Board of Directors Elections 2016 - Candidacy - Meg Ford

[meg ford <megford gnome org>]

Name: Meg Ford

Email: megford gnome org

Affiliation: ShoreTel 

Dear Foundation Members,

I have been involved in GNOME since 2011. I got involved through the Outreach Program for Women (Outreachy), and subsequently interned with GNOME through Google Summer of Code. Currently I am a technical contributor, and maintain the sound recorder application that I wrote during my last internship. Recently I have also been volunteering as a member of the LAS GNOME papers committee.

In my local community I have given talks on GNOME at local events such as Chicago's Flourish! conference and presented on GNOME outreach at Software Freedom Day. Jim Campbell and I co-organize the Chicago LUG, which meets at our local hackerspace. We frequently host talks related to GNOME and other Linux technologies, and hack on GNOME. Most recently we partnered with the EFF on a free workshop to teach surveillance self-defense to local grassroots groups. Additionally I have organized OpenHatch workshops to teach university students to contribute to FOSS projects and workshops to teach women Python programming.

I am deeply appreciative of the support and knowledge I have gained as a member of the community, and I would like to have the opportunity to make a larger contribution by serving on the Board. I have a personal commitment to freedom, diversity and inclusion, and I would like to work to make sure the GNOME remains a welcoming and growing community. I am interested in helping to ensure that hackfests and bounties are organized and that contributors have the resources they need to be engaged. I am also interested in reaching out to prospective sponsors for GNOME as well as helping to maintain our relationships with our current sponsors. 

Thanks,

Meg