Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Wikimedia New York City strategic implementation

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statusFunded
Wikimedia New York City strategic implementation
start date2023-07-012023-07-01T00:00:00Z
end date2025-06-302025-06-30T00:00:00Z
budget (local currency)159147 USD
amount requested (USD)159147 USD
amount recommended (USD)309000
grant typeWikimedia Affiliate (chapter, thematic org., or user group)
funding regionNA
decision fiscal year2022-23
funding program roundRound 2
applicant and people related to proposalPharos
organization (if applicable)Wikimedia New York City

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Applicant details[edit]

Wikimedia username(s):

Pharos

Organization:

Wikimedia New York City

G. Have you received grants from the Wikimedia Foundation before?

Applied previously and did receive a grant

H. Have you received grants from any non-wiki organization before?

Yes

H.1 Which organization(s) did you receive grants from?

Consumer Reports

M. Do you have a fiscal sponsor?

No

M1. Fiscal organization name.

N/A

Additional information[edit]

R. Where will this proposal be implemented?

United States of America

S. Please indicate whether your work will be focused on one country (local), more than one or several countries in your region (regional) or has a cross-regional (global) scope:

Local

S1. If you have answered regional or international, please write the country names and any other information that is useful for understanding your proposal.

T. If you would like, please share any websites or social media accounts that your group or organization has. (optional)

N/A

M. Do you have a fiscal sponsor?

No

M1. Fiscal organization name.

N/A

Proposal[edit]

1. What is the overall vision of your organization and how does this proposal contribute to this? How does this proposal connect to past work and learning?

Wikimedia NYC brings New Yorkers together to share in a richer and more representative cultural landscape of free knowledge.

We have a long experience as an affiliate of over a decade, and an active local community of Wikimedians compared to other global and metropolitan areas. We take pride in our Wiki-related innovations, with a number of now-current outreach models beginning here, such as edit-a-thons, Wiki Loves/GLAM efforts and translate-a-thons. We have had an outsized impact on the global wikiverse, helping to spur global thematic efforts such as Art+Feminism, AfroCrowd, Wiki Loves Pride and similar smaller initiatives. We have continued our growth and outreach despite a minimal budget. This is especially exceptional when compared to other locations of comparable population and costs (such as medium-sized or smaller European countries that have a population at or below the 20-million of our NYC metropolitan area).

We have historically done this on an almost purely volunteer basis, consciously choosing to stay small, connected and grounded. Since our inception, we have created an informal network across regional universities, museums, libraries, community groups, including the United Nations Headquarters. We have an active board of directors eager to find an employee to help implement our strategic plan developed with Barretto Consulting.

We assess now is the time to hire an Executive Director to jump-start our professionalism, solidify the commanding network of institutions available in the NYC greater metropolitan area, and increase our overall operational processes. We aim, as well, to expand, maintain, and make more sustainable our local community efforts.

We take this step in alignment with the emerging vision of a North American Hub, to further diversify and strengthen our outreach both locally and in connection with the global efforts. As members of WMNYC, we are uniquely suited to this task. In addition, our volunteer board completed an extensive formal strategic planning process in 2022 and with the help of a professional facilitator, have designed our efforts for the next three years.

2. What is the change that you are trying to bring about and why is this important?

Our Theory of Change envisions our capacity to bring people together, form partnerships, and create a platform for sharing and exchange. The goals are to grow the community, increase the overall education of the community, and to provide additional content to the Wikipedia universe through community work. We aim to advance public knowledge about topics of interest to our partners, volunteers and those who are curious about Wikipedia.

We do this in four areas. Our Platform for impact includes building on our distinctive capabilities, such as our connection(s) to knowledge, to the Wikimedia Foundation, and to a network of people locally and globally to energize and utilize the passion and knowledge of our members. We also have traditionally made good use of our high-profile partnerships, skilled facilitators and nimbleness to respond to the cultural diversity of New York City. Our board and expanded set of volunteer facilitators are eager and responsible when conducting edit-a-thons, always understanding the assorted levels of skillfulness we routinely assemble.

