Grants:IdeaLab/We are the World

Inspire campaign

We are the World

Build a healthy global pipeline of future Wikipedian by teaching and nurturing high potential young users across the world to be part of building out this important resource. Create a training curriculum and special learning center for future Wikipedians to build meaningful skills in small consumable lessons that are age appropriate. Consider making this into a classroom activity, perhaps scaled for various ages or grades. Ideally we should build a pipeline that extends to all corners of the world, not just to economically leading geographies. It could be as simple as just making some easier training for youth, or as sophisticated as a full blown global campaign to recruit and nurture the best student candidates of today into tomorrow's editorial powerhouse. Perhaps even consider setting levels like WP/EIT (editor in training), where we can signal to the mature editorial community that we are in gentle guidance mode with the intention of finding and growing a healthy pipeline of the next generation of editors.

countryUS

themeother

contact email• my2wins@gmail.com

idea creator• Cindyjwilson

this project needs...

volunteer

developer

advisor

project manager

community organizer

designer

researcher

created on02:12, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

Project idea

What Wikimedia project(s) and specific areas will you be evaluating?

Is this project measuring a specific space on a project (e.g. deletion discussions), or the project as a whole?
This could apply to the project as a whole, or we could ring-fence a specific area where "editors in training" are encouraged to learn and try their hand in incremental steps with training wheels

Describe your idea. How might it be implemented?

Provide details about the method or process of how you will evaluate your community or collect data. Does your idea involve private or personally identifying information? Take a look at the Privacy Policy for Wikimedia’s guidelines in this area.
assign an owner to champion this idea, someone who knows wikipedia inside and out, and has a passion for bridging in young editors to be the future experts

Are there experienced Wikimedians who can help implement this project?

If applicable, please list groups or usernames of individuals who you can work with on this project, and what kind of work they will do.
not sure who they are, but I'm certain there are many talented people who could define and execute this

How will you know if this project is successful? What are some outcomes that you can share after the project is completed?

We could project the number of high value wikipedia editors that are active now, and those that will be active in 2020 (or some future date) without any changes. Is that number growing or shrinking? If shrinking, we could identify the number of editors in training that are needed per year (or per month) in order to grow the base to the most appropriate target. And we could identify the milestones and KPI's for each person who starts this program as an editor in training until they become a high value editor.

How would your measurement idea help your community make better decisions?

After you are finished measuring or evaluating your Wikimedia project, how do you expect that information to be used to benefit the project?
This would do two things. It would proactively create a healthy pipeline of tomorrow's wikipedians, and it would also define high value community members as something others can aspire to.

Do you think you can implement this idea? What support do you need?

Do you need people with specific skills to complete this idea? Are there any financial needs for this project? If you can’t implement this project, can you scale down your project so it is doable?
I can definitely provide strategic guidance on how to build a plan and then execute successfully, but I am way too new in my wikipedia journey to understand what specific content would be best included. I can provide the perspective of being new to the community, and give perspective on whether the messaging and content is clear and simple.

Get Involved

About the idea creator

I have been a prolific Wikipedia user since as early as I can recall, but just recently started learning how to edit. I hope to become familiar enough to contribute on a broad scale, as its very satisfying to be part of something so important. I just wish I had learned this a lot earlier in life since I now feel behind the eight ball, and am not sure if I'll ever understand all there is to know even at a basic level. If I could start over, I would have wanted to learn in small baby steps over many years -- which is what is the inspiration for this idea. Thank you for reading.

Expand your idea

Would a grant from the Wikimedia Foundation help make your idea happen? You can expand this idea into a grant proposal.

Expand into a Rapid Grant

No funding needed?

Does your idea not require funding, but you're not sure about what to do next? Not sure how to start a proposal on your local project that needs consensus? Contact Chris Schilling on-wiki at I JethroBT (WMF) (talk · contribs) or via e-mail at cschillingwikimedia.org for help!