Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Introduction of the Wikimedia movement and its projects at Middle East Technical University Northern Cyprus Campus (ID: 22444539)/Final Report
Report Status: Under review
Due date: 2024-08-30T00:00:00Z
Funding program: Rapid Fund
Report type: Final
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[edit]- Applicant username: ToprakM
- Organization name: N/A
- Amount awarded: 2710.31
- Amount spent: 2371.55 USD, 78174.54
Part 1: Project and impact
[edit]1. Describe the implemented activities and results achieved. Additionally, share which approaches were most effective in supporting you to achieve the results. (required)
We did all of our activities as an extracurricular student society with the name of Wikipedia Society, a student club we established in the fall of 2023 at Middle East Technical University Northern Cyprus Campus. All of the activities were held in the Spring semester of the 2023-2024 academic year.
In chronological order:
We set up an introduction stand in the first week of the semester with other societies. The stands are for explaining to other students what society is about and trying to encourage them to participate in our further activities. We talked about Wikipedia, its purpose, the purpose of our society, and what the planned events are. Took a member list of those who would interest in those events.
In general, all active student societies hold an introductory meeting to give a detailed brief of the societies. About a week later of the stand, we held an introductory meeting. We introduced our team, explained our motivation and goal, which is mainly increasing the number of Wikimedia project volunteers in Cyprus, and talked about the situation in other university Wiki student clubs, of which there were two others at that time. Then, we briefly discussed what Wikipedia is, who writes it, how it works, what open data is, and why it is essential. We also discussed the Wikimedia movement and the sister projects and showed some articles we wrote earlier as examples. Lastly, we talked about our planned events for the semester, which was the main goal of the meeting: motivating people to come to our events. We introduced our social media accounts and received questions. We received some interesting questions, including about the former ban on Wikipedia in Turkey. We believe that we achieved our goal of briefing the purpose of our future planned activities.
About two weeks later, we held a meeting we called Wikipedia 101. We got the idea for the name from the "Wikipedia 101 Education Set for Beginners" project of WMTR. Our aim for this meeting was to give a complete explanation of what Wikipedia is with its general aspects. We briefly talked again about Wikipedia, its sister projects, etc., for those who did not participate in the introductory meeting. Then we talked about some aspects of Wikipedia. Such as how it relates to community collaboration and what it is. We gave an example of group work with a real Wikipedia article history: one writes a whole page, one writes to create new images, and one fixes simple mistakes... Then, we discussed the five pillars of Wikipedia, what they are, and why they are essential. We discussed what an encyclopedia is, how to write with a neutral point of view, what is an open license, and how editors discuss. After a detailed explanation of Wikipedia, we played a minigame, "What Wikipedia is and is not," and asked each other questions from our pre-prepared papers, such as whether Wikipedia is or is not "verifiable", and then discussed them. Then, we discussed why being bold is essential. Finally, I demonstrated how to create an article from the beginning and wrote a pre-determined article with some Internet citations. Then we helped those who needed help to make an edit, those who brought a laptop or phone and were trying to edit something.
Although our university does not provide a room for most societies. After some efforts, we achieved to have one, shared with another student society. By so, after the Wikipedia 101 event and until the beginning of final exams at the end of the semester, we tried to have at least one of our team members in the room at determined times once a week. And so, we encouraged everyone interested and seeking help to visit our society room. After the first exams started, we could not continue it very often because everyone was busy. However, we achieved to help newbies who visited our room person by person. It can be noted that the most common "problem" was revert edits by experienced users.
A few weeks after the Wikipedia 101 event, we hosted two other Wiki student club presidents visiting our campus from Turkey, Üsküdar University and Istanbul Bilgi University. Together, we discussed the Wiki Student Clubs project, with which all of us established a student club with that project, what can be done to improve collaboration between Wiki student clubs in different universities, and how we can encourage people from other universities to establish a Wiki student club. We have put into practice much of what we talked about.
