Grants:PEG/Esino Lario/Youth Hackathon
Goal[edit]
The projects is focused to have a Hackathon dedicated to young people (10-15 years old) in Esino Lario, one month before Wikimania, in form of summer school mixing topics of Wikimedia projects together with the topics of Devoxx for kids like coding, technology and practical experiments.
In this case we will use the learning pattern of Motivating students to contribute to Wikimedia projects but we would experiment it within a biggest program with technology and coding in order to have a more attractive and various event. The format of the program is adapted from Devoxx for kids (see the Manifesto): several concurrent training sessions in order to introduce young people to the technology and to new media but using a creative and innovative approach ("making thinks"). The students are organized in classrooms rotating each 40 minutes per each session and topic with a lot of breaks and exhibitions of technological tools (3D printers, drones, Raspberries, etc.) and ended by a big treasure hunt in the village to find qrcodes and related Wikipedia's article where there are the keys to solve the final puzzle.
The sessions will be held in Esino Lario (in the local building of elementary school, in the local park and in the local museum) in order to test the connectivity of Wikimania Esino Lario, with young people coming escorted by their parents. The same day there will be some concurrent events which will help to have more visibility.
The event is organized together with the group of volunteers of Wikimania Esino Lario and the experienced group of ATED4Kids of Lugano (Switzerland) (total 20 organizers).
The aim is focused in two points:
- Increasing reach: the events would involve several young people but the main action is to experiment workshops of Wikimedia projects together with workshops of coding in order to propose the similar formula also in other events connected with Voxxed. The manifesto of Voxxed says that the coding should increase the creativity, the event would propose Wikimedia projects as a "creative" workshop to mix "hard coding" and "soft coding". In addition the educational programs in Italy and in Switzerland are pushing a lot the coding and the new media and with this event we would give more visibility to the use of Wikimedia projects at the school.
- Increasing participation: the events would involve from 60 to 100 young people. Our expectation is to create young users and to train these users to be not only passive users but also active users in addition the feeling we would transfer is that writing in Wikimedia projects is "cool" like programming robots and games. Asking to the parents to escort their sons in this summer school would help also to introduce Wikimedia projects to the parents. All programs of development in the Alpine region would improve the connectivity and the introduction of the use of internet in these valleys, with this event we would present Wikimedia projects as a good alternative to increase the use of internet in these regions.
This session would be the version zero to test the possibility to organize similar summer schools twice per year focused to Wikimedia projects for young people, teachers and parents.
Plan[edit]
Activities[edit]
The young participants will come from local schools of Italy and from Canton Ticino (Switzerland) and will be escorted by their parents. The mentors will be present in Esino Lario the day before to setup the seat of the event.
Scheduled activities
Plan of the event (before 1st of May)(done)Definition of the program session (before 1st of May)(done)- Participation of wikipedians to Devoxx4kids in Lugano (1st May) to experiment the format to be replicated in Esino Lario
- Starting of the page for reservation of the participants
- Communication to the schools and to the media (1st half of May)
- Gathering of the required authorization and insurances (1st half of May)
- Organization of the infrastructure in Esino Lario (21th May)
- Execution of the event in Esino Lario (22th May)
- Gathering of the feedback and of the measures
Organization of the event[edit]
The event is planned following this plan:
- 10:00-10:30 Presentation to the attendees
- 10:30-11:10 1st classroom session
- 11:10-11:50 2nd classroom session
- 11:50-13:00 Lunch
- 13:00-15:00 Treasure hunt and exhibitions
- 15:00-16:00 Final presentation and results
- 16:00-16:30 Break and Final ceremony
Format[edit]
Classroom[edit]
The classroom are training sessions organized as workshops. Every workshop has a maximum of 20 students (theoretically 15) and a duration of 40 minutes (10 minutes are considered as preparation and setup).
Every classroom has a minimum 2 mentors.
