Grants talk:PEG/WM RS/Wikipedia in Schools 2012-2013

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GAC members who abstain from comment/vote[edit]

GAC members who have read this request but had no comments[edit]

GAC members who have read this request but are waiting for more details[edit]

Budget and more organizational details[edit]

As the scope and idea of the project for sure well fits with Wikimedia strategy - there is no budget/organizational details provided, so it is hard to evaluate the project. Try to answer (not here but in grant proposal) such a questions:

  • How does the cooperation with partners looks like? Do you organize workshops, or just provide some promotional materials and on-line support?
  • What kind and how many promotional materials are you about to produce?
  • How are you going to distribute these materials?
  • What does it mean "working materials" and what is the difference with promotional materials?
  • Where and for what purpose are you about to travel and communicate?
  • How many people from WMSR are about to be involved in the project?

Polimerek (talk) 20:27, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Following the prior comment, I would like to know what this 'items' consist of: Working material (Like 'X'...), Promotional material for students (also like 'Y'...) and Communication and transport expenses (from where to where, and how many times?). I hope I make sense, and a last thing, maybe the other shoudl be expressed as a percentage (10%?) of the prior items...--3BRBS (talk) 23:13, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm also in the same position. Can WMRS detail the grant proposal please? Béria Lima msg 23:53, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you all for your questions. I will answer following the Polimerek’s questions. Please find my answers.--Ivan25 (talk) 12:53, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • As we wrote in the grant proposal, the negotiations are underway and we cannot be 100% sure how cooperation will looks like. Goal of negotiations is to find out all possibilities with all faculties and schools separated, because not all institutions have the same conditions and all cooperation is individual. We build concept of work for every cooperation specifically. Also students are on the different stage of education so program must be adjusted to them. Previous co-operations and workshops had this pattern: Lecture about Wikipedia and what it is, How to write an article on Wikipedia, What are the basic guidelines of Wikipedia. Professors choose theme (topic) and than students begin with writing. Every group of students had at least two theoretical lectures and two practical workshops. All of them had on-line support from us during the project.We believe that this year will be the same or very similar, but as I said at the beginning, negotiations will define project perspective. We will offer lectures, workshops, promotional material and on-line support. Our wish is to improve project and raise up its quality.
  • We have designed one part of our promotional material, and other one is translation of existing. This is some small brochure about Wikipedia and WMRS, and also Introduction to free licenses.
  • Material will be distributed during lectures. Also our plan is that one part of it will stay in Belgrade Youth Office where we will have workshops about Wikipedia.
  • Working material is material that is needed for lecturers (from WMRS). For example, papers, notes, folders, pens etc. I hope that difference between working and promotional material is now obvious :-)
  • It is planned to implement the project in Belgrade, Novi Sad and Research center Petnica. This is one year project so, and we are very thankful to our volunteers, but we couldn’t expect that they will cover all expenses. Budget of 150€ for one year is more than a minimal.
  • We expected standard number of people from WMRS involved in this project, and this is between 6-8 individuals.--Ivan25 (talk) 12:53, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Just to understand it right, then promotional materials, is just printing them? Maybe that should be the name of the item. No more Q's on this.--3BRBS (talk) 15:55, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, we will printing promotional material. :-)--MikyM (talk) 06:29, 15 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the submission. The project seems to be fine to me. Most of my questions are already asked, so my only question at the moment is related to the lectures/workshops. Do you have any plans on the number of lectures to be given at any of the faculty and what these lectures will present about? For example, do you plan to have only one lecture to introduce the students with the essentials of Wikipedia and then they to start editing, or a different model with more than one lecture will be used? Best regards.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 01:01, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Kiril for your question. I think that answers are partially included in my previous answer. Exact number of lectures and workshops depends from group, and we adjust our workshops to them. we noticed that students in high schools need more lectures and workshops, and on the other side, students on faculties need less (two lectures and two workshops). Also number of lectures/workshops depend from number of students and number of co-operations. So far, until September 15th we will have at least one lecture and workshop in Belgrade Youth Office. Before starting up with students, we will make arrangements with professors about topics, workshop time frame, making student groups etc.--Ivan25 (talk) 12:55, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Ivan for your abundant response. Best.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 14:24, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If the budget is a minimal, why not re-check it with actual fairs, maybe is underestimated and you'll need more money in the end.--3BRBS (talk) 16:07, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Question about community involvement[edit]

