Developement teams are present on O-F all the time in various forms.
Look at SSU, Orbiter Forum Italia (yes, I know they have separate board but that's not the point as they gather feedback from here and post updates here), French team(s) (DG-IV, Orbiter sound, UCGO, Orcus Patera, Pappy's addons etc), Dbeachy1 (Altea) and various 3d artists, etc... (that's just from the top of my head. Sorry if I ommited someone)
All of those teams are working per project basis, they're created for particular project and with certain goals in mind.
If you want to improve orbiter in some way then:
1. Define your goal.
Vauge "making Orbiter better" won't gather audience. Identify problems new users may have with Orbiter. Try to think about solutions for those problems.
Maybe some things might be solved by simply including simple tutorial scenarios, step by step easy to understand PDF document regarding working with Orbiter or youtube video tutorial. Maybe it'll need separate app that'll generate scenario file and then launch orbiter with this scenario loaded.
UI wise there is still room to improvement but just pointing at KSP won't solve any. Ask yourself (or others) what UI elements need to change and how they're need to change. Write your thoughts about it, draw proposed solution on a piece of paper (flow chart) and think at least 10 times if your proposed solution will be more convinient for new user.
2. Investigate your solution
Orbiter has quite extensive API so many things can be done via 3rd party add-on. Check if you can do it. You claim being at intermediate college level in programing. Even if you don't know C++, I'm sure you know the term "pseudo code" and you're familiar with object oriented programming, therefore if you don't know C++, you can write your ideas in pseudocode.
3. Propose your goal with groundwork you've done to achieve it. Define skills that'd be needed.
No one will jump into project without prior information. Time is money and developement takes lots of time. Those are not 5 minute / 1 hour jobs you know. If you want someone to commit to project you need to present information, so that pearson can assess, if project have chance of being done and have ballpark figure how much work it'd need.
O-F is a place for that as we have programmers, 2d & 3d artists and, many people with extensive spaceflight knowledge. Many of folks here worked on enterprise level software and are familiar even with massive codebase, working within API limitations etc, UI design etc.
Before posting provide all that info you've gathered. Even tyrants leaders do their homework. Inspirational speech is not enough.
4. Know your place in the project
Don't demand features, but check with fellow developers if feature is possible. Don't throw in new features while project is underway without consulting how it'll affect rest of the project. Help wherever you can to the best of your abilities.
Belive me, being a leader is not the same as being tyrant. And since you have no real authority in volunteer-based project, mismanagement will quickly result in people leaving you.
Without those people Orbiter would be probably limited to 5 default vessels. At this point we have 4,428 add-ons on OHM not counting external sites. I think that speaks for itself.
Keep in mind that's just brief overview and handfull of tips but that's where you start.
