Liridon/2019/finalreport2

Application or grant stage: grant application
Applicant or grantee:
Wikimedians of Albanian Language User Group
Amount requested: 12,000 EUR (includes 10% contingency)) ($13,500)
Amount granted: 12,000 EUR (includes 10% contingency)) ($13,500)
Funding period: 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2019
Application created: 1 November 2018
Recommended application date: 1 November 2018
Midpoint report due: 15 July 2019
Final report due: 30 January 2020

Application

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Background

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Link to these documents, for the upcoming funding period, only if you have them.

  1. Link to your organization's staffing plan, for the upcoming funding period. This organization is not requesting staff to be funded from WMF. However, other financing avenues are being looked for possible funding of one project manager.
  2. Link to your annual plan, for the upcoming funding period. Please visit this worksheet to view global metrics targets and progress.
  3. Link to your strategic plan, which includes the upcoming funding period. *

Please add your grants metrics to this sheet. Note that requirements for shared metrics have changed for grants starting 1 January 2017 or later. Please visit this worksheet to view global metrics targets and progress.

Programs

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Please describe any changes to your programs for the upcoming funding period, including the addition of new programs or any programs you are no longer doing. Include your rationale for any major changes to your programs here.

Please use the templates provided to add information about each program you are planning for the upcoming funding period.

Education

During our first year, our focus was to establish cooperation with high schools, integrating Wikipedia into teaching curriculum. Our aim is to fill the content gap in terms of quality and quantity in Albanian Wikipedia, by integrating Wikipedia editing into an academic setting. Furthermore, we created collaborations with two universities in Kosovo and we are working on more.

Seeing the potential, we will continue extending our education program, setting partnerships, creating collaboration, deliver presentations, workshops & editathons, and assist and train teachers and professors on Wikipedia editing.

 
Workshop with students in Berat

We want to continue our education program in creating collaboration with educational institutions such as high schools and universities. The aim of such goal is to include Wikipedia editing inside the classroom to add and improve content. We will deliver several workshops with students during school time, teaching basic Wikipedia editing skills as well as with students who encountered technical problems. We will also deliver workshops with educators, teaching basic Wikipedia editing skills, as such to give them the opportunity to work closely with students on Wikipedia assignment.

 
Workshop in Podujeve, Kosovo in October

In Kosovo, teachers are required to fulfill an amount of training during the academic year as a tool to improve the quality of teaching and use modern and interactive approaches. Throughout the year we aim in working with government and NGOs in developing an accredited training for teachers based on Wikipedia editing, as a teaching tool that will increase student’s academic writing skills, IT skills, critical thinking, research and more. Through this, we will push further our education program by increasing the number of teachers who use Wikipedia in the classroom.

Goals:

  • Continue to establish partner relations with universities and high schools
  • Increase the number of educators who use Wikipedia in their class and train them
  • Increase the number of students involved in Wikimedia projects
  • Establish several Wiki Clubs at high schools & universities
  • Enhance content creation and improvement in Wikimedia projects (especially Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons) by editing in an academic setting
  • Establish accredited training for teachers

Measures of success:

  • Create 2 collaborations with high-schools & universities
  • Deliver 20 workshops with students
  • Deliver 5 workshops with educators
  • Produce 226 new articles
  • Have 5 offline volunteers
  • Have an accredited program for teachers by end of year
  • 100 new Wikidata items

GLAM

In regard to GLAM activities, in 2018 we have been working on establishing collaboration with one GLAM institutions in Kosovo (Museum of Kosovo) and one in Albania (National Museum of Albania). In 2019 we will formalize and develop these GLAM partnerships which will include Wikimedia residencies as well as several editathons in Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata. We believe that through these partnerships we will be able to source important material, as well as gain experience and create successful examples for expansion to future GLAM institutions, including gaining Ministry of Culture support.

