Grants talk:PEG/Nkansah Rexford Nyarko- PWM GH/Wikimedia outreach in Ghana

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GAC member status[edit]

Abstaining[edit]

A small thing, the target dates are outdated!

No objection[edit]

Waiting for more details[edit]

Questions[edit]

Question 1[edit]

Hello Ghana! Thanks for this grant request. I am really happy you are making efforts to spread Wikimedia's projects and mission in your country. I have some question for you. Did you contacted any educational institution and presented to them his project? If yes, what were the reactions? Cooperation with institutions before the implementation of the project can be very useful. Sometimes educators can be included in making the program of working with students. Other benefits are their resources (space and technical equipment). Have you thought about it? Using their resources can save a lot of money and can build a good relationship of cooperation between you and educational institution for future projects. I have some question more about budget, but let's stop here for now to see your response to the previous questions.--MikyM (talk) 01:36, 14 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi MikyM, The PWMGH team has contacted some educational institutions to inquire about their view of Wikimedia Foundation's projects. Many of them who have heard of Wikipedia have welcomed the outreach and are happy to have their students and educators participate in the programmes. One of the good things about Ghana's educational system is that you don't need to follow detailed and complex procedures in embarking on such useful projects. Meeting the heads and/or principal beforehand is the only required effort on our part. About having their space and technical equipment, we have thought of it. That is why we mentioned in the introductory part of the project scope and activity that selection of cities and then schools are based on existing ICT infrastructure that will facilitate this maiden outreach.We have also been in touch with Director General of Kofi Annan IT Center. Her interest in Wikimedia in Ghana is big. She has clearly indicated her support in using her institution and its facilities if needed. SandisterTei (talk) 14:33, 14 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your response! I must tell that I do like the idea and the project. And If you need some help with it, let us know. Anyway, my opinion is the requested money is a little bit big for some "start up/first project" for the group that is in the process of development. I would like to see you start doing project with less money and with less schools, and after several months come to us with big project. Than you will have results, experience and prepared team. --MikyM (talk) 00:37, 21 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Q2[edit]

Some good things here. I'm inclined to support this.

  • Language. No mention of language, so I presume every WM project cited will be the English-language version, yes? While English is the official language of Ghana and the most common used in education, most Ghanans, I'm guessing, are native-speakers of another language (45% Akan?). Just a side-point: are there any moves to start a WP in one of these Ghanan languages?
  • Participation and article-improvement measures. Good to see them listed, but there's not much about how students/teachers will be inducted into editing and image uploading. Do you have a strategy? (This is my most important question.)
  • Women. Do you expect female student participation? Apparently girls comprise almost half of the school population, which is really good. Does PWMGH have women in active roles who might be able to present and liaise to encourage girls to participate? While the cooking theme will probably involve many female students, I wonder whether they will be encouraged to participate in wider themes. (Apologies, I can't determine from the team-members' names whether any are women!)
  • Selection of schools/colleges. What is most important in identifying the likely best institutions?
  • Freedom of the press/internet. Any political/legal constraints on how the elections are covered?
  • Budget. Cameras ... a bit pricey at $200 each ... but if they're used for the long term to shoot uploadable pics for Commons, they do need to be of reasonable quality. The projector (three times the cost of a camcorder?) will be a permanent investment in the ability of the organisation to give presentations ... good. The legal registration: it's for one year, or permanent? Tony (talk) 08:58, 19 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Ans

Language: Akan language has its own wiki, the ak.wikipedia .org already. Other wikis such as ak.wikinews, ak.wikibooks are in the wiki incubator. because of little contributions to the local languages wiki, we set up a translation team some months ago to help reais Akan language from the Google Translate Toolkit to the Google Translate services. The team comprises of Benjamin Adamtey, Michael Annor, and Seyram Ahiabor. We also received glossary translation from many others. The use of Google translate will make editing and contribution to the Akan Wikipedia faster and simpler since with little knowledge in written Akan, one can write his article in English and translate using Google and put on the Akan Wikipedia. In short, we wanna kill two birds with one stone and we’re surely on that. We have a division of the translation team working on Ga and Ewe. Though, the progress to these languages are relatively slow.

