Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/General Support Fund/Wikimedians of the Levant General Fund 2025/Final Report
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Part 1: Understanding your work
[edit]Per the recent update on the Wikimedia Foundation Affiliates Strategy process, Wikimedia Affiliates that are General Support Fund grantees will fulfill their affiliate reporting requirements through their final or yearly grantee report.
If you are a Wikimedia Affiliate, you will use this form for your affiliate reporting and to address the affiliate health criteria. You do not need to submit a separate report to AffCom. Follow the guidance in the green boxes to report on how you met the corresponding affiliate health criteria.
If you are not a Wikimedia Affiliate, aligning your responses with the affiliate criteria is optional and not required.
1. Please share to what extent your programs, approaches, and strategies contributed to addressing the challenges you shared in your proposal. If they did not contribute as you believed they would, please share what obstacles you faced and what, if anything, you learned from them? (required)
For affiliates, use this space (Question 1.) to address Affiliate Health Criterion 1.1 (Goal delivery). Describe how you actively delivered on mission goals, e.g. content creation.
During 2025, Wikimedians of the Levant encountered significant challenges, particularly following the decline of our General Support Fund request. Despite these constraints, our programs and strategies continued to advance several of the objectives outlined in our proposal.
Educational Program
We successfully implemented the third iteration of Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom in partnership with the Jordanian Ministry of Education. This initiative strengthened awareness of Wikipedia as an educational resource and expanded engagement among high school and university students, encouraging deeper participation in the Wikimedia ecosystem.
Contests, Edit-a-thons, and Trainings
In 2025, the user group participated in the Wiki Loves Folklore contest, focusing on documenting the cultural heritage of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan. This effort not only enriched Wikimedia Commons but also attracted new contributors to the movement.
Addressing the gender gap has been a core priority since the founding of the user group. In 2025, we organized a Wikidata contest dedicated to Levantine women, raising visibility and improving representation. Additionally, our collaboration with the She Said campaign helped promote Wikiquote and encouraged new editors to contribute to this often-overlooked project.
Microgranting Program
The microgranting program provided essential flexibility, enabling us to support emerging contributors and explore new project areas. Notably, it facilitated the final 2025 Wikiquote contest focused on Levantine women, further strengthening our gender-equity efforts.
Capacity Building and Partnerships
Throughout the year, we invested in the development of our members’ skills and expanded our network of partnerships. Collaborations with other user groups, the Jordanian Ministry of Education, and the Syrian nonprofit Juzoor Al-Salam contributed to broader community engagement and knowledge-sharing.
Challenges and Lessons Learned
The year also presented several substantial obstacles:
- Financial limitations resulting from the non-approval of our 2025 grant request.
- Insufficient active membership, which affected our ability to recruit and support new organizers.
- A decline in sustained volunteer engagement, limiting the user group’s operational capacity.
- Operating entirely online for a decade, which hindered community cohesion and made it difficult to attract and retain contributors without in-person user group conferences.
These challenges highlighted the need for stronger internal capacity, diversified funding strategies, and renewed efforts to rebuild community connections—both online and, when possible, through future in-person activities.
2. Is there a plan to build on the key successes you had? If yes, please describe the plan and if no, please share the limitations to do so. For instance, did the activities lead to any new priorities, ideas for activities, or goals for the future? (required)
Yes, we have clear plans to build on the key successes of 2025, with a focus on institutional partnerships, regional inclusion, and community development.
In 2025, we initiated a promising collaboration with the Jordanian Ministry of Education. Building on this momentum, we aim in 2026 to formalize Wikipedia contributions as recognized voluntary service hours for students. This would significantly increase youth engagement and integrate Wikimedia into formal education frameworks.
We also identified the need to strengthen our presence in underrepresented areas—particularly Lebanon. To address this, we plan to restructure the user group and expand our team to include dedicated coordinators who can lead outreach and programmatic efforts in Lebanon.
Looking ahead, we are committed to launching more advanced programs, including Training-of-Trainers (ToT) initiatives, to empower local leaders and ensure knowledge sustainability. These efforts are designed to cultivate a more active, skilled, and resilient community across the Levant.
Key learnings from 2025 include the importance of institutional partnerships for long-term impact, the need for equitable regional representation, and the value of investing in leadership development. These insights are shaping our 2026 priorities and reinforcing our commitment to inclusive, community-driven growth.
