Grants talk:PEG/WM UA/Programs in Ukraine 2014

Discussion

Hello, WMUA!

Thank you for your submission. Once again my personal feeling is that full one-year submissions are less a project and more something like FDC and are pretty demanding for GAC - but if WMF wants to proceed via its grants programme, let it be.

Regarding the major ideas for 2014: I think we have a consensus that Netherlands-born WLM and Poland-born Wikiexpeditions are safe franchises which we know that are generally worth financing. WMUA's idea Wiki Loves Earth looks like a very similar concept (although in WMPL we keep having problems in ironing out details, e.g. with width of the scope and verifiability of the pictures). Wiki events and a reasonable office space are understable as well.

Thus I will ask for details. My first questions are:

1. The budget mentions Souvenirs and Wikizghushchivka - one special award for $1001. Could you elaborate on this item a bit further? Is it really one award worth of 1001 USD? Personally I find such an award pretty high in terms of Wikimedia movement.
2. Wiki events prizes ($375): is it electronics, cash, books...? Did you notice a strong positive feedback in terms of users' retention and motivation so far?

   I am asking not only as a GAC, but also as a neighbouring chapter member looking for your insight. :)

3. Office space: I think you have a typo in your submission, as you mention 4 months but the total sum is for 5 months. Moreover, is it Kiev based and do you have an opportunity to rent something at a special rate (e.g. for NGOs)? In many countries and cities there are such opportunities, see the recent WMCZ submission.

Best Regards and stay safe,
aegis maelstrom δ 11:27, 28 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Aegis and thank you for your feedback.

Concerning this submission, we have opted for two half-year submissions in the moment, as we are in the process of organisational developpment, and in our discussions with WMF people we have found out that GAC will be more suitable for us this year. We believe that we will be able to proceed with FDC request for 2015. We are also happy to help WMPL with details of WLE if you need.

1. Concerning souvenirs and Wikizghushchivka, it is not one award, but one project. The first part of this project would include sending zghushchivkas (cans of condensed milk, our local award similar to barnstars that became a physical one with support of Wikimedia Ukraine) and some souvenirs (e.g. badges) to the most active contributors of each month (a newbie and an established contributor) of each project (Wikipedia, Wikinews, Wikiquote etc.). The second one will be a number of souvenirs (e.g. T-shirts, pens, cups etc.) that will be given to the most active participants of our projects. We expect that some souvenirs will be awarded to most active contributors (e.g. cups with Wikipedia logos), some will be awarded to most active participants of Wikimedia projects (e.g. T-shirts for participants of Wikiexpeditions). It is currently hard to provide the exact breakdown per item, as most manufacturers cannot provide exact price quotes until we have a ready model.
2. We usually provide electronics as top prizes (e.g. best users of the contest), and books as small prizes (e.g. best contributor of the week). We do not provide cash instead of prizes, we have done it only once when the sponsor insisted that he will provide only cash and not any other prizes, but this had nothing to do with WMF funds. We have noticed that such prizes are most efficient if we manage to provide relatively many prizes so that more participants have chances to win something. The case of article contests is a bit particular: we offer relatively expensive prizes because we want to attract established researches who will write high-quality articles in the sphere or their competencies. Our previous experience of WikiBioContest has shown that some of articles were the best references in Ukrainian on the subject in general, and a number of participants continued contributing to Wikipedia, although not all of them were very active.
3. We do want to have a Kyiv-based office. However, we are not aware of any office owners providing special rates for NGOs in Kyiv. Most NGOs use either coworking (not an option for us as the space is loaned per staff member, and we do not have any permanent staff yet) or loan an office like any other organisation. Unlike EU countries, real estate owners in Kyiv usually do not distinguish NGOs and other companies and provide similar rates for all of them, and we are not aware of any office spaces exclusively for NGOs. Concerning costs, thank you for being attentive, this was indeed a typo, I missed the line, now it's correct

Please let me know if you need any additional details — NickK (talk) 17:37, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Evaluation by the GAC

GAC Members who approve this grant request

1. I appreciate a lot what WM UA is doing in the fields of wikiexpeditions and Wiki Loves Earth, so I have no big opposition. --Ilario (talk) 13:14, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Question about currency

