Grants talk:Project/GastelEtzwane and Mouha.ibs/Offline Wikipedia in Senegal Schools

Goals section[edit]

Hi Mouha.ibs and GastelEtzwane, this seems like a very interesting project. I'm wondering about the goals section, though. I think we need more information here about what it looks like to say you have met your goal. Will you check in on teachers and see if they are indeed able to use Kiwix to improve access to educational sources? Will you see if this has any effect on student learning outcomes? How would you do that? Before I endorse, I'd like to know more about how you're going to measure impact. Thanks! NSaad (WMF) (talk) 18:58, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Train twelve offline Wikipedia users... OK
Make the teachers in the target schools aware of off-line Wikipedia... We are planning on running two surveys. On two months after, and the second on in July. For the second survey we will try to reach each and every teacher who attended a workshop.
Provide these school teachers with Kiwix off-line Wikipedia... OK

The achievement of goals #1 and #3 are relatively easy to evaluate. That leaves goal #2 and your questions.

The surveys should enable us to measure how much and how often the teachers use Kiwix during the school year, once the novelty of offline Wikipedia has worn off. I hope to be able to get feedback from the school directors and find out from them if there was any significant improvement in the student's results. Having access to the information is one thing, understanding and learning is something else. That is why we are going through the teachers so that they will bring the knowledge to their students. GastelEtzwane (talk) 18:57, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Project Grant proposal submissions due 30 November![edit]

Thanks for drafting your Project Grant proposal. As a reminder, proposals are due on November 30th by the end of the day in your local time. In order for this submission to be reviewed for eligibility, it must be formally proposed. When you have completed filling out the infobox and have fully responded to the questions on your draft, please change status=draft to status=proposed to formally submit your grant proposal. This can be found in the Probox template found on your grant proposal page. Importantly, proposals that are submitted after the deadline will not be eligible for review during this round. If you're having any difficulty or encounter any unexpected issues when changing the proposal status, please feel free to e-mail me at cschillingwikimedia.org or contact me on my talk page. Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 23:20, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Question about Project Plan[edit]

Hi User:GastelEtzwane and User:Mouha.ibs! This is such a great project! I'm wondering if you could share a little bit more about the plan for your activities, particularly regarding the strategies you'll use to engage the participants in pedagogical discussions about the applications of Kiwix and Offline Wikipedia in the learning processes beyond the technical training (which is well detailed in your project plan). Thank you in advance for sharing! -MGuadalupe (WMF) (talk) 22:29, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi User:MGuadalupe (WMF)

As I stated, I am a teacher and have also been a Computer Science teacher trainer for about 15 years. When I train my colleagues, I use a very hands-on approach, and walk them through the different steps they need to take to master a subject. From my experience, it just does not work as well when I teach ex cathedra. I guess I would be no good doing a TED talk, that just is not my style of teaching.

Anyway, this project is all about running workshops so that teachers have the opportunity to try out and learn how to use Kiwix offline Wikipedia, as well as the other educational zim files available on the kiwix.org site. I do not plan to delve into the pedagogical discussions about the applications of Kiwix and Offline Wikipedia in the learning processes. We can exchange about this my email if you wish, but it is not something I can do in the scope of this project.

For example:

I am a member of the Swiss Zédaga association (see here: http://zedaga.ch/nos-partenaires/soutiens-individuels/) and we do teacher training in Benin. I have not gone myself to Benin, but I have introduced them to Kiwix and offline Wikipedia. The seminars in Benin last one week, and are held for about 50 teachers. The seminars are run by colleagues who are IRL teacher trainers or high school directors. I suggest you look up the annual reports on their web site (they are in French). All this to say that you do not become a teacher trainer after a two day seminar...

The project I am proposing is a lot less ambitious, a lot less expensive and I hope that it will be able to spread wider in Senegal and in other countries. We will show the trainees how to run a successful workshop during which school teachers will become familiar with offline Wikipedia. Access to this huge encyclopedia will enable them to get much more accurate and up to date information they can then use when preparing their lessons.

