Hello there! 👋
I’m Ruth Ikegah, an Open-Source Program Manager, Community Manager, GitHub Star, and Technical Writer.
I help engender interest and participation in the open-source space by inspiring, influencing, and educating developers in open source in Africa. To further entice developers to contribute to open source, I have written several blog articles and done speaking engagements at conferences on first contributions and sustainability in Open Source.
As I progress, I make it a point to share my journey, showing developers that they utilize the power of open source to advance in their careers. I’m open to new connections and collaborations. I believe I’m a valuable addition to people around me and the teams I’m a part of. This is largely due to my doggedness and dedication to work. My value expands beyond the traditional, as I have an entire network that comes with me.
I am open to opportunities to be impactful and help the sustainability of an ecosystem integral to human progress while doing what I love.
OPEN-SOURCE
01/
CHAOSS
CHAOSS is a Linux Foundation project focused on creating analytics and metrics to help define community health.
At CHAOSS, I participate in the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) working group. I double as an event-badging maintainer to recognize and badge Open-Source events that have diverse and inclusive practices put in place.
I also work as a member of the DEI Audit Committee funded by the Ford Foundation.
02/
Layer 5
Layer5 is an open source-first company and community of cloud-native engineers. At Layer 5, I served as a community mentor in 2020 and 2021, helping to onboard new contributors and get them up to speed to retain long-term contributors and growth.
I currently participate as a program liaison for the SCA Contributhon cohort.
03/
Open-Source Stories
The Open-Source Stories project celebrates what is counted and who represents open source by collecting narratives from creators, contributors, and consumers alike. I work as a facilitator on this project, hosting the sessions to highlight the stories of Open Source heroes.
COMMUNITY
01/
CHAOSS Africa
I serve as the community lead at CHAOSS Africa, building a chapter of the community in Africa to build sustainable and healthy Open-Source communities and educate and empower Africans to participate and build an Open-Source career.
02/
GitHub Community: GitHub Africa Virtual Meetup
The GitHub Africa Virtual Meetup is a monthly meetup where African techies present and discuss tech-related topics to educate, connect and interact with people.
I am currently one of the organizers ensuring the smooth scheduling of the event. I source for speakers, work to promote the event and co-host the sessions.
03/
She Code Africa Mentorship Program
She Code Africa (SCA) is a community focused on celebrating and empowering women in tech across Africa. For the SCA mentorship program, I volunteer as a point of contact (POC), enabling easy communication and syncing between the program facilitators, mentors and mentees. Volunteering in the SCAMP program is an avenue for me to give back to the community and directly impact the mentees because I was a mentee in 2020.
SPEAKING
Alongside other interesting speakers and Open Source experts, I spoke on how people can get paid for contributing to Open Source
I led a session on how to make your first Open Source contribution for the Enyata community.
I taught the OSCA Warri members how to create their first Open Source project in a practical class.
I spoke on a Twitter Space alongside other Open Source participants on how to get started with contributing to Open Source in the tech space.
I led a workshop during OSCAFEST to walk my attendees through how to set up their Open-Source projects seamlessly.
April 2022, OpenSource 101.
I firmly believe that we should be more intentional about the quality and impact of our open-source contributions that the number. I gave a talk during Open Source 101 event to communicate this and share best practices for effective open-source contributions.
April 2022, Open Source Collective
I gave a talk at Open Source Collective to address the issue of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Open-Source communities and why DEI badging is important.
March 2022, OSCAFEST
During OSCAFEST 2022, I gave my first keynote speech, sharing highlights of my two-year-old tech journey and how consistency and strategy have helped me grow my career rapidly.
2021
In this video, I talked about how to contribute to open-source as a beginner in tech.
January 2021.
I had an interview with Monica Ayhens-Madon where I talked about how I started my journey in tech and how I scaled up.
August 2021
I spoke about contributing to open-source outside coding by actively helping beginners transition and contribute.
July 2021
I talked about my motivation and how I started my journey in tech in this video.
July 2021
I shared my experience, challenges and contributions about contributing to open-source beyond code in GNOME.
June 2021
Here, I explained the reviewer process of the DEI badging initiative.
My Awards
In recognition of my work and growth in the tech ecosystem, I have received 5 awards over the years from GitHub and She Code Africa.