OK, doesn't really answer my primary question: the project will be conducted in English and the primary (initial) contributions will be to English-language WMF sites? Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes! Primarily, in English! However, attention also will be drawn to some of our local languages. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 23:19, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Participation: Our first strategy is to impress on the teachers and students how easy it is to edit and contribute by using live online practical presentations. Secondly, via the Writing contest, we plan to incite the influx of as many articles as possible and contributors alongside. Thirdly, since many students do not have access to internet and PC at home, we plan to initiate the use of their school’s ICT centers for the contribution and edits. Fourth, many start and love to contribute and edits wikis after they’ve seen practical support of the wiki in their research and studies. Thus, we wish to impress on the students and teachers to use wikipedia and Wikiversity as a research and learning tool. By doing the avoce we hope to get a quicker impact.

I can see no mention of a writing contest in the application.
So the key is to train the professional teachers to guide the students in contributing in the longer term? We'll be most interested in your reportage of the strong and weak points of this part of the project. Lessons learnt are a key part of the WMF's strategies. :-) Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Women: Well, our goal at visiting the schools is to recruit contributors. Our aim isn’t geared towards any particular gender. Whether male or female, all what we expect is to get contributors. Yes, PWMGH has got females on board, however, only two active members - Sandister Tei and Senam Bridget. To encourage females to contribute on the Wikibooks Cookbook is a part of the reasons why the outreach has got females on board the team

I hope that after this first project, the role of women might be deliberately extended beyond cooking. Any chance you find in this project of widening the scope of women's and girls' contributions would be most welcome. Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Selection of Schools: We select schools based on, but not limited to, these factors:

  • The presence of ICT lab or Center in the school with working computers and internet access, through internet access isn’t a must.
  • The school’s performance in the BECE and WASSCE exams 3 years ago till now.
  • Private schools will be favored much as those most at times meet the aforementioned criteria. * Theoretically and practically, the selection preference ratio would be Private schools 5: 1 Public Schools.
Sounds good, and I suppose a solid skew towards the offspring of wealthier families is a burden we'll have to bear initially, in practical terms. Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Freedom of press: Yes, there’s are legal constraints as to how election are covered. However, our coverage of the election forms in alignment with those constraints - from a neutral point of view.

Meaning that the press aren't free. It will be interesting to cover the experience in the Signpost at a later stage. In particular, just how critical writers can be of the existing government. Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Budget camera: Picking a camera to use was a bit tricky for us. We didn’t want to purchase a professional-use camera such as canon rebel or similar. On the other hand, we didn’t want to target a less-pricey camera which wouldn’t last. Weighing these factors and considering easy portability, we plan going in for a camera of about 16MP quality, such as kodak easyshare or sony cybershot. We plan to use them for a long term.

Yep, fair enough. Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Legal registration: From our current knowledge, the registration is a lifetime. And since we’re registering as a not-for-profit organization, we hope to be exempted from tax-paying.

Sounds good. Do inform us if there are problems. Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Projector and camcorder: We target to acquire at least a 2,500 Lumen projector so that in the future event of doing presentations in relatively large auditoriums, our presentations and slides will appear and still match up to standards.

Good. One presumes an efficient sign-for-usage practice. It would be done by ... the treasurer? Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

3 times the cost of Camcorder? Even though camcorders theoretically are the inverse of projectors, the technology behind a projector makes it pricey. Projectors are exact opposite to a video camera, however, i’ve never seen a projector the size of a a camcorder. :-) That attests to the fact of their 3:1 ratio in their price. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:37, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Tony (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Some hopefully helpful observations[edit]

Ni!

Hi, and first of all let me welcome this audacious proposal. Because it's not mentioned in the proposal, I've been asking myself whether you guys have experience in doing Wikimedia workshops in schools.

ans: Experienced? We are not in a position to call ourselves as experienced in organizing workshops to talk about Wikimedia in schools. However, we are good to say at least, the little unofficial visits to few schools in our neighborhood and localities can attest to the fact that, we're okay in organizing a workshop on Wikimedia. And we have the feeling, with basis to support the fact that we will be mostly welcomed by almost every institution we visit.
On very few occasions, we've been invited to talk about Wikimedia at events organized by other organizations and we could create and at least, introduce Wikimedia to the audience at such gatherings.