The classrooms already defined are:
- Gaming with Wikipedia
- Mapathon with Open Street Map
- Gaming with Scratch
- Gaming with Code.org
- Gaming with experiment in physics
- Internet security for young people
Exhibition[edit]
The event will have an exhibition area where the young people can experiment and enjoy with the technology:
- Wikimedia projects
- 3D printers
- Raspberry/Arduino
- Drones
- Robots (Thymio and NAO robots)
- Kiwix
Treasure hunt[edit]
The treasure hunt will be based on Open Street Map where participants can find the places in Esino Lario where we will hide some qrcodes.
Qrcodes will address to wikipedia's articles where students can find the keys.
The session will finish with a final step where students will have to modify some pages to add information that they can find in the local museum of natural science.
The prizes will be gadgets or t-shirts.
Impact[edit]
Target readership[edit]
The event will have impact on Italian Wikipedia, Wikisource and Commons including also Open Street Map.
Fit with strategy[edit]
The event would act on several strategical points:
- Increasing reach: the events would involve several young people but the main action is to experiment workshops of Wikimedia projects together with workshops of coding in order to propose the similar formula also in other events connected with Voxxed. The manifesto of Voxxed says that the coding should increase the creativity, the event would propose Wikimedia projects as a "creative" workshop to mix "hard coding" and "soft coding".
- Increasing participation: the events would involve from 60 to 100 young people. Our expectation is to create young users and to train these users to be not only passive users but also active users in addition the feeling we would transfer is that writing in Wikimedia projects is "cool" like programming robots and games.
Measures of success[edit]
- 60-100 participants (young people)
- 60-100 visitors (in addition to the participants)
- 60-100 new accounts on Wikipedia
Follow-up[edit]
What are the expectations?
There is already a regional program to have recurrent summer schools in Esino Lario after Wikimania to introduce young people to the technology and to the new media. The program will be focused in Wikimedia projects and to coding. This is the first experiment to have a summer school with the help of the experienced group of mentors of Italian Switzerland in order to train local mentors.
In Italian Switzerland there is already a very active group of mentors proposing event for children and young people to introduce them to coding and to the new technologies. There is an on going discussion to integrate the program with some sections focused to Wikimedia projects also in Switzerland. This experiment will help to check if this additional program can bring more interest to the overall program.
In Switzerland and in Italy there are some reforms to the educational program in the schools:
- in Italy it has been introduced in the school the National Plan for Digital School with the new role of "digital trainer" [1]
- in Switzerland it has been introduced in several cantons a Center of Digital Resources [2] focused to train teachers and to provide digital equipments
with this program we would provide an example and a "case of study" to submit within these programs.
Resources and risks[edit]
Resources[edit]
A similar project has been done by Wikimedia Armenia within the PEG (Wikicamp).
The team will include:
- the team of mentors of Lugano, experienced in the organization of similar events for young and for IT people [3], [4].
- the team organizing Wikimania Esino Lario
- the Italian Swiss community of wikipedians
The total amount of organizers is around 20 persons.
Several resources will be provided by the team of Esino Lario, the training material by the team of Lugano.
What we are looking to fund are:
- additional material for training (to donate to the local teams to organize in future similar events)
- accommodation and food
- giveaway material (i.e. t-shirts) and prizes for young people
Risks[edit]
- Security: Young people can be a risk but we assume that everyone must be escorted by a parent and we will have an insurance
- Meteo: Every classroom is in a school. About exhibition we will have a backup program tobe hosted within the local museum
- Withdraw of mentors: the program is huge and offers the possibility to compensate the withdraw of some mentors with an alternative classroom
- Equipment: Every participant should come with his/her own laptop, we will provide some spare equipment (10% of the overall participants) for young people without equipment
Budget[edit]
Please provide a detailed breakdown of project expenses according to the instructions here. See Budget Guidelines.
Grantees are subject to line-item scrutiny of expenses. Changes to the approved budget beyond 10% in any category must be approved in advance.