The following day, we held a meeting we named "Introduction to Wikimedia Commons". We planned this meeting as an education for our photowalk. At the meeting, first of all, our guests from Turkey introduced themselves and explained what they do in their universities as student clubs, what their situation is right now, and what their aim is. We also discussed what can be done to improve collaboration between wiki student clubs altogether with participants this time. Secondly, we began to explain Wikimedia Commons. What is it, why do we collect free files, and why do we improve it? Then we discussed what copyright, copy-left, attribution, and share-alike terms are, which licenses can be used for Wikimedia Commons, and why they are needed. We demonstrated some image uploads, how to name a file, how to describe it, and what categories are. Finally, we helped some participants upload some photos from their phones. We also encouraged participants to upload images of their visits to different places.
The following day, we held our very first photowalk in Famagusta. Our guests from Turkey have joined us. Due to the limited number of seats available on the bus, we only invited interested people who had participated in our previous events. After a two-hour bus ride, we visited Varosha, Fagamusta, an abandoned city, for a few hours and took photos in groups of 5 to 7. After lunch, we went to the walled city of Famagusta and took pictures of the beauties of the city. At the end of the day, we took lots of photos, and it was effective in terms of the members getting to know each other.
A few weeks later, the social affairs department of our university asked the societies to arrange some events for the university's spring fest. We decided to participate in order to increase our awareness of our activities. This event, unlike the others, is not predetermined. Therefore, we have discussed and decided to make a quiz-type game. We prepared some easy to difficult questions from Wikipedia and set a stand at the fest area. We asked these questions to those who wanted to participate and gave some simple awards such as snacks or a society pen. We explained what this society is for to those who are interested.
At the last week before the final exams of the semester, we held an online meeting about OpenStreetMap with our guest speaker from TomTom. We talked about what OpenStreetMap is in detail, how it works, how to contribute to it, what tools to contribute, what its area of use is, and how it is related to Wikimedia projects with its usage and free-to-use aspect. And we talked about some case studies.
2. 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
Meta wiki page of the METU Northern Cyprus Campus Wikipedia Society
Our Wikimedia Commons category, which includes all of the posters and slides we used and photos of our events
Our social media accounts where we announced and posted some photos of our events:
- https://www.instagram.com/metunccwiki/
- https://www.linkedin.com/company/metuwiki/
- https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61552196586155
Diff post about the photowalk:
- English original: https://diff.wikimedia.org/2024/05/13/a-photowalk-with-the-wikipedia-student-club-through-an-abandoned-city-frozen-in-time/
- Turkish translate: https://diff.wikimedia.org/tr/2024/05/13/zamanin-dondugu-terk-edilmis-sehirde-vikipedi-ogrenci-kulubu-ile-photowalk/
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
See our Wikimedia Commons category for all slides and posters we used
What was we planned
3. To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the work carried out with this Rapid Fund? 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 | Agree |
B. Create a more inclusive and connected culture in our community | Agree |
C. Develop content about underrepresented topics/groups | Neither agree nor disagree |
D. Develop content from underrepresented perspectives | Agree |
E. Encourage the retention of editors | Not applicable to your fund |
F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Not applicable to your fund |
G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | Strongly agree |
F. Other (optional) |
Part 2: Learning
[edit]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: What strategies can be employed to incentivize interested people to increase their level of engagement and contribution? In what ways did our approach prove efficacious in promoting the value of open knowledge to our audience? Besides, what aspects of our plan failed to achieve the expected results? Have we provided clear and complete guidance to potential contributors on how they can actively contribute and improve their skills? What was the gender distribution of our events? The gender distribution of students at the campus is about 65% male and 35% female. Is it similar for the participants?
What strategies can be employed to incentivize interested people to increase their level of engagement and contribution?
- We provided regular meetings with our capacity, as well as trainings to help interested students improve their skills and understanding of Wikimedia projects. It is possible to say holding regular meetings and events keeps members engaged and connected. We regularly asked for suggestions from participants to improve the society's activities and better meet their needs.
In what ways did our approach prove efficacious in promoting the value of open knowledge to our audience?
- The events provided an engaging way to introduce Wikipedia and the Wikimedia movement. They offer personal interaction, allowing attendees to ask questions and receive immediate answers. It is possible to say that even though some participants are not interested in joining us in editing Wikipedia further, they are fully aware of the value of open knowledge.
Besides, what aspects of our plan failed to achieve the expected results?