3. Please provide a link to reports that detail the activities that took place in the last year. This can include an annual report, Meta pages, and websites. If there are no links available, briefly describe the implemented activities and programs below or upload any files. (required)
For affiliates, use this space (Question 3.) to address Affiliate Health Criteria 2.1 (Affiliate health & resilience), 4.1 (Internal engagement), 4.2 (Community connection), and 4.3 (Partnerships and collaboration):
- Describe your activities engaging new users, new members for your decision-making body(ies), and developing leaders and organizers (2.1).
- Describe your activities creating or hosting spaces to encourage greater collaboration and engagement among your members (4.1).
- Describe how you engage with the contributing community that you serve and/or support (4.2).
- Describe your partnerships with other affiliates or with non-Wikimedia entities (4.3).
Link: [1]
4. Are you interested in sharing what you achieved or learned this year with the wider community through different peer learning programs (e.g. Let's Connect program, Diff)? (optional)
Yes, We will have Diff post, we will update here ASAP
5. Did you collect feedback from your community or target groups on how the activities implemented impacted them? If yes, please attach/provide information on the results (e.g. community surveys, stories, impact booklets/reports, interviews with partner institutions, etc). Did you collect other impact-specific data? (required)
For affiliates, the response to Question 5. also partially addresses Affiliate Health Criteria 4.1 (Internal Engagement), 4.2 (Community Connection), or 4.3 (Partnerships & collaboration), where applicable.
yes, you can reach them from our annual report on Meta
6. During the fund period, did your efforts do any of the following? (required):
For affiliates, the response to Question 6. also partially addresses Affiliate Health Criterion 2.2 (Diversity balance).
- 6.1 Bring in participants from the following groups: women, young people, underrepresented geographical regions (ESEAP, LATAM, SSA, MENA, SA)
- 6.2 Develop content about the following underrepresented topics or groups of people: women, underrepresented geographical regions (ESEAP, LATAM, SSA, MENA, SA)
- 6.3 Support the retention of: Editors, Organizers, Partnerships
7. What, if any, effective tactics or approaches can you share that worked well when dealing with the programs under points 6.1-6.3 that you selected? (optional)
Highlighting about women in less editing projects like wikiqoutes.
8. If you developed partnerships, which of the following factors most helped you to build partnerships? Please pick a MAXIMUM of the three most relevant factors (optional):
Permanent staff outreach, Board members’ outreach, Institutional support from the Wikimedia Foundation, Volunteers from our communities
Part 2: Metrics
[edit]| Metrics name | Target | Result | Comments and tools used |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of all participants | 200 | 60 | |
| Number of all editors | 100 | 30 | |
| Number of new editors | N/A | ||
| Number of retained editors | N/A | ||
| Number of all organizers | 5 | 7 | |
| Number of new organizers | N/A | 2 |
| Wikimedia project | Target - Number of created pages | Target - Number of improved pages | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | 500 | 2000 | 60 | |
| Wikimedia Commons | 200 | 1000 | 300 | |
| Wikidata | 1500 | 2000 | 400 | |
| Wiktionary | ||||
| Wikisource | ||||
| Wikimedia Incubator | ||||
| Translatewiki | ||||
| MediaWiki | ||||
| Wikiquote | 373 | |||
| Wikivoyage | ||||
| Wikibooks | ||||
| Wikiversity | ||||
| Wikinews | ||||
| Wikispecies | ||||
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
Tool used and comments (optional):
Dashboard
11. Did you set other quantitative and qualitative targets for your project (other metrics)? (required): No
11.1. Other Metrics.
In your application, you outlined some other open metrics that you would like to measure. Please fill out the achieved results for each of the open metrics you defined.
| Other Metrics name | Metrics Description | Target | Result | Tools and comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Part 3: Skill Development / Capacity Building
[edit]12. Reflecting on your programmatic (external) and organizational (internal) work, did your grant support you to undergo any skill development that made a difference to your success? If yes, what skill was developed, and how did it lead to success? (e.g. received coaching on public speaking, attended training on nonviolent communication, hosted professional development conversations on leadership, learned and used a new tool for project management, etc.)? Can you share any materials? (required)
For affiliates, use this space (Question 12.) to address Affiliate Health Criteria 2.2 (Diversity balance) and 3.1 (Diverse, Skilled, and Accountable Leadership):
- Describe actions taken to prioritize gender balance in affiliate leadership, as well as any areas of diversity relevant to your affiliate's context (2.2).
