Grants talk:IEG/Increase Awareness of and participation in Indic language Wikipedias in Colorado

From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki

Gujarati community in Colorado Springs, CO[edit]

Do you've any estimate on number of Gujarati community in Colorado Springs, CO? We at Gujarati Wiki already struggling to get active users inside Gujarat/India and I'm wondering how you can reach them without being native Gujarati speaker. Just curious thoughts! --KartikMistry (talk) 04:09, 29 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

By my estimate, the Gujarati community is at least a couple hundred strong.
I am not sure how you are able to draw inferences about my Gujarati skills but suffice to say that I spent 15 years in Gujarat and am very well versed in that language. I'll be happy to prove my Gujarati skills to you at any time but that's not the point. :-) The point is, I'm trying to get a well-resourced segment of Indian-origin people to contribute to Indic wikipedias and would like your support and help for it.
Do let me know if you have any suggestions for making this even better.
Thank you.
अभय नातू (talk) 14:43, 29 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Dear @अभय नातू and अभय नातू: Can you create a guide that can be used in other US Gujarati communities? That would be a way to improve the number of Wiki Gujarati editors in the USA? Geraldshields11 (talk)

Eligibility confirmed, round 2 2015[edit]

This Individual Engagement Grant proposal is under review!

We've confirmed your proposal is eligible for round 2 2015 review. Please feel free to ask questions and make changes to this proposal as discussions continue during this community comments period.

The committee's formal review for round 2 2015 begins on 20 October 2015, and grants will be announced in December. See the schedule for more details.

Questions? Contact us.

Marti (WMF) (talk) 01:23, 4 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

comments from Thepwnco[edit]

@अभय नातू:: hello and congrats on your grant proposal being confirmed as eligible for review! I have a few questions for you before the formal review period begins (I am part of the IEG committee).

  • I see that you have a lot of experience with editing and mentoring which is great. Does this experience include teaching or helping with native language typing? Could you provide more details about the proposed activities related to native language typing? I'm curious to know more, as I don't think I've seen a project where teaching these skills is included as part of Wikipedia editing workshops. On a related note, would you consider documenting this teaching, perhaps in a guide or toolkit, as a possible deliverable of the project?
  • Is there a community you are already familiar with/involved with in Colorado? From the sounds of it there is as your outreach includes community get-togethers. It'd be helpful if you could confirm this is the case, and whether you have already identified or been in contact with individuals who you think may be interested in participating.

thanks in advance. -Thepwnco (talk) 23:45, 13 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Answers[edit]

@Thepwnco: Hello Thepwnco,

Thanks for reaching out to me.

1. My experience does include teaching native language/script typing. I have done that formally and informally online as well as offline on many occasions. My plan around this project is a series of encounters between (prospective) users and wiki projects. Some steps (but not all) are --

1.1 Introductory talk on crowd-sourcing in general and Wikipedia in specific, including the Five Pillars of Wikipedia
1.2 User Registration and preliminary hands-on, using sandbox on English Wikipedia.
1.3 Demo of native language typing
1.3.1 Phonetic
1.3.2 Inscript <-- This is a script-agnostic (for the most part) keyboard developed under the aegis of Government of India for Indic languages. I have been using it for years and it's way better than phonetic...of course, that's a personal opinion :-)
1.4 Native language editing in various Indic scripts. Depending on the audience that shows up on a given day, it will involve --
1.4.1 Marathi - mr
1.4.2 Gujarati - gu
1.4.3 Tamil - ta
1.4.4 Telugu - te
1.4.5 Kannada - ka
1.5 Benign editing on native wikipedias (above list and possibly more) that includes basic wiki markup
1.6 A tutorial on what "good" edits are and what can be construed as "bad" edits
1.7 Wikipedia etiquette including references, talk pages, direct contact (or lack thereof), etc
1.8 Introduction of templates, categories and other semi-advanced concepts
1.9 Decidin on a set of topics on which users want to create/enhance articles
1.10 Edit-a-thons.
1.11 Editing competition

More than one of these steps may be folded into the same encounter and/or split over multiple encounters. Some of these activities will be repeated in case users prefer and/or new groups of users shows up halfway. The above list will evolve as I work through a more formal recipe/plan.

I will be collecting metrics at several points in this process to measure effectiveness of this initiative. I plan to use these metrics to infer if this is a repeatable initiative in more geographical locations.

I will certainly document the session(s) on native script typing. They can be polished later and perhaps used in subsequent initiatives. Native language typing has been a significant hurdle for Indic language w:'s, in my experience hence I want to tackle that first, even before throwing them feet-first into Wikipedia.