Hi there, great project, and nice to see it seems to spread over the years. One detail I would be interested in: What kind of community process (if any) is there to "rate" the students contributions? I guess my question is more: how does the community react to these contributions? You mention a few successful projects, but do not provide any links to pages that could give us an idea of the result. Maybe that would help? I know the Serbian Wikipedia is a small community, so I just want to get a better feel of how this project is supported/received from the community at large. Thanks! notafish }<';> 08:28, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Notafish for your question. Serbian community has mixed reactions on this projects. I think that reactions isn’t any different from the same in some bigger communities. Characteristic is that greater part of community have reactions on this topic, because community is small. Part of community welcomes new members and help them, and other part look on that like additional job. Serbian community is small if looking on size of Serbian Wikipedia. Community has developed special ‘’system’’ of help. For each project we make separate pages, instructions, and help with technical issues (Categories, Interwiki, Links etc). Also, our community wrote down special guideline and templates for this type of co-operation/projects. List of our successful projects are listed here: http://sr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Википедија:Семинарски_радови, http://sr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Википедија:Семинарски_радови/Списак_уноса. --Ivan25 (talk) 12:55, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
хвала, Thanks a lot for your answer, that page is exactly what I was looking for. It does show that the "process" of this is integrated in everyday's Wikipedia life, which was at the heart of my question. My question is now answered. notafish }<';> 08:38, 17 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Questions[edit]

The movement has had mixed results in education programs and is gradually learning (I think) how to optimise them. I have a number of queries, and I'm sorry they're so pernickety for such a small request (but the development of broader best-practice is at stake here):

