Grants:Project/Rapid/Cbrescia/Wiki Loves Andes Edit-a-thon 2018/Report

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Report accepted
This report for a Rapid Grant approved in FY 2017-18 has been reviewed and accepted by the Wikimedia Foundation.


Goals[edit]

Did you meet your goals? Are you happy with how the project went?

We are very happy with how the project went. We didn´t reach some of the targets but still the dedication put by the persons that participated was impressive, especially from the university students. As this was the first time we organized events like this in Huaraz, although much effort was given to reach the targets, we still understand that the first time is like a pilot project: much lessons are learned by doing. We received support from public institutions from the educational, environmental and cultural sectors. We also received support from students and nature enthusiasts. It was the first time we organized and editathon in Huaraz and we could host the events in an auditorium from the Ministry of Culture, use the computer lab from the local public university and obtain permits to take pictures in natural protected area. We initiated 14 Spanish Wikipedia articles and improved 22 other on plants, mountains and lakes from the region where we live in. We believe we have planted a seed that will continue to grow and inspire other Andean cities that are not national capitals. From our local experience, decentralization is crucial for the sustainibility of our territories. The articles created, the pictures taken and the video recording will create important promotional material for future events.

The original goals where:

Goal 1.- Recruit and increase skills of new editors for the Spanish Wikipedia

17 new editors were recruited for the Spanish Wikipedia, 11 participated in the Editathon.

Goal 2.- Add or improve content in articles about the Andes in the city of Huaraz in Peru for the first edition

14 new articles were created for the Spanish Wikipedia:
Type Articles Total
Plants Werneria nubigena, Cantua pyrifolia, Lupinus weberbaueri, Ranunculus weberbaueri, Jungia rugosa, Nostoc sphaericum, Senecio tephrosioides, Perezia multiflora, Antennaria linearifolia, Tagetes filifolia 10
Lakes Laguna 513, Laguna Purhuay 2
Mountains Cayesh, Andavite 2
Extras:
3 new Wikidata pages were created: Nostoc sphaericum, Laguna 513, Laguna Purhuay
7 new Wikispecies pages were created: Werneria nubigena, Ranunculus weberbaueri, Jungia rugosa, Cantua pyrifolia, Lupinus weberbaueri, Senecio tephrosioides, Aristolochia didyma
6 new Wikimedia Commons categories were created: Perezia multiflora, Werneria nubigena, Pucaranra, Palcaraju, Ocshapalca, Cayesh
22 articles were improved for the Spanish Wikipedia:
Type Articles Total
Plants Species Tagetes elliptica, Baccharis latifolia, Lepechinia meyenii, Buddleja incana, Barnadesia dombeyana, Cestrum auriculatum, Culcitium canescens 7
Plant Genres Jungia, Antennaria, Ranunculus, Lupinus 4
Lakes Laguna Querococha 1
Mountains Tullparaju, Vallunaraju, Ranrapalca, Churup, Huandoy, Palcaraju, Pucaranra, Ocshapalca, San Juan, Quitaraju 10

Goal 3.- Improve the quality of the content on Wikimedia projects by providing images to the articles

14 new images were provided for the following articles:
Type Articles Total
Plants Perezia multiflora, Cestrum auriculatum, Lepechinia meyenii, Werneria nubigena, Antennaria linearifolia 5
Mountains Cayesh, Huantsán, Churup, Huandoy, Quitaraju, San Juan, Ocshapalca, Pucaranra, Palcaraju 9

Goal 5.- Recruit new contributors to Wikimedia Commons in the city of Huaraz for the first edition

We have recruited 4 new contributors from the city of Huaraz to Wikimedia Commons: PercyDextre, DomiBer, ElvisPalma2018, Evavequ. This number will continue to grow as we are still waiting for some pcitures to be uploaded from the participants of the photo walk and we are campaigning with local mountain guides to provides us with the pictures they have of the mountains they climb.