We conduct high-impact activities which create vivid community outreach opportunities. We connect Wikipedians through various programs, convenings, and events throughout the year, always looking to observe and encompass themes relevant to our diverse communities. We continually activate the education of users through trainings, workshops, conferences, and other events, simultaneously growing content contributions to Wikimedia projects.

The direct impact of our Theory of Change is to grow the Wikipedia universe as well as develop more knowledgeable, critical information users. This allows individuals to become empowered to edit and see themselves reflected in Wikipedia. Members are integrated with the larger free knowledge ecosystem and improve and increase knowledge relevant to New Yorkers and global Wikimedia content.

The ultimate goals of our theory of change are to advance public knowledge, particularly for the people and institutions of the greater New York area and have them share in a richer and more representative free knowledge ecosystem.

3. Describe your main approaches or strategies to achieve these changes and why you think they will be effective.

In order to stabilize and improve the organization for our community, we have identified the following strategic priority accomplishments and commitments, per our strategic plan. Strategic priority accomplishments and commitments

1. Stabilize the organization

a. Increase our staffing capacity i. Hire an executive director b. Create succession plans i. We have held elections for the current term and are in the process of discussing any restructuring of the board deemed necessary c. Explore long-term options for alliances and global community i. Develop & follow Movement Strategy community. As our chapter members are already involved in the Movement Strategy, we plan to continue to specifically allocate time to discuss Movement Strategy at our meetings.

2. Refine our operational model to emphasize agility, learning, and impact a. We plan to establish an annual visioning meeting to review results, determine two to three priorities, and outline annual activities that will achieve them. Additionally, we plan to incorporate visioning into annual planning meeting 3. Revitalize our members and volunteers

a. Clarify our terminology around the various categories (and sub-categories) of individual engagement with WMNYC (e.g., member, volunteer, etc.) i. Establish a working group to define shared terminology/glossary around categories of individual engagement (member, volunteer) b. Define membership structure, including levels, communications, and benefits i. We have begun to research membership structures to determine best for us c. Develop a comprehensive volunteer engagement program, including recruitment, communications, benefits, and supervision, among others i. Liaise with 4.1 working group to solidify action plan to define scope of volunteer development initiative no later than beginning of Year 2

4. Build the capacity of our partners

a. Define partnerships and establish process for identifying partners and engaging them i. Research and assess existing partnerships. Develop a shared terminology for partnerships and affiliated entities. b. Develop and implement process to identify capacity priorities proactively c. Develop an event proposal / intake form d. Develop resources and trainings to address current priorities i. Identify roles and responsibilities for co-sponsored events (e.g., via a template)

5. Develop dashboard identifying and monitoring key metrics that will define our success a. Identify key metrics and create annual dashboard
6. Increase awareness of our brand and impact

a. Establish an ad hoc pro bono marketing and PR committee i. We are launching a committee to develop a description for recruitment of 3-6 individuals b. Develop our branding and messaging i. Create and implement a marketing plan and event protocols

1. Create marketing plan and protocols to be used for all new events

4. What are the activities you will be developing and delivering as part of these approaches or strategies?

Our primary activities for this fiscal year are the following:

First, we will be hiring and onboarding our first-ever Executive Director. This will allow us to keep Wikimedia NYC sustainable while expanding our reach. We expect the Executive Director will spend part of their time supporting and fostering partnerships

Second, we’re actively engaging new participants through regular edit-a-thons, Wiki Loves X, and other campaigns. In partnership with various New York City institutions, we facilitate and support edit-a-thons on a wide variety of topics. And we participate in national and global campaigns, in addition to hosting our own city-wide contests.

Next, to support local Wikimedians, we host monthly wiki-salons (“WikiWednesday”) as a way for community members to discuss, share, and celebrate what is happening on the wikis. We also hold annual conferences, like Wikipedia Day, that bring in interested people from the broader New York City metro area. In 2022 we held the first-ever NYC Wikidata Day conference and will continue it going forward with support from other Open Data communities.

