Would it be possible to offer on-site internships in Engineering?
As far as I know, on-site internships are offered in Legal. It would be really, really great if similar offers were also given in Engineering, especially for outreach program interns who want to work at the WMF.
There are actually some very initial discussions about setting up internships for WMF Engineering, just like other WMF departments have. It's not the first time this topic has been raised, but I hope this time we end up opening some positions.
Assigning this task to me, while I find the actual owner at the WMF.
Sorry, no. I will post updates here when I have them. This depends on WMF HR and Engineering management, so apart from pinging them, there is not much I can do.
Not really. In a first short discussion in a WMF Engineering management meeting, it was explained that these internships are actually more complex (than I expect at least) in legal terms. The WMF cannot just bring in volunteers as tech interns paying them a stipend, on site or online, due to regulations observing that companies don't use this mechanism for cheap labor without the required compensations. Makes total sense, but it will not help us having first tech internships in place any time soon...
We agreed on a follow-up meeting, but it has not been scheduled yet. I will report here any news. Sorry I thought this topic would move forward faster, but I didn't expect so many factors involved.
It's been a month now, are there any updates? I'm sorry for asking so frequently, but I was really looking forward to interning at the WMF this summer.
A lot of companies do offer internships of this kind though, so while I understand that it might be complex, it certainly does happen every year at a pretty large scale. Surely WMF-Legal can figure out how to adhere to the legal guidelines? :/
Unfortunately the status is still as described in Quim's previous comment T114348#1800521 - no news to share yet, sorry.
Sorry for the confusing activity. There has been some progress:
I have shared further details privately with @polybuildr, and I'm happy to do the same with other known volunteers interested following this task. At this point, we don't want to promote this program more widely and set too high expectations. Still, something is something.
True, but usually these companies you have in mind have thousands of employees, and those offering international programs have also international subsidiaries. In comparison, the Wikimedia Foundation is a much smaller organization based in one country only. This is not a justification per se, but I hope it helps understanding the different position we are in.
On-site Engineering internships are happening, and they are being announced in the regular channels where WMF job positions are announced. I would say this task is resolved.