To quote Jimmy Wales « Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing. ». GastelEtzwane (talk) 18:27, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, User:GastelEtzwane!

Thank you for your kind reply! I agree that "you do not become a teacher trainer after a two day seminar" and I understand the focus of your program on trainees becoming familiar with offline Wikipedia to use in their lesson planning and then replicating this knowledge with other teachers. Could you share a little bit about the strategies that you'll use during day 1 of the seminar to ensure that trainees will be equipped to replicate the knowledge gained? Will previous knowledge/involvement with Wikimedia projects be a criteria in the selection of the participants to make sure that they can take full advantage of the 1 day of training and then jump to action? I'm guessing that motivation and excitement will be really high and can be easily leveraged into action! I look forward to your answer and to learn more about this great project! --MGuadalupe (WMF) (talk) 15:54, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The trainees will be giving a "crash course" on Wikipedia basics, actually the basics of reading the offline Kiwix program. This course will cover not only how to read and use the information made available by Kiwix, it will also cover the duplication and installation of Kiwix on other computers.

We will make sure that the trainees feel that they have become "experts" in their domain which will be using Kiwix and offline Wikipedia (T-shirts, ceremonies, diplomas and so on). This self-confidence will enable them to replicate the crash course for teachers, not going into any pedagogical considerations, just showing them how to use the offline Wikipedia in a way that will enrich their current teaching methods.

The trainees will be selected on their knowledge of the internet as a source of information (not just playing games and watching Youtube), their awareness of Wikipedia and their technical skills useful for fixing minor issues with computers, both hardware and software. There are hardly any Wikimedia projects being run in Senegal, so that will not be a criteria. GastelEtzwane (talk) 23:24, 16 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you once again for your answer, GastelEtzwane! Very insightful to know how the selection criteria will impact the effectiveness of the project. MGuadalupe (WMF) (talk) 18:02, 19 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Eligibility confirmed, round 2 2018[edit]

This Project Grants proposal is under review!

We've confirmed your proposal is eligible for round 2 2018 review. Please feel free to ask questions and make changes to this proposal as discussions continue during the community comments period, through January 2, 2019.

The Project Grant committee's formal review for round 2 2018 will occur January 3-January 28, 2019. Grantees will be announced March 1, 2018. See the schedule for more details.

Questions? Contact us.

--I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 02:39, 8 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Participants[edit]

A very nice program, nevertheless there is the need for more volunteers, teachers and librarians with skills and competencies of using IT to impart knowledge should be attracted to join the program so that it will enhance the impact and effective reach of the program. MuhammKabir (talk) 19:59, 23 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you are quite correct.

One of the teachers who will be associated with this project has equipped the schools where he works with computers and has put together a small school library. He will be a great inspiration for the trainees. GastelEtzwane (talk) 00:14, 26 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Project duration[edit]

It seems to me that the project duration is more than 12 months - the second survey will be about 16 months after the beginning of the project. However 12 months is maximum allowed project duration. Ruslik (talk) 20:15, 13 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for your input. I corrected the minor mistake in the project plan. The current plan is:

Preliminaries --> spring/summer 2019

Set up --> September 2019

...

2nd Follow-up survey --> July 2020

-

When I wrote up the plan, I was not counting the preliminaries in the actual project duration.

We need to keep in mind that school related projects run by school year. The planning and approval needs to be done well before the start of a school year, and the follow-up is done after the end of a school year. 12-15 months is a minimum for most official school projects, and I would like to think that Wikimedia Foundation supported projects fall in that category.

A quick example:

I give teacher training courses in computer science. I prepare a draft of my course proposals in November/December 2018 and sound out my superiors on my different prospective proposals. The submission deadline for the 2019-2020 school year is January 30th 2019, and one of my courses will probably be given in May 2020. We tend to plan a long time ahead. GastelEtzwane (talk) 14:00, 14 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal questions[edit]

Hi GastelEtzwane. My name is Alex and I am one of the Program Officers that works on the Community Resources team to review Project Grants in coordination with the committee. Thank you for this thoughtful proposal and all your work on promoting offline access to Wikipedia over the last several years. We receive a number of proposals related to offline access and are often challenged to understand how the project could be sustainable or scaled over the long-term. Your train-the-trainer approach is an exciting development that would be very interesting to pilot. We have a number of questions about the proposal and look forward to hearing your responses.

