DSF calls for applicants for a Django Fellow

The Django project and the Django Software Foundation are looking to hire one or two "Django Fellows" to work on Django on a part-time or full-time basis, for a pilot project with an initial contract period of three months. The program and the contracts may be extended should the program prove successful - that is, if we see good results, and the DSF is able to raise more funds on the back of the program.

The position of Fellow is primarily focused on housekeeping and community support - you'll be expected to do the work that would benefit from constant, guaranteed attention rather than the current volunteer-only nature of Django development. In particular, your duties will include:

monitoring the security@djangoproject.com email alias and ensuring security issues are acknowledged and responded to promptly

fixing release blockers and helping to ensure timely releases

fixing severe bugs and helping to backport fixes to these and security issues

reviewing and merging pull requests

triaging tickets on Trac

answering user questions on IRC and the django-developers mailing list

helping new Django contributors land patches and learn our philosophy

Being a core committer is not a necessary prerequisite for this position; we'll consider applications from anyone with a proven history of working with either the Django community or another similar open-source community. Successful applicants will be given commit access, with supervision initially if you're a new committer.

You'll be expected to report weekly to a few members of the Django core team detailing the work you've done that week and any feedback on how Django and the DSF could help you (feedback will be vital in this first phase of the Fellow program), as well as publicly posting about your activities to help communicate your role to the Django community at large.

If you don't perform the duties to a satisfactory level, we may end your contract early. Please note there's no guarantee of contract renewal after the initial three months - this is a pilot program, and its extension relies on us being able to raise sufficient funds for the DSF.

Your geographical location is not important - we have several methods of remote communication and coordination that we can use depending on the timezone difference to the supervising members of Django.

The DSF has an initial fund of $40,000 USD set aside for the pilot phase (first three months) of the program. We're aware this isn't competitive with full-time salaries in big cities like San Francisco or London; the fellows will be selected to make best use of our available funds.

If you are interested in applying for the position, please email us with details of your experience with Django and open-source contribution and community support in general, the amount of time each week you are able to dedicate to the position (a minimum of 20 hours a week), and the amount of money you're asking for. Applications will be open until 1200 UTC, September 28, 2014.

Successful applicants will not be an employee of the Django Project or the Django Software Foundation. Fellows will be contractors and expected to ensure that they meet all of their resident country's criteria for self-employment or having a shell consulting company, invoicing the DSF on a monthly basis and ensuring they pay all relevant taxes.

If you or your company is interested in helping fund this program and future DSF activites, please get in touch to learn about corporate membership.