia: Community Discussion

Back in February 2013, Greg Wilson (co-founder of Software Carpentry) flew out to Sydney and Melbourne to run the first ever Software Carpentry “bootcamps” outside of Europe and North America. Those of us involved in those initial workshops could not have anticipated just how quickly things would grow. Fast forward six years and here’s how far we’ve come in Australia:

• 150+ workshops
• 3,750+ learners
• 130+ qualified instructors
• 7 member institutions

Past Software Carpentry workshops in Australia

With the recent announcement of an official Regional Coordinator for Australia, now is a good time to take stock of how things are travelling. In particular, our workshop statistics suggest that growth has levelled off in recent years (see below).

This can be partly explained by the fact that a number of our member organisations are incorporating Carpentries ideas and lesson materials into their own custom workshops and courses (which is great), as opposed to running officially branded Carpentries workshops that are captured in our database. Even so, as we look forward there are a number of questions for the Australian community to consider, such as:

• What can be done to ensure continued growth?
• What can be done to establish and support Carpentries communities in cities (e.g. Adelaide, Darwin) and regional centres that don’t currently have one?
• How do we capture non-branded / unofficial usage of Carpentries lessons in our statistics?
• Should we establish a team of regional coordinators spread around the country, as opposed to relying on one person?
• Should we establish a regular community discussion and/or newsletter so that people can stay up-to-date with what’s happening around the country?

To start answering these and other questions, we’ve scheduled an Australia Community Discussion for 12pm AEDST on Tuesday 2 April. Please sign up on the Etherpad to let us know you are planning to attend. On the day, join us in the Zoom meeting.

Hope to see you there!