As I understand this grant is for 6 interventions in 4 cities, thus 24 interventions total over 5 months, thus about 5 intervetions a month which is more than once a week. With such a considerable scale, are you confident that you are realistically considering your targets? Have you already tried doing this with one school to see how it goes?

ans: Realistically, we see ourselves on-track, by working on this project. I don't know if the project seems very huge for us to work on, but the interesting part is, we wouldn't embark on a project that will be exhausting that wouldn't let have the joy in promoting WMF project sites. We've also considered our targets and we fully know they are within our reach. In mind too, we want to increase participation and contribution to WMF project sites, thus we go forward with this goal in mind. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:37, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, even if you don't already have experience, you can learn a lot on the go. But my question is about your planning, which directly reflects on the resources you need. If later you find out you've planned badly, you might be missing crucial resources that might stop you from fulfilling the proposal adequately, or at all. And coming back to ask for more will be more difficult and time consuming than doing a pilot and planning well.

ans: Well, it took over a month of considerations and discussions among the team members and much research until the draft proposal came up. We think we've asked for what really is needed to complete this project successfully. With regards to the logistics we request, we have plans of using all of them. We don't think we will lack any material for the project after having these ones we've put forth on the proposal page given us. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:37, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thinking about resources, I don't know the reality of schools in Ghana, or of Ghana in general for that matter. But I can see somethings you might miss depending on your intentions. For example, you ask for a camcorder but not for a microphone and audio recorder. Audio recording from cameras on a stand are often total crap compared to somebody holding a microphone, so you might want to have both and mix the audio later. You'll also be traveling with expensive equipment, so have you considered getting insured? Imagine the projector breaks and you have to cancel all further events until you can get a new one.

ans: That's nice. Thanks for the idea of mixing audio and video mechanism. I think that will be better. We'll consider adding that! --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:53, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

On more procedural issues, usually an editathon to a newly introduced public will not by itself generate continuity. How are you planning to follow up with those people after the event? Follow up is a crucial aspect of any outreach activity, and at least a general plan for it should be included in the proposal, so we can help you improve it!

Other than the above, your plan looks nice, so congrats!

ans: Thank you! Follow ups? Yes! We have plans of following up the schools that we visit. We hope to do so few months after the end of the project. During the project, we also plan to organize a club in each visited school so that, even after the project, such clubs can still keep in touch with the PWMGH and organize in-school meetups for members of the club and other newbies or interested students (all on campus). We hope to better still, use the clubs to indirectly rope in more contributors for the WMF project sites. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:53, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, some details always need to be changed on the go, so the following questions try to give you some heads up on that, which you might want to think ahead.

You are announcing a single 2 hour editathon in each place. Will you offer to stay a bit longer (3 or 4 hours) if there is interest from the participants? It is crucial to provide people with a complete and fulfilling first contact that directly leads into the follow up strategy (see previous comments about follow up!). Also, plan wisely for pauses. Wiki editing can be very complicated and people need rest, yet not so long that they get distracted.

ans: With regards to the number of hours to engage the students in such edithons, we believe depends on the school's available time and schedules. We do not want to use precious time of the schools in promoting Wikimedia. Besides, they also have to attend to pressing academic activities. Therefore, we choose to stay for a maximum of 2 hours by default (however, depending on each school's circumstances, this time-span might either go up or come down). We are free to also return to these schools a day or two before since we plan staying for a 12 day period --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:53, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More importantly, depending on the situation, even 10 people can be too much to handle during a workshop. How many people do you plan to accommodate in each workshop? Will you be ready to do more than a single workshop in a place if it gets too crowded? And have a parallel activity for those waiting?

ans: Number of people to accommodate in each workshop? This can be tricky sometimes to give figures. The number of students to partake in the workshop depends on how spacious the auditorium or center is. If more students wish to partake, we will try to group the students once or twice, so that they take turns in coming to the center/auditorium for partake in the workshop. We also will make the workshop more live than doing a talk-and-explain thing about Wikimedia because we want to have practical understanding of how to use Wiki, not just the theory. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 14:53, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, this is enough - hehe. Let me know your thoughts about these issues, and looking forward to seeing you on the streets!

Hugs,

--Solstag (talk) 21:36, 19 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Reply from Solstag

Thanks for the answers Nkansah, and I'm glad to hear you feel ready and set to take on this project and are not impressed by its size. The documentation for the Grants Program says applicants should aim high, and I stand for that. I just want to reinforce two suggestions, first that you create a section in the proposal with your plans for following up with the groups you reach out to. I feel this follow-up issue must be part of the proposal and not just an explanation in the talk page. Second, than you take your time to consider using an audio recorder with a microphone and get insurance for the equipment.

Other than that, I only have to add that you should develop a good strategy to deal with the Wikimedia project's communities and technical issues as you'll be dealing with unexperienced editors making edits. There are all sort of stupid problems you can run into, from reaching account creation limits, since everyone will be using the same IP address, to having your pages deleted. You should definitely talk to someone who's done workshops with the specific project and language you're going to work with, and learn how to adequately get technical restrictions lifted, how to label the new users and their contributions so they're not misinterpreted etc. Hopefully you've already gone through part of that.

