Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Attendance at SPNHC Conference 2023 (ID: 22061116)

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Applicant Details

Please provide your main Wikimedia Username.

Ambrosia10

Please provide the Usernames of people related to this proposal.

N/A

Organization

N/A

Are you a member of any Wikimedia affiliate or group, including informal groups like Wiki Fan Clubs, emerging language communities, not recognized Wikimedia groups etc.? Please list them all.

Wikimedia User Group of Aotearoa New Zealand / Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand Wellington Wiki Meetup group - co-organiser Aotearoa New Zealand Online Wiki Meetup group - co-organiser Wikiproject Women in Red Wikiproject Women Scientists WikiProject Plants WikiProject Lepidoptera Wikidata:WikiProject Biodiversity Wiki:GLAM/Te Papa collaboration GLAM/Smithsonian Institution/American Women's History Initiative (AWHI) Wikidata:WikiProject BHL

Grant Proposal

M. Please state the title of your proposal. This will also be the Meta-Wiki page title.

Attendance at SPNHC Conference 2023

Q. Indicate if it is a local, international, or regional proposal and if it involves several countries? (optional)

International

Q2. If you have answered regional or international, please write the country names and any other information that is useful for understanding your proposal.

The Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC) is an international organisation with members from all over the world. The majority of members are the curators and collection managers from museums and other natural history institutions, including institutions overseen by various government agencies. For more on the SPNHC website https://spnhc.org/

R. If you would like, please share any websites or social media accounts that your group or organization has.

1. What is the change that you are trying to bring about and why is this important.

I want to encourage and empower the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC) community to engage more with Wikimedia projects. The world has a biodiversity crisis and projects overseen by the Wikimedia Foundation can help increase awareness of this issue as well as improve the sharing of knowledge about biodiversity loss. Natural history collections play a role in informing everyone about biodiversity. Our ability to understand biodiversity depends on the collection, preservation, and study of natural history specimens. By attending this conference I will have an opportunity to strengthen and enrich my current relationships within this community and to establish new connections. I aim to encourage more SPNHC members and their institutions to engage more actively with Wikimedia projects including various language Wikipedias, WikiCommons and Wikidata. I am hopeful that by encouraging engagement with Wiki communities, as well as educating SPNHC participants on openly licensing, our two communities can together help raise the profile of natural history collections and their importance in solving issues such as biodiversity loss.

By attending and presenting at SPNHC 2023 (I have submitted an abstract to the SPNHC 2023 organising committee), as well as attempting to achieve the above, I will also have the opportunity to educate the SPNHC community, using practical examples, on how engagement with various Wikimedia projects can assist natural history institutions to address systemic bias in their data as well as assist with efforts to decolonise museum collections.

Finally, I aim to ensure interactions between the SPNHC and Wiki communities help inspire the open reuse of natural history images and data so that the same might be reused in Wikimedia projects. I aim to show in my presentation that to do so will also assist with the SPNHC mission of highlighting the importance of natural history collections.

2. Describe your main approaches or strategies to achieve these changes and why you think they will be effective.

My main strategy for encouraging engagement by the SPNHC community has been to make myself known to that community over a number of years and at a variety of events. While doing so, I have proved to that community my willingness to assist or advise should a SPNHC community member or an institution want to undertake engagement with any Wikimedia project. By becoming known to the SPNHC community as a Wikimedian and being willing to share my knowledge, undertake and support collaborative efforts, and facilitate introductions to other Wikimedians and Wiki Projects, I believe I have helped encourage engagement by that community. My history of 5 years of shepherding this community, attending conferences, workshops, data days, and a hackathon, has led to numerous projects and outreach efforts. For recent examples see this 2022 report which outlines some of the projects I (Ambrosia10) have been involved with. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_User_Group_of_Aotearoa_New_Zealand/Annual_Report_2022

3. What are the activities you will be developing and delivering as part of these approaches or strategies?

The main activity I will be delivering will be presenting an in person oral presentation at the SPNHC 2023 conference. My abstract is entitled “Reuse in the Wiki world empowers engagement with Natural History Collections” and has been offered in the “Broadening Access and Use of Natural History Collections Through Innovative Approaches and Engagement” symposium. By presenting, I intend to educate conference attendees about the Wiki world and how to engage with the same. I also intend to make myself more visible to the SPNHC community as a Wikimedian. My presentation will highlight past and present projects undertaken by the SPNHC community, and provide practical examples about how members and institutions might further their engagement with Wikimedia projects. I will be offering the SPNHC community my assistance and knowledge as well as my ability to facilitate introductions to other editors and Wiki communities in the Wiki world.

