Community Resources and Partnerships/India Rapid Project/DCW November-December 2025 Strategic Activity Plan/Final Report
Application type: Standard application
Part 1: Project and impact
1. Describe the implemented activities and results achieved. Additionally, share which approaches were most effective in supporting you to achieve the results. (required)
As outlined in our related activity plan, we implemented a series of activities from 1 November 2025 to 15 January 2026. These include regular workshops, conversation hours, and learning sessions, all focused on the community's overall growth and development. Our approach has followed the principle of evaluation, iteration, and adaptation, and we keep on improving our strategic directions with time. We see Heritage Lens, our annual convening, targeted contests around our Heritage Lens campaign as most effective, while the DCW Conversation Hour remains one of our major initiatives that serves the global knowledge community.
Conversation Hours
During the period, we successfully hosted two editions of the DCW Conversation Hour featuring PP Sneha and Pavan Santhosh. These conversations focused on Digital Knowledge Commons and Reimagining Collaborations: Communities Beyond Wikimedia. We have produced recordings of these hours for wider community benefit.
Editing and Contributing drives
Through the Wiki Club Deoband, we organised a very niche-oriented pilot writing contest on Urdu Wikipedia related to Dars-e-Nizami. We received a total of 25 quality submissions. We also organised Munfarid Aqwal contest focused on Urdu Wikiquote from 8 December 2025 to 6 January 2026. This editing drive helped revitalise the Urdu Wikiquote project.
We also organised a special contest on Wikimedia Commons from 7 to 12 January 2026. We received 182 submissions through this.
Heritage Lens
We conducted the 7th iteration of Heritage Lens from 20 to 25 November 2025, focusing on several iconic places in Lucknow. This iteration contributed about 110 images to Wikimedia Commons.
Workshops and other meetups
We organised several workshops and learning meetups during this period, and our first annual convening on 21-22 December 2025. Others include:
| Mehfil-e-Wiki, January 2026 - Thursday, 15 January 2026 |
| Community Orientation, December 2025 - Sunday, 28 December 2025 |
| Mehfil-e-Wiki, November 2025, Sunday, 23 November 2025 |
| Exploring Wikimedia Commons with Photowalk, Anantnag - Saturday, 22 November 2025 |
| Wikiquote Workshop - Friday, 21 November 2025 |
2.1. Documentation of your impact. Please use space below to share links that help tell your story, impact, and evaluation. (required)
Share links to:
- Project page on Meta-Wiki or any other Wikimedia project
- Dashboards and tools that you used to track contributions
- Some photos or videos from your event. Remember to share access.
You can also share links to:
- Important social media posts
- Surveys and their results
- Infographics and sound files
- Examples of content edited on Wikimedia projects
Our 2025 activity report provides an overview of the impact we have been able to create and see throughout the year 2025, including the activities in November and December 2025.
Available recordings
The recordings for the DCW Conversation Hours:
Content, Media and Else
Our volunteers curated a wide range of content on Wikipedia (English/Urdu/Kashmiri). Some of the major contributions are en:Burhan Academy (Elgin, Illinois), en:Mehdi Hasan Aini Qasmi, en:Dar Al-Kotob Al-Ilmiyah and Ilm Asma-ur-RIjal, Talkhees al-Miftah.
Our community members uploaded a wide range of media files to Wikimedia Commons and created 79+ articles on Urdu Wikiquote as well.
.jpg)
2.2. Additionally, share the materials and resources that you used in the implementation of your project. (required)
For example:
- Training materials and guides
- Presentations and slides
- Work processes and plans
- Any other materials your team has created or adapted and can be shared with others
Our activities have been guided by Movement Strategy Recommendations Increase the Sustainability of our movement (#3), Invest in Skills and Leadership Development, Evaluate, Iterate, and Adapt, alongside our own strategic direction. We have relied on the learnings from our Leadership Development and Skills Infrastructure Plan. We have used EventMetrics to record metrics and our social media channels to keep our community members aware of the latest happenings.
3. To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the work carried out? You can choose “not applicable” if your work does not relate to these goals. Required. Select one option per question. (required)
| A. Bring in participants from underrepresented groups | Neither agree nor disagree |
| B. Create a more inclusive and connected culture in our community | Agree |
| C. Develop content about underrepresented topics/groups | Strongly agree |
| D. Develop content from underrepresented perspectives | Agree |
| E. Encourage the retention of editors | Agree |
| F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Agree |
| G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | Strongly agree |
| F. Other (optional) |
Part 2: Learning
4. In your application, you outlined some learning questions. What did you learn from these learning questions when you implemented your project? How do you hope to use this learnings in the future? You can recall these learning questions below. (required)
You can recall these learning questions below: The learning questions build on our questions described at: Community Resources and Partnerships/India Rapid Project/DCW April 2025 - September 2025 Strategic Activity Plan#Metrics.
Our learnings are briefly elaborated in the following pointers:
- We learned that transitioning from a consensus-based model to a formal Executive Board (established in March 2025) provides a more structured oversight for community development. Crucially, we found that achieving 40% female representation on the board ensured that diverse perspectives directly shaped our strategic decisions and community governance.
- We learned that while university-based Wiki Clubs are vital "hubs" for bringing new talent into the ecosystem. A significant learning was the vulnerability of these clubs; for example, Wiki Club Jamia was briefly left without a Core Organising Team (COT) for several months, highlighting the need for more robust succession planning.
- Through supporting individual volunteer efforts like the GLAM IIT Delhi project, we learned that providing specific support (such as travel and food) for passionate volunteers enables them to successfully serve as Wikimedians in Residence. We also learned from global experts during our "Conversation Hours" that the WiR role is a powerful tool for empowering local institutions to collaborate for the public good.
