NY Wiki Chics

This page is dedicated to helping NY peeps organize initiatives focused on reducing the gender gap in Wikipedia. If you are new to Wikipedia, live in the New York area, and need some guidance or would like to get involved, you can email us at nywikichics @ gmail dot com

Goals

To increase the number of women in NY editing Wikipedia.

Overall Strategy

To conduct very targeted initiatives geared to various age groups which, hopefully, can be easily replicated in the future.

Deliverables

A facebook page and twitter account to attract, cultivate and engage a local community
Possibly some type of web presence to launch publicity campaigns. Maybe a Tumblr Account?

Possible ideas according to audiences

High School Students: Empowering Young Girls Through Wikipedia

NYC has specialized high schools that are open to alternative learning methods, such as Stuyvesant High School. We can offer to host an after school program that would only span one to five days. The message would be: empowering young women through Wikipedia. We believe that the Wikipedia notion of being "bold" and engaging in discussion may provide the girls with the opportunity to share their voice and thoughts - which can be challenging to young girls. Ie, through Wikipedia young girls can both find and practice using their "voice." Additionally, providing girls with tips on how to be safe online, and learn valuable web skills/knowledge.

College Students: Value Added to Their Education

To our advantage, one of the NY women just finished a masters in gender studies, and focused on women in technology. We will try to reach out to individual professors in the area asking them if they would be interested in a guest speaker that can talk about Wikipedia. We will also create a mini PR campaign targeting professors, showing them the advantages of using Wikipedia in class. Obviously, we will pay special attention to gender studies classes. However, we also decided that we can use media literacy as a way to get involved with journalism and communication classes. (No one like a Wikipedian can teach media literacy lolol) Ironically, we can use the gender gap to illustrate media literacy. (Ie, not just describing what is authoritative, but also how background/experience/political leanings affect what is written.)

Young Professionals: Rockstar Web Girls

The lack of women in Wikipedia is indicative of a larger problem in the web/tech world. New York has the advantage of attracting a large population of young professional women. We believe the best way to initially engage this crowed is to create a fun but educational event, ala Mashable. Considering there are many top webby women in the area, we were thinking of creating an event that presented "the top 5 rockstar web girls in NYC." These women could share their experiences and the challenges they face. It would be cool that for Wikipedia, we actually three or more girls to present Wikipedia :) The event would have edge and present cutting-edge web info as well.

Retired Women: Help Reduce the Gender Gap and Share your Expertise

We will try to conduct sessions at libraries that both focus on the gender gap and "how to edit" Wikipedia. For this, we will probably start at a Manhattan branch. There is a community of retired women in this borough that both had accomplished careers and are experts in their fields. Why not try to reach out to them and get them to be "ambassadors" for their age group.

Other ideas we need to flesh out

Adopt one article campaign
Irridicent and Google Apps for HS Girls - Ann to reach out to friend
Girl Scouts
Lower East Side Girls' Club - Deanna Z can reach out
Feminist groups in NYC
- WAM!NYC -- The NYC chapter of Women Action & the Media, who created the Women Write Wikipedia webinar; Deanna Z can reach out
Eyebeam
National Center for Women's History

Messages

Wikipedia can empower girls/women
Wikipedia educates a large segment of the world. 50% readership is women, why wouldn't 50% edit as well
Still many articles that need to be completed, and many articles that have holes
It's a community resource - contribute to your tribe by expanding articles of interest, and then also contribute to the global world.
Adopt 1 article