Finally, we are constantly working and training with partners at the United Nations, GLAMs and educational institutions. New York City is an incredibly culturally rich city that is excited about working with Wikipedia to spread free knowledge.

5. Do you want to apply for multi-year funding?      

Yes, for 2 year

5.1 If yes, provide a brief overview of Year 2 and Year 3 of the proposed plan and how this relates to the current proposal and your strategic plan?

We developed a 3-year strategic plan facilitated by Barretto Consulting at the Wikimedia Foundation's request to professionalize our operations and set up conditions for an Executive Director.

Hired in the midst of Year 1, the Executive Director will actually complete their first year of service during Year 2. It is vital for our strategic plan that there is at least one full year's funding in place for the Executive Director, to be able to attract a quality candidate and to ensure organizational stability.

Continued quarterly milestones from the Wikimedia NYC strategic plan.

Quarter 5 (July to Sept 2024) ● Re-assess staffing capacity and needs (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Assess new board structure (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Develop succession plan (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Clarify our relationship with the Foundation and other groups in the movement (“Stabilize the organization”)

Quarter 6 (Oct to Dec 2024) ● Hold annual meeting and create annual plan with priorities (“Refine our operational model”) ● Identify key metrics and create annual dashboard (“Refine our operational model”) ● Launch new branding and messaging (“Increase awareness of our brand and impact”) ● Develop and launch membership structure (“Revitalize our members and volunteers”)

Quarter 7 (Jan to March 2025) ● Continue to assess defined categories and levels of individual engagement (“Revitalize our members and volunteers”) ● Develop volunteer engagement program (“Revitalize our members and volunteers”) ● Identify and solicit new partnerships in alignment with annual plan (“Build the capacity of our partners”)

Quarter 8 (April to June 2025) ● Continue to track and assess partner capacity through developed procedures (“Build the capacity of our partners”) ● Work with volunteer engagement program lead to develop trainings for volunteers at and/or in support partners (“Build the capacity of our partners”)

6. Please include a timeline (operational calendar) for your proposal.

The parentheticals are the relevant tenets of the Wikimedia NYC strategic plan.

Quarter 1 (July to Sept. 2023) ● Kick-off hiring process for Executive Director (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Incorporate visioning into the annual planning meeting. (“Refine our operational model to emphasize agility, learning, and impact”) ● Recruit up to 3-6 individuals and launch branding committee (“Increase awareness of our brand and impact”) ● Restructure the Board. (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Participate in the Movement Strategy process. (“Stabilize the organization”)

Quarter 2 (Oct. to Dec. 2023) ● Hold Board elections (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Complete hiring process for Executive Director, begin onboarding. This may happen in Q1 if the hiring process completes sooner. (“Stabilize the organization”) ● Participate in the Movement Strategy process. (“Stabilize the organization”)

Quarter 3 (Jan. to March 2024) ● Research and assess existing partnerships. Develop a shared terminology for partnerships and affiliated entities. (“Build the capacity of our partners”) ● Establish a membership working group to define shared terminology/glossary around categories of individual engagement, such as member and volunteer. (“Revitalize our members and volunteers”) ● Branding committee to create marketing plan and protocols to be used for all events. (“Increase awareness of our brand and impact”) ● Participate in the Movement Strategy process. (“Stabilize the organization”)

Quarter 4 (April to June 2024) ● Develop an event proposal / intake form. (“Build the capacity of our partners”) ● Identify roles and responsibilities for co-sponsored events, e.g. via a template. (“Build the capacity of our partners”) ● Liaise with membership working group to solidify action plan to define scope of volunteer development initiative. (“Research membership structures”) ● Identify key metrics and create annual dashboard (“Refine our operational model to emphasize agility, learning, and impact”) ● Participate in the Movement Strategy process. (“Stabilize the organization”)

7. Do you have the team that is needed to implement this proposal?

Yes, we believe we have the team needed to implement this proposal. Our team is primarily volunteer board members who have lengthy experience in the Wikimedia movement. Richard Knipel (User:Pharos) is the president, Wil Fyfordy (User:Wil540 art) is vice president, Bob Kosovsky (User:kosboot) is treasurer, Kunal Mehta (User:Legoktm) is secretary, Rajene Hardeman (User:Windblown29) is the chief strategy officer and Megan Wacha (User:Megs) is the president emeritus. Each of these individuals brings in expertise from different areas of Wikimedia projects and broader free culture movement underscored by a love of the Wikimedia movement.