My physical presence at the conference will also ensure I am available should SPNHC 2023 attendees wish to discuss engaging with Wikimedia Projects more informally. It has been over three years since I have interacted with this community in person. I see this conference as an opportunity to strengthen and enrich current relationships within this community and to establish new connections, with the aim of encouraging more curators and collection managers and their institutions to engage with various Wikimedia projects.

4. Are your activities part of a Wikimedia movement campaign or event? If so, please select the relevant campaign below. If so, please select all the relevant campaigns from the list below. If "other", please state which.

Not applicable

5. Do you have the team that is needed to implement this proposal?

No team is needed to implement this proposal.

6. Please state if your proposal aims to work to bridge any of the identified CONTENT knowledge gaps (Knowledge Inequity)? Select up to THREE that most apply to your work.

Content Gender gap, Cultural background, ethnicity, religion, racial

6.1 In a few sentences, explain how your work is specifically addressing this content gap (or Knowledge inequity) to ensure a greater representation of knowledge.

In my conference presentation I intend to highlight how natural history collections can engage with Wikimedia projects to assist in rectifying the historic systemic bias against women & under-represented groups. I will emphasise how Wikimedia projects can be used to increase accessible knowledge about the contributions of under-represented folk in natural history collections and give practical examples where institutions have undertaken this effort through engagement with Wikimedia projects.

7. Please state if your proposal includes any of these areas or THEMATIC focus. Select up to THREE that most apply to your work and explain the rationale for identifying these themes.

Culture, heritage or GLAM , Climate Change and sustainability, Open Technology

8. Will your work focus on involving participants from any underrepresented communities?

Not applicable

9. Who are the target participants and from which community? How will you engage participants before and during the activities? How will you follow up with participants after the activities?

The target participants are the SPNHC 2023 conference attendees and the institutions they work for. As has been outlined above I have been participating in outreach and supporting this community's engagement with Wikimedia projects for several years. Prior to this particular activity (that is attendance at the SPNHC 2023 conference) I will be using twitter as well as other social media platforms such as Telegram, Slack, Mastodon and Facebook to advertise my attendance at the conference as well as my anticipated presentation to the SPNHC community. I intend to engage with attendees by making myself available in person to discuss Wikimedia project engagement during the whole of the conference, and intend to encourage and support discussions with those conference attendees who are interested in learning more about how to contribute to Wikimedia projects. I anticipate that much of this interaction will happen during the Question and Answer portion of my presentation as well as during the conference coffee and lunch breaks as well as during workshops I attend. In my presentation I intend to share my email address and my social media handles to empower those less social folk to contact me. I will follow up with any participants with whom I make contact, or who reach out to me during the conference, and who have expressed an interest in learning more about how to engage with Wikimedia projects. I intend to do this either via email or social media messages. I will continue to engage with this community after the conference, as I have done so historically, by actively offering my support to community members who are undertaking efforts to engage with Wikimedia projects.

10. In what ways are you actively seeking to contribute towards creating a safer, supportive, more equitable environment for participants?

I intend to abide by the Universal Code of Conduct. This is an in person conference & I will be travelling internationally. As a result I will be at a higher risk of contracting COVID. Although I am fully vaccinated, to mitigate the risk of passing COVID onto conference attendees, I intend to wear a N95 or equivalent mask where practical during travel & conference attendance. I will also take a COVID RAT test prior to attending the conference & undertake to isolate should I test positive.

11. Please tell us about how you have let your Wikimedia communities know about the planned activities and this proposal. Use this space to describe the processes you carried out to make the community more involved in planning this proposal. Please link the on-wiki community discussion(s) around the proposals.

In my report back to the New Zealand User group community on my 2022 virtual attendance of the SPNHC conference I discussed with the New Zealand Wiki community the possibility of me attending the 2023 conference in person. I have emailed the Wikimedia Aotearoa New Zealand (WANZ) committee informing them of my need to apply for funding to attend this conference. My email was discussed at a meeting of the committee on 15 January 2023. As the money budgeted by the committee for conference support was not enough to cover the cost of my in person attendance, I was encouraged to apply for a rapid grant. I discussed my proposed presentation & funding application at the in person Wellington Wiki meetup in January 2023 & intend to keep this group and the Aotearoa New Zealand online Wiki meetup informed of progress of the same in upcoming meetings. I also reached out to the Wikidata:WikiProject Biodiversity Telegram channel informing them of my abstract submission & funding application.

12. Are you aware of other Rapid Fund proposals in your local group, community, or region that are being submitted and that align with your proposed project?

No

If yes:

12.1 Did you explore the possibility of doing a joint proposal with other leaders in your group?

N/A

12.2 How will this joint proposal allow you to have better results?

N/A

13. Will you be working with other external, non-Wikimedia partners to implement this proposal? Required.

No

13.1 Please describe these partnerships and what motivates the potential partner to be part of the proposal and how they add value to your work.

