Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom in Yemen - Phase Two (ID: 22747505)/Final Report
Report Status: Under review
Due date: 30 March 2025
Funding program: Rapid Fund
Report type: Final
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[edit]- Applicant username: رشاد
- Organization name: N/A
- Amount awarded: 4979
- Amount spent: 4753.03 USD, 2542871.05
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)
The "Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom - Yemen" program implemented a range of activities designed to equip teachers with the knowledge and skills to effectively utilize Wikipedia in their classrooms. The core of the program consisted of three training sessions held over three weeks. These sessions were structured to deliver content in an engaging and accessible manner, catering to the diverse learning styles of the participants. The program was organized in collaboration with the Wikimedians of Yemen User Group and the Google Developers Group in Sana'a (GDG Sana’a).
Activities Implemented:
- Interactive Training Sessions: Each session incorporated a variety of teaching methods, including lectures using the program handbook, informative presentations, and illustrative videos. To foster active learning and deeper understanding, trainees were encouraged to participate actively through questioning, sharing their perspectives, and engaging in group discussions.
- Hands-on Activities: The program prioritized practical application. Trainees participated in hands-on exercises designed to familiarize them with Wikipedia's interface, editing tools, and community guidelines. These exercises allowed them to practice creating accounts, navigating articles, evaluating sources, and making basic edits.
- Online Support and Communication: Utilizing Google Classroom and WhatsApp groups, the program fostered a collaborative learning environment where trainees could connect with trainers and peers, ask questions, share resources, and receive ongoing support throughout the program.
- Results Achieved:
The program achieved significant results in several key areas:
- Increased Participation: A total of 30 individuals committed to participating in the training program.
- Teacher Graduation: 22 teachers and individuals interested in Wikipedia successfully completed the training, gaining valuable skills in using and editing Wikipedia effectively.
- Significant Editing Activity: Participants collectively contributed around 1600 edits to Wikipedia during the program, demonstrating their active engagement and newly acquired editing skills.
- Positive Changes in Knowledge and Attitudes: Pre- and post-training surveys indicate positive changes in participants' knowledge, skills, and attitudes toward Wikipedia, which suggests the program is succeeding and achieving its objectives.
- Effective Approaches:
Several approaches proved particularly effective in supporting the achievement of these results:
- Blended Learning Modality: Combining in-person training sessions with online support created a flexible and accessible learning environment that accommodated the unique challenges faced by teachers in Yemen.
- Interactive and Engaging Training Methods: The use of interactive lectures, group discussions, and hands-on exercises kept participants engaged and facilitated deeper learning.
- Collaborative Learning Environment: Creating a supportive online community through Google Classroom and WhatsApp allowed participants to connect with each other, share resources, and receive ongoing support.
- Localization of Materials: Tailoring the training content and materials to the local context and language needs of Yemeni participants was crucial for ensuring their relevance and accessibility.
Co-trainers: Experts who assisted the certified trainer in the training process provided clear insights into Wikipedia and its workings, and presented real-life examples from the encyclopedia in practical application.
By combining these effective approaches, the "Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom - Yemen" program was able to successfully empower teachers to use Wikipedia as a valuable tool for promoting student engagement, critical thinking, and access to information in their classrooms.
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
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Reading_Wikipedia_in_the_Classroom_in_Yemen_2025
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1MWNCjQf7k/
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
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 | Strongly agree |
| F. Encourage the retention of organizers | Agree |
| G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | 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: How many undergraduate students majoring in education will be interested in this program? What is the participation rate in the program? Is this target group better than the category of teachers who were targeted in the first stage? What percentage of those wishing to participate in this program are non-educational professionals? How many will be interested in joining our new core community after completing this program? What percentage of Yemeni content was created or improved in the targeted Wikimedia projects? Which kind of Wikimedia project did they get involved more? Are they interested in participating in other activities related to the targeted Wikimedia projects?
The following reflects what we learned from our initial learning questions during the implementation of the "Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom - Yemen" program:
- How many undergraduate students majoring in education will be interested in this program?
We found that there was no interest from undergraduate students majoring in education. Despite actively promoting the program on social media with funded advertising, we received no participation from this demographic. This result suggests a potential lack of awareness among education students regarding the importance and relevance of such programs to their future careers.
- What is the participation rate in the program?
The participation rate in the program was heavily skewed towards female participants, with 70% female and 30% male representation. This gender disparity could indicate a greater interest in professional development opportunities among female educators in the Yemeni context.
- Is this target group better than the category of teachers who were targeted in the first stage?
Yes, this target group proved to be more effective than the teachers targeted in the first stage. The majority of participants were actively working teachers, whereas the initial cohort included a significant proportion of volunteer teachers. This suggests that focusing on actively employed educators leads to greater engagement and impact within the educational system.
- What percentage of those wishing to participate in this program are non-educational professionals?
