Wikimedia Foundation elections/2021

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The election ended 31 August 2021. No more votes will be accepted.
The results were announced on 7 September 2021. Please consider submitting any feedback regarding the 2021 election on the elections' post analysis page.

The 2021 Board of Trustees election has been rescheduled to 18 – 31 August 2021 due to technical issues with SecurePoll. Read more.

2021 Board Elections

Main Page

Candidates

Voting information

Single Transferable Vote

Results

Discussions

FAQ

Questions

Organization

Translation

Documentation

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The 2021 Board of Trustees elections was from 18 August 2021 to 31 August 2021. Members of the Wikimedia community have the opportunity to elect four candidates to a three-year term. The Call for Candidates closed on 29 June 2021.

Read the candidate questions and answers.

Candidate Table

Please click on a candidate's name to learn more.

Reda Kerbouche Lionel Scheepmans Dariusz Jemielniak Victoria Doronina Eliane Dominique Yao Vinicius Siqueira Adam Wight Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight Mike Peel Lorenzo Losa Raavi Mohanty Ashwin Baindur Pavan Santhosh Surampudi Ravishankar Ayyakkannu Farah Jack Mustaklem Gerard Meijssen Douglas Ian Scott Pascale Camus-Walter Iván Martínez

Voting

Voting was from 18 August 2021 to 31 August 2021. Voting information and instructions are on the Voting information page.

Before voting, please read the Candidate Presentations and skills assessment done by the existing Board.

Note: If your vote is rejected, don't try logging in on votewiki. Instead, if the system rejects a valid vote, you should just restart the voting process. Since the voting form will be blank again, it is a good idea to write down your choices in a separate document or take a screenshot before submitting the form.

Learn more about the Board of Trustees in this short video:

Timeline

15 April: Board of Trustees resolution about the upcoming elections
29 April: Call for Election Volunteers
9 June – 29 June: Call for Candidates
30 June – 2 July: Announcement of confirmed candidates
7 July – 3 August: Candidates campaign period
18 August: Voting period opens
31 August: Voting period closes
1 September – 7 September: Vote counting and processing
7 September: Announcement of vote results
September: Board of Trustees appoints selected candidates

Board of Trustees election timeline

The Board election facilitators created a graphic of the timeline. This can be used to share information about the election. The graphic is available in more languages.

Campaign Activities

This is a list of campaign activities planned during the campaign period. Further activities are in the making, the list will be updated continuously. Community members are welcome to add additional activities to the list below. If you add activities, please link to the page where community members can find more information.

3 July at 15:00 UTC : Candidates meet with the facilitation team for a Campaign Briefing.
During this conversation the facilitation team will answer questions candidates may have.
04 July at 19:00 UTC : Candidates meet with Middle East and North Africa (MENA) communities
7 July: Candidates begin answering questions submitted from the community : list posted on 2 July.
10 July: Candidates meet with Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) communities
17 July at 18:00 UTC: Candidates meet with the Spanish-speaking communities
21 July at 19:00 UTC: Candidates meet with Board of Trustees Community Affairs Committee
23 July at 17:00 UTC: Candidates meet with the African & MENA communities
28 July at 17:00 UTC: Candidates meet with European communities July 28
31 July at 10:30 UTC: Candidates meet with the South, East, Southeast Asian and Pacific communities
1 August at 00:00 UTC: Candidates meet with the community of the Americas August 1

Outreach

Voter turnout in prior elections was about 10% globally. It was better in communities with volunteer election support. Some of those communities reached over 20% voter turnout.

Election Volunteers

Do you want to help improve voter numbers in your community? You don’t need to have experience in elections. Election Volunteers can help promote the Board election in their community. Volunteers from all Wiki Projects are welcome! The aim is to have at least one Election Volunteer for Wiki Projects in the top 30 for eligible voters. Help form a more diverse and better performing Board of Trustees by getting your community involved in the election!

Conversations

There are many conversations happening around the world about the Board of Trustees selection. Come join the conversations!

Telegram Board Selection chat: The Board election facilitation team will share announcements and updates here.
Election Volunteers from South Asia
Add link here so others may join the conversation

Team

Elections Committee: AbhiSuryawanshi; Carlojoseph14; HakanIST; KTC; Mardetanha; Masssly; Matanya; Ruslik0
Facilitation team (Movement Strategy & Governance): Quim Gil: coordination; Xeno: English communities and Meta-Wiki; Jackie Koerner: English communities and Meta-Wiki; Civvi: Italian communities; Maciej Nadzikiewicz: Polish communities; Mahuton Possoupe: French-speaking communities; Oscar Costero: Spanish communities and the Latin America region; Denis Barthel: German communities and North-Western European region; Mehman Ibragimov: Russian communities and Central and Eastern Europe region; Ravan Al-Taie: Arabic communities and Middle East region; Mervat Salman: Arabic communities and Middle East region; Zita Zage: Sub-Saharan African region; Sam Oyeyele: Yoruban communities and West Africa region; Krishna C. Velaga: South Asian region; Youngjin Ko: Korean communities and East Asia region; Ramzy Muliawan: Indonesian communities and Southeast Asia and the Pacific region

Background

The Board of Trustees elections were due in 2020 to elect three of the Community trustees seats. In April 2020, the Board announced that the voting process was being postponed. The Board of Trustees announced in April 2021 the plan for the 2021 Board elections. The Board is seeking to increase diversity and participation in Board elections.

The Board is expanding to 16 seats to better cover the increasing work and areas of expertise required to steer the Wikimedia Foundation. This expansion was based in part on recommendations from an external governance review.

3 new Community- and Affiliate-selected seats
3 new Board-selected seats

Four seats will be up for selection in 2021, the three due for renewal and a fourth from the approved Board expansion. The two other new community-and-affiliate seats approved will be selected during 2022, together with the two affiliate seats that will be due (four in total).