Hello, Wikimedia Ukraine Colleagues: Would you mind clarifying why WMUA is requesting this grant in US dollars rather than Hryvnia? It seems from reading your request that the original budget may have been in UAH. Is there a reason why it makes more sense to receive the grant in USD? Note that our accounting team at WMF has already confirmed that sending the funds in UAH is possible. Thanks for clarifying! Winifred Olliff (Grants Administrator) talk 17:23, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Winifred,

Given the current situation in Ukraine and having checked with other board members and with our bank, it would still be better for us to receive this grant in USD. The current outlook for Hryvnia is unfortunately negative (see, for example, this review saying that most analysts are convinced that the Ukrainian currency is about to face major devaluation in the near future), thus we would prefer receiving USD and transferring them into UAH just before spending them. We will keep reporting in both USD and UAH wherever possible to track the changes in the exchange rate if such changes happen — NickK (talk) 19:05, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Just in time for this request: today the National Bank of Ukraine changed the official exchange rate for the first time since 19 months: it is now 870.8 UAH per 100 USD instead of 799.3 UAH per 100 USD. This means that hryvnia has lost almost 9% in just one day, so prices in hryvnia are likely to change as well, but we believe that USD equivalent will remain stable. In such situation we would definitely prefer to request grants in US dollars only until situation is back to stable — NickK (talk) 21:26, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

And restrictions on buying foreign currency were introduced as well, thus we will have to follow a long procedure if we ever want to convert UAH into USD (e.g. to pay for the scanner or to send prizes to winners of Wiki Loves Earth), but converting USD to UAH remains easy — NickK (talk) 22:11, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

My thoughts

Thanks for the submission. I like the planned activities in the request and, in general, support to fund it. However, there are still some things that need to be clarified, so my questions are the following:

1. What are the prizes that you plan to award as part of your Wiki events? I see that the item costs USD$1,877, but it lacks description with more details.
2. Could you please explain the methodology you used when estimating the amount of USD$2,502 for the publishing costs? Do you have any relations with publisher that could result in discounts?
3. Can you reveal more information about Wiki Loves Earth 2014? What are the prizes that will be awarded in both the domestic and the international competition? Could you please clarify how many different types of prizes will be awarded since there are multiple items in the budget appointed to prizes? How do you plan to organise the presentations in other countries, how many people will be engaged in those visits and what are they specifically supposed to do? I find this project of particular importance because there are initiatives to expand it in other countries (including my country), which may result in another grant requests seeking money for the same project.
4. What do you plan particularly to use the dryscanner for? Have you ever considered the possibility to use a dryscanner which is owned by any of the GLAM institutions that you plan to cooperate with? The only problem here is the ownership-related issue over the equipment after the conclusion of the planned activities that was previously mentioned in many occasions.

Best regards.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 23:09, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Kiril and thanks for your questions.

