No doubt you will have heard of the successful Joomla 8 sprint that was held last autumn to roadmap Joomla for the future. And I think it would be fair to say that we, as a community have a good idea of what Joomla is and what it can do.

However there is a knowledge gap with how the outside world perceives us and to address this and other related issues, the Outreach department will be staging a Sprint of our own. The proposed topics we will be workshopping are:

1. Developing a marketing strategy for the next 12 months to 2 years to raise awareness of Joomla to business owners, agencies and the next generation of developers.

2. Look to develop an educational outreach program to promote Joomla at secondary school level.

3. Revise the social media department to allow for a common design language across all posts, publicising our CMS, extensions and our sponsors.

4. Reinvigorate PBF possibly in conjunction with item 2.

5. Strategies for attracting future funding for the project.

 The structure of the Sprint will be as follows:

• Arrive the evening before. Socialise, get to know each other and dinner.

• Day 1 morning: Introductions, Topic 1 workshop

• Day 1 Lunch.

• Day 1 afternoon: Topic 1 breakout sessions followed by a recap and conclusions. Preview of Day 2

• Day 1 evening: Dinner. If you are lucky there may be karaoke!

• Day 2 morning: Topic 2 workshop and breakout sessions

• Day 2 Lunch.

• Day 2 afternoon: Topic 2 recap and conclusions. Topic 3 workshop. Preview of day 3.

• Day 2 evening: Dinner.

• Day 3 morning: Topic 3 breakout sessions followed by recap and conclusions. 

• Day 3 Lunch.

• Day 3 afternoon: Final group session, conclusions and goodbyes.

 The Sprint will take place in the Netherlands in the Spring and will be over 3 days (location and dates to be finalised) so we’re putting out a call to the community for up to 16 individuals who would like to participate in the Sprint. A background (or experience) in marketing would be preferred though not essential. If you’re the sort of person who has a head full of ideas and you would like to be considered as a participant please add your details to the link below:

 Participants Prospect List

 If you get selected, OSM would provide board and lodging and, if budget is left, help with traveling costs.