Uncharted: Lessons from the First University System OSPO Network
MCLD 2002 | Fri 07 Aug 2 p.m.–2:20 p.m.
Presented by
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Stephanie Lieggi
https://ucsc-ospo.github.io/
Stephanie Lieggi is the Executive Director of the Center for Research in Open Source Software (CROSS) at University of California, Santa Cruz. She supports academic-based open source projects and aims to create a sustainable contributor base through the establishment of hands-on mentorship programs, including the Open Source Research Experience (OSRE) Programs. Since 2022 her role has also helped lead the UCSC newly formed Open Source Program Office (OSPO), supported by a grant from the Alfred P Sloan Foundation. Most recently, Stephanie led the effort to build a system-wide network of OSPOs at the University of California, securing financial support for building the network from the Sloan Foundation in Spring 2024. Stephanie was the co-PI on UCSC’s first US National Science Foundation's Pathways to Enable Open Source Ecosystem (POSE) grant, which has enabled exploration into successful models for building sustainable open source projects at universities. Prior to starting at CROSS, Stephanie was a senior researcher and adjunct professor at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, part of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, where she researched the intersection of national security and global trade.
Stephanie Lieggi
https://ucsc-ospo.github.io/
Stephanie Lieggi is the Executive Director of the Center for Research in Open Source Software (CROSS) at University of California, Santa Cruz. She supports academic-based open source projects and aims to create a sustainable contributor base through the establishment of hands-on mentorship programs, including the Open Source Research Experience (OSRE) Programs. Since 2022 her role has also helped lead the UCSC newly formed Open Source Program Office (OSPO), supported by a grant from the Alfred P Sloan Foundation. Most recently, Stephanie led the effort to build a system-wide network of OSPOs at the University of California, securing financial support for building the network from the Sloan Foundation in Spring 2024. Stephanie was the co-PI on UCSC’s first US National Science Foundation's Pathways to Enable Open Source Ecosystem (POSE) grant, which has enabled exploration into successful models for building sustainable open source projects at universities. Prior to starting at CROSS, Stephanie was a senior researcher and adjunct professor at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, part of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, where she researched the intersection of national security and global trade.
Abstract
n 2024, campuses from the UC system proposed an ambitious idea: building the first systemwide Open Source Program Office (OSPO) network across multiple University of California campuses. Our team had a plan, Sloan Foundation funding, and the experience of UC Santa Cruz's pioneering campus OSPO — what we lacked was any concrete roadmap drawn by anyone who had done it before. This session is an update on where we are now — two years in and a little bit wiser. The presenter, who has chaired the UC Network since its inception, will share what has worked, what required course corrections, and what remains genuinely hard. Our goal is that our experience — the detours as much as the progress — provides a practical guide for others building similar efforts. This talk will highlight the critical role of groups like CURIOSS, the global community of university and research institute OSPOs — because some of the challenges we face aren't unique to UC, even if the scale is. Academic open source has enormous unrealized potential. Projects like Ceph, RISC-V, and Jupyter show what's possible when university research finds its way to broader adoption and sustainability. Two years in, we have a clearer picture of both how to do that and how much work remains.
n 2024, campuses from the UC system proposed an ambitious idea: building the first systemwide Open Source Program Office (OSPO) network across multiple University of California campuses. Our team had a plan, Sloan Foundation funding, and the experience of UC Santa Cruz's pioneering campus OSPO — what we lacked was any concrete roadmap drawn by anyone who had done it before. This session is an update on where we are now — two years in and a little bit wiser. The presenter, who has chaired the UC Network since its inception, will share what has worked, what required course corrections, and what remains genuinely hard. Our goal is that our experience — the detours as much as the progress — provides a practical guide for others building similar efforts. This talk will highlight the critical role of groups like CURIOSS, the global community of university and research institute OSPOs — because some of the challenges we face aren't unique to UC, even if the scale is. Academic open source has enormous unrealized potential. Projects like Ceph, RISC-V, and Jupyter show what's possible when university research finds its way to broader adoption and sustainability. Two years in, we have a clearer picture of both how to do that and how much work remains.