Again, thank you for the answers!

ans: Okay! Thanks for the suggestions. We are working on adding the follow-up strategy to the original grant page for easy access and not only on the talk page.

--Solstag (talk) 05:55, 24 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Solstag it looks like you do have an idea of problems we are likely to run into. You may offer advice. We will see to creating a section in the proposal for plans of follow up SandisterTei (talk) 22:05, 24 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
+1. Follow up strategy must be well defined and perhaps even down scaling the outreach plan in order to finance follow-ups in reached areas? I am sure that if planned properly follow-ups can be done in month 6 of the project? It will also help in evaluating the succes of the project.--Thuvack (talk) 15:53, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Assets[edit]

ans: If the assets such as laptops are not available, how do you suggest we do this project? Well, I, User:Nkansahrexford, will take custody of the assets before, during and after the project (until PWMGH can get a permanent place to operate from. We plan to setup HQ of PWMGH in Koforidua since its less costly operating in the city.). I stay at Densuano, Koforidua, Eastern Region, Ghana. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 15:01, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
+1. On opposing asset acquisition. Untill Wikimedia-Ghana is officially recognised and registered by Ghanaian Law. Organisational assists cannot be held intrust by an individual.--Thuvack (talk) 15:57, 19 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Office Space[edit]

Oppose Oppose Abbasjnr (talk) 08:00, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Shipping[edit]

ans: I think they gave the items to us as goodies and in my own opinion, I don't see them to be the ones to ship the items to us. I think we need the items and we are responsible for bringing those items down to Ghana, and putting them to use. Well, we've not asked them to support us in shipping. Since they are also a chapter like we want to be, we don't want to burden them financially in this. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 15:07, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Overall[edit]

Since this is your fist time embarking on this project, I would suggest that you start with a small pilot (in one city?) and learn from that, before rolling out to other cities. Abbasjnr (talk) 08:00, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Measures of success[edit]

Hi Nkansahrexford, can you explain me questions in this chapter? Under Measure of success I understand for instance “We will consider this conference a success if we have at least 30 participants” (cf. WM RS/Wikimedia CEE Conference 2012). Thanks. --Packa (talk) 23:47, 20 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ans: Thank you Packa. It was not intentional to include that in the final proposal. I will take it off. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 12:47, 22 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the submission. My concerns are related to the measures of success as well. I concur with Packa's note on using numerical measures, but some of them seem to be pretty strange for me. Why do you think that the improvement of the Ghana-related articles will come from Ghanian Wikipedians? How can you measure whether the professional writers, bloggers and/or journalists have started contributing to Wikinews? What is meant by Portal:Ghana? Is it the portal on the English Wikipedia or anywhere else? How the increased number of page views will suggest it was made by people from Ghana? Best regards.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 19:19, 22 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ans: The improvement of Ghana-related articles, we are not saying should be done only by Ghanaians. Many articles on Ghana are authored by non-Ghanaians. By using the Special Contribution page, we hope to learn about how much contributions are being made. We don't have any automatic mechanism to monitor that. The Ghana Portal is on Wikipedia. Its a portal dedicated for use by Ghanaians. We cannot measure the number of page views ourselves. We'll have to rely on the Wiki Stats to learn that over a period of time. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 18:05, 23 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nkansahrexford, I have told you would rewrite this chapter. Particular measures of success are, IMHO, important part of a grant application. --Packa (talk) 15:54, 30 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

@Packa Concerning the measures of success, are we missing something? Please help. Thanks
Instead of
  • How many articles and photos were written and uploaded at the end of the project?
I think you should write (the numbers are only an example, of course)
  • 200 articles and 100 photos will be written and uploaded at the end of the project.
I know some other applications are written in this way (for instance Wiki Loves Monuments 2012 USA) but after my opinion your capability to estimate the number of articles, people and clubs indicates your goals are realistic. --Packa (talk) 07:02, 10 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The intent of the measures of success is not to give precise values. They are there to guide us during the project and remind us of what our aims are. In the end, those are the questions we will ask ourselves to evaluate the work done. We can input, "We'll have 50 recipes articled". Well, assuming we got 35 instead, that concludes the project wasn't successful? The measures of success are to guide our activities and urge us to reach higher in getting real values during the project. We can do proper estimation of the project, both high and low, but the practical project will determine the real values. And that doesn't make the project on paper unrealistic! Thanks --Nkansahrexford (talk) 00:44, 6 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Time & gadgets[edit]

First, I'll like to say it's great to read of the proposal for outreach in Ghana. Now to the proposal itself.