Out of the 22 participants who graduated, 5 participants were non-educational professionals. Those non-education professionals accounted for 22.7% of the participants in the program.
- How many will be interested in joining our new core community after completing this program?
Only four participants expressed interest in joining our new core community after completing the program. This indicates that while the training effectively equipped teachers with Wikipedia skills, further effort is needed to cultivate a sense of community and encourage ongoing contributions to Wikimedia projects.
- What percentage of Yemeni content was created or improved in the targeted Wikimedia projects?
While the intention was to encourage participants to focus on enriching Yemeni content, the participants preferred to have open participation based on individual interests. Therefore, there wasn't a concentrated effort on specifically Yemeni content creation or improvement.
- Which kind of Wikimedia project did they get involved more?
The primary focus was on the Arabic Wikipedia, and it was the most active project. The second intended target was Wikimedia Commons; we were unable to introduce participants to it due to the website being blocked by the internet provider in Yemen.
- Are they interested in participating in other activities related to the targeted Wikimedia projects?
The results were varied. Some participants preferred translation using the translation tool, while others found direct translation easier. Others preferred correcting spelling errors and enriching weak content. Some participants even requested to learn advanced skills such as editing and adding templates to wiki pages. This is a positive indication, as it demonstrates a diverse range of interests and skill levels among the participants, signifying the program's ability to cater to different learning styles and foster a desire for continuous improvement.
How we hope to use these learnings in the future:
- Targeted Outreach to Education Students: We need to develop strategies to specifically raise awareness among undergraduate education students about the value of participating in programs like this, emphasizing the skills and resources they can gain to enhance their teaching careers.
- Addressing Gender Disparity: Investigate the reasons behind the higher female participation rate and ensure that the program is inclusive and accessible to all genders.
- Community Building: Implement strategies to foster a stronger sense of community among participants, such as mentorship programs, collaborative projects, and ongoing support networks, to encourage long-term engagement with Wikimedia projects.
- Championing Yemeni Content: While open participation based on individual interests is important, future programs can explore ways to subtly encourage the creation and improvement of Yemeni content, perhaps through targeted challenges or incentives.
- Circumventing Technological Barriers: We need to learn how to circumvent technological barriers that could prevent trainees from learning vital information from external websites.
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)
One minor surprise we encountered was the discovery that Wikimedia Commons is blocked by the primary internet service provider in Yemen. While we had planned to introduce it as a supplementary platform for image uploading and media management, its inaccessibility did not significantly impact the core objectives or overall success of the "Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom" program. The primary focus remained on enhancing teachers' skills in using and editing Wikipedia itself, and this was successfully achieved through the training sessions and hands-on activities. The experience reinforced the importance of being adaptable and resourceful in challenging environments, and it highlighted the need to prioritize core program components while being prepared to adjust supplementary elements as needed. We learned to focus on what we could effectively deliver, ensuring the program's primary goals were met despite unforeseen external limitations.
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)
• Arabic Wikipedia Page: Recognizing the importance of reaching the Arabic-speaking community, we have created a dedicated page on the Arabic Wikipedia to share the program's details and outcomes. This ensures that our learnings are accessible to educators and Wikimedia enthusiasts in the Arab world.
- Diff Blog Post & Education News: To disseminate our key learnings and results in a more accessible and engaging format, we have prepared an article summarizing our experiences, which has been published on Diff, the Wikimedia Foundation's blog, and Education News. This article highlights the program's successes, and key takeaways, providing valuable insights for other community members.
- Community Sharing: We have shared the Diff article and links to the Wikimedia Commons and Arabic Wikipedia pages with relevant communities within the Wikimedia movement, particularly those focused on education, Arabic language initiatives, and projects in challenging environments. This has involved sharing on mailing lists and social media.
- Wikimedia Commons Content Upload: To ensure that our training materials are openly accessible and reusable by others, we have uploaded the program's training content to Wikimedia Commons under a Creative Commons license.
- Future Presentations and Workshops: We plan to present our project at relevant Wikimedia conferences, events, and online workshops to share our experiences and engage in discussions with other community members.
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 | 30 | 30 | |
| Number of editors | 25 | 22 | |
| Number of organizers | 7 | 5 |
| Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | 1000 | 31 | 1549 |
| Wikimedia Commons | 50 | 0 | 0 |
| Wikidata | |||
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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)
2542871.05
11. Please state the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
4753.03
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/1LMmebyy9SQgfw-AjuRZqDQZUbEbrSehCWyCaONn17cE/edit?usp=sharing
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.
$225.97
13.2. What are you planning to do with the underspent funds?
B. Propose to use them to partially or fully fund a new/future request with PO approval
13.3. Please provide details of hope to spend these funds.
Expenses for activities related to Wikimedia activities such as Editing Workshops.
14.1. Are you in compliance with the terms outlined in the fund agreement?
Yes
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