By: Mina Foundation
We are excited to share the upcoming launch of new community grants as well as an upcoming Community Spark Leaderboard, the Mina Academy, and the Mina Achievements Program to support community members in their participation within Mina’s ecosystem. We aim to empower the Mina ecosystem by creating conditions for them to thrive, and these new programs will help us all to get there.
Community Grants
The Mina community is filled with talented individuals and teams continuously working to grow the protocol and community. Since Mainnet, existing and new members have been building tools, creating resources, starting community groups, amongst other activities, and the Mina Foundation will be awarding new grants to those whose contributions were critical to Mina’s growth and made an impact on the greater community in the last few months. Here is the list of members who are eligible to be onboarded for a grant for this cycle including the criteria used to evaluate. We’re also looking to improve and develop a more participatory contributions review process together with the community as part of the Mina Achievements program. Read on to find out how to get involved in this.
Community Spark Leaderboard
Given the influx of new community members since Mainnet, we will be launching the Mina Spark Leaderboard in the near future, so members can take part in fun community challenges that help to further grow the Mina ecosystem. Points* will be awarded to participants who support other community members to thrive through providing education, building tools, and creating resources to improve the user experience of members in our ecosystem. If you like friendly competition and want to interact with other members who are passionate about helping Mina’s ecosystem to thrive, we encourage you to join!
Mina Academy and Mina Achievements
As part of the Community Spark Leaderboard, we are also inviting members to participate in the building of the pilot programs called Mina Academy and Mina Achievements. The goal of these programs is to help community members become leaders and pillars of the Mina ecosystem.
There will be fun and helpful activities and learning tracks, such as a pathway for members to become an expert in designing with Mina, or to become more well-versed in social media and running meetups. There will also be the opportunity to earn badges for different types of contributions and for completing achievements. To make sure that the Mina Academy and Mina Achievements will help with shaping an inclusive and collaborative environment that is aligned with the community’s vision for Mina, we will be developing these tracks and a new contributions review process together with our members. We will kick off the development of the Mina Academy and Mina Achievements program with any interested community members in a few weeks in mid-October 2021. If you are interested in building communities and contributing to the growth of Mina in a collaborative way, we highly encourage you to sign up here.
A Future Powered by Participants
We want to make sure that the Mina community is a healthy and safe space that fosters collaboration and is accessible for all members. These initiatives are the first step for that and the community’s participation is critical for its success.
The new grants, the Community Spark Leaderboard, as well as the Mina Academy and the Mina Achievements program were inspired by feedback from our community in the recent ecosystem survey. The salient takeaways from survey responses were that the community values are transparency, productivity, collaboration, and respect. Members expressed overwhelming excitement about the prospect of guiding and orienting new members to the Mina ecosystem, helping to spread awareness of Mina’s mission, and taking part in decision-making processes pertaining to the network. Mina Academy and Mina Achievements will create these opportunities for the community.
With the voices of the community in mind, we are excited to soon be launching these new programs to best empower the ecosystem. In order to grow, the community must thrive and work together towards a future powered by participants.
Sign up for our newsletter here to stay updated on community grants, the Spark Leaderboard, the Mina Academy, and the Mina Achievements Program.
*Points (abbreviated ‘pts’) are designed solely to track contributions to the Mina Community and Leaderboard Points have no cash or other monetary value. Leaderboard Points are not transferable and are not redeemable or exchangeable for any cryptocurrency or digital assets. We may at any time amend or eliminate Leaderboard Points.
About Mina Protocol
Mina is the world’s lightest blockchain, powered by participants. Rather than apply brute computing force, Mina uses advanced cryptography and recursive zk-SNARKs to design an entire blockchain that is about 22kb, the size of a couple of tweets. It is the first layer-1 to enable efficient implementation and easy programmability of zero knowledge smart contracts (zkApps). With its unique privacy features and ability to connect to any website, Mina is building a private gateway between the real world and crypto—and the secure, democratic future we all deserve.