VERSO Playbook#
Open source has transformed the way knowledge is created, shared, and sustained. Yet, in academic research, the adoption of open source principles often faces structural and cultural barriers. The Vermont Research Open Source Program Office (VERSO) was created to find, support, and grow open source software, open data, and open science. This playbook tells the story of VERSO’s creation at the University of Vermont, including its vision, struggles, successes, and challenges. It is both a documentary of our experience and a candid reflection for anyone seeking to build an Open Source Program Office in an academic setting.
About the University of Vermont#
The University of Vermont (UVM), founded in 1791, is one of the oldest universities in the United States and the fifth-oldest in New England. Located in Burlington, Vermont, UVM sits on a 460-acre campus overlooking Lake Champlain, with the Green Mountains to the east and the Adirondacks to the west. The university enrolls nearly 14,000 students across more than 100 undergraduate majors and 100+ graduate programs, organized into nine schools and colleges. UVM is nationally recognized for its commitment to sustainability, research excellence, and community engagement, earning a Top-100 Research University ranking and a spot among the Top 50 Green Colleges. The surrounding area combines a lively small city with abundant outdoor recreation, and Burlington has become a regional hub for culture, innovation, and environmental stewardship.
In February 2025, the University of Vermont earned the prestigious R1 designation from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, placing it among the top-tier research universities in the United States. This classification, established in 1973, recognizes institutions with “very high research activity,” defined by metrics such as annual research expenditures exceeding $50 million and the production of at least 70 research doctorates per year. Achieving R1 status reflects decades of investment in research infrastructure, faculty excellence, and interdisciplinary collaboration.
About VERSO#
The Vermont Research Open Source Program Office (VERSO) is the University of Vermont’s initiative to make open source a strategic asset for research, education, and community engagement. It was established in 2022 through a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, making it one of the first academic OSPOs in the United States, alongside Johns Hopkins, RIT, and UC Santa Cruz. The original proposal was a collaboration between Juniper Lovato of the Vermont Complex Systems Center and Bryn Geffert of the UVM Library. The office was organizationally housed under the College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences (CEMS), though its first physical office was located in the UVM Library.
VERSO’s mission centers on three guiding principles: enablement, community, and sustainability. The office provides researchers with clear guidance on licensing and intellectual property, offers templates for governance and contribution guidelines, and delivers training workshops to build confidence in open-source practices. Beyond technical support, VERSO fosters a culture of shared knowledge through events, hackathons, and cross-disciplinary collaboration, and embeds sustainability planning into every project so that open-source outputs remain useful and maintained well beyond their initial development phase. For more on VERSO’s foundational vision, see 2022 Vision and Foundation.
Since its founding, VERSO has grown substantially in scale and organizational maturity. In 2024, the office transitioned from the UVM Library to the Vermont Complex Systems Center, becoming more independent as it developed into an institute under the Office of the Vice President of Research. This transition strengthened interdisciplinary work across colleges and deepened connections with the Office of Engagement for community-focused research translation. The office’s educational reach also expanded with the launch of the Open Research Collaborative Activities (ORCA) program, a student internship initiative that grew from 5 participants in 2023 to 40 by 2025, collectively contributing thousands of hours to open-source projects while building professional skills that led to careers in technology, planning, and research.
VERSO’s work extends beyond campus. The office has built partnerships with over 25 external organizations, including Vermont regional planning commissions, state agencies, nonprofits, and municipalities. These collaborations have produced practical tools such as the Vermont Zoning Atlas, the Vermont Liveability Map, and wastewater infrastructure mapping systems that serve community needs. The office has hosted or participated in more than 40 conferences, symposiums, and community events, ranging from the United Nations OSPOS for Good symposiums to PyData Vermont, from ESIP meetings to local UX design jams. VERSO has also delivered guest lectures in 20+ university courses spanning computer science, engineering, design, economics, and community development.
By 2025, as UVM achieved R1 research designation, VERSO had become integral to the university’s research infrastructure: managing over 40 repositories across diverse domains, serving as the institutional administrator of UVM Dataverse, and engaging with 60+ research collaborators across campus. The March 2026 NSF FAIROS award now supports this Dataverse stewardship, open-data training, and a Vermont Open Data Summit. Rooted in UVM’s land-grant mission to serve the public good, VERSO partners with Vermont communities, nonprofits, and industry to co-develop solutions to real challenges.
This playbook documents VERSO’s journey through chapters spanning 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, and 2026, covering the wins, setbacks, and lessons learned along the way. It offers a practical framework for other universities building open-source research programs, with guidance on tools, infrastructure, and policies, impact measurement, and sustainability planning for the long term. For context on why academic OSPOs matter, start with Why VERSO Was Created and Context and Landscape.