With this grant, we intend to hire an executive director, who will not only lead the organization's growth, but build up the chapter's programming, systems, and processes to best support and engage our members, partners, and other stakeholders.

Phoebe Ayers (User:Phoebe), a former WMF board member, has volunteered to help with the hiring process. Harrison Devine (User:Hdevine825), who joined us from the OpenStreetMap community and professionally works on non-profit accounting, will be assisting with any other financial steps as well.

Finally, Wikimedia New York City is backed by a vibrant and diverse community of editors, librarians, journalists, educators, activists, photographers, community organizers, students, retirees, developers, and artists, each of whom have their own motivations for engaging with Wikimedia projects broadly and the Wikimedia NYC community specifically.

8. Please state if your proposal aims to work to bridge any of the identified CONTENT knowledge gaps (Knowledge Inequity)? Select up to THREE that most apply to your work.

Content Gender gap, Important Topics (topics considered to be of impact or important in the specific context), Cultural background, ethnicity, religion, racial

8.1 In a few sentences, explain how your work is specifically addressing this content gap (or Knowledge inequity) to ensure a greater representation of knowledge.

Our primary topical focus is our city and its metropolitan area. New York City is an influential and diverse city on a global scale and has built up significant history over the years. More than 1% of all “vital articles” on the English Wikipedia fall under the scope of NYC content. Through partnerships with cultural and historical institutions, we are able to connect editors with relevant online and offline resources to improve coverage of these vital topics.

Wikimedia New York City has a long track record of working to reduce the content gender gap, through partnerships and events with Art+Feminism, WikiGap and others.

Finally, we work to address cultural gaps through a variety of work. For example, in 2022 we partnered with The Met, AfroCROWD and Black Lunch Table to host a workshop and edit-a-thon on their Afrofuturism exhibit. We have actively supported and hosted local events including Wiki Loves Pride and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, among many others.

9. Please state if your proposal includes any of these areas or THEMATIC focus. Select up to THREE that most apply to your work and explain the rationale for identifying these themes.

Education, Culture, heritage or GLAM , Diversity

10. Will your work focus on involving participants from any underrepresented communities? Please note, we had previously asked about inclusion and diversity in terms of CONTENTS, in this question we are asking about the diversity of PARTICIPANTS. Select up to THREE that most apply to your work.

Gender Identity, Sexual Orientation, Ethnic/racial/religious or cultural background

11. What are your strategies for engaging participants, particularly those that currently are non-Wikimedia?

We frequently partner with organizations of those in underrepresented cultural, gender or groups to give them the tools to contribute through specialized edit-a-thons and ongoing engagement. The majority of our edit-a-thons are in coordination with or supporting such groups, and we try to also build cross-fertilization of those active in organizing in particular domains.

In hosting monthly public events open to the public, we interact with the non-Wikimedia community often. With increased capacity of an executive director, we will be able to better retain and recruit attendees by emphasizing new members and increased communication/promotion to current members. We aim to continue to follow our multi-year partnership action plan based on our strategic plan developed with Barretto.

12. In what ways are you actively seeking to contribute towards creating a safer, supportive, more equitable environment for participants and promoting the UCOC and Friendly Space Policy, and/or equivalent local policies and processes?

Wikimedia New York City has been one of the leaders in ensuring participants have a safe space. We wrote the original basic definition and scope of the friendly space policies on Meta-Wiki now in use by the Wikimedia Foundation and the larger Wikimedia movement.