Goals:

  • Establish collaboration with 2 partner GLAM institutions
  • Organize residencies who will interface with the User Group and Wikimedian community and conduct wiki technical work within the partner institutions
  • Organize editathons with partner institutions
  • Increase content in Wikimedia Commons from partner institutions
  • Document Museum artifacts in Wikidata
  • Increase the number of articles in Wikipedia with material from partner institutions

Measures of success:

  • Start and develop 2 collaboration with GLAM institutions
  • Develop and support 2 residencies with GLAM institutions
  • 200 new materials uploaded in Wikimedia Commons from Museum of Kosovo and Museum of Albania
  • 200 new photos of monuments added to Wikimedia Commons
  • 30 items added to Wikidata
  • 30 new articles in Wikipedia from GLAM material

Outreach

We will continue to focus on our outreach program, making Wikimedia projects more visible to the general public using a variety of platforms and activities. Our outreach program includes reaching out to media and organizations, hosting online and offline competitions and events that attract the public and continuously being active in social media, raising awareness on Wikimedia movement. Through this program, we will support active users and reach to new users, building a larger engaging community who will increase the quality & quantity of content.

 
Wikidata Birthday Celebration 2018 in Tirana

Goals:

  • Reach the general public through media and online promotion and mass edit campaigns
  • Develop a larger and more diverse community of volunteers through events and collaborations
  • Diminish the content gap in specific areas such as local knowledge or Articles every Wikipedia should have through thematic online campaigns & competitions, and offline events such as walkathons
  • Promote the free knowledge concept and Wikimedia projects through guest speakers in conferences
  • Establish a network of collaboration with different organizations, finding new editors who are passionate about niche topics

Measures of success:

  • 5 new offline volunteers recruited through offline events
  • 100 new editors registered
  • 330 new articles in Wikipedia
  • 50 new items in Wikidata
  • 1800 new media files uploaded to Wikimedia Commons
  • 3 guest speakers on Wikimedia projects/free knowledge topics

Staff and contractors

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Please describe any changes to your staffing plan for the upcoming funding period. These should include increases in staff or contractor hours, new staff positions, or staff positions you are removing. Include your rationale for any staffing changes here.


From August 2018, the User Group incorporated its first staff member based in Prishtina. The hired Project Manager was expected to lead the program through planning, coordinating and executing tasks within budget and time prospect. The part-time position of our Project Manager is supported by Ipko Foundation.
To implement the program, the Project Manager's duties and responsibilities are:
  • Identify and coordinate activities, timeline, and budget to execute within program’s grant application
  • Network, research and reach institutions, organizations and individuals to create further collaborations and partnerships
  • Manage activities, allocate resources, coordinate and organize duties and tasks within the timeframe
  • Organize events and other promotional activities
  • Develop and implement a communication plan for the User Group
  • Send press-releases, reach out to media and manage social media marketing to promote events, user group and the free knowledge concept of Wikipedia
  • Develop and monitor user group’s reports, proposals, presentations, and other documentation
  • Administer the budget, by executing, monitoring and recording expenditures
We are seeking means to develop partnerships with organizations or institutions which would sponsor a Project Manager in Tirana. As much as we do now, with the help of volunteers in Albania and a part-time Project Manager in Prishtina, another dedicated employee would support further and ensure an efficient implementation of the program grant.

For each new staff or contractor position, please use the template provided to add information about each new staff or contractor you are planning for the upcoming funding period (or to describe significant increases in hours or changes in job descriptions for existing staff). You are not required to provide this information for existing staff where no changes are required.

This organization is not requesting staff from WMF.

Budget and resource plan

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Link to a detailed budget for the upcoming funding period. This budget should include all of your organizations expenses. Please specify which expenses will be covered from your APG.

Wikimedians of Albanian Language User Group/Activity and Budget Plan

Midpoint report

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This is a brief report on the grantee's progress during the midpoint reporting period: 1 January-31 June 2019.

Program story

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Please link to one program story that showcases your organization's achievements during the reporting period.