1. As we have mentionned in the grant request, these are the prizes we are going to award to the winners of the contest of good and featured articles. We usually award some electronic devices to our winners: for WikiBioContest-2013 we had smartphones, tablets and photo cameras. This year we expect to award something similar (6 prizes, $375 each, incl. one donated by sponsors)
2. The two major publications in this period will be our annual report (like our 2012 report) with the expected cost of approx. $600-700 (last year we had a price quote of $4.3 per copy for 100 copies but we distributed all of them in just a couple of months, so we expect to order 200 copies this year and get a lower price per copy) and a hand book on editing Wikipedia (like How to Edit Wikipedia) with the expected cost of approx. $700-800 (in 2012 we had a price quote of $3.5 per copy for 100 copies but the quality was rather low, this year we expect to opt for more copies and higher printing quality). We are also going to print leaflets with information on our projects (e.g. a leaflet with the information specific to Wikisource or to music projects), cards with contacts (especially as we will get a physical office), posters and/or programs for our events (in particular music concerts) etc, with total costs estimated at $1000. We are unable to provide exact references at the moment as publishers can provide exact quotes only once they have all details (number of pages, number of colour and grayscale pages etc.) Unfortunately we do not have any partnerships in the printing sphere at the moment, and we are yet to find a publisher who will propose an adequate quality and a good discount.
3. For WLE 2014, we are yet to discuss some details with organising teams from other countries (about mid-February), so some details may change, but expences will most likely not:
   • Concerning domestic prizes, we expect to follow the same scheme as we had in WLM 2013: all winners get a list of prizes (of course lists are different depending on the user's place) and choose the prize they like. We offered various photo equipment (cameras, lenses, tripods etc.), portable GPS devices, tablets, e-books, external hard drives etc., and this approach turned out to be really successful.
   • For international prizes, at the moment we consider the same scheme as for WLM 2013: Wikimania scholarship for the 1st place and vouchers for other places, but we are going to discuss with other countries if this arranges everyone.
   • The exact domestic prize categories are: top 1-3 photos, top 4-6 photos, top 7-10 photos, top 1-3 by number of sites, top 4-6 by number of sites, top 7-10 by number of sites, winners of regional nominations, potentially special nominations provided by sponsors
   • International prize categories will be similar to WLM 2013: just prizes for top photos, with the value decreasing from 1st to 15th, plus potentially special nominations provided by sponsors
   • Concerning presentations abroad, we are planning to do it in a similar way as WLM team did - by organising some kind of training and providing help for the local team. We are going to get in touch with the international WLM team to get their feedback on what worked well in such trainings and what not.
   • We will not be able to fund prizes for organizers of local contests in other countries (it is very complicated from legal point of view), thus local teams will have to make separate requests if they want to buy prizes for their national contests, but we may provide some kind of souvenirs, especially if we have such sponsors. We will provide the necessary information around mid- or late February.
4. This is a DIY-scanner and not a dryscanner, just a cheap version of scanner for scanning books without damaging them. We expect to scan public domain books from the libraries we will work with within GLAM, and of course we will not transfer this scanner to anyone, it is not very heavy and it may be transferred from one library to another. The estimated number of public domain books in Ukraine that are interesting for Wikisource is way higher than our scanning capacities, thus we do not worry much about "after the conclusion of the planned activities": all public domain books in Ukraine will not be scanned soon :) We want to order this scanner as none of GLAM institutions we have contacted has adequate scanning capacities, but several libraries have already let us use their funds provided we bring our own scanner.

I would be happy to provide any additional details if you need — NickK (talk) 04:27, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for your extensive answers.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 14:40, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Feedback from WMF

Thank you for your proposal and for your clarifications so far.

Please see our comments/questions regarding the proposal below.

1. Publishing: It is best to keep printing of Annual Reports to a minimum. Beyond printing what is legally required, you should only print a small number (20-30) for important ceremonial meetings. Members can make do with digital copies of the report. When you adjust the numbers, please reflect those changes in the budget. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2014 (UTC)
2. WLE calendars: Please let us know your rationale for wanting to publish 500 calendars. How did you calculate that number? Since calendars are a very time-sensitive item, you will need to be very clear on the production timeline so you have the printed calendars and can distribute them at least 2-3 months before January 2015. It would be a good idea to discuss with the WLM international team and WM France about their experience printing calendars and photobooks in regards to quantities, distribution, target audience, and shipping costs. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2014 (UTC)
3. International post expenses: Can you provide a breakdown for how you came up with this budget? $3,128 sounds like a lot.
4. How to Edit Wikipedia: Please note that the WMF Global Education Program recently improved the Editing Wikipedia Brochure. It is much more useful than the previous version and could serve as a good reference as you update your How to Edit Wikipedia guide. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Please let us know if you have any questions regarding the above comments. We look forward to your response. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Alex and thanks for your feedback.