- Project budget table
| Number | Category | Item description | Unit | Number of units | Cost per unit | Total Cost (ALL) | Total cost (USD) | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Accommodation and food | Accommodation and food for the mentors | cost per person | 10 | 60 EUR | 600 EUR | Costs to cover the accommodation, dinner and breakfast for mentors arriving the day before to setup the classroom and to prepare the material. | |
| 2 | Accommodation and food | Food and beverages | cost per person | 200 | 12.5 EUR | 2'500 EUR | Costs to provide food and beverages for the young participants and their parents. | |
| 3 | Equipment | Equipment (rental or buy) | total | 1 | 2'000 EUR | 2'000 EUR | Equipment for training (provided by sponsorship) | |
| 4 | Prizes and Gifts | Promotional Materials and Gifts | total | 1 | 2'000 EUR | 2'000 EUR | The event has several contests for young people, this material is considered as prizes for these contests with a small gift bag. | |
| 5 | Venue | Hall Rent | total | 1 | 500 EUR | 500 EUR | The cost (flat) covers the electrical power and the cleaning | |
| 6 | Insurance | Insurance | cost per person | 100 | 10 EUR | 1'000 EUR | ||
| 7 | Project management | Project management | Total | 1 | 1'000 EUR | 1'000 EUR | Provided by external sponsorship | |
| 8 | Unforeseen | Unforeseen | 10% | 660 EUR | 660 EUR | Calculated on the basis of the amount to be funded by the grant | ||
| Total Cost | 10'260 EUR |
- Accommodation and food (item #1) is calculated for the organizers arriving the day before to organize the event and the material. It's hard to have a daily journey for some of the organizers, so we organized 10 places for them.
- Snack and food (item #2) is calculated considering the worst scenario, it means a maximum of 100 participants each of them escorted by a parent.
- IT equipment is provided by external sponsorship (here is an estimation)
- Hall rent (item #5) is a flat free to compensate the use of the power and the cleaning and covers the school, the park and the museum.
- Insurance (item #6) is an extension of the insurance defined for Wikimania Esino Lario and calculated on the basis of this rate.
- Project management is kindly provided by external sponsorship (here is an estimation)
- For gifts and prizes we are evaluating the possibility to use the material from [5]
- Total cost of project
- 10'260 EUR
- Total amount requested from the Project and Event Grants program
- 7'260 EUR
- Additional sources of revenue that may fund part of this project, and amounts funded
- Travel = in charge of the attendees
- The community of Esino Lario provides the infrastructure with the equipment, the internet connection and some services.
- The main technical sponsor of Wikimania Esino Lario (NGI) provides the internet connection
- The group of mentors of the Italian Switzerland provides some educational material
Non-financial requirements[edit]
See a description of non-financial assistance available. Please inform the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) of any requests for non-financial assistance now.
- Requests for non-financial assistance, if any
- We have to provide some gadgets as prizes. It would be interesting to check if we can buy or receive material from other chapters or from the shop of Wikimedia Foundations (stencils, pens, notebooks or mugs).
Discussion[edit]
Community notification[edit]
You are responsible for notifying relevant communities of your proposal, so that they can help you! Depending on your project, notification may be most appropriate on a village pump, talk page, mailing list. Please paste a link below to where the relevant communities have been notified of this proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions. Need notification tips?
- The event has been notified to the Italian community of Wikipedia it:Wikipedia:Raduni/Youth_Hackathon_Esino_Lario_22_maggio_2016
- The event has been notified to the community of mentors of the Italian Switzerland in the annual session in presence
- The event has been notified to the community of Esino Lario through their main contacts
- The events has been notified to the schools of the region
Endorsements[edit]
Do you think this project should be selected for a Project and Event Grant? Please add your name and rationale for endorsing this project in the list below. Other feedback, questions or concerns from community members are also highly valued, but please post them on the talk page of this proposal.
- Great idea!! Good luck! 85.47.141.186 13:30, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
- I like this kind of activities. I endorse it! --Yiyi (talk) 09:03, 1 March 2016 (UTC)