I edit Wikipedia was an online campaign that took place during March 2019. The online campaign aimed to inform the public what is Wikipedia and that it is edited by everyone. During March 2019, we had the campaign banner showing at Wikipedia Shqip, we outreached our network through newsletters and constantly advertised in social media. During this period we also wrote how-to articles on our website, as an aid for people interested in editing Wikipedia.

Besides we went on 4 national televisions and 2 radios, talking more about the campaign and Wikipedia in general. The campaign resulted with 42 editors being involved who produced 52 articles.

Media: Klan Kosova Tribuna channel

Social Media: Promoting campaign on Facebook Promotion post on Facebook

Articles in our blog:

How to become a Wikipedia editor Opening a Wikipedia account 10 Wikipedia principles you should know

Progress

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Please add text or a link to a page with details on your program progress. This should including reporting against each of the SMART objectives form your proposal.

Education Programs

The first part of the year was very successful for our education program as we were able to sign a Memorandum of Understanding and foster 3 collaboration with educational institutions. Besides, we initiated our accredited training for teachers with one pilot training with teachers from "Mileniumi i Tretë" high school in Kosova. In addition, we hosted 5 workshops and 1 editathon in Albania.

Metrics Goal Description Status
1 partnership and 2 cooperations Develop further 2 partnership with educational institutions During May 2019, WoALUG signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Riinvest College, one of the top private colleges in the country. Riinvest College, an organization aimed at advancing student education, wants to encourage its students and staff to participate in WoALUG's programs to increase the availability of information in Wikipedia Shqip.

As part of this agreement, Riinvest has committed to engage Wikipedia editing in at least 2 classes per semester, while WoALUG will support instructors and student editors through materials and staff time. In the following months, we plan to work closely with professors in building a curriculum for the Wikipedia assignment.

In Albania, we have collaboration with 2 high schools in Berat, Department of Biology at the University of Tirana and Linguistic Department of the University of Durres. Through these cooperations, we are hosting numerous workshops and editathons.

60%
5 workshops and 1 edit-a-thon Host Wiki workshops with high schools During this period, we have organized 5 workshops and edit-a-thons with 2 high schools in Berat and University of Tirana.
100%
1 accredited training Establish an accredited training for teachers On May 2019, WoALUG held its first teachers’ training involving 15 teachers from Mileniumi i Tretë High School. During this 2-part training, teachers were introduced to Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikidata. Extensive focus was put on copyright and referencing. Besides, teachers were introduced to the Outreach Dashboard as a tool to monitor the assignment, as well as implementation tactics for Wiki projects in the classroom.
40%

Outreach

During this period we hosted serveral online and offline activities outreaching the general public. Moroever, we signed a MOU with Authority for Information on the Documents of ex-Secret Service in Albania. While promoting each of our events, we reached out to several media organizations, appearing on national TV & radio. Besides, we promoted most of our activities on social media and wrote articles on our blog.

Metrics Goal Description Status
1 partnership with public institution Memorandum of Understanding with Authority for Information on the Documents of ex-Secret Service We have signed our memorandum of understanding with Authority for Information on the Documents of ex-Secret Service, co-organized an event with them related to Albanian writer and political pioneer Musine Kokalari. Media coverage can be found here.
100%
10 new Wikipedia articles and 20 Wikidata items Wikipedia Birthday Editathon In January we held an editathon in Tirana celebrating Wikipedia's 18th birthday. During this editathon, 10 people participated in writing 10 articles and editing 20 wikidata items.
100%
42 new editos & 52 new articles in Wikipedia I Edit Wikipedia I edit Wikipedia was an online campaign that took place during March 2019. The online campaign aimed to inform the public what is Wikipedia and that it is edited by everyone. With no specific theme, the campaign targeted the wide audience, creating space for anyone to edit articles that are of interest to them. A big focus of the campaign was promotion, for which we promoted the activity online and offline. During March 2019, we had the campaign banner showing at Wikipedia Shqip, we outreached our network through newsletters and constantly advertised in social media. During this period we also wrote how-to articles on our website, as an aid for people interested in editing Wikipedia. Besides we went on 4 national televisions and 2 radios, talking more about the campaign and Wikipedia in general. The campaign resulted with 42 editors being involved who produced 52 articles.