2. Yes. I have been part of this community for almost two decades now. I have been approached by several people showing interesting in getting involved but expressing mild annoyance that there wasn't a lot of "user-friendly training" and "someone to talk to right away" when things get confusing. I have a list of about a score of individuals that are interested. This in fact spurred me to put up this project for approval, for both (partial) monetary support and some kind of semi-official status.

I hope this answers your questions. Do let me know if I can clarify anything or offer more details.

While I monitor this page (almost) daily, I'm on my w:mr talk page almost throughout the day (when not working my day job :-) ) and I will be more accessible there, if a quick response is needed.

Thanks again.

Cheers,

अभय नातू (talk) 03:44, 14 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@अभय नातू: thanks for your comprehensive answers! I have no further questions at this time, but would encourage you to add any details you have about the metrics you intend on collecting to the actual grant page (under measures of success). It's always good to see a prospective grantee has given a lot of thought to how to evaluate their project and measure impact :) -Thepwnco (talk) 22:22, 14 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Addis' Comment[edit]

Hi @अभय नातू: could you make your target people more specifically, what is their job, how old are then etc. And could you also talk a little bit about how does different people could generate different impact in your project. What is your exceptions.--AddisWang (talk) 14:08, 21 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@AddisWang:, I assume you're asking this to be included in the metrics as baseline data. I will survey the users and note the information they choose to provide.
Thanks for this suggestion.
अभय नातू (talk) 00:48, 25 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Aggregated feedback from the committee for Increase Awareness of and participation in Indic language Wikipedias in Colorado[edit]

Scoring criteria (see the rubric for background) Score
1=weak alignment 10=strong alignment
(A) Impact potential
  • Does it fit with Wikimedia's strategic priorities?
  • Does it have potential for online impact?
  • Can it be sustained, scaled, or adapted elsewhere after the grant ends?
7.5
(B) Innovation and learning
  • Does it take an Innovative approach to solving a key problem?
  • Is the potential impact greater than the risks?
  • Can we measure success?
8.8
(C) Ability to execute
  • Can the scope be accomplished in 6 months?
  • How realistic/efficient is the budget?
  • Do the participants have the necessary skills/experience?
8.2
(D) Community engagement
  • Does it have a specific target community and plan to engage it often?
  • Does it have community support?
  • Does it support diversity?
7.0
Comments from the committee:
  • The project target is not clearly defined, making it hard to assess potential impact
  • This project fits with the WMF priority to increase participation. It has potential for online impact, sustaining activity by engaging/recruiting new editors and eliminating some of the barriers that prevent them from editing.
  • Outreach to non-English language communities based in the U.S. is a good idea. It could be an alternative way for the growth of Wikimedia Movement.
  • The idea to bring expats / migrants to work on their native language wikipedia is new and promising. I see no risk, but great potential. Measures for success are detailed enough but still achievable and simple.
  • The focus on native language typing is innovative. I don't really see any risks here. Reasonable measures of success are provided.
  • This project may have low impact individually, but could be a worthwhile pilot of future projects for immigrants in other contexts.
  • This project sounds relatively easy to accomplish.
  • I love the simplicity of this proposal. It has a clear idea of what the grantee is going to do and which steps are going to be taken. The budget reflects the single steps that are envisaged and seem very realistic.
  • Budget is realistic and extremely low for potential impact. Applicant has a lot of experience with editing and mentoring. Because a community of participants has already been identified (this was mentioned on the talk page), I think the scope of this project is feasible.
  • Indian community has a very high potential power that we need to dig it out.
  • Online communities have been notified. Project supports language diversity on projects.
  • Only need to make a more specific target person to help the grantee has a better control on his project.
  • If this is a success, I would like to see the grantee present his idea at wikimania or any other occasion to other wikipedians. This could be done also in other countries with diaspora/minority populations (not only in the US). I regard this proposal as very well spent money.
  • The project seems good. There is need to improve on other languages of Wikipedia.

Round 2 2015 decision[edit]

Congratulations! Your proposal has been selected for an Individual Engagement Grant.

The committee has recommended this proposal and WMF has approved funding for the full amount of your request, $800

Comments regarding this decision:
We appreciate the opportunity to partner in this innovative outreach project as you seek to increase participation among a previously untapped pool of contributors. We support your close attention to a project design that is tailored to your community, and we look forward to thinking with you about how this model might be shared if it proves successful.

Next steps:

  1. You will be contacted to sign a grant agreement and setup a monthly check-in schedule.
  2. Review the information for grantees.
  3. Use the new buttons on your original proposal to create your project pages.
  4. Start work on your project!
Questions? Contact us.


Lots of Indic language contributors in NYC[edit]

Hello! In New York there are lots of Indic language contributors. Most of them are casual Wikipedians. I look forward to seeing what happens in Colorado. Perhaps what is tested there can be tried again in New York. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:51, 7 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]