On Saturday, 31st Jan, from 10am to 5pm, 100s of Drupal enthusiasts will descend upon SICSR. It is a free (un)conference for Drupal developers, and entry was given a first-come-first-served basis. But as of this writing, Drupal Camp is full. However, Tarun Chandel, the god-father of all Pune unconferences, is encouraging everyone to gate-crash, and land up there, with or without registrations, and PuneTech fully supports him, (and so does Amit Kumar Singh, a.k.a. thecancerus).

That’s right – gate-crash, like uninvited wedding guests. It’s free, and it’s an unconference. Gate-crashing will actually be in the spirit of the event.

And if you are a student, then you must go, because in that one day, you will get more education than an entire month of your so-called classes.

With this in mind, here are PuneTech’s top 5 reasons why students must gate-crash Drupal Camp

• Surprise your future employers: If you are in software, no matter what job you get, sooner or later you will be asked to build or oversee the building of a website, and there you should surprise everyone by having it ready, singlehandedly in one week as against their projections of 2-months using 3 people.
• Beat the recession: As IT budgets get cut around the world, the web-development community will be hard hit, and companies will look to reduce spending on expensive web development. That’s why you should become a ninja at inexpensive web development using Drupal and its wide array of readymade modules.
• Use this knowledge when you don’t get a job: Hey, let’s face it, if you are a student right now, it is very likely that you are not getting campus placement this year (or if you have been placed already, there’s a chance that it will get delayed or canceled). Instead of sitting around moping, the smart thing to do would be to start your own website and get to work for yourself. And for this, events like Drupal camp are great, for knowledge, for ideas and for contacts. For more reasons, see “Top 10 reasons why now is the best time to start a business with Drupal.”
• Because you can: Think of all the poor little underprivileged students in Bangalore/Delhi/Hyderabad/Mumbai who cannot attend Drupal camp even if they want to. Because Drupal camp doesn’t happen in Bangalore. It doesn’t happen in Mumbai. It’s happening in Pune, and you are getting it free. Don’t give up this chance, because in the future, you (or your employer) will be charged exorbitant amounts for events like these, and you’ll still not be able to go because you have a stupid deadline.
• Because PuneTech said so. And Amit Kumar Singh said so. And Tarun Chandel said so. And, I’m sure Rohit Srivastwa will say so as soon as he reads this. Seriously, you need to start listening to these guys.

If you are already going for Drupal camp, then please add to the list of reasons in the comments below.

Drupal Camp details:

What: Drupal Camp India ’09. Drupal Camp is a free, unconference, being conducted in Pune, with the objective to build up the community base and bring people closer. Details.
When: Saturday, 31st January, 10am to 5pm
Where: SICSR, 1st floor, Atur Centre, Gokhale Cross Road, Model Colony, Pune. Map.
Fees and Registration: This event is free for all to attend. Register here. Or not!

More from the website:

Drupal camp pune is an effort to pull in all drupal developers located in india to come together and cherish this wonderful CMS cum application framework. More than the sessions, its about interacting with fellow drupalers and listening to their experiences. This doesn’t discount us to not prepare session list, On our menu we have things like:

1> Advanced Module development
2> Site auto configuration using patterns.
3> Insight into Galaminds.
4> Managing staging,production and live sites specially syncing with Migraine.
5> Drupal on EC2
6> Case study on ILoveBolly

and much more…

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