Media coverage links: Klan Kosova Tribuna Channel

100%
43 new articles in Wikipedia CEE Spring This year also we participated in the CEE spring online campaign for Albania and Kosovo. During this period, editors translated articles submitted by others countries. From this campaign, participants produced 32 articles for Albania and 11 articles for Kosovo.
100%
n/a Diaspora Edits Wikipedia online campaign On July 2019, we will host an online campaign targeting Albanian diaspora, mainly students. This campaign in organized with Germin, an NGO that leverages Diaspora skills, knowledge and networks to advance the development and diplomacy of Western Balkan countries. During this campaign, we aim to host several online workshops with participants on the basics of Wikipedia editing. The aim of the campaign is for the participants to write articles for Kosovo in their speaking language Wikipedia.
30%
529 photos uploaded in Wikimedia Commons Wiki Loves Earth On May 2019 we participated in Wiki Loves Earth photo competition, organizing the contest in Kosovo and Albania. Promoting the natural monuments of Kosovo and Albania, the contest aimed to reach nature photographers to upload pictures for the contest. Promoting the contest online, we send newsletters, wrote articles on Wikimedia Commons on our website and advertised on social media throughout the month. Moreover, we went on media, talking about the activity in 1 radio and 2 national TV. During the one month period, 94 pictures were uploaded for Kosovo's contest and 435 pictures were uploaded in the Albania's contest. We finish the evaluation process, and will announce the winners during a modest ceremony on July 18.

Media coverage: KTV RTV Dukagjini

90%
10 new editors and 9 new articles in Wikipedia Special guest speaker at Dokutech conference When we submitted the grant we intended to invite Ms. Katherine Maher to speak on Dokutech conference, one of the largest tech conferences in Kosovo. as this wasn't possible, we organized an activity during FemArt festival, one of the largest feminist festivals in the region.

During this activity we gave a presentation on Women in Wikipedia, showcasing WikiWomen projects active in Wikipedia, with a call to action pushing the participants to become part of these projects. We also hosted an editathon, writing articles of women in Kosovo. With 14 participants the event resulted in 9 new articles of Kosovar women in Wikipedia Shqip.

100%
160 photos uploaded in Wikimedia Commons 3 Wiki Photowalk On July 8th, we organized Wiki Photowalk 2019 in Kosovo. On this photowalk we had 5 participants who in one day visited and photographed three cities: Prishtina, Vushtrri and Mitrovica. From this photowalk the participants uploaded 160 new photos in Wikimedia Commons. The winner of the competition received a Polaroid camera as a gift for their contribution.

In Albania, the WIkiphoto was organized on 13 of July and more details will be published in August.

50%
25 editors involved, 20 new articles and 41 articles in Wikipedia Wikidiversity edit-a-thon Instead of organized our annual Wikidiversity editathon, this year we participated at the Wikigap editathon for both countries, Albania and Kosovo. On March 8th, we organized 2 editathons simultaneously in Pristina and Tirana, in cooperation with the Swedish Embassy in both countries. In Kosova 14 new editors were registered and 8 new articles produced.

In Albania, 41 articles were improved and 12 new ones were created.

100%
11 new editors involved, 6 new articles in Wikipedia Wikipedia as activism We were invited by S'Bunker, an educational NGO to hold a Wikipedia Module as part of their TruAktiv training. TruAktiv is an alternative education program aimed at advancing critical thinking and critical approaches to understanding society and civic engagement in community and society.

The Wikipedia module aimed to:

  • Promote Wikipedia editing as a form of activism;
  • Promote Wikipedia and other Wiki projects;
  • Develop articles in Wikipedia about civic engagement, youth, and advocacy.