  1. Why do promotional materials have to be printed in hard-copy (this chews up almost 2/3 of the budget)? I'm surprised it can't be done online.
    Our experience so far tells us that pupils/students engage with the activities better if they are given tangible material. Do have in mind that about two thirds of the budget are for promo materials, because the team wanted only the basics and didn't want to have a large budget, even though it's an annual project. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  2. What are the transport expenses for?
    For volunteers that will give lectures. If we ask of them (us) to devote a part of their free time to giving lectures about Wikipedia, the least we could do is cover their transport expenses (which bottles down to public transport tickets). --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  3. It says "seminal work" has been done. Is it significantly different from the methods or results of the other education programs in the movement?
    "Seminarski radovi" (seminal 'papers') are a common high school/faculty devices in Serbia, just like essays, reports and various other projects are elsewhere. They shouldn't be too different from other methods -- the bottom line is that pupils/students should use literature to create valuable and valid articles for Wikipedia. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Is a "Gymnasium" a high school? What age-range will the students be?
    Yes, Gymnasium is basically a high school (but with some differences from the US-style) and it encompasses ages from 14/15 to 18/19. Students are 18/19+. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  5. How many students in each class, roughly? Egypt had 15 or fewer, I recollect.
    As for high schools, there are about 20-30 pupils in each class, but not all of them could/would/might participate, or there could be several groups with smaller number of pupils. As for faculties, regular presentation-style lectures are usually held in lecture halls for the entire class that take the course in question, so that could mean 100+ students, but when it comes to lab work (workshops in a computer lab), there are usually up to 20 students working separately, with one or two supervisors in the lab. Of course, all those numbers depend on the infrastructure of the educational institution, computer lab availability and our and pupils'/students' schedules. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Will there be "ambassadors"?
    Not in the sense of US Campus Ambassadors. There are no campuses here to speak of, and there is no official role such as that, but all of us who are involved in the lectures are at the pupils'/students' disposal whenever they have questions. Also, about 10 Wikipedia editors in total have listed themselves in an appropriate page on srwiki as willing to answer to questions pertaining to their assignments and students often use that to contact people in order to get advice and help. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  7. What proportion of the tasks will be to expand existing articles on the list, and what proportion will be to create the new articles? How will these be allocated (will students be assessed for their suitability in undertaking one or the other type of task? Will one student work entirely on one article, or will the task be shared among two or more students?
    Students almost always start writing articles anew, as that's easier than fixing existing articles. At times, they write a large new article, if quite a small one already exists, but that's more of an exception than a rule. The teacher's assistants create a list of topics (article names) for creation, in cooperation with students. As for high school pupils, we create a list for them, and they choose which one(s) to create. It is possible that a student writes one to several articles, depending on the size of the topic. It's also possible that two or more (a team) of students write one big article or cover a larger topic, but all of that is discussed beforehand and agreed upon by all parties (us, as supervisors and trainers, teacher's assistants as the medium level, and students on the other side). --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  8. To what extent will students, professors (and ambassadors?) discuss the details of expansion beforehand? All articles listed for expansion are followed by just "(article already exists, it should be expanded)".
    We usually don't have time to discuss in-depth about the nature of each particular assignment. What we do is instruct them how to write articles in general, with special instructions for typical scenarios they are likely to have (so, pertaining to the course). Of course, they are welcome to (and do) ask questions about how to approach a particular topic or what aspects to portray and in what way, and we always try to guide them in the right direction. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  9. In both article categories, what will be the role of translation from other Wikipedias such as en.WP?
    Even though translation from other Wikipedias is quite common on srwiki, we discourage that in these instances. The primary task of students is not to translate (unless, maybe, when we're working with the Faculty of Philology), but to present skills in writing encyclopedic materials, using references and learning proper (and simple) wiki syntax. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Could you please give us an idea of what the rules for verification are on the Serbian WP? (Citations, reliable sources, etc.)
    There is no "verification" in the sense that an article has to pass a certain set of criteria in order to "survive". That's just not how Wikipedia works. "Rules" that apply elsewhere are also present on srwiki, so articles produced through these projects are treated like all others -- if they are non-notable subjects or lack references or are promotional etc, they can easily get deleted. I honestly have no idea how this question relates to this project/grant. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Has a method of assessing student assignments been developed?
    That has so far been solely the teacher's assistant's burden, as they're the ones that give out grades. As for the community's (or WMRS's) assessment of the work, nothing in that regard has so far been done, at least not formally. We always do have general assessments of the overall work, and the noticed trend is that with each semester, we get better results and better articles. --FiliP ██ 08:37, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Tony (talk) 01:42, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Budget breakdown[edit]

What do you mean by "Other"? Will it be used to cover miscellaneous activities? Abbasjnr (talk) 06:28, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Abbasjnr. Yes, Other is for miscellaneous activities. :-)--MikyM (talk) 10:45, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments[edit]

  1. I'm very supportive of this project. The budget could be significantly higher and I could still be supportive.
  2. It's important to make this one good, as a precursor to more work along similar lines in Serbian-speaking institutions.
  3. The evidence is that smaller student groups work much better; I quaver at the idea of 100+ students in a hall. I can link you to material about Egypt's experience if necessary, and the foundation also has useful information.
  4. Good relations with the professors is critical, and those "10 Wikipedia editors [who] have listed themselves in an appropriate page on srwiki as willing to answer to questions pertaining to their assignments" will be very important. You can't pay them, as volunteers, but next time you might think of some kind of reward to ensure their efforts, such as paying for their expenses to attend a future wiki-related event (feedback, training, etc?).
  5. If the application is successful, your report on the project process and outcomes will be very important to the movement—the strengths, the weaknesses—since education programs are a work in progress.

Tony (talk) 01:02, 25 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Request for extension[edit]

Dear all,

I would like to ask for one month report date extension. There are a few reasons:

  • Semester in high schools is finished a few days ago, so we are still collecting info and results about project,
  • Semester in faculties is still in progress, so some of started projects are in final phase.

With one month more we will be able to write down our report using all collected results from all schools and faculties. That will show more realistic results and evaluation of our project scope. We will appreciate if you could approve this request.

Thank you in advance. If any question please us know. --Ivan25 (talk) 22:19, 28 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the clear request. This is approved. Asaf Bartov (WMF Grants) talk 22:32, 28 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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