Grants talk:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia New York City/2021-2022

Dear Wikimedia New York City, thank you for submitting your application. We are pleased to learn about the different programs you are proposing for 2021-2022. We have completed the initial review of your Annual Plan and have some questions that we would like you to respond to:

• We are curious to learn how your annual plan aligns with the Movement Strategy Recommendations?
• How did you engage the community members in the development of this proposal?
• We are also curious to learn about the governance structures and processes you have put in place to support the realization of this annual plan and your overall strategic plan of WM New York City?

Thank you for all the work you do, and we look forward to your responses.--VThamaini (WMF) (talk) 12:34, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

@VThamaini (WMF): Thank you for your questions! We have answered them to the best of our abilities below, and hope you will let us know if there is any additional information we can provide! Megs (talk) 18:50, 10 June 2021 (UTC), on behalf of the WMNYC Board of Directors

We are curious to learn how your annual plan aligns with the Movement Strategy Recommendations?

Wikimedia NYC is committed to advancing its mission and goals within the larger context of the 2030 Movement Strategy. The Movement Strategy aligns with WMNYC’s longstanding commitments to community-based grassroots infrastructure, supporting representation of marginalized people in Wikipedia’s content and community, and the larger free knowledge ecosystem. As we wrote in our strategic plan, “prior to its recognition as an official chapter in 2009, its members clearly articulated their commitment to building a Wikipedia as democratic and diverse as the New York City subway and to partnering with libraries, museums, and educational institutions that shared their vision in providing access to knowledge. Its members also distinguished themselves through their commitment to the larger free-culture movement, recognizing that Wikipedia exists as part of a greater information ecosystem. The realization of this early vision for the Chapter is evidenced in its partnerships, its edit-a-thons and monthly meetups, and its role in the early development and growth of projects such as AfroCrowd, Art + Feminism, Wiki Loves X initiatives, and other catalyzing, replicable, global efforts growing from a diverse local context.”

Wikimedia NYC is directly involved in the current phase of the Movement Strategy process, with members organizing the monthly SWAN meetings for affiliates and actively participating in the global conversations facilitated by the WMF. This work extends to our local context as well; we regularly facilitate community conversations about the strategy process at our monthly WikiWednesday Salon and the global strategy work coincides with our own.

More specifically, during the 2021-2022 grant period WMNYC will focus on supporting work to Invest in Skills and Leadership Development, to Provide for Safety and Inclusion and the implementation of the Universal Code of Conduct, and to Identify Topics for Impact.

• At the core of its grant proposal is the hiring of an Executive Director who will not only lead the organization's growth, but build up the Chapter's programming, systems, and processes to best support and engage our members, partners, and other stakeholders. To put it simply, the successful candidate will grow the Chapter’s capacity by researching and improving member and partner satisfaction. They will build capacity for mutually beneficial relationships with our partners, perhaps through the development of resources and training materials to support local organizers to successfully host events on their own.

• Wikimedia NYC wrote the basic definition and scope of the friendly space policies now in use by the Wikimedia Foundation and the larger Wikimedia movement. However, in order to identify and address harassment and abuse, the Chapter required a more robust policy, as well as training and support from an external expert. Therefore, in the 2018–2019 fiscal year, Wikimedia NYC continued its leadership in this area and hired a Support and Safety consultant to write a Code of Conduct and establish a model for reporting, identifying, documenting, and addressing harassment issues in the Wikimedia community that does not happen on a Wikimedia project. While it was not a defined goal requiring resources during the upcoming grant period, this work will continue in 2021-2022. Our leadership is engaged with the global conversations regarding the UCoC, including one board member on the drafting committee for the implementation plan.

• Wikimedia NYC will continue its work identifying topics for impact, both on Wikimedia projects and within the larger free knowledge ecosystem. During the 2021-2022 grant period, WMNYC will host two events to educate New Yorkers about the larger free culture movement, so they may be more engaged with how Wikimedia supports free culture and is hindered when knowledge isn’t available, either because it’s held captive behind a paywall or because it hasn’t been created yet. A board member is serving on the advisory committee for the 2021 International Open Access Week.

Wikimedia NYC will also host 30 edit-a-thons in thematic areas that support knowledge equity. These thematic edit-a-thons are a central component to WMNYC programming, based on our local strategic planning process which is ongoing. In previous years, this has included (but has not been limited to) increasing the representation of content and editors around issues related to gender, the African diaspora, and/or the LGBTQIA community, as well as in the multiplicity of languages relevant to New York City.

How did you engage the community members in the development of this proposal?

Continually engaging community members regarding planning and strategy goals is at the core of what we do. Wikimedia NYC discusses strategy and program development with its members monthly during our WikiWednesday Salon meetings and we maintain a robust feedback loop for listening to community needs. We are also currently reinforcing this work through our strategic planning with Barretto Consulting, which includes targeted surveys and individual interviews with our members at large and institutional partners, working to Coordinate Across Stakeholders.

We are also curious to learn about the governance structures and processes you have put in place to support the realization of this annual plan and your overall strategic plan of WM New York City?

Since its founding, Wikimedia NYC has been entirely volunteer-run, but its significant growth over the years has outstripped its volunteer capacity. WMNYC struggles to meet current demands and is unable to support its continued growth without more formalized support. Therefore, The Board of Directors is committed to hiring an Executive Director in the 2021-2022 grant period to establish a clearcut infrastructure for the administration of our goals, and to Increase the Sustainability of Our Movement.

WMNYC is also completing our strategic planning work with Barretto Consulting. This will help ensure that our administration and governance flow in accordance with our mission and goals and help identify support structures needed for each of our stakeholders to succeed, and that we continue to Evaluate, Iterate, and Adapt. That is, to Manage Internal Knowledge and determine which work is best done by staff, an external consultant, or our volunteers, and to identify the support structures needed so that each of these stakeholders is successful.

Simple APG Funding Decision

We recommend that Wikimedia New York City first concludes on the process of being reinstated before receiving the grant funding of $100,000 for up to 12 months.

While we find that the programmatic work is of good standing, we find it necessary that the reinstatement to a 501c3 organization occurs before any approval of the grant is made.

The approval is contingent upon the submission and review of sufficient information and documentation supporting Wikimedia New York City’s reinstatement as a 501c3 organization to the program officers and grants administration team.

Our Review of the proposal ;

As Wikimedia New York City continues to work on resolving the issue of reinstatement, here are our thoughts on the proposal that will be useful upon approval of the grant.

Wikimedia New York City continues to demonstrate through its programs how they are achieving their mission to “......to contribute to a brighter, broader, and better Wikimedia movement through advancing open content and communities in partnership with the peoples and institutions of the greater New York metropolitan area.”

The programs they continue to work in include Chapter Membership and Community, and Outreach and Education. We recognize the goal to add new programming to support your work in developing partnerships and new relationships contingent on increasing your staff capacity by bringing on board an executive director.

We see the need to increase your capacity and advice on evaluating the specific roles needed to achieve the set-out goals.

We recommend that you be specific about the groups you intend to reach out to and that further your priorities of engagement and infrastructure; and especially with the strategic goal of embracing diversity and inclusion.

Lastly, we recommend that Wikimedia New York City reviews its governance structures and systems to strengthen and build healthy governance to avoid any challenges with regulation structures and systems such as with the current issue with the reinstatement of the 501c3 organization status.

Thank you for the work you do and we look forward to seeing the change you realize.

Best Regards, from the SAPG Committee and Staff--VThamaini (WMF) (talk) 19:05, 17 June 2021 (UTC)