First thing I noticed was time. 2 hours for an edit-a-thon with experienced editors is okay, but 2 hours to train a group of complete beginners is from my experience possibly unrealistic. It's probably doable if it were like a lecture where the students just listen but not if it were a workshop where you expect the students to actually have time to try editing and ask questions if they encounter difficulties.

ans: I think about time issue, I've commented on already. We do not intend to train the students using a single 2 hour program a day. We will run the training over a period of time, from 3-7 days during our stay in the city. We also consider activity schedules for the various schools. We don't want to interrupt with classes hours or take much of the time of the schools in training their students in how to use the Wikis besides, those schools also has got their academic works to concentrate on. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 18:12, 23 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Now to the acquisition of the various computers and cameras etc. I know you're wanting it to do the outreach, but on first glance, the proposal of getting all these at the same time without a formed organisation yet can be seen as simply a few Wikimedians wanting the Foundation to buy them a bunch of fancy gadgets and devices for them to play with.

ans: Interesting! If laptops and tablet are fancy gadgets, then how will one describe Nintendo Gameboy Advanced and Nintendo Wii?--Nkansahrexford (talk) 11:19, 24 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Do you really need the laptops? Personally, you already have access to computers otherwise you wouldn't be able to edit Wikimedia projects. You're going to educational establishments which have computers (per the whole basis of this proposals). Where, when and what will you be using these two laptops for?
ans: Yes! We really need the laptops. Not all the team members have access to computers. We might appear online so often sometimes. Personally, I visit internet cafes to do my replies and answers.
  • The same point apply to the projector.
ans: Yes! We really need the projector.
  • I'll grant you the tablet and camcorder as providing a capability you might not have at the moment.

:'ans: capability? Kindly define what you mean by capability you might not have at the moment?

I meant I can see you as not having tablets and camcorder now and would benefit from such purchases. It wasn't a point for you to response to. :) KTC (talk) 19:17, 23 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Modems on its own isn't very useful. Who's going to be paying for the internet connection?
ans: The modems on their own are useless. As such, we plan to use them in schools with computers but without internet connection.
I know. What I meant is, you get these modems, take it into schools, and the school use the modems to connect to the internet. Who's actually going to be paying for that internet connection established using these modems since I'm guessing it's not going to be free? The school or you? KTC (talk) 19:17, 23 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
ans: Internet fee? 1) Myself and Sandister hope to receive a 1 year internet sponsorship from Wikimedia Switzerland soon. We both plan use this in the various schools. 2) In case the sponsorship from Wikimedia Switzerland doesn't come in as planned, paying for internet charges for use in the various schools isn't something beyond our personal financial capability. It cost only around 50 Cents (USD) for unlimited internet connectivity daily using Tigo Telcom (Ghana).--Nkansahrexford (talk) 11:19, 24 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As previously expressed by User:Abbasjnr, I'm also concerned about ownership of these assets after the project and what use will be made of it outwith the project. -- KTC (talk) 22:09, 22 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Nk, how fast and reliable will the connections be for the schools you're targeting? When will you find out from Switzerland about the funding? Tony (talk) 07:43, 6 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
We will use 3G enabled Modems, with speeds like HSPA, WCDMA and/or 3G in the areas we plan running the project. If the internet funding does not arrive earlier before the project, we will pay for the internet cost. We can only subscribe for a bundle as and when we need it during the project. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 12:25, 17 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Various remarks[edit]

First, a great thanks for putting up this proposal, I think it's great to see that things move in Ghana. A few observations, which recoup many of the observations of my fellow GAC members.