14. In what ways do you think your proposal most contributes to the Movement Strategy 2030 recommendations. Select a maximum of THREE options that most apply.

Increase the Sustainability of Our Movement

Learning, Sharing, and Evaluation

15. What do you hope to learn from your work in this fund proposal?

I would like to learn more about the possibilities of collaborating with the SPNHC community. I will have an opportunity to learn which attendees or their institutions have schemes that are using Wikimedia Projects as well as those that are motivated to do the same. I can learn from those folk how I can best facilitate that engagement. Do they need to be put in contact with local wikimedians? Do they need assistance with Wikidata tutorials on species or collector item curation? I hope to gain knowledge about the collections that are or would like to undertake work to rectify the historic bias that will exist in their collection data including any decolonisation work that may be being undertaken and also how this work might be being implemented. It will also be an opportunity to learn more about initiatives in the SPNHC community being presented on during the conference and provide me with an opportunity to share that knowledge with others in my Wiki community.

16. Based on these learning questions, what is the information or data you need to collect to answer these questions? Please register this information (as metric description) in the following spaces provided.

Main Open Metrics Data
Main Open Metrics	Description	Target
Deliver conference presentation	Successfully deliver my presentation and openly licence and publish the script and slides of my presentation.	N/A
Engagement discussions	Engage in at least 5 conversations with attendees about current or potential opportunities to engage with Wikimedia Projects	5
Report on Conference & publicise to Wiki community	Report back on the conference to my local wiki community as well as to Wikidata:WikiProject Biodiversity. Publicise my conference report with any interested Wiki folk.	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A

17. Core quantitative metrics.

Core Metrics Summary
Core metrics	Description	Target
Number of participants
Number of editors
Number of organizers

Number of new content contributions per Wikimedia project
Wikimedia Project	Description	Target
N/A	N/A	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A
N/A	N/A	N/A

17.1 If for some reason your proposal will not measure these core metrics please provide an explanation.

As this is an application for conference attendance and engagement with the SPNHC community at that conference, the additional core quantitative metrics are unlikely to be relevant to this application. However I do undertake to publish my openly licensed presentation slides into WikiCommons. I also intend to upload my openly licensed presentation script as well as the slides into Zenodo https://zenodo.org/ and create a Wikidata item for the presentation linking to its DOI.

18. What tools would you use to measure each metric selected? Please refer to the guide for a list of tools. You can also write that you are not sure and need support.

Metric 1. The tools I will be using to measure each metric outlined above will be the successful presentation at the conference, the publication of my abstract in the official journal of the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections. The openly licensed publication of my script and slides in Zenodo https://zenodo.org/ as well as the publication of my presentation slides into Wikicommons. Use Wikidata to link the presentation with its DOI generated via Zenodo.

Metric 2: Make notes on the conversations I have with conference attendees and in particular record the names and institutions of attendees who discuss engagement with Wikimedia projects with me.

Metric 3. Complete a Grant final report and include in this information on the conference presentations that may be of interest to other wikimedians. Link to this report when presenting on the conference to the Wellington and Aotearoa New Zealand meetups. Have an in person meeting with en:user:Stitchbird2 to discuss the conference. Keep the Wikidata:WikiProject Biodiversity community updated on Telegram and report back to them on about the conference by sharing with them the final report. Contribute to the GLAM/Wiki newsletter reporting back on the conference.

Financial Proposal

19. & 19.1 What is the amount you are requesting from Wikimedia Foundation? Please provide this amount in your local currency.

6705.12 NZD

19.2 What is this amount in US Currency (to the best of your knowledge)?

4313.77 USD

20. Please upload your budget for this proposal or indicate the link to it.

Rapid Fund Budget for SPNHC 2023 Conference.xlsx

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1J7a0hLJHUGPDwqJMsCCHlOzA76fRbxtV_50cNEuGtrI/edit?usp=sharing

We/I have read the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and Universal Code of Conduct.

Yes

Endorsements and Feedback

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Community members are invited to share meaningful feedback on the proposal and include reasons why they endorse the proposal. Consider the following:

Stating why the proposal is important for the communities involved and why they think the strategies chosen will achieve the results that are expected.
Highlighting any aspects they think are particularly well developed: for instance, the strategies and activities proposed, the levels of community engagement, outreach to underrepresented groups, addressing knowledge gaps, partnerships, the overall budget and learning and evaluation section of the proposal, etc.
Highlighting if the proposal focuses on any interesting research, learning or innovation, etc. Also if it builds on learning from past proposals developed by the individual or organization, or other Wikimedia communities.
Analyzing if the proposal is going to contribute in any way to important developments around specific Wikimedia projects or Movement Strategy.
Analysing if the proposal is coherent in terms of the objectives, strategies, budget, and expected results (metrics).

Endorse