- Describe the management, financial, or other leadership skills of your affiliate leaders. If you have a succession plan, please include it here (3.1).
- Describe any training or skill development (as outlined in the question above) (3.1).
- Incorporate into the annual report a disclosure of conflict of interests (if any) from the leadership (3.1).
Yes, the grant-supported activities in 2025 contributed to meaningful skill development that shaped our success.
Externally, engaging with the Jordanian Ministry of Education strengthened our capacity for institutional outreach and strategic communication. Internally, operating with limited resources pushed us to become more agile, prioritize effectively, and explore new models like microgranting and cross-group collaboration. These experiences also highlighted the need for decentralized leadership, leading us to plan Training-of-Trainers (ToT) programs for 2026.
Overall, we gained sharper organizational focus, stronger advocacy skills, and a clearer roadmap for sustainable growth.
13. What is one capacity/skill area that you would like to focus on for the next year? And how do you plan to achieve this capacity? (required)
In 2026, we aim to strengthen three key areas: mentorship, technical capacity, and internal governance.
We will expand our mentorship model by pairing experienced contributors with active newcomers from 2025, focusing on skill development, policy literacy, and sustained engagement. To support innovation, we plan to introduce training on advanced technical tools, including the role of AI in the future of Wikimedia editing.
Additionally, we recognize the need to rebuild our internal structure. We plan to recruit new staff and revise our governance model to ensure more inclusive representation—particularly from underrepresented regions like Lebanon—and to support long-term organizational resilience.
14. If you have additional information or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here. Use the space below to upload any additional documents that would be useful to understand your report.
For affiliates, also use this section (Question 14) to fulfill the Affiliate Health Criteria requirements.
- Describe and link to any public-facing documentation for affiliate governance, including affiliate leadership and membership with a breakdown of the demographics; how elections are conducted; how conflicts of interest are declared; and how decisions are made and communicated (2.2, 2.3, 3.1).
- Describe and link to any public-facing documentation for activities incorporating, promoting awareness about, or enforcing the Universal Code of Conduct in your affiliate's activities (3.3).
- Describe and link to any public-facing documentation for internal membership engagement, such as notes from your regular meetings and how you communicate to or involve your membership (4.1).
Part 4: Financial reporting
[edit]For affiliates, also use this section (Part 4: Financial reporting) to address Affiliate Health Criterion 3.2 (Financial & Legal Compliance).
| Description | Planned / received budget for this category (USD) | Amount spent (USD) |
|---|---|---|
| Personnel costs | 21300 | 9022 |
| Operational costs | 5880 | 1900 |
| Programmatic costs | 26500 | 8548.27 |
| Total General Support Fund | 19580 | 19470.27 |
| Other revenue | ||
| Remaining funds from General Support Fund | 109 |
15. Please state the total amount spent from this fund in your local currency. (required)
19470.27 USD
16. Please provide an overview of the amount spent from this fund in the following budget categories in your local currency. (required)
- Operational costs: 1900 USD
- Programmatic costs: 8548.27 USD
- Staff and contractor costs: 9022 USD
17. Did you have any other revenue sources (e.g. other funding, membership contributions, donations)? (required): No
- 17.1. Provide the total amount received from other revenue sources in your local currency. (required): USD
- 17.2. Provide the total amount spent from other revenue sources in your local currency. (required): USD
18. Provide a financial report document which will provide the details of funds received and spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
- Upload Documents, Templates, and Files.
- Report funds received and spent, if template not used.
18.2. 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)
N/A
19. Do you have any unspent funds from this funding?: Yes
- 19.1. Please list the amount of unspent funds in your local currency. (required)
- 109
- 19.2. Explain why you did not use the amount. (required)
- Overhead amount
- 19.3. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
- A. Propose to use the underspent funds within this Fund period with PO approval
- 19.4. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
- added to 2026 general fund
20. Final confirmations (required)
- 20.1. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement? You must be in compliance with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Funds as outlined in the grant agreement. In summary, this is to confirm that the funds were used in alignment with the Wikimedia Foundation mission and for charitable/nonprofit/educational purposes.
- Yes
- 20.2. Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement?
- Yes
- 20.3. Are you in compliance with provisions of the United States Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), and with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Funds as outlined in the grant agreement? In summary, this is to confirm that the funds were used in alignment with the WMF mission and for charitable/nonprofit/educational purposes.
- Yes
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