With 11 new editors involved, the activity resulted in 6 new articles created in Wikipedia.

100%

GLAM

During this period we were able to host 1 Wikimedian in Residence at Mueseum of Kosovo. The Wikimedian did Wikipedia workshops with Museum staff, which resulted in a very successful activity. The staff were enthusiastic about Wikipedia editing and contributing to it.

Metrics Goal Description Status
15 new articles in Wikipedia 2 Wikimedians in Residence On April 2019, we put the first Wikimedian in Residence at the Museum of Kosovo. During this three month period, the Wikimedian gathered materials from the Museum, writing articles in Wikipedia and adding them to Wikidata. The Wikimedian did also Wikipedia workshops with Museum staff, which resulted in a very successful activity. The staff were enthusiastic about Wikipedia editing and contributing on it. During this period the Wikimedian wrote 15 article in Wikipedia.
50%

Spending

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Please report your organization's total spending during the reporting period, or link to a financial document showing your total spending.

3,825 EUR

Final report

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This is the final report for your grant, describing your outcomes from the period {{{reportingperiodfinal}}}.

Program story

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Please link to one program story that showcases your organization's achievements during the reporting period.


Transitional Justice edit-a-thon
The Transitional Justice edit-a-thon was an offline edit-a-thon we had originally intended to organize in partnership with an NGO from Kosovo but since the negotiations were taking considerable time, we decided to host it on our own. The main goal of the event was the recruitment of as many participants, preferably experts of the field, to write articles in Wikipedia on the situation of the transitional justice in Kosovo and events related to the last war that took place in the period of 1998-1999. The edit-a-thon took place throughout December where we met with the participants who signed up through an open call that we made in social media and by asking potential partners to help us promote it. The participants, mainly students, were beginners in Wikipedia so we first hosted a training session for them and we met again during the weekend of 14 & 15 December to start writing the articles. Over the course of this weekend, besides the process of writing, we also invited two field experts on transitional justice in Kosovo as guests to help the participants find more sources they can use as references and to give them helpful tips about what to be cautious about when writing on such sensitive topics. The discussions with the guests were really productive and we received positive feedback about them from the participants. As per the outcomes of the edit-a-thon, our expectations for the number of the articles were not entirely met but we are still satisfied with the quality of them and plan on being more persistent with the promotion this year because it is a topic that deserves good coverage.
Wiki Loves Monuments Albania & Kosovo
As in our previous year of hosting the competition, many photographers were eager to contribute and become part of it. The call for participants was open during September and we made sure we did our most promoting it on social media, national TVs and online newspapers, our blog, etc. Many people joined and uploaded in total 202 photos of monuments from Albania and Kosovo in Commons. After the evaluation process, the jury chose 20 winning photos from both Albania and Kosovo and we held a joint ceremony in Prishtina Hackerspace where they were rewarded with gift cards and certificates and had the chance to share the “behind the scenes” of their photographs.
Media coverage:

Learning story

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Please link to one learning story that shows how your organization documents lessons learned and adapts its programs accordingly.


