Grants:IEG/Daily Positive Student Internship

status: idea

Individual Engagement Grants	review grant submissions	visit IdeaLab submissions
eligibility and selection criteria

project:

Daily Positive Student Internship

project contact:

nicolebeatty

participants:

Dr Arif Jubaer and Ms Nicole Beatty CFRE

summary:

Daily Positive works to enhance global social capital by engaging virtual citizens in a digital dialogue through positive, open-concept journalism.

2013 round 1

Project idea

D+ Journalism is an internship program that supports disadvantaged youth interested in pursuing a career in freelance writing, journalism or reporting. Interns serve as “information ambassadors”, researching and designing strategies on how to increase citizen participation in open access media technology, such as the platforms powered by Wikimedia. Our focus is on increasing engagement in Asia and Oceania as we are an Australian-based NGO.

Funding from a Wikimedia IEG will be used to fund three D+ interns who will be trained and mentored by D+ staff. The D+ student interns will be tasked with developing a strategic plan on how to increase Wikimedia's reach in the Global South, a need that has been identified as a priority in Wikimedia Movement Strategic Plan Summary.

Project goals

• To provide an opportunity to an aspiring writer to gain hands-on experience in open-concept journalism • To teach underprivileged populations how to empower themselves using new technologies To support Wikimedia in creating a world that is educated by open, free information

Project plan

Industry leaders and policymakers have been calling for more research, debate and discussion around increased access to open media, new technologies and improved network infrastructure to narrow the digital divide, promote universal equality and empower engaging democracy across the virtual landscape.

Daily Positive contributes to the debate and discussion by facilitating a participatory platform of positive information that focuses on connecting human-oriented technology to human values. It achieves this by: • Coordinating an ICT skills training program through private-public partnerships • Conducting human-based research to determine the World’s Most Positive Countries, an annual publication of the world’s 10 most socially-minded countries as measured by the Positivity Index designed by Arif Systems • Curating news that stories openness, optimism and opportunity

The D+ student interns will focus entirely on conducting human-based research to identify sustainable tactics on how to expand Wikimedia's usership throughout Asia and Oceania. Daily Positive already has a series of research methodologies that the students will be able access, including the Positivity Index as used for World's Most Positive Countries, big data reports for the Global South, and surveys monitoring online behvaiour by internet users in the region. As D+ follows a similar model as Wikinews, D+ expects its interns will become great resources for Wikimedia and its affiliated sites.

Scope:

Scope and activities

Trained by writers and engineers, Daily Positive interns will learn how to conduct online social research, analyse data, aquire new Wiki users and deliver strategic recommendations on how Wikimedia can increase its global reach in the southern hemsiphere.

Tools, technologies, and techniques

Access to survey design to ensure we are following Wikimedia protocol Outreach to current users/membership Gadgets for wikipages Expertise in information sharing

Budget:

Total amount requested

$30,000 AUD

Budget breakdown

An IEG in the amount of $30,000 will fund three journalism interns ($10,000 per intern) in the form of a stipend to assist with student salary, accommodation, and training costs.

Intended impact:

Target audience

There are approximately 4 million people in Australia who do not access the internet. In the Global South, only 45% of the world's population are active internet users. These numbers--nearly one fifth of Australia's population and more than half of Asia and Oceania's population--demonstrate the need and unlimited potential for Wikinews to expand its reach and resources to improve the lives of many remote populations through open access media.

Fit with strategy

We believe our project aligns itself with the Wikimedia movement by designing a strategy to increase reach in the Global South. According to Wikimedia, "Wikimedia has dramatically lower reach in the Global South, which includes regions with the world's most rapid growth in Internet usage. In the coming years, a key challenge for Wikimedia will be to replicate its earlier successes in developing editing communities that create valuable, high quality knowledge resources in languages they are literate in, to engage a growing readership in all parts of the world." Daily Positive believes that its interns will be a beneficial resource to Wikimedia based on our experience, skills, scope in language and knowledge-base across Asia and Oceania.

Sustainability

Daily Positive is a community initiative of Arif Systems, a tech-based social enterprise. As such we receive the net profits from the business. As outlined in other areas of this proposal we have a three-year development plan to build capacity and sound fundraising practice to ensure that our work continues well past 2015.

Measures of success

We will measure our success based on the following:

-Recruiting three successful student interns from ethinic and language backgrounds -The provision of a strategic plan to increase reach for Wikimedia in the Global South -The number of partnerships the students form during their internship in support of their own personal outreach -Qualitative and quantitative measurements based on research and survey methodology (to generate recommendations for strategic plan) -The acquisition rate achieved by Wikimedia as a result of the recommendations setforth in the strategic plan

Daily Positive

Daily Positive is a digital news platform working to enhance social capital in Australia and around the world by connecting people through positive, open-concept journalism.

Powered by Arif Systems, an ICT-based social enterprise, Daily Positive is a new human-oriented technology designed to educate and empower people experiencing disadvantage, including Indigenous Australians, refugees, and at-risk youth.

Discussion

Community Notification:

Please paste a link to where the relevant communities have been notified of this proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions, here. http://www.dailypositive.org/Daily_Positive http://www.facebook.com/dailypositive

Endorsements:

Do you think this project should be selected for an Individual Engagement Grant? Please add your name and rationale for endorsing this project in the list below. Other feedback, questions or concerns from community members are also highly valued, but please post them on the talk page of this proposal.

• Community member: add your name and rationale here.