Art+Feminism User Group/Planning/StrategicPlan2019-2020

Introduction

This plan documents the strategic priorities and objectives for the 2020 cycle of the Art + Feminism initiative, as a part of our Simple APG application. The main grant page is here (add link).

Mission

Our mission is representation. Since its inception, Art+Feminism has organized people of all gender expressions and identities to increase coverage of gender, feminism, and the arts; contributing and amending meaningful content to the encyclopedia every year since 2014. Art+Feminism is about making Wikipedia better, as a tool for open access to reliable information, but it doesn’t end there. It’s about dismantling systems of that ignore the contributions of marginalized people and erase their place in history. Over 4,000 people at three hundred events around the world participated in Art+Feminism’s six annual Wikipedia Edit-a-thon, which took place across the months of March and April. This global effort created or improved nearly 25,000 articles on Wikipedia and added 2,000 images to Wikimedia Commons.

Challenges

Burnout and workload

• Continued risk of burnout for lead organizers. This past cycle presented may challenges due to rapid growth and changes in personnel.
• Director hours are not sufficient to cover the amount of work required. As happened last year, Director used 2/3 of their hours by the midpoint report, and by 9 months into the cycle had used all of their hours allocated for a 12 month cycle.
• This will be our first year operating as a non-profit, which will come with a learning curve, unforeseen challenges, and additional reporting responsibilities.

Continued harassment and pushback from the Wikimedia Community

• The toll of harassment from community members, the time required to document this harassment, and the lack of adequate support from the Foundation is deeply disheartening and distracting from our mission.

Institution building

Establishing nonprofit operations

• In May 2019, our application to become a not-for-profit entity was approved by the IRS. This year, our focus will be on establishing efficient, sustainable, forward looking operations appropriate to our new status.

De-centering co-founders role

• Part of expanding the leadership collective and elevating members is part of a strategic process of the co-founders stepping back. Michael Mandiberg will be stepping down as a Lead Co-Organizer to become Treasure of the Board. Siân Evans and Jacqueline Mabey will serve one more year as Lead Co-Organizers.

Board

• As of writing, we have confirmed artist and artworker Sheetal Prajapati as a board member. We intend to reach out to X individuals, working in the arts, social justice, and free culture to serve on the board.

Building leadership

• Melissa Tamani will stay on as Lead Co-organizer, and we will bring on a new member to account for the departure of Michael Mandiberg.
• We will keep the expanded the regional organizer team, but intend to increase their honoraria and the specificity of their roles.

New Roles: Executive Director and Project Administrator

• We will conduct an extensive search for a new Executive Director
• The ED position will be expanded to full-time to meet the needs of the organization
• We will also take on a halt-time Project Administrator

Contractors: Grant Writer and Webmxter

• Diversifying our sources of funding is essential to our continued success. We will contract a grant writer to aid us in this goal.
• Our website is key infrastructure, and in dire need of an update.

See our Staffing Plan for more information.

Social Media, Education, Community

Online Community

• Continue to serve our community online by creating dialog around the larger issues at play in the project. We have continued to see incredible growth in size and participation in our online communities over the past year, as detailed in our Midpoint Report.

Training + Education

• Continue to offer a variety of forms of training to organizers and participants
  • continue to offer online workshops, providing training in English and Spanish, to introduce potential partners to Art+Feminism, event hosting, and editing on the platform
  • leveraging additional opportunities to answer the question 'how does it work?' presenting a simple linear visual on our our various online platforms that outlines essential steps to hosting an edit-a-thon

Nurturing our communities

• Growth in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Arabic-speaking countries
  • Art+Feminism’s regional organizers continue to expand the project’s resonance and reach. Our goal for 2020 is to nurture the connections we've made, to ensure that these communities can thrive.
• Stabilize in North America and Europe
  • Our growth in North America and Europe has stabilized. We will work to find ways to keep this community engaged in the project.

Growth forecast and future budget considerations

Our primary focus is on nurturing our existing community and building organizational capacity for the project's future stability.