Hello ,

Welcome to FOSS United’s August Student Digest. We are back with the latest round of project showcases, opportunities and stories from around.

Whether you are looking for the next cool FOSS project, trying to make sense of the shifting tech landscape, or searching for ways to engage with the digital commons, we’ve foraged the best resources to keep you going. Follow long!

Student Projects

• expressive-shapes: A pure-Python library for creating, rounding, and morphing polygons using cubic Bezier curves.

• Pomelo: An open source platform by the Sahyadri Open Source Community, designed to manage programming contests, technical assessments, and hackathons.

Reads

• Stories of the Commons: Data isn’t just numbers; it’s a powerful tool for advocacy and protecting shared resources. This project demonstrates how mapping, data visualisation, and storytelling can make the invisible visible, highlighting how technical skills can directly defend community rights and the real-world "commons."

• Building Open Design Systems: A candid postmortem from a designer at Ente (a privacy-first, open-source platform) detailing the messy, iterative reality of building a production-grade design system from scratch.

• DevLabs Playbook by OpenLake: Created by IIT Bhilai’s open-source society, this step-by-step framework details exactly how to structure and run an eight-week, zero-budget technical bootcamp.

• Is AI Going to Destroy Our Lives or Not?: The conversation around AI is rapidly shifting from code implementation to career survival. Understanding how AI impacts the labor market and shapes white-collar jobs is critical for students navigating their futures in a rapidly automating industry.

Opportunities

• Policy in Action: The Policy in Action Program is for young professionals and university students keen to explore the fields of public policy and development. FOSS United is also offering a scholarship to community members who wish to pursue this program.

• Graphic Design Associate Hiring: The FOSS United Foundation is looking for a junior graphic designer to join our team.

• Digital Humanities Winter School 2027: Applications are open to writers, poets, artists, students, researchers, and other creative practitioners who want to explore digital storytelling, narrative forms, and creative expression using open-source tools. If you have applied for the program and need financial assistance, write to clubs@fossunited.org.

• Sequoia Open Source Fellowship: A 6 to 12-month fellowship by Sequoia Capital designed to support open source creators and projects that have real world adoption. The program covers living expenses so you can focus entirely on building and maintaining open-source tools, without any expectations of starting a business or giving up equity.

Resources

• Open Design Resources: Openly licensed tools, icons, fonts, images, and other resources for designers working in open source.

• Make Learning Interactive: Turn any YouTube video into an interactive lesson in seconds and get actionable insights on how students learn.

Contributors

Shoutout to ashish_kumar_dash, aman_valiyakath, kk_surendran, justmodo, jeswin and ansh for their contributions to this newsletter!

If you’d like to feature your community’s work or your own in the next edition, please share it in the Newsletter topic on the FOSS Clubs Telegram before 15th of next month.