A more robust chapter policy was developed as well, with training and support from an external expert. For the 2018–2019 fiscal year, Wikimedia NYC hired a Support and Safety consultant to write a Code of Conduct and establish a model for reporting, identifying, documenting, and addressing harassment issues in the Wikimedia community that do not happen on Wikimedia projects.

We start every event by restating the WMNYC Code of Conduct and by letting all participants know which specific people they can ask for help. We ensure that all events run by the chapter have sufficient moderation capabilities whether in person or online.

13. Do you have plans to work with Wikimedia communities, groups, or affiliates in your country, or in other countries, to implement this proposal?

Yes

13.1 If yes, please tell us about these connections online and offline and how you have let Wikimedia communities know about this proposal.

We have engaged deeply with peer communities at affiliates across our country and continent, as well as globally. Our chapter hosted the first WikiConference North America (then “USA”) in 2014, and have been part of collaborative planning for it every year since, including through virtual conferences since the pandemic. We also engage with North American affiliates and unaffiliated volunteers through WALRUS and similar channels, and are working with Wikimedia DC to develop a North America Hub planning process.

We also have strong on-wiki engagement of local editors through hybrid monthly wiki-salons and other events where we regularly share and discuss chapter developments and projects, WikiProject New York City, and our Wikimedia NYC Discord server.

14. Will you be working with other external, non-Wikimedian partners to implement this proposal?

Yes

14.1 Please describe these partnerships and what motivates the potential partner to be part of the proposal and how they add value to your work.

Wikimedia NYC maintains a range of partnerships with organizations located within and outside NYC. We have a strong partnership with the Brooklyn Public Library and the New York Public Library. These two library systems have donated space at local branches and provided technical support including laptop rentals to our members. Being located in a cultural hub, we also maintain partnerships with a number of local museums, heritage organizations, and cultural centers including the Metropolitan museum of art, MOMA, Queens Museum, International Center for Photography, CUNY, SUNY, NYU, Columbia, New York Botanical Garden, Sure We Can, and the New York Historical Society. Some of these relationships are more current than others. With the grant, we will be able to re-invigorate and strengthen these partnerships. In addition to the GLAM partnerships, we collaborate with national and international Wikipedia focused organizations including Wikimedia DC, Black Lunch Table, AfroCrowd, and Art+Feminism.

15. How do you hope to sustain or expand the work carried out in this proposal after the grant?

We have sustained an effort to host monthly events since 2014 and plan to use the grant to increase our capacity. With this increased capacity, we plan to consider applying for additional grants outside of the Wikimedia Foundation including those related to organizations serving New York City. With this great we will also be able to publicize our events more which will allow us to scale our impact.

16. What kind of risks do you anticipate and how would you mitigate these. This can include factors such as external/contextual issues that may affect implementation, as well as internal issues, such as governance/leadership changes.

A significant portion of our grant and plan follows the successful hiring of an Executive Director. It is possible that we are unable to hire someone or the person we select is unable to perform well in the role for whatever reason. If that happened, we would need to consider restarting the ED search, delaying our plans, or simply scale them back in absence of an ED.

Hiring an Executive Director is conditional on receiving enough funding to pay them. A risk is that because of poorer than expected WMF fundraising, we are unable to receive the full grant amount requested. This would significantly decrease the effectiveness of our strategic plan. We have reserve funding that we would be able to maintain the base level of services for our members and the NYC community, but even those would risk losing momentum.

Another risk is an event similar to the COVID-19 pandemic, which largely affected our ability for in-person events and disproportionately affected our older members. The chapter is surviving the effects of the current pandemic but has been significantly impacted through lower attendance, temporary loss of non-profit status and members actually getting sick from COVID. To mitigate this, we are strengthening our online meeting capabilities to enable us to have hybrid online and in-person events and even fully remote events.

Finally, a big risk is board and volunteer burnout. The chapter is anxious to implement our strategic plan, which involves the gradual scaling up of our activities and presence. With the addition of an Executive Director, we will be able to decrease some of the load from volunteers and reduce the risk of burnout.