- Through the newly established Youth Focus Group and student workshops, we identified a critical need to shift from a laptop-centric to a mobile-first approach to reach a wider audience. We also learned that significant digital literacy gaps exist among potential contributors, including academics and researchers, which impacts their willingness to engage with open platforms.
- Our Train-a-Wikipedian (TAW) residential programs taught us that a lifecycle of "Identify, Learn, Think, Mentor" is effective for developing the skills and confidence of participants in leadership roles. We learned that connecting Wikimedia activities directly with academic pursuits is a key motivator for retaining efficient contributors.
Given our principles of evaluation, iteration, and adaptation, we immediately begin incorporating our learnings into our new initiatives. Our mechanisms for 2026 include:
- We will use the insights regarding digital literacy and mobile usage to redesign our outreach materials, moving away from purely text-based announcements to short reels and video summaries to better engage a mobile-first youth audience. We are particularly working on this in our 2026 activity plans.
- The success of the inaugural Executive Board will be used to formalise our Leadership and Skills Infrastructure Program, ensuring that the principle of fair representation remains a permanent fixture of our governance.
- Building on the learnings from the GLAM IIT Delhi initiative, we hope to formalise a methodology for such collaborations in the future, providing a clearer framework for volunteers who wish to pursue residency roles in other GLAM or governmental institutions.
- We will apply our learnings about COT stability to develop a more consistent support system for our Wiki Clubs, ensuring they have the necessary resources to remain active independently of shifting academic schedules.
- We continue to follow the principle of "evaluate, iterate, and adapt," using our Mehfil-e-Wiki program, annual convening, and frequent "Progress Prism" calls as established spaces to share challenges and refine our strategies based on community feedback. We also aim to continue shaping our Wikiversary Conference initiative.
5. Did anything unexpected or surprising happen when implementing your activities? This can include both positive and negative situations. What did you learn from those experiences? (required)
Late wiring of resources has quite negatively impacted the initial planning of activities, though we have been able to sustain our community initiatives positively. We have found a surprising drop in the live participation for DCW Conversation Hours, as we expounded on our RIE report. Our learnings indicate that this happens due to timing mismatches for the global community, platform preferences (Zoom), and other similar trends. A significant positive surprise was the success of the GLAM IIT Delhi project, which was initiated independently by volunteers like Raydann.
We have learned that while administrative factors such as delayed resource allocation can impact planning, providing basic support for independent, volunteer-led initiatives is an effective way to facilitate institutional collaborations, as evidenced by the GLAM IIT Delhi project led by Raydann. Observations of university-based Wiki Clubs during this time highlighted that their growth is often non-linear, necessitating more robust succession planning for Core Organising Teams to ensure sustainability across academic cycles. Additionally, a decline in live attendance for virtual sessions led to the conclusion that live participation is not the sole metric of impact; consequently, the community identified a need to transition from laptop-centric outreach to mobile-first strategies, such as short-form video content, to better engage youth. Finally, the inaugural annual convening and niche writing contests held during this period reinforced the value of an "evaluate, iterate, and adapt" approach to refine governance and content curation.
6. What is your plan to share your project learnings and results with other community members? If you have already done it, describe how. (required)
We utilise our formal and informal spaces such as Mehfil-e-Wiki, the Progress Prism call, and community channels to share the learnings with our community members. Additionally, our annual convening now serves as an established space to share our learnings, challenges, adopted practices and strategies, with our community towards the end of the year. The first edition of the convening was organised on 20-21 December 2025 in Aligarh.
Part 3: Metrics
7. Wikimedia Metrics results. (required)
In your application, you set some Wikimedia targets in numbers (Wikimedia metrics). In this section, you will describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used.
| Target | Results | Comments and tools used | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 60 | 65 | |
| Number of editors | 35 | 45 | Template:DCW/Members - current active members. |
| Number of organizers | 20 | 21 |
| Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | 80 | 232 | 630 |
| Wikimedia Commons | 150 | 733 | 0 |
| Wikidata | 200 | 11 | 310 |
| Wiktionary | |||
| Wikisource | |||
| Wikimedia Incubator | |||
| Translatewiki | |||
| MediaWiki | |||
| Wikiquote | 100 | 79 | 130 |
| Wikivoyage | |||
| Wikibooks | |||
| Wikiversity | |||
| Wikinews | |||
| Wikispecies | |||
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
8. Other Metrics results.
In your proposal, you could also set Other Metrics targets. Please describe the achieved results and provide links to the tools used if you set Other Metrics in your application.
| Other Metrics name | Metrics Description | Target | Result | Tools and comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
9. Did you have any difficulties collecting data to measure your results? (required)
Yes
9.1. Please state what difficulties you had. How do you hope to overcome these challenges in the future? Do you have any recommendations for the Foundation to support you in addressing these challenges? (required)
Event Metrics tool doesn't, unfortunately, seem that strong. It doesn't have any option to track contributions for projects like Urdu Wikiquote. The tool often lags in terms of the number of days and the nature of the events. For example, tracking contributions to multiple Wikimedia projects in one go.
Part 4: Financial reporting
[edit]10. State the total amount spent in your Indian Rupees. (required)
167900
11. State the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
1868.97
12. Report the funds spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
Upload the financial report
12.1. If you have not already done so in your financial spending report, provide information on changes in the budget in relation to your original proposal. (optional)
13. Do you have any unspent funds from the project? (required)
No
13.1. Amount of unspent funds.
N/A
13.2. Explain the reason for unspent funds.
N/A
13.2. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
N/A
13.3. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
N/A
14. Are you in compliance with all applicable terms, laws and regulations as outlined in the project agreement? Yes
15. If you have additional recommendations or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here. (optional)