1. Concerning annual reports, we are planning to make an activity+financial report (not just a financial report which is of little interest for promotional purposes) in both Ukrainian and English. This is not at all a report to satisfy legal requirements, but a report to provide information about our activities. We do not plan to distribute any copies to our members (and we have not done it last year), all copies will be distributed to our partners and during important meetings. It is however important for us to have much more than 20-30 copies, as last year we had 21 partners and sponsors for WLM and 16 partners and sponsors for WLE (with very little intersection between the two), thus only these two activities will not be covered with 20-30 copies, and we also have partners in other programmes, such as Wikiexpeditions, WEP, GLAM, articles contests, music concerts, QRpedia etc. Please also note that despite this grant request ending in June 2014, these reports will be distributed until early 2015 (something we could not do this year as we ran out of 2012 reports several months before the end of the year). As we have noticed that these annual reports really helped our partners better understand our movement and activities, it will not be a good idea for us to reduce the number of copies to 20-30. We can do it if you really insist, but in this case we have to prepare some kind of leaflet on our activities to our partners and potential partners.
2. As you can see, this is a grant until June 2014, so WLE calendars will definitely be ready at least 2-3 months before January 2015. We hope to get them printed and sent in June, and we have already successfully done this last year for WLE-2013. We are indeed going to discuss the distribution strategy with the international WLM team.
3. We cannot currently provide an accurate estimation at the moment, as it will highly depend on which countries will winners come from (something we can hardly estimate, for example, one of winners in Ukrainian WLM-2013 was coming from Spain, so the number of participating countries and geography of winners may be different) and how heavy will be prizes (we will be definitely sending calendars, but we are yet to decide with other countries which prizes they want). We expect that we will definitely have to send something to local organizers (calendars, post cards, souvenirs etc.) and we will have to send some prizes to authors of top-15 photos (likely vouchers and diplomas, but we might also opt for something heavier). This gives us approximately the following estimate:
   • 300-400 UAH (37-50 USD) for a small package for 15 winners, for a total of 550-750 USD
   • 800-1200 UAH (100-150 USD) for a large package (sending calendars, post cards and other souvenirs) to 15-20 local organisers, for a total of 1500-3000 USD

   Some references for shipping costs from Ukraine we have checked are TNT, DHL, UPS.

   Please note that here we use the "old" rate 100 USD = 799.3 UAH, the rate is constantly changing since 7 February with fluctuations up to 10% per day, but businesses either charge directly in USD or EUR (like TNT) or adapt prices based on exchange rate changes, so the dollar quote should remain constant

   We would also consult WLM-2013 international team to organise shipment in the most efficient way. This quote seems reasonable for us, as WLM 2013 team had a quote of 5000€ (ca. 6700 USD) for 50 countries, this a quote of ca. 3000 USD should be fine for 15-20 countries, given that international postal service in Ukraine is a bit more expensive than in EU, especially for sending outside Europe

4. Thank you very much for the link, I will share it with people who will be in charge of this project.

Please feel free to request any additional details or provide further feedback — NickK (talk) 00:09, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Request approved

This grant request has been approved. Thank you for your patience. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 03:26, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

Thank you Alex! — NickK (talk) 21:13, 22 February 2014 (UTC)

Requesting an Extension

Hi,

We would like to request an extension of this grant for three months (until 30 September 2014). This is due to, on one hand, the delay in organising Wiki Loves Earth (some countries, like Syria, have not yet started the contest, thus we are unable to determine the international winner before the end of the grant), and on the other hand, due to event in Ukraine that made us postpone some of our activities (and we hope to complete them in the forthcoming months).

This extension has been approved by the board

Best regards,

Mykola Kozlenko

WMUA treasurer

NickK (talk) 10:01, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Extension Approved

Hi NickK. Thank you for this update. The extension is approved. The new end date is 30 September 2014. You final report is due 29 November 2014. Best, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 16:53, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

thank you very much! --アンタナナ 21:58, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Request for change to project budget

Dear GAC members,

We have planned to organise a conference on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of Ukrainian Wikipedia, but the situation was not okay then and we had to abandon the project. Here is our previous request for change to project budget.

We have been working to have a proper two-day conference in Kyiv (here) on July 26-27, 2014, and we at last have all the figures to be put in the modified budget, thus we request your permission to rearrange the budget, so that accommodation, meals and reimbursement for travel expenses for conference participants are to be present in the budget:

Budget breakdown (modified)

