Grants talk:Project/Rapid/OFWA/Ashesi Education Program

Comments from I JethroBT (WMF)

Hi Rberchie and Flixtey, and thanks for your proposal for this series of activities and through the WikiClub. I have some questions a comments about your proposal:

• It looks like the project is set to last for about two months. Can you clarify what events or programs you plan to conduct during this time? You've listed a number of events: photohunt events, writing contests, edit-a-thons, hackathons, class assignments, etc. You might also consider extending the length of this project so as to include some of these events where this merchandise and other materials would be used.
• In terms of the goals you've set under the Impact section, you aim to reach 300 students and 10 lecturers and want to create awareness, but awareness of what, specifically? Also, you noted under the Activities section "all these events will seek to recruit Ambassadors of Wikipedia", but I don't see any goals related to this under the Impact section. I think the idea of recruiting ambassadors who can help mentor others is a great idea, but would you consider adding a goal for how many ambassadors you hope to recruit?
• This should come as good news-- some of the items you've noted in your budget, such as stickers, can be requested separately and for free using this page for requesting swag. We'd prefer if you use this process and adjust your budget by putting those funds towards something else in your project if needed.

When you're able, please respond to the above questions and make any changes to your budget as needed. Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 02:55, 21 July 2017 (UTC).

Hi I JethroBT (WMF) thanks for your comments. This project is set to last the whole semester which will be 3-4 months. In terms of events this will cover, it will cover 12 events in all with 4 major monthly events. This will include the major Awareness Drive,(the Awareness as you sort to know is to create awareness and publicity about Wikipedia and its sister projects,and to dispel some misconceptions students and lecturers alike have about Wikipedia). In terms of the Impacts from the awareness creation for 10 lecturers and 300 students;

• We hope to at least get a new course start the Wikipedia Education Program.
• We hope to have at least 10 new active editors who will also be the Ambassadors and help train more students and also contribute actively.
• We hope to train over 100 people on how to edit Wikipedia and have over 30 new editors.
• We hope to have at least 2 new Developers for MediaWiki.

The Photowalk will also be used to gather content around the University on Commons and also train students on how to contribute to Wikimedia Commons. There will also be n Training for Developers via the African Wikimedia Developers Group and finally a Wikimedia Clinic to expose them to other WMF sister projects.

In addition to these, the campus Wiki Club meets once every fortnight so we anticipate that at lease 8 meetings will be held during the span of this project. I will however do well to furnish the grant page with

Touching on the merchandise, we are glad to know that we can still request for swags from the Foundation. We sort to print these merchandise since we wanted to customize and localize them using the logos and colors of the University and the Club. In view of that we will still want to maintain the budget on that however we will be glad to still augment this with some from the Foundation. Rberchie (talk) 02:30, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

Hi I JethroBT (WMF), just to elaborate on Rberchie's point, between the span of 3-4 months the WikiClub will run biweekly trainings. Meaning 2 events every month and resulting in 6 - 8 events in the semester. Also our team will work with the club and the class participating in the education program to organize an event every month and giving as a total of 4 more events for the semester and an overall 10-12 events for the semester. The four other events to be organised by our team include:

• An awareness drive as mentioned by Raphael (awareness on Wikipedia and its sister projects)
• A developer training session on campus for computer science students.
• Photowalk with students to gather content and to showcase the use of Wikimedia commons.
• An edit-a-thon using photos gathered.

Also about the souvenirs as Rberchie mentioned we were hoping to create customized stickers with the Wikipedia Education Program Ashesi logo and the WikiClub Ashesi Logo to make it useful in the local context, however having some souvenirs from WMF maybe a great mix for students as well.--Flixtey (talk) 20:36, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

@Rberchie and Flixtey: Thanks to both of you for your responses and clarification around the project. Responding to your comments:

• Could you adjust the end date of this proposal to reflect that the project is due to take about 3-4 months time? With an August 1st date, this would put an end date sometime between November 1st - December 1st. This way, we'll be able to see how the materials and merchanise was used at all of your planned events.
• Regarding ambassadors, what is your plan is for training brand new editors to become an ambassador (and train other students) in the 3-4 month period of this grant? Have you considered focusing on training existing editors who are not yet doing active outreach or training?

Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 22:17, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

Hi I JethroBT (WMF), we wish to maintain the project dates because the nature of the grant application is to provide one off marketing items which we wish to give a full report right after we have purchased the items and provide all receipts accordingly. However we will still provide additional report of outcomes at the end of the semester, we wish to avoid waiting to report after the semester as some receipts may get missing or may be wiped and may cause reporting problems.

I don't know if you have noticed from the resources provided on the grant page, we have had a club running from and also run an education program at the university in the previous semester, so we have a lot of members whom we will groom to take on the ambassadorial role. These people already have some experience with Wikimedia projects and will do a great job as ambassadors. Thanks--Flixtey (talk) 22:16, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

@Flixtey: I understand the concern, but grantees can send in receipts at anytime during the grant period, and don't need to wait until the end of the grant or when the final report is due. Maybe we have not made this clear in our guidance for grantees. Knowing you can do that though, would you be willing to change the dates? It sounds like you are planning on reporting on all of them in due time, and if you think you will need more time to report, that is OK. Thank you also for clarifying the procedure with recruiting and training participants to become ambassadors. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 22:43, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

I JethroBT (WMF): we are willing to change that but we might have to request for some funds towards another project other than this and we don't want to have multiple grants opened. We are planning a summer open school which we will be writing a grant for soon. Since this grant is just for priniting materials we will be happy to fully report and close that chapter pending just a status report at the end of the semester. I hope this explains better, thanks --Flixtey (talk) 22:55, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

@Flixtey: I understand. I'll be approving this grant shortly, with the expectation that you will provide a status report at the end of the semester. In the future, so long as there isn't an issue with your of your group's ability to manage multiple grants or projects, and so long as there's aren't unspent funds that haven't been sent back to the Wikimedia Foundation or used for a different grant, it's also OK to have multiple Rapid Grants open at a time. Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 22:30, 28 July 2017 (UTC)