Grants talk:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia Belgium/2019
"External Sponsorship"
editHi! In your annual plan for 2019 you mention external sponsorship that will be adding 25.000 € to your budget. Is this actual money or are these in-kind donations? And how do they factor into your programs? Best, Philip Kopetzky (talk) 20:59, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Philip Kopetzky, Mostly in-kind donations. For example venues (often expensive in Belgium) sponsored for us for free. Other examples are the sponsoring of prizes for the annual photo contest as well as staff time that organisations make available for us to use as part of projects. Hopefully this answers your questions? Romaine (talk) 06:51, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Romaine! I think in that case it would be helpful to indicate in your budget that these aren't actual funds but in-kind donations :-) It would help understand which budget you can freely use and what is controlled by other parties in your projects. Philip Kopetzky (talk) 09:21, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Philip Kopetzky, In our budget we haven't pre-defined what the origin is of external sponsorship. For example with venues with edit-a-thons, as those are pretty expensive in our country, it does not matter that much how they get externally funded, but that they get externally funded, to keep costs of activities reduced. There are occasions possible that we do get the funds on our bank account. Werther the funds pass through our bank account or go directly through the supplying party, in both cases these are still externally sponsored as indicated in the budget table. The reason why we have listed what we get externally sponsored is to show the support we get from third parties in our goals and that the activities are bedded in our community and society. Greetings - Romaine (talk) 09:51, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Romaine, as I tried to explain in my previous statement, it's totally fine to have these figures in your budget, but very confusing when setting them equal to the APG funds. That implies that the organisation itself is funded to more than 50% by external sources, which is not the case as you outlined here. Best, Philip Kopetzky (talk) 10:36, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Philip Kopetzky, Thank you for your feedback. I personally do not see the implication, but we will think about your comment how it can be more clear in future in what we try to describe. For the budget and resources plan, we asked ourselves what input do we need to be able to organise the various activities successfully. As venues are expensive, we consider it an important resource that organisations provide us their venues for free, while other organisations have to pay for them. If these venues are not provided to us, we would have high costs. Because of this we consider it significant to list it as we did. With this in mind, as well as what I wrote earlier, what would you change if you would make it for yourself more clear? Greetings - Romaine (talk) 07:49, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
- Just having a separate table with the in-kind donations you are planning to receive would be enough :-) Additional information can be found in this learning pattern. Best, Philip Kopetzky (talk) 09:45, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Philip Kopetzky, Thank you for your feedback. I personally do not see the implication, but we will think about your comment how it can be more clear in future in what we try to describe. For the budget and resources plan, we asked ourselves what input do we need to be able to organise the various activities successfully. As venues are expensive, we consider it an important resource that organisations provide us their venues for free, while other organisations have to pay for them. If these venues are not provided to us, we would have high costs. Because of this we consider it significant to list it as we did. With this in mind, as well as what I wrote earlier, what would you change if you would make it for yourself more clear? Greetings - Romaine (talk) 07:49, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Romaine, as I tried to explain in my previous statement, it's totally fine to have these figures in your budget, but very confusing when setting them equal to the APG funds. That implies that the organisation itself is funded to more than 50% by external sources, which is not the case as you outlined here. Best, Philip Kopetzky (talk) 10:36, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Philip Kopetzky, In our budget we haven't pre-defined what the origin is of external sponsorship. For example with venues with edit-a-thons, as those are pretty expensive in our country, it does not matter that much how they get externally funded, but that they get externally funded, to keep costs of activities reduced. There are occasions possible that we do get the funds on our bank account. Werther the funds pass through our bank account or go directly through the supplying party, in both cases these are still externally sponsored as indicated in the budget table. The reason why we have listed what we get externally sponsored is to show the support we get from third parties in our goals and that the activities are bedded in our community and society. Greetings - Romaine (talk) 09:51, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi Romaine! I think in that case it would be helpful to indicate in your budget that these aren't actual funds but in-kind donations :-) It would help understand which budget you can freely use and what is controlled by other parties in your projects. Philip Kopetzky (talk) 09:21, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
Changes
editAfter discussion with Delphine, we implemented her feedback on the annual plan and grant. These changes don't alter the essence of the annual plan, but give a better explanation why we plan to do certain aspects of the annual plan. With these modifications we hope to be more clear in what we try to do and why. If there are any lines that could use more clarification, we would be happy to hear them. To see the changes, see the diffs of the annual plan and grant. Romaine (talk) 07:52, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
Capacity building and board training
editHello Romaine, I recall you and I talking about this but can you clarify here the purpose of board training and capacity building expenses laid out in your budget (for 4000 €)? They don't appear anywhere in the plan and they constitute a big part of this grant so it is important for clarity that they are better explained. Thank you! Delphine (WMF) (talk) 14:40, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
- Dear Delphine, The capacity building expenses are described in the Constraints section of the annual plan. Not having the experience is one of the constraints we experience with the volunteers in Wikimedia Belgium. The annual plan describes this with:
- The available volunteers have not enough experiences and skills. That is why we think it is important for our volunteers to follow trainings and participate at conferences, to learn how to better organise projects, create better metrics, and learn from other volunteers and best practices presented. Also we think this would inspire to provide better documentation and organisation of metrics.
