Grants talk:Project/Rapid/Tulsi Bhagat/The Calendar Initiative

Moved to draft

Hello, Tulsi Bhagat; thank you for submitting this grant request. As per the email I sent you on June 7, we need your expense documentation and final report for your previous grant before we move forward with the review of this one. We are moving it to drafts in the meantime. Regards, MMontes (WMF) (talk) 02:41, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi MMontes (WMF), Thank you for moving this proposal to draft. I will send you the expenses documentation and final report of my previous grant until the next week. Thank you for your consideration! Kind regards, — Tulsi Bhagat (contribs | talk) 04:56, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Comments from WMF

Hello Tulsi Bhagat, thank you for resubmitting this Rapid Grant request. It is great to see that you are organizing the second part of your awareness campaign! I have reviewed your proposal and have the following questions and comments.

• In your budget you have expenses for "Wiki-Informative Calendar designing". Rapid Grant funds may not currently be used as compensation for people’s time, so please remove design expenses from your budget.
• Would you please describe what is the purpose of "Communication" expenses?
• How are you going to distribute the printed calendars? Do you have a specific target or distribution plan? Will you, for instance, hand out those calendars on the streets for free?

Thank you for your engagement in the Rapid Grant review process. Best regards, DSaroyan (WMF) (talk) 08:57, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi DSaroyan (WMF), many thanks for reviewing this grant proposal. We are glad and excited to step up with this second part of our awareness campaign. Also, we would like to thank you for putting questions and comments. The answers and thoughts are likewise:

• Yes, we clearly understand that Rapid Grant funds may not be used to pay for people’s time. But, here designing for "Wiki-Informative Calendars" is considered as direct expenses for the project. The design is meant to be done in Graphic Designing Software for high resolution images, maintaining quality and eye catching look in calendar format, and all this needs to be done by a professional graphic designer as such, fee will be charged.
• Of-course! As you may know, communication always plays the vital role for any kind of project. The purpose of "Communication" expenses is to better coordinate with the team members located in different cities. Further, we have mentioned in the grant page regarding Bulk SMS which means we will be sending SMS about the campaign to individuals who have registered their mobile numbers during different period of time of this event. Not limited to this only, for ensuring proper distribution of Calendars, promotion of the campaign and coordination among task force team members and participants need Communication expenses.
• We will be visiting schools, colleges, universities and various other educational institutes to distribute the printed calendars. Yes, we do have a specific target group as already mentioned in the grant proposal i.e. students of different universities, research enthusiasts and professionals. No, we will definitely not handing out those calendars on the streets for free. This will not be just a random distribution of calendars. Let me tell you, we will give a quick short orientation on the spot during distribution. We believe the distribution of "Wiki-Informative Calendars" and quick orientation will drive participants' interest towards being an active reader and editor in the upcoming days.

Thank you for your consideration! Kind regards, — Tulsi Bhagat (contribs | talk) 14:18, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

@Tulsi Bhagat: Hi Tulsi, thank you for following up with Davit's questions. I appreciate the lack of clarity around compensation in our criteria and guidelines page for Rapid Grants. Unfortunately, eligible expenses related to production of code, research, and materials need to be direct expenses such as materials, rental equipment, and some business services (such as printing), but not compensation for contractors or people's time. This expense will need to be removed in order or us to fund your proposal. I acknowledge that the eligibility guidelines do not make this distinction clear at present. This has now been updated on the guidelines and criteria page.

The main reason for this limitation is that Rapid Grants is not currently budgeted to be able to broadly fund compensation for individuals, as the budget for the program is limited, and funding general compensation expenses would limit our ability to fund Rapid Grant proposals broadly in the movement. In the past, we have had to close the Rapid Grants program temporarily as the program has run out of funding, and these kinds of expenses have been a contributing factor to that closure. However, myself and the Community Resources team are considering into revising this policy, as we recognize some tasks and responsibilities are important for the success of funded projects and merit compensation, and would not disproportionately affect the program's budget and therefore prospective applicants' access to the program.

This change in eligible expenses for the program would be substantial, so when we have updated this policy, these changes would be announced on the Rapid Grants main page and on wikimedia-l and WikimediaAnnounce-l. With thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 19:56, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

@I JethroBT (WMF): Hi Chris, many thanks for the detailed information. I really appreciate it. With regard to Davit, I've updated and striked out the "Wiki-Informative Calendar designing". Thank you once again for reviewing the grant proposal. Kind regards, — Tulsi Bhagat (contribs | talk) 03:09, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Approved

Hello Tulsi Bhagat, thank you for responding to the questions and for making the requested changes in the proposal. I am approving your grant request. Best regards, DSaroyan (WMF) (talk) 06:18, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Requesting an extension for the report

Hello, I hope this thread finds you well. I apologize for not submitting the report of The Calendar Initiative. Due to COVID-19 pandemic and IRL stuff, I was unable to complete it on the due date. I would like to request an extension of 14 days from today to submit the report. Please confirm and approve the new deadline to be May 01, 2021. Thank you for looking into it. Kind regards, — Tulsi Bhagat ^{[ contribs | talk ]} 14:09, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

Hi Tulsi Bhagat, your request is approved, the reporting due date is shifted to May 1, 2021. Best regards, DSaroyan (WMF) (talk) 06:42, 19 April 2021 (UTC)