Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/When Women Train Women, More Women Lead on Wikimedia (ID: 23472249)/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)
In this project, we carried out several activities to empower women in Daura to join and contribute to Wikimedia projects. We started by reaching out to women groups, students, and teachers in the area to invite them to our training. After that, we organized a workshop where we introduced participants to Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikidata. During the training, we taught them how to create and improve articles, upload photos, and add information about women and their achievements. Many of the participants were new to Wikimedia, but they were very excited to learn and quickly understood the process with the help of our team. After the workshop, we created a WhatsApp group to keep in touch, guide them, and answer their questions as they continued editing. As a result, we got a good number of women who became active editors. They created and improved articles about women from Daura and other parts of Nigeria, and also uploaded photos to Commons. The project helped many women to find their voices and understand that they can share knowledge online. The approach that worked best was face-to-face training combined with personal guidance. The practical editing sessions and the follow-up group helped the participants gain confidence and continue contributing even after the event.
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
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 | Strongly 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 | Strongly agree |
| G. Increased participants' feelings of belonging and connection to the movement | 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: Through this project, we aim to learn how a women-to-women training and mentorship model can impact the participation, retention, and leadership of women in Wikimedia projects. Our learning will help us and others understand the most effective ways to empower women within our community to contribute to open knowledge.
Learning Questions
- How effective is a women-led training and mentorship approach in increasing the participation of women on Wikimedia projects?
- What are the main challenges that women face in continuing to edit after receiving initial training, and how can these be addressed?
- Does offering a combination of physical and virtual follow-up training help improve retention and engagement of women participants?
- What types of content (e.g., Wikipedia articles, Wikiquote entries, Wikidata items) are women most interested in contributing to when supported through peer mentorship?
- How can we improve the creation of a supportive community space that encourages women not only to edit but also to take on leadership roles within Wikimedia projects?
The data we collect from participants feedback, editing metrics, and follow-up engagement will help answer these questions. This learning will inform not only our future projects but may also serve as a model for other Wikimedia communities working to close the gender gap.
From our learning questions, we discovered many useful things during the Daura WomenWiki Initiative. Our main aim was to see how a women-to-women training and mentorship model can help increase participation, retention, and leadership of women in Wikimedia projects. We learned that a women-led approach really works well. When women are trained and mentored by other women, they feel more comfortable to ask questions, share ideas, and continue editing after the project. This friendly and supportive environment helped many participants build confidence and believe that they can also become trainers in the future. We also found that one of the main challenges women face after the first training is lack of time and limited internet access. Some participants wanted to continue editing but struggled with network or device issues. To solve this, we learned that combining physical training with simple online follow-up sessions helps keep them engaged and active. We noticed that most of the women were more interested in writing about topics that relate to women’s achievements, education, and culture. This shows that when women are given the chance, they help fill the content gap about other women. Finally, we learned that creating a small but strong community space — like our WhatsApp group — is very important. It gives members a place to share progress, ask for help, and get motivation to keep contributing. In the future, we plan to use these learnings to improve our training and mentorship methods, continue empowering women editors, and support them to take leadership roles in Wikimedia activities both locally and nationally.
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)
Yes, a few unexpected things happened during the project. One positive surprise was that more women joined the training than we expected, and many of them were very eager to learn. Some even brought their friends along, which made the event more lively and interesting.
On the other hand, we faced some small challenges too. The internet connection was not very strong in Daura, and that made uploading and editing a bit slow during the workshop. Also, some participants were using phones instead of laptops, so it took extra time to guide them step by step.
From these experiences, we learned that it is good to always prepare for internet issues by having offline learning materials and extra time for practical sessions. We also learned that women are really interested in contributing to Wikimedia when they are given the right support and encouragement.
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 plan to share our project learnings and results with other community members through our Wikimedia groups and social media platforms. We will post updates, photos, and stories from the Daura WomenWiki Initiative on Facebook, WhatsApp, and Telegram where other Wikimedians can see what we achieved.
We also plan to talk about the project during our next community meet-up, so that others can learn from our experience and apply the same ideas in their own local communities. In addition, we will encourage some of the women who joined the project to share their experiences and edits during future Wikimedia events or online discussions.
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 | 40 | 45 | |
| Number of editors | 40 | 39 | |
| Number of organizers | 6 | 6 |
| Wikimedia project | Target | Result - Number of created pages | Result - Number of improved pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | 1000 | 476 | 2225 |
| Wikimedia Commons | 50 | 223 | 523 |
| Wikidata | 50 | 6 | 572 |
| Wiktionary | |||
| Wikisource | |||
| Wikimedia Incubator | |||
| Translatewiki | |||
| MediaWiki | |||
| Wikiquote | 30 | ||
| 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)
11. Please state the total amount spent in US dollars. (required)
12. Report the funds spent in the currency of your fund. (required)
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?
No
13.1. Please list the amount and currency you did not use and explain why.
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
14.1. 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