17. In what ways do you think your proposal most contributes to the Movement Strategy 2030 recommendations. Select a maximum of three options that most apply.

Increase the Sustainability of Our Movement, Invest in Skills and Leadership Development, Innovate in Free Knowledge

18. Please state if your organization or group has a Strategic Plan that can help us further understand your proposal. You can also upload it here.  

Yes

Learning, Sharing, and Evaluation[edit]

19. What do you hope to learn from your work in this fund proposal?

How many local partners (organizations, universities, interest groups, etc) can we collaborate with per year? How many partnerships can be expanded (multiple events a year)? How many partnerships can we re-vitalize?

How can we increase the chapter’s communication and collaboration with other Wiki-communities? How many regional/international events can we participate in? How will the chapter's relationship to other Wiki-communities grow, including Wikimedia DC and the potential North American Hub?

How can we serve as a role model for other chapters? How can we encourage satellite/sibling events?

20. Based on these learning questions, what is the information or data you need to collect to answer these questions? Please register this information (as metric description) in the following space provided.

Main Metrics Description Target
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A

Here are some additional metrics that you can use if they are relevant to your work. Please note that this is just an optional list, mostly of quantitative metrics. They may complement the qualitative metrics you have defined in the previous boxes.

Additional Metrics Description Target
Number of editors that continue to participate/retained after activities N/A N/A
Number of organizers that continue to participate/retained after activities N/A N/A
Number of strategic partnerships that contribute to longer term growth, diversity and sustainability N/A 20
Feedback from participants on effective strategies for attracting and retaining contributors N/A 100
Diversity of participants brought in by grantees N/A N/A
Number of people reached through social media publications N/A N/A
Number of activities developed N/A 40
Number of volunteer hours N/A N/A

21. Additional core quantitative metrics. These core metrics will not tell the whole story about your work, but they are important for measuring some Movement-wide changes. Please try to include these core metrics if they are relevant to your work. If they are not, please use the space provided to explain why they are not relevant or why you can not capture this data. Your explanation will help us review our core metrics and make sure we are using the best ones for the movement as a whole.

Core Metrics Summary
Core metrics Description Target
Number of participants N/A N/A
Number of editors N/A N/A
Number of organizers N/A 30
Number of new content contributions per Wikimedia project
Wikimedia Project Description Target
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A

21.1 If for some reason your proposal will not measure these core metrics please provide an explanation.

N/A

22. What tools would you use to measure each metric selected?

We will primarily use the Programs and Events Dashboard and possibly other more flexible tools like PetScan and Quarry. We will develop human and partnership metrics in spreadsheets and through surveying interfaces.

Financial Proposal[edit]

23. & 23.1 What is the amount you are requesting from WMF? Please provide this amount in your local currency. If you are thinking about a multi-year fund, please provide the amount for the first year.

159147 USD

23.2 What is this amount in US Currency (to the best of your knowledge)?

159147 USD

23.3 Please upload your budget for this proposal or indicate the link to it.

23.4 Please include any additional observations or comments you would like to include about your budget.

We developed a 3-year strategic plan facilitated by Barretto Consulting at the Wikimedia Foundation's request to professionalize our operations and set up conditions for an Executive Director.

Two versions are included, a Full Budget and an Abbreviated Budget. There is also an accounting of Annual Volunteer Hours.

The Full Budget is the one that fulfills our strategic plan as requested by the Wikimedia Foundation, giving us rather less than comparable affiliates in other countries that support multiple staff, but enough funding to attract diverse qualified candidates for the single keystone role of Executive Director. By comparison, there are a couple of dozen Wikimedia Foundation staff in our region, none of whose roles are focused on the needs of the local community.

Please use this optional space to upload any documents that you feel are important for further understanding your proposal.

Other public document(s): https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_New_York_City/Staffing_plan/2022-2023

Final Message[edit]

By submitting your proposal/funding request you agree that you are in agreement with the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and the Universal Code of Conduct.

We/I have read the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and Universal Code of Conduct.

Yes


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