Number	Item description	Unit	Qty	Cost per unit UAH /USD	Total cost USD	WMF contribution (USD)	Other sources (USD)	Notes
1. WEP and GLAM events
1.1	Wikiworkshops (travel and per diems for conducting workshops)	event	6	375.00 UAH / 32.00 USD	281.00	187.00	94.00	The number of workshops will be reduced, it is inevitable, taking into consideration the current situation
1.2	Travel (travel and per diems for signing the agreements etc)	event	2	375.00 UAH / 32.00 USD	64.00	64.00
2. Wikiexpeditions
2.1	Wikiexpeditions (by bus, train or car)	event	9	600.00 UAH / 52 USD	465.00	465.00		The number will be reduced
2.2	Wikiexpeditions (by bike)	event	10	225.00 UAH / 20.00 USD	200.00	163.00	37.00	The number will be reduced
3. Wiki events
3.6	International conference travel expenses	person	2	2000.00 UAH / 250.22 USD	500.00	250.00	250.00	We were able to negotiate that Wikimedia Poland covered the expenses for one international conference
3.7	The 4th Wikiconference	event (participants' accommodation, meals (dinner, lunch), travel expenses reimbursement)	1	17 935.00 UAH / 1540 USD	1540.00	1540.00		accommodation: 560 UAH per night, 8 2-bed rooms = 4480 UAH / 385 USD travel expenses reimbursement: 241 UAH per person, two-ways = 3855 UAH / 330 USD meals: lunch, 2 times, 50 UAH per person, 60 participants = 6000 UAH / 515 UAH meals: dinner, 1 time, 60 UAH per person, 60 participants = 3600 UAH / 310 UAH
4. Publishing
4.1	Publishing	project	1	22 819.00 UAH / 1957 USD	1957.00	1957.00		The prices have risen, but exchange rate changed as well

Best regards,

--アンタナナ 11:52, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

ED of Wikimedia Ukraine

Thank you for this updated information. The budget changes are approved. We wish you success with the upcoming Wikiconference! Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 17:55, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Requesting an Extension - 2

Hi,

We would like to request an extension of this grant until the end of the year (31 December 2014). This is mainly due to the situation in Ukraine that has made us slightly scale down our activities, so that what we initially planned for 9 months will now be fine for a year. This is also due to the slower progress of Wiki Loves Earth on the international level, with some countries finishing in July instead of May as expected making us unable to distribute all prizes until the end of the month.

Best regards,

Mykola Kozlenko

WMUA Treasurer — NickK (talk) 22:38, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Hi, NickK. Thank you for the update. The extension request is approved. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 22:49, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Alex! — NickK (talk) 06:29, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

Budget change and reallocation requests

Hi,

Following, on one hand, the evolution of our organisation, and on the other hand, the need to adapt some activities to the current situation in Ukraine, we would like to request the following changes.

Firstly, we would like to request an extension until 31 January 2015. We have several projects that we are not able to complete by 31 December: in particular, an ongoing article contest and distribution of Wiki Loves Earth prizes, as well as purchase of scanner (due to changes in customs rules we could not order it until now). Thus we would be more comfortable with this grant extended until 31 January 2015.

Secondly, we would like to request an addition of the position of part-time PR manager. As our projects are almost back to the level we planned for the year and due to the growth of popularity of social networks and online media in the country (for example, usage of Twitter has tripled during the year) we are in a situation where volunteers do not manage to produce the necessary impact anymore. To keep our media presence and awareness of Wikimedia projects high, we would like to hire a part-time (0.5 FTE) PR-manager until 31 January 2015. The details are below:

• Text of the job announcement
• Board decision #34/2014 of 16 October, approving the need to recruit a PR manager
• Board decision #39/2014 of 4 December, approving recruitment procedure.

The PR manager will be working 20 hours a week in our new office (or in external location, e.g. attending an event if needed) and will report to the Executive Director. (S)he should have an experience of work with Wikimedia projects, know wiki markup language, have an experience of PR work, have excellent writing skills in Ukrainian and a good command of English. His/her project goal will be management of external relations, maintaining public image of the organisation, support of relations with volunteers and media community. (S)he will be responsible for updating pages in social networks of Wikimedia Ukraine and Ukrainian Wikimedia projects, regular blog posts, preparation of press releases, media monitoring, organising public events and maintaining contacts with external partners.

We will offer him/her a part-time contract until 31 January 2015, and we may extend it if we are satisfied with his/her work and we have it approved in 2015 grant.

Measures of success

We find that our PR manager will be successful if following targets are met:

• updates on social media: at least 1 per working day per social network
• press reactivity: press-releases published on the day of the event, or on the planned day no later than 11:30 a.m.
• increasing reach: at least 10% increase in likes/subscribers per social network; at least 4000 viewers per week per social network
• media publications: at least 20 publications per month (excluding our own communication channels); at least 3 publications in leading nationwide media (nationwide TV channels, top websites, top magazines etc.)
• contacts: at least 20 new press contacts per month
• event management: making bookings and orders for events within 1 working day from request
• media monitoring: at least once per working day.

