dean

In the Perl Programmers Facebook group we have kicked off a Perl Mentoring program. Already more than a dozen experienced Perl people have offered their services to anyone looking to learn more about Perl. It's very convenient that mechanics of volunteering and looking for a mentor are handled by Facebook's mentoring functions. Here's a few thoughts on how to build on that.

For Mentees:

Before reaching out to mentors first pick a specific area of Perl you would like help with. Think up a few ideas for projects that you can complete in 4-6 weeks. With those in mind, review the available mentors looking for skills & experiences that might match your project ideas.

A good project might be: adding a test suite to your module, writing a nagios plugin, a perl weekly challenge, something from pull request club, a bug/feature for your CPAN module, or learning how to create modules from scratch and using Moo.

In terms of expectations; the Mentor's roll is to confirm your direction and to help get you unstuck. You will need to actually do the work, so you will need to set aside the time to complete the project. And the relationship isn't commercial nor are they a 24/7 tutoring service.

For Mentors:

Help the Mentee select a realistic project that they can achieve in the 4-6 week period. Avoid writing code for your Mentee, instead you should provide direction, guidance, and help the Mentee get unstuck. Teaching them how to find solutions is more important than providing solutions for them.

So let's get going!

Facebook's system will then walk you through their 7 steps, these will be a good guide.

Start by getting acquainted, then settle on the project, and schedule regular catch ups, then make it happen.

Get started on Facebook