- We could not achieve the number of participants we expected. Although we announced and invited our activities in all possible ways, including social media posts, emails, and posters, we are below the in according to the target number of participants.
- Also, we could not organize the regular editathons we planned. It is purely because we did not have time for this due to our university workload.
Have we provided clear and complete guidance to potential contributors on how they can actively contribute and improve their skills?
- We tried to be sure that after the semester had ended, the participants would be able to move further themselves. For that reason, we exclusively explained how the community communicates, how to use the talk pages, and where to ask generic questions.
What was the gender distribution of our events? The gender distribution of students at the campus is about 65% male and 35% female. Is it similar for the participants?
- %66.3 male and %33.7 female. Pretty close to the gender distribution at the campus.
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)
We were planning a seminar with a Greek Cypriot Wikimedian at our university. The aim of the seminar was to promote collaboration among volunteers from both sides of the divided island in contributing to wiki projects together. We had made almost all the plans, including determining the date and the place. However, about two weeks prior to the event planned, the university declined our event form. We were unaware of the declinability of event forms: we did not know there was an approval process. We had to cancel the event, and our plans were interrupted.
It is not clear the reason for the declination. We were only informed that it was a decision made by higher. Now, think back; we could have planned outside of university if we thought that problem might occur.
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)
I wrote a Diff article about our photowalk to explain our journey. We discuss what we did in the last two weeks at biweekly online meetings as WMTR and get some comments. At Wikimania, Caner explained what Wiki clubs do, and I personally had some conversations with some other young Wikimedians about the project. I also plan to share this report with the community.
Part 3: Metrics
[edit]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 | 100 | 65 | We took a list of participants. |
Number of editors | 40 | 25 | Although we did not collect data on their further contributions, we are sure at least 25 participants have contributed to Wikimedia projects. |
Number of organizers | 9 | 8 | We were not able to host a planned speaker. See Q5 for the details. |
Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
---|---|---|---|
Wikipedia | 180 | 10 | 100 |
Wikimedia Commons | 200 | 100 | 0 |
Wikidata | 500 | 50 | 100 |
Wiktionary | |||
Wikisource | |||
Wikimedia Incubator | |||
Translatewiki | |||
MediaWiki | |||
Wikiquote | |||
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 |
---|---|---|---|---|
Time spent the team members as volunteers | We will count the time each team member spent during the activities, including preparing and researching. (in hours) | 60 | ||
9. Did you have any difficulties collecting data to measure your results? (required)
No
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)
Part 4: Financial reporting
[edit]10. Please state the total amount spent in your local currency. (required)
78174.54
11. Please state the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
2371.55
12. Report the funds spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
Provide the link to the financial report https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1d05PwM6AtUPv3vlZjZgpyz1l8yOPraQmPkH708Z_xdE?gid=928458698
12.2. If you have not already done so in your financial spending report, please provide information on changes in the budget in relation to your original proposal. (optional)
13. Do you have any unspent funds from the Fund?
Yes
13.1. Please list the amount and currency you did not use and explain why.
In total, we spent 78,174.54 of 130,500 TRY.
The unspent fund:
- 9686.58 TRY was for the planned seminar with a Greek Cypriot Wikimedian, which we had to cancel due to a university decision.
- 19,589.41 TRY was for snacks for the editathons we planned, which we couldn't do due to our lack of availability.
- 3065.50 TRY was for accommodation for our guests from Turkey. It was not needed since our university provided reduced accommodation.
- 9128.95 TRY was mainly for lunches for the editathons we planned, which we couldn't do due to our lack of availability.
In general, it is possible to say we did not use the unspent fund since we could not complete all the activities we planned at the beginning. Even though we did complete it, we would not have spent a considerable amount of the funds. It can be attributed to the price uncertainty in Turkey, and frankly, it is possible to say that it is due to our inexperience.
13.2. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
D. I have already sent them back to the WMF
13.3. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
N/A
14.1. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement?
Yes Your response to the review feedback. 14.2. Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement?
Yes
14.3. 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
15. If you have additional recommendations or reflections that don’t fit into the above sections, please write them here. (optional)
Review notes
[edit]Review notes from Program Officer:
N/A
Applicant's response to the review feedback.
N/A