Budget breakdown (modified)

Number	Item description	Unit	Qty	Cost per unit UAH /USD	Total cost USD	WMF contribution (USD)	Other sources (USD)	Notes
2. Wikiexpeditions
2.2	Wikiexpeditions (by bike)	event	0	225.00 UAH / 20.00 USD	0.00	0.00	0.00	Due to poor security situation in Ukraine in summer we were unable to organise any Wikiexpeditions by bike, as people were not really interested in travelling alone out of big cities. Although situation has improved since then, we will not be able to organise any Wikiexpeditions this year due to unsuitable weather conditions (winter, frost, snow...)
2.3	Wikiexpeditions (on foot)	event	4	10.00 UAH / 1.25 USD	6.00	2.00	4.00	We were not able to organise such expeditions in spring due to security situation. We are now able to organise such expeditions in winter, but we have only two months remaining and will be unable to meet the target.
2.4	Photo grants (accreditations, tickets for events)	event	19	200.00 UAH / 25.02 USD	475.00	450.00	25.00	Small reduction of amount.
3. Wiki events
3.8	PR manager	month	2	250.00 USD	500.00	500.00		Based on monthly wage of 500.00 USD for full time = 250.00 USD for part-time with 0.5 FTE = 40 UAH (2.7 USD) per hour. See above for measures of success.
8. Wiki Loves Earth
8.6	National jury's offline meeting (travel expenses and meals)	event	0	2400.00 UAH / 300.26 USD	0.00	0.00		We had to cancel this offline meeting as a number of jury members could not travel to it due to security reasons (it was to take place in June when insecurity level was among the highest) and replace it with an online evaluation.

Best regards,

Mykola Kozlenko

WMUA Treasurer, for WMUA Board — NickK (talk) 02:55, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi NickK. The request for extension of the grant deadline is approved. The end date is now January 31, 2015 and the final report will be due April 1, 2015. We will need a bit more time to consider the PR Manager role. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 05:25, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi NickK. After discussing the need for the position, plans for management, and expectations with Antanana this morning, we are comfortable approving the budget change and reallocation. We would like to emphasize that this is a trial period and there should not be expectations of an extended contract after January until WMUA has reviewed the impact of the position on the projects. We are definitely interested in supporting WMUA's volunteers and if this position will allow them to focus on project management and capitalizing on new partnerships/outreach then we are happy to test it out. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 01:25, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Requesting an Extension - 4

Hi,

We would like to request an extension of this grant for one more month (28 February 2015). While our activities are back to usual scale, we still have some backlog, most notably:

• article contest: the contest was extremely popular and attracted more participants than we expected, thus we were unable to evaluate all articles and organise an award ceremony yet (we think to hold it mid-February)
• issues with WLE winners: we were not able to get contact details for some winners and we hope to get them by the end of February
• problem with scanner delivery: we had a problem with new customs regulations, but we hope to be able to ship it by late February

Thanks in advance!

Best regards,

Mykola Kozlenko

WMUA Treasurer — NickK (talk) 12:46, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi NickK. Great to hear the article competition was so successful! This extension is approved.

Requesting an Extension - 5

Hi,

We would like to ask for the new extension of the grant — this time until 15 March 2015. We have completed almost all activities (in particular we will organise an award ceremony of the article contest tomorrow), but we are blocked with WLE prizes. The issue is that this week our National Bank has blocked all foreign currency operations and will not unblock them until early March, thus we are unable to buy WLE prizes, as we need both to sell dollars (the remainder of the grant) and buy dollars (as prices for the prizes are in US Dollars) for this. We hope to be able to complete this until 15 March provided our National Bank does not impose any further restrictions.

Thanks,

WMUA Treasurer — NickK (talk) 15:04, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Hi NickK. The extension is approved. However, the reporting due date will remain the same -- April 29, 2015.

Hi Alex,

Following our previous discussion, we would like to request an extension to the reporting due date. We have completed our activities, but we are not able to provide a Wikimania scholarship to the WLE winner by 29 April 2015, so we would like to postpone reporting deadline until 31 May 2015.

Thanks!

WMUA Treasurer — NickK (talk) 23:45, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

Hi NickK. This is approved. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 15:12, 3 May 2015 (UTC)