- The main benefits for board training and capacity building is to grow the experience of our main volunteers. They usually have the experience how Wikipedia works, how editing works, but as soon as it becomes offline, these online skills alone are insufficient for them. How to organise an edit-a-thon, workshop or photo contest in the best way possible? That is what we try to share amongst us and also to document, but more is needed to give them the insights, experience and skills. Therefore we think it is important to have them participate in training sessions and conferences abroad. There they can learn how other affiliates organise them, can follow trainings organised by other chapters, and exchange ideas and good examples. Over the years I have seen the best examples of projects in other countries. How to find them? The best way of getting a sense of what ideas there are we can copy at the conferences, like for example the Poster and Art Reception in the Friday evening of Wikimania in Cape Town was very useful for this. With a colleague board member I went along the various boards to see which ones we may be able to adopt ourselves locally and discussed them. So to summarise, the purpose of board training and capacity building is to get new ideas, gain and share knowledge, learn about best practices, and to follow trainings to enhance our skills to be better able to organise projects, activities and the other chapter work. Romaine (talk) 08:30, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
Following our conversation today, Geert, it would be great if you could break down the whole 4000 EUR for capacity building and board training into more sizeable and understandable budget lines. Thank you! Delphine (WMF) (talk) 16:37, 16 January 2019 (UTC) cc/Philip Kopetzky
Wikimedia Belgium's grant is approved in the amount of 15,000 EUR for 11 months
editWikimedia Belgium's grant is approved in the amount of 15,000 EUR (+10% contingency fee so a total of 16,500 EUR) for 11 months, from 1 February to 31 December 2019.
Wikimedia Belgium successfully resolved its eligibility issues and provided all documents necessary to process this grant.
Wikimedia Belgium's application this year builds on past results and past activities. We appreciate the fact that WMBE exposes its constraints in this plan, giving a good overview of the context they operate in and the opportunities and threats they see in operating in that context.
This plan takes into consideration what worked last year and builds up on it, furthering activities. We found interesting the focus on Wikidata in the GLAM program and how this build on the success of last year's plan. The focus on building long-term relationships with institutions in the Education program and gearing those partnerships towards quality of content is also interesting.
We have noted the revision of targets following the mid-term report and their adjustment towards more realistic and more contextually grounded targets. We expect WIkimedia Belgium will be in a better position to reach those targets than that of last year.
On a more practical note, Wikimedia Belgium should not hesitate to copy/paste their budget and resource plan as part of their application rather than copy only parts which make it confusing to read.
We hope that Wikimedia Belgium will continue to adapt to changing circumstances, in its governance and in the way it is run and we are looking forward to see more involvement from the board in general and to observe good results from the efforts made to bring more volunteers on board.
Thank you for your efforts and have a great 2019. Delphine (WMF) (talk) 08:38, 29 January 2019 (UTC)
Request for approval of provision for delayed Wiki Loves Heritage 2019 Prize award session
editAs we have previously announced by e-mail, WMBE would like to make a provision for the Wiki Loves Heritage Campaign 2019 on the budget of sAPG 2019.
The prize session for Wiki Loves Heritage 2019 will run on the 21th of February 2020, so we would like to move 2625 EUR of the budget till after the reporting period that ends on 30th of January 2020, for obvious reasons not to impact our budget or 2020.
- I hereby approve the reallocation of 2570 EUR from your APG 2019 into the event for Wiki Loves Heritage 2020 in February 2020 from the following:
- 1700 EUR originally planned for Wiki Loves events (APG 2019)
- 870 from the GLAM budget line (APG 2019)
- Any underspend from 2019 above this amount should be discussed with us before you reallocate them when we know how much exactly if any you have underspend at the end of this fiscal year. If this amount is not enough to cover the event and there is no further underspend, you will have to take the funds from your 2020 allocation for Wiki Loves. Delphine (WMF) (talk) 09:58, 17 December 2019 (UTC)