Grants talk:Project/Wiki In Africa/Exploration of Open Access Policy at the African Union

Eligibility confirmed, round 1 2017

This Project Grants proposal is under review!

We've confirmed your proposal is eligible for round 1 2017 review. Please feel free to ask questions and make changes to this proposal as discussions continue during the community comments period, through April 4.

The committee's formal review for round 1 2017 begins on 5 April 2017, and grants will be announced 19 May. See the schedule for more details.

Questions? Contact us.

Please note that in the case of this particular proposal, not all proposed activities may be eligible for funding. The Wikimedia Foundation's legal team is currently reviewing whether any of the activities qualify as lobbying, in which case certain legal constraints apply to what we can fund as a nonprofit organization. We will be in touch with further feedback about this prior to the committee review period.

--Marti (WMF) (talk) 23:20, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

Round 1 2017 decision

This project has not been selected for a Project Grant at this time.

We love that you took the chance to creatively improve the Wikimedia movement. The committee has reviewed this proposal and not recommended it for funding. This was a very competitive round with many good ideas, not all of which could be funded in spite of many merits. We appreciate your participation, and we hope you'll continue to stay engaged in the Wikimedia context.

Next steps: Applicants whose proposals are declined are welcome to consider resubmitting your application again in the future. You are welcome to request a consultation with staff to review any concerns with your proposal that contributed to a decline decision, and help you determine whether resubmission makes sense for your proposal.

Over the last year, the Wikimedia Foundation has been undergoing a community consultation process to launch a new grants strategy. Our proposed programs are posted on Meta here: Grants Strategy Relaunch 2020-2021. If you have suggestions about how we can improve our programs in the future, you can find information about how to give feedback here: Get involved. We are also currently seeking candidates to serve on regional grants committees and we'd appreciate it if you could help us spread the word to strong candidates--you can find out more here. We will launch our new programs in July 2021. If you are interested in submitting future proposals for funding, stay tuned to learn more about our future programs.

Aggregated feedback from the committee for Exploration of Open Access Policy at the African Union

Scoring rubric	Score
(A) Impact potential Does it have the potential to increase gender diversity in Wikimedia projects, either in terms of content, contributors, or both? Does it have the potential for online impact? Can it be sustained, scaled, or adapted elsewhere after the grant ends?	5.0
(B) Community engagement Does it have a specific target community and plan to engage it often? Does it have community support?	4.3
(C) Ability to execute Can the scope be accomplished in the proposed timeframe? Is the budget realistic/efficient ? Do the participants have the necessary skills/experience?	3.6
(D) Measures of success Are there both quantitative and qualitative measures of success? Are they realistic? Can they be measured?	3.9
Additional comments from the Committee: These costs are more aligned with what AU would fund. I do not quite see the correlation with Wikimedia's strategic priorities - at least this isn't evident in the proposal. The project fits with Wikimedia's strategic priorities and can have an online impact. However its sustainability is unclear because the project goals are vague. No criteria of success exist. I think similar researches already exist and they should possibly work on collating that instead of trying to redo what already exists. Not really a good fit with our current strategy but such work was frequently mentioned during this year's strategy process. On the other side, it can have potential for online impact but providing as many materials under a free license as possible. Liaising with a political body is quite ambitious and is something more for a well established chapter or WMF directly. The capacity of the intended interaction must be clarified since the grantees will not represent WMF or WMF projects. The risks are high, in my opinion, as this is actually a form of political activity or political campaign. A mix of innovation and iteration: innovation because this has never been done in Africa, iteration because we already have this in Europe. Measures of success are not very clear. Research goals are unclear. Research team is yet to be determined. These uncertainties need to be resolved before a grant is discussed. The project's goals and plan are very vague. So, it is impossible to assess. I am not sure participants have the necessary skills/experience. Budget is too big, especially salaries for African standard. I have significant concerns regarding efficiency of the budget: we do not know who will be paid and for what, and stipend budget is high for Africa. There is no evidence of community engagement, not that it should be required in research of this nature. Limited community involvement only. There is no information about community support. Not sure regarding community support, but a good commitment to diversity. I doubt that the proposal can be called a research project. It looks like a political campaign with vague goals and plans. I am not sure that it is within the scope of the project grants program. I would be excited if this project could work on what already exists, and take initiatives to solve these identified problems rather than just researching. It would be OK to fund it if it had a realistic budget where we would know who would work and on what, i.e. with more details than just 18k$ stipends.