  • Scope: I do believe that the scope of the project is very ambitious. As Solstag pointed out, it's good, but it's also difficult to pull together. I would rather see a pilot project in one or two cities (covering both highschools and university to have a good benchmark) before you engage on a wider scale thing. You will need to adapt your project based on how people recieve it, what works and what does not, and you should give yourself time to do that. Rolling out right away in 24 workshops over 5 months leaves very little time to adjust from one to the other and also quickly burns out volunteers, in my experience. You might want to revisit this grant in two grants, one as a "pilot project", and one as "rolling out", which would pick up where the first one left off.
  • Measures of success: these need to be very clear, as Packa mentionned. Thank you for rewriting those with clear numbers to enable measurements.
  • Legal registration: I am not sure why this comes into play in this grant request. If I understand this well, this would be to register Wikimedia Ghana as a legal entity, but to me, this does not fall at all in the scope of this grant, it does however, fall under the scope of a potential chapter starter grant. Maybe I missed something though, thank you for clarifying.
  • Laptops and tablet: Any way to rent those rather than buy them right off the bat? If a pilot project is succesful, it might then make sense to buy them. 09:17, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

What next?[edit]

So is Planning Wikimedia Ghana willing to incorporate the proposed changes, or? Abbasjnr (talk) 05:48, 5 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to second Abbas. We would like to see the organizing team take into consideration the concerns and suggestions made above, and revise the proposal page accordingly. This should include scaling down the total amount to under $5000. I am also e-mailing this to Nkansah, to make sure this is noticed. Asaf Bartov (WMF Grants) talk 23:26, 14 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Email from Asaf received and suggestions will be considered. Updates will reflect on the grant page soon. Thanks --Nkansahrexford (talk) 11:43, 16 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Changes added to the grant page. thanks --Nkansahrexford (talk) 15:59, 25 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Equipment[edit]

I'd like, along the lines of some previous observations, to suggest you describe in the request your plan to manage the equipment acquired, after the project is concluded.

Basically, these questions should be addressed in the proposal:

  • who will keep it?
  • how will you publicize that it is available for future projects in ghana?
  • if later borrowed by other projects, how will you document the lending?
  • if later borrowed by other projects, how will you keep track of its whereabouts?

As long as you have a sound procedure for that, I don't see a problem in acquiring equipment. Still, you could consider whether renting it would not be easier.

Other than that, I don't see anything else keeping it from being funded.

--Solstag (talk) 22:53, 25 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Okay Solstag, Grant page updated in relation to equipment and re-use. Thanks. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 23:30, 29 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yay! =D --Solstag (talk) 05:40, 30 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Some feedback[edit]

First, let me echo those above and say that it's great to see a bunch of committed editors in Ghana taking their first steps towards bringing a new chapter into the world.

I only really have two concerns:

  1. In Wikimedia Australia, we've done a lot of outreach and training, and two hours is completely inadequate if you want to include any editing. Two hours is probably enough to teach basic navigation through Wikipedia and Commons, but even then you'll be pushing it. We do full day sessions at Wikimedia Australia with a dozen participants at most, and even that only scratches the surface of what's possible.
---- Each of the schools we will visit during the project has their own academic tasks to accomplish day in day out. Program line-up for each term or semester's activity is done prior to its commencement. Thus, spending too much time will be cropping into their also useful curriculum activities. However, when the schools get to appreciate what Wikimedia is all about and how its in to promote education and research, the schools will be willing to open up more time periods during their school sessions or after school or during the weekends. We hope to arouse their interest more instead of making it boring for them. Those we will be meeting in the schools (both students and tutors) are individuals without any prior knowledge and/or understanding of Wikimedia. So we wanna draw them gradually into the Wikimedia world, whiles we train them to edit. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 20:14, 1 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  1. I'm a little concerned about the ownership of the assets. It's fine if they become the property of Wikimedia Ghana once incorporated, but what if something happens and the association never happens? Do you just get to keep the gadgets? I'd prefer a staged release of funds where the money for equipment is approved, but not actually granted until the legal association is formed.
---- What if something happens and the association never happens? Based on your comment, then it will be hard for any upcoming chapter like PWMGH to go for grant from the WMF until chaptered. And if so, how will such an upcoming chapter be able to create the needed awareness and run projects to involve many? This isn't the case as found in the Step by Step Chapter Creation Guide, Step 3, paragraph 3 and 4. Is it? PWMGH currently has an interim ad-hoc permission to use wikimedia trademarks. The level we are at now, there's no shrinking back to nothing.
I'm glad we were able to submit this grant proposal after being able to work stuffs on the ground. At least, some members of the PWMGH attended a couple of conferences and gatherings to talk about Wikimedia, run our own informal smaller projects, successfully held WLM 2012 in Ghana and recognized by WMF for operating in Ghana using their name. --Nkansahrexford (talk) 20:14, 1 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Other than that, looks like a good plan, achievable, and quite cheaply too. Well done. Craig Franklin (talk) 11:59, 1 December 2012 (UTC).[reply]

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