Grants talk:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Conference Fund/WikiConference Nigeria 2024

Endorsment from Kambai Akau (talk)

•  Strong support - This would enable the Nigerian Wikimedia communitte to hold a local Wikimania event to accommodate those who would ordinarily not make it to other Wikimania events outside of Nigeria.

--Kambai Akau (talk) 08:06, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

WMF review and feedback

Hi @Olaniyan Olushola and Wikimedia Nigeria Foundation,

Thank you and Wikimedia Nigeria very much for this proposal and for your initiative in organizing the first WikiConference Nigeria. I highly appreciate the time and effort you put into this proposal. I have reviewed your proposal and have some comments and follow up questions:

As this is an event that has wide goals and hopes in developing the relationships and partnerships between the different active groups in Nigeria, I’m interested to know how do you see Wikimedia Nigeria Foundation’s role in this?

Wikimedia Nigeria Foundation will play collaborative roles in leading and providing guidance in the following roles for the proposed Wiki Conference Nigeria:

1. It will serve as the Fiscal sponsor
2. It will facilitate meetings and set up working committees among the Nigeria Wikimedia affiliates to plan and execute the conference activities. #It will co-lead discussions leading to partnerships and other engagements with mission-aligned organizations that may be of importance to the success of the conference.
3. Our staff members will support pre-conference, during, and post-conference activities.
4. Reporting and evaluation of the conference.
5. Co-lead implementation of conference recommendation.
6. And other general supports.

• Can you please elaborate more on the Mentorship Program? Who will lead this program, how will you identify the mentors/ mentee and from which communities?
• How will you judge ‘The involvement of the candidate within their communities’ when those come from communities you are less engaged with?

There would be different learning tracks for conference participants. Considering that participants may not learn at the same pace, we have integrated mentoring plans into specific aspects of our events, such as grant-making and capacity-building. Experienced members of the Nigerian Wikimedia Community would lead this. These members will be drawn from all the established communities in Nigeria.

• Who will serve on the scholarship committee and how will you ensure the right representatives of the different communities are a part of the decision making?

As mentioned earlier, the core organizing team comprises leads from all the affiliates in Nigeria. We've held a series of meetings among the Nigerian community leaders to select who will lead each organizing committee, e.g., programs, scholarships, partnerships, communications, etc. The leaders have unanimously asked Isaac Olatunde, who has led the Wiki Indaba Scholarship Committee in the past and served in various scholarship committees, including Wikimania 2023 and CC Summit ( 2020 and 2023) to facilitate the process. Each committee leader will recruit members from the Nigerian community, taking diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) into consideration. The scholarship committee will announce an open call for volunteers to join the scholarship committee.

• Do you already have POC’s (point of contact) you are working with from the other Nigerian groups you identified as your co-organizers?

Yes, as I mentioned above, we have an existing team called the co-organizing team for WikiCinference Nigeria, and it comprises all the leads of Nigeria Wikimedia affiliates.

• Provide support for trust and safety during your stay in Morocco (?) - please rephrase.

Fixed

Budget:

• The budget reflects 70/75 scholarship recipients, but the application suggests 100 scholarships (90 full + 10 partial). Can you please clarify?

There is provision of 100 scholarship (Full or partial) for members of the Wikimedia Community expected for the conference (With or Without affiliates).

1. 70 full scholarship (We focus on community diversity, community work collaboration and competence) this category will be selected from the entire Nigerian community ( With or without affiliates).
2. Ten partial scholarships., This category resides in Abuja, and they will only attend the conference without accommodation.
3. 15 full scholarships. The organizing team members comprised three leaders from each affiliate. This category of people will travel from different states in Nigeria to attend the conference.
4. 5 Members will receive full scholarships; we anticipate that some scholars who reside in neighbouring states will not need a flight to connect to Abuja for the conference.

In summary,

• 85 scholars will need accommodation and flight
• 10 scholars will only join the conference without flight and accommodation.
• 5 scholars will need only accommodation and local travels.

• Souvenirs - what kind of items are planning on giving? Per our guidelines, and in efforts to be more environmentally sustainable, we ask that you keep it to low cost items such as stickers etc. Please amend the budget to accommodate this. $30 USD per person is a lot and far more than what we recommend and encourage.

Noted

Thank you for this proposal. It is very straightforward and I think given the growth of the communities in Nigeria in the last few years and the role it has played in the region, this kind of gathering, even if targeting only local communities, can have a lot of impact and we think it is also a right time to do so.

The main thing I would like to emphasize is that if this proposal is approved, we would like to see a strong collaboration and engagements between the different communities in Nigeria. As this is a growing community, we are also aware of the challenges you are facing in having multiple communities in your country. So if we want to move forward with this proposal, we want to know and to have a clear plan and tracking of the engagement and a plan on how to work better together, how to hold responsibilities together (not only for the conference planning - but more so for the future of the community in Nigeria), how to resolve conflicts, to ensure representation and equity.

Thank you again for submitting this proposal. When you're able, please respond to the questions on meta and revise the proposal on Fluxx if needed (I have sent the application back on Fluxx so you can edit it, just don't forget to re-submit when you are done). These revisions will be due by March 4, 2024 after which the Conference Grant Committee will begin formal review of the proposal to make the funding decisions.

Best, CAlmog (WMF) (talk) 03:47, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Thank you so much for the feedback, and we hope our responses have provided more clarity to your queries. Best regards, Olaniyan Olushola (talk) 12:32, 1 March 2024 (UTC)