Our first workshop with the instructors of BONEVET makerspace
In Kosovo: We kicked off our collaboration with BONEVET, a non-formal educational institution in Prishtina, by hosting a workshop for the instructors of the space. We met for five sessions during October and November to introduce them to Wikimedia and teach them the basics, expecting them to carry out what they learned in their activities with the students. Generally, the whole process went fine but as the sessions were coming to an end there were some minor problems we identified and we believe our observations on them might be of hand for future references. The agenda of the sessions, the duration of which varied from 60-90 mins, consisted of a presentation we would host, answering questions about things the participants were unclear about and at the end we would assign to them a task that involved putting into practice what they learned. In the beginning, the participants seemed quite enthusiastic to learn and were engaged in asking questions but as the weeks passed it seemed as if their interest was fading. This also showed in the fact that they were neglecting or not fully completing their tasks and it was unclear to us why this is happening because during the sessions they claimed to understand our instructions. To get feedback from the participants, we asked them to answer a few questions regarding the quality of the sessions - to get a better idea of what can be improved. A pattern we noticed in the answers is that we were advised to keep the presentations shorter, which is understandable because the instructors in this case were also occupied during the week with their own activities. Other feedback we received was to simplify the presentations on Wikipedia, Wikidata and Commons because as we were suspecting they might have seemed a bit overwhelming for them as beginners. This feedback was valuable and will surely be taken into consideration for our next similar activities.
In Albania: Two successful collaborations that we had started last year were with American Peace Corp and REC Albania. One of the goals of American Peace Corp in Albania is to increase the quality of Education. They invited us to host different presentations in Tirana with around 50 American teachers so then they can include Wikipedia in their daily work in schools all over Albania. Our first challenge with this collaboration was transportation. We needed a dedicated person to travel more than 2h to reach the schools outside Tirana. The second challenge was to keep pupils interested so they can keep editing without one of us being there. For most of the schools that we have been, editing Wikipedia was one the most interesting things that happened that day in school, so they didn't have that much interest to edit if their teacher was the one leading the workshop. So we had to come up with ideas like video calling during workshops, and gifts for the best ones.
Not having a working lab in their school was also a challenge.
Workshops with REC Albania(an environment NGO) ran pretty smoothly because the workshops are co-organized with teachers working in the universities and writing on Wikipedia is part of their classes.
Something that students didn’t like during the workshops was the venue. They don't like to do these workshops in their university lab but somewhere that doesn't feel like a daily class, so for every workshop we collaborated with labs or co-working spaces for youth. But finding a proper place for more than 20 participants is a challenge since most of them have high rents.

Results

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Please add text or a link to a page with details on your program results. You should report on each of the objectives you included in your Simple APG application.

Education

As in our previous year, we are continuously working to push forward collaborations with educational institutions who share our common goals, including that of bringing to the fore digital literacy in the classroom - thus using Wikipedia as a tool to achieve it.

Throughout the year, we have conducted meetings with professors, students and people of interest in high schools, universities and non-formal educational institutions to discuss our possibilities of implementing Wikipedia in their syllabus and agenda. Since our mid-point report, we have signed another MoU in Kosovo: with Bonevet Makerspace. Moreover, we have hosted various workshops with other partners such as RIT Kosovo and also Faculty of Science and Faculty of History in Albania.

GLAM

For the second part of our grant, we have not been able to make as much progress as we were hoping to with our GLAM program, mainly due to the fact that institutions were not as cooperative and this was an obstacle in pushing our plans forward. Consequently, we have shifted our focus to other institutions so we can have better results this year. Nevertheless, our members have remained active in other GLAM related projects as is the case of the collaboration between Liridon, a member of WoALUG, who helped Armenian members transfer existing data from the Armenian National Gallery into Wikidata. More on this collaboration covered in the GLAM newsletter can be found here.

Outreach

The offline and online campaigns organized within our Outreach program are proven to be quite effective in promoting and spreading the word about our user group, therefore engaging a wider audience for our activities and helping the community grow. After opening a discussion in the community portal, for a couple of months we worked on changing the front page of sqWikipedia to make it more friendly for newcomers. Also we worked on articles “how to get started” and “help” to have the basic information. A lot of improvement was made on categorization.

Overall, the activities we were able to organize reached our expectations and as for the rest, we had no choice but to postpone them for next year. As in our previous year of participation, Wiki Loves Monuments again attracted many new and experienced photographers who helped enrichen Commons with their captures of the beautiful monuments in Albania and Kosovo. Some of our members were also part of conferences such as the CEE Meeting 2019 in Belgrade and Wikidata Con 2019 in Berlin where stories and ideas were shared with fellow Wikimedians.


Spending

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Please link to a detailed financial report for your spending during the grant period. This should be in the same format as your detailed budget from your Simple APG application.

Final spending report

Please include the total amount of Simple APG funds you spent during the grant period.

7,080.46 EUR