2018 Winter Cycle
- osu! / osu!catch / osu!taiko / osu!mania -
Hello,
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Along with the Organization Team, I now present the tenth cycle of the Community Mentorship Program (last cycle announcement can be found here).
What is this Program?
- This program is intended for aspiring mappers of all game modes.
- This program operates on a 10+2 week cycle basis (10 weeks for the program, final 2 weeks buffer time). During this timespan, a mentor is bound to a mentee. The buffer time is used for reorganisation, reflection and simply taking a break.
- Everything regarding this program is organised in one Discord server. Hint: get Discord.
- Cycles do not culminate in any specific event, instead, there are lots of internally organized mapping and modding related events taking place each cycle! Previous iterations featured classroom-like lessons hosted by mentors, speedmapping contests, puzzles of different kinds as well as regular mapping contests!
General Rules
- Mentor/Mentee pairings are free to continue for more than one cycle. These mentors may not be eligible this cycle unless they want to take on more mentees than in the previous cycle (specified below).
- Mentor/Mentee pairings are free to part ways within the buffer time. In case they do not get along there is no reason to force anyone. These scenarios are evaluated on a case-by-case basis while aiming to not leave any mentee behind for no reason.
- You must not be restricted from osu! when signing up for this program in any role. If you got yourself into a situation like this we do not deem you as suitable for participating in a program of this nature.
- You have to inform an Organizer before any longer absences. Organizers keep track of the activity between each Mentor/Mentee pairing, so if one of them is absent for a longer timespan, countermeasures can be taken. Not informing anyone about your absence can get you excluded from the current cycle.
- The only roles that are mutually exclusive are mentor and mentee within the same gamemode. This means any other combination such as Organizer/Mentee, Organizer/Mentor are valid within one gamemode. This also means that the combination of osu!-Mentee and osu!catch-Mentor are valid as well.
Timelines
- The following deadlines are fixed, there will not be any exceptions to these dates:
- Opening post: 2018-09-23.
- Mentor sign-ups start on 2018-09-23 and end on 2018-09-30.
- Mentee sign-ups start on 2018-10-07 and end on 2018-10-17.
- The Winter 2018 cycle starts on 2018-10-21 and ends on 2019-01-13.
- Rough timeline for the Spring Cycle 2018:
- Opening post: 2019-01-06.
- Mentor sign-ups start on 2019-01-06 and end on 2019-01-13.
- Mentee sign-ups start on 2019-01-20 and end on 2019-01-30.
- The Spring 2019 cycle starts on 2019-02-03 and ends on 2019-04-14.
Mentor Criteria
- Rules -
Mentors joining this cycle ...
Mentors staying from previous cycles ...
- Guidelines -
- Rules -
Mentors joining this cycle ...
- may only apply for one gamemode. Because teaching two people in two completely different games is a huge risk, this scenario is disallowed.
- may choose one mentee in total. This has proven to be necessary because the reliability of a mentor is best observed in practice - if one mentee needs a new mentor because they quit teaching the administrative effort to arrange this is minimal.
- will not be allowed to choose a Mentee with a timezone difference of more than 6 hours. Anything larger has proven to be too much of a gap between average online times to get anything done productively. Mentors who already stayed for a cycle are still strongly advised to avoid a timezone difference like this.
- may only take on applicants that are really new to mapping. If you are new to teaching others your best bet is to teach someone where you are not prone to running out of material to teach within a few weeks. The progression of an applicant is judged by organizers upon evaluating applications.
Mentors staying from previous cycles ...
- may take mentees from different gamemodes provided they are qualified to teach both of them.
- may choose one additional mentee per completed cycle while proving they can handle their current amount of mentees, capping off at three as the maximum.
- are free to take on mentees with larger time differences provided they can reasonably explain how the scheduling between both parties is supposed to work. Taking on someone from a completely different timezone poses a huge risk in connection with online times, availability as well as general scheduling and thus needs to be carefully considered.
- may take on applicants that are up until mediocre at mapping. Anyone doing so will have to provide a lesson plan to prove that they actually have material to teach their mentee on and that this material is enough to fill the schedule of this program. Anyone who is deemed to be at a skill level where they do not necessarily need a teacher is deemed unsuitable to be a mentee on this program. The progression of an applicant is judged by organizers upon evaluating applications.
- Guidelines -
- Mentors who were removed from the program for any reason will not be reconsidered unless there are special circumstances. If your behaviour / general absence / lack of commitment gives us reasons to remove you will need convincing reasons to come back.
- You should have more than 2 hours a week at your disposal for this program. Explaining and discussing mapping related things tends to take time.
- Each applicant will be considered on a case-by-case basis and informed in both acceptance and denial. We reserve the right to choose who will be mentoring in this program and explain denials in detail for every case as well as give the applicant the chance to argue against this decision.
- You should …
- have ranked beatmaps in the gamemodes you are applying for teaching in. (guest difficulties or their own sets count) as they indicate experience with the process as well as giving/taking constructive criticism.
- have a predictable schedule. So that the chances of you suddenly disappearing without any traces are low.
- have a decent amount of kudosu to indicate that they have experience with giving feedback on beatmaps.
- demonstrate more or less regular modding activity to indicate a baseline of activity in terms of giving feedback.
- have encountered mentoring or teaching previously. Experience never hurts.
- have a more or less clean record. People who are known for bad behaviour in the recent past should reconsider their behaviour before taking a teaching position.
Note that none of these above are criteria that would 100% exclude you if you do not fulfill them fully. This is still a case-by-case evaluation.
Mentee Criteria
- Rules -
- Guidelines -
- Rules -
- Former mentees who want to be part of the program again can only do so for a total of four times per game mode. This equals about a year of being on the program which should be more than enough time to get into the mapping community.
- Each applicant is eligible for any mentor respecting the mentors' constraints. If a mentor who was not your first or second choice wants to mentor you, we will notify you.
- You must be able to take criticism. You are here because you aim to improve how you map so, therefore, taking criticism is necessary. Familiarise yourself with the Code of Conduct for Mapping and Modding on the Ranking Criteria to know what this means.
- If you sign up for a newly joined Mentor your timezone differences must not exceed 6 hours. You will not be eligible as a choice for that mentor as per the Mentor Criteria if you do so anyway.
- Guidelines -
- Mentees who were removed from the program for any reason will not be reconsidered unless there are special circumstances. If your behaviour / general absence / lack of commitment gives us reasons to remove you will need convincing reasons to come back.
- You should invest more time than your mentor into the program. Given that they are supposed to help you make progress this entire thing only works if you actively work on it.
- Your availability and timezone should match the mentors you are applying for. This is recommended due to being easier for both parties.
Code of Conduct
- As a mentor, do not resort to using authority over rational arguments. If you find yourself doing this you probably do not have good arguments to begin with. Treat everyone equally instead of assuming authority.
- Repeated misbehaviour on the Discord server can and will get you excluded. Though you really have to try our patience for us to do that.
- Make sure to drop us a message if you happen to have some things coming up which will impact your activity. Not that we are interested in your personal lives too much, we just happen to keep track of activity and progress so you disappearing without anyone knowing you did causes confusion.
- Please report violations of the Code of Conduct for Mapping and Modding if you encounter them. We investigate cases individually will take measures accordingly. We just cannot act if we do not know what is going on, though.
Help wanted/needed!
We are currently looking for helping hands in the following areas:
We are currently looking for helping hands in the following areas:
- the gamemodes osu!catch, osu!taiko and osu!mania need more people knowledgeable in these specific areas to help out with the program to ensure events on there are running smoothly.