Goal 5.- Inform nature enthusiast organizations about the possibility to contribute to Wikimedia projects

By organizing the workshops, the editathon and the photo walk, we visibilized in the city of Huaraz and surroundings that it is possible to contribute to Wikimedia projects to not only the participants of the events (35) and persons that enrolled in the events but didn´t assist (29), but to even more public. Through the Facebook events statistics we now that also persons responded to the events (60) and more than 2300 people saw the events. Also, one of the banners promoting the event was located in the main square of Huaraz for more than two weeks so we estimate that even more people would have seen it. Finally, some posters were located in the faculties of the local public university and many students saw it.

Goal 6.- Promote the participation of academics into creating and improving articles in Wikimedia projects

This is a goal that was not directly reached. We believe that maybe this goal was a little bit too much of a first edition. There is much to learn in the process of communicating what Wikipedia is in a new context and encourage researchers to participate in creating and improving articles. Although the University and the directors of the Environmental Science Faculty and Environmental Engineering School supported the events, no professors participated. Also, when we designed the project, one objective was to build an alliance with the researchers from the Glacier and Mountain Ecosystems Research Institute (INAIGEM). This project was designed on May and approved on June, but on August a new president of the institute was appointed to direct the institution[1] creating an instability phase inside the institute affecting the relationships we had with the past director. Finally, some scholars in Huaraz don´t realize yet the impact of having informed articles from reliable sources in the largest online encyclopedia.

Outcome[edit]

Please report on your original project targets.


Target outcome Achieved outcome Explanation
TARGET 1
Number of events: 5
Number of events: 5 The five events planned were all implemented: i. 01 Botanical Photography Workshop on October 31st; ii. 01 Photo Walk on November 1st; iii. 02 Wikipedia Editing Workshops on November 2nd; and iv. 01 Editathon on November 3rd. On-line events in Facebook were created:
TARGET 2
Number of participants: 40-50
Number of participants: 35 We didn´t achieve the target number of participants in the events. For the Botanical Workshop 32 persons previously suscribed and for the Editing Workshops 14 did. One of the main reasons we believe was that just one week before the event, the UNASAM university declared that the Friday, November 2nd was a non working day: this generated that many students took the day off and took advantage of a long weekend since November 1st is already a holiday. Also, we had rainy days from Wednesday to Saturday and this demotivates the participation of some persons.
TARGET 3
Number of new editors: 30-40
Number of new editors: 17 The same main reason as exposed in the above target.
TARGET 4
Number of articles created or improved: 20/20
Number of articles created or improved: 14/22 14 new articles were created of the 20 planned and 22 articles were improved of the 20 planned. The new articles created in the Editathon had to be reviewed after the event. Most of the pictures that improved the already created articles were uploaded in Wikimedia Commons after the events not only by participants but also by nature enthusiasts in the city.
TARGET 5
Number of repeat participants (for projects that include a series of events): 30
Number of repeat participants (for projects that include a series of events): 11 As explained in TARGET 2, certain events affected the number of participants in the events. Still, at least 6 of the repeat participants in the editathon can become assistants for future editathons and help new editors develop their skills and articles.


Botanical Photography Workshop, Editing Workshops and Editathon
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Photo-walk & Plant photography
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Mountain Photography
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Learning[edit]

Projects do not always go according to plan. Sharing what you learned can help you and others plan similar projects in the future. Help the movement learn from your experience by answering the following questions:

  • What worked well?
Our alliance with Arte+Feminismo Peru was crucial as we used their know-how and lessons learned based in real experience organizing editathons for five years. Although they didn´t have the experience working with plants, mountains and lakes Wikipedia pages, they were very important when motivating, training and technically assisting the new editors.
Our instutional alliances with Environmental Sciences Faculty from the National University Santiago Antunez de Mayolo (UNASAM), the Ancash Regional Office of the Ministry of Culture in Peru and the Main Office of the Huascaran National Park. They provided media channels for promotion, computers and multimedia projectors, and locations for the workshops and editathon.
A not planned alliance was with the Red Universitaria Ambiental (Environmental University Network): a group of six students helped us organize and promote the events. They all participated in the workshops and their motivation, resources and skills developed will be a plus when organising the II Editathon next year.
  • What did not work so
The alliance with the Glacier and Mountain Ecosystems Research Institute (INAIGEM) didnt work as planned by the reasons explained in the comments of GOAL 6 above. Still, aiming for scholars participation in creating and improving Spanish Wikipedia articles is a too high expectation for a first edition and maybe for a second one as we recently discussed the idea of organising an editing workshops addressed to academics with some experts. Our conclusion is that we should keep working with the University and nature enthusiasts for the next editions as professionals in public institutes are over loaded with work and will not have much time for extra laboral activities.
Although the participation was low and we didnt achieve the number of participants targeted maybe due to the reasons exposed in TARGET 2, discussing with our friends from Arte+Feminismo Peru we reflected on the reasons why this type of events in Peru were so few compared to editathons in other countries like Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico and Spain. We discussed that not only technical requirements have to be reached like providing computers (and tablets, smart phones) and good internet connections, but also people that like to write is essential to create and improve articles. Educational policies and practices in Peru still have much space for improvement[2] but we believe that events like Wikipedia Editathons can inspire and promote quality of education so they should continue.
  • What would you do differently next time?
Next time we need to strengthen the promotional activities of the events beyond social networks like Twitter and Facebook. Also, publicity was well located but not too much time before the events. The promotional offline and online material must be available at least one month before the events.
Something that affected in a way the implementation of the promotional activities was a technical financial issue with the money transfer from WF to the local account provided: the money provided should have arrived on August but arrived after the events. Money had to be obtained to buy and rent resources, and then spent in a very efficient way. We don´t know exactly what happened with the bank transfer but we would recommend that money transfers in USD from the US should be transfered to USD bank accounts in Peru as the money exchange operation in the transfer when using different currencies might have caused a rejection of the transfer (e.g. money transfered in USD from the US to a local currency bank account in Peru). Still, good news is that this allowed to have 461 $ USD of remaining funds that can be used for more activities in 2019 if approved by WF.
From the experience of Arte+Feminismo Peru in editathons and other Wikimedia Editathons, we would include money to be invested in stickers, magnets and t-shirts in order to visibilize the project and the possibility to contribute to Wikimedia projects. Also, we would include prizes for the best contributors. Plants, mountains and lake photographs are excellent material for creating oustanding memorabilia.

Finances[edit]

Grant funds spent[edit]

Please describe how much grant money you spent for approved expenses, and tell us what you spent it on.

# Description Planned
Budget
(USD)
Actual
Cost
(USD)
Actual
vs
Planned
%
Comments
1 Bus transport from Lima to Huaraz (and return) of Arte+Feminismo partners 250 95 38.14%
2 Accommodation and board for Arte+Feminismo partners 120 129 107.20%
3 Food and drink for 2 workshops and 1 editathon 400 184 45.97%
4 Food and drink for 1 photo walk and 1 photo workshops 200 91 45.42%
5 Bus rental for photo walk in natural area 200 212 105.94%
6 Development and printing of editing guide 200 209 104.42%
7 Graphic design of posters and printing 230 211 91.67%
8 Video recording of the events 250 272 108.96%
9 Office supplies 50 28 55.09%
10 Graphic design of certificates and printing 50 50 100.00%
11 International bank transfer costs 50 59 118.00% Not considered in total
Cost grand total 2000 $ 1480 $ 461 $ Not spent

Total amount requested from WMF: 2000 $ (USD)

Total amount received from WMF: 1941 $ (USD)

Total amount spent on the project: 1480 $ (USD)

Remaining funds[edit]

The funds remaining from this grant in the amount of US$461 were deducted from another grant payment for Grants:Project/Rapid/Cbrescia/Wiki Loves Andes Edit-a-thon 2019.

Do you have any remaining grant funds?

Yes, we have grant funds remaining: 461 USD. We would like to use the remaining funds on the 2019 edition of Loves Andes Editathon. The project includes two editathons, an editing workshop and a photo walk.

Anything else[edit]

Anything else you want to share about your project?

  • We registered in video the four events but we still havent edited the material. This will be done by the end of February and used to promote the II Editathon and Photo Walks of next year (if approved by WF).
  • We are very happy and grateful with the experience and we would like to continue organising this type of events, and even expanding the type of pages created and improved beyond plants, mountains and lakes. We could in future editions include also archaeological sites, important regional & national environmentalists, and environmental issues in Ancash such as famous mining tailings in the region (proposed by university students).