We understand you have been working with teachers in Senegal since 2015. In reading about this project on outreach wiki, several questions come up:
- Regarding the small scale trial in 2015, the report mostly talks about the process/activities of the project. What were the longer-term outcomes? It sounds like Kiwix was useful for the officers in training out at sea, but what about the other people that were trained?
- Regarding the 2016 project, you write that "The next step in this project will be to prepare a survey and a means of getting feedback from all of the schools and institutions involved at the end of the 2016-2017 school year. Ideally, these reports will be able to determine that the Kiwix offline Wikipedia reader has a positive impact on education as measured by an improvement of exam results." Were you able to complete these surveys and are the results documented anywhere?
- It seems one of the main challenges of the project was "getting reports/survey responses because of the oral nature of culture." How will you address this in this next project?
- In your Empowering African schools with Kiwix Rapid Grant report you write that you were able to establish a reporting procedure for 2016-2017 (not sure if this is the same project as mentioned above) and that the answers would be "collated and available as part of the report". Where was this documented?
- The Rapid Grant report also mentions that the workshop trainings will be documented as well so that others can replicate the materials. Please link to that documentation.
- It is important for us to understand the outcomes of the previous projects as they are quite similar and working with what sounds like a very similar group of teachers (our understanding is that some of the schools would be the same as in the past). We are curious to know how this project proposals builds off both the learnings and challenges of those experiences. Without more information about the outcomes from 2015-2017, it is difficult for us to assess how successful this project will be and how any new approaches would address remaining challenges.
Our understanding is that the goals of the project are focused on awareness building, training, and most importantly, actually having an impact on student learning outcomes. Nichole asked about this above and it would be great to understand in more detail beyond just surveying how you will work with the teachers to get the information needed to really assess impact on learning outcomes. Have you been successful in assessing this in the past? If not, what do you plan to do differently? Can our education team support you in thinking through this aspect of the project?
In the proposal, you write that you hope this project can serve as a train-the-trainers pilot that others can replicate in similar contexts. How do you plan to document your work?
As you know from past grant proposals, we typically do not fund hardware except for Wikimedia affiliates who can manage sharing of equipment with their Wikimedia community. While we can consider this request given its nature as a pilot, we would not be able to do so for future iterations. What are your thoughts on how these types of projects can be sustainable or scale since we do not have the resources to be a hardware distributor? You mention that "for long-term success, funding needs to come from outside the movement" and we agree. Do you have a sense that there are organizations (government or independent) that are interested in funding this? In the past we have had several indications from grantees that if we fund an offline pilot the government could sustain it, but none of these partnerships have developed. It would be interesting to know if you already have leads on potential outside funding or partnerships, especially in Senegal.
Related to the above question, you write that "This project aims to be self-sustaining and financially independent: the following workshops will be funded by the schools themselves, or by other donors." Do you already have confirmation from the schools or other donors that they will fund the workshops?
Please provide more details on the roles and responsibilities of each of the project managers as well as how the costs were estimated ($/hr, number of hrs, etc.).

Thank you again for your work to put this project together and previous efforts that this pilot builds upon. We look forward to learning more about the outcomes from previous years as well as how you are thinking about assessing learning outcomes and sustaining these types of projects in the long-term. Best, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 18:43, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for getting back to me with a few questions. I will answer by numbering my answers. GastelEtzwane (talk) 09:45, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi GastelEtzwane. Great. We look forward to reading your responses as soon as possible. Thanks. Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 19:37, 1 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

1.a) Regarding the small scale trial in 2015, the report mostly talks about...

In 2016, I went back to the schools and training facilities that were part of the 2015 trial and talked to the school directors so that I could obtain some feedback.

At the KOCC Barma school the teachers used and shared the Kiwix program a lot, up to the point a which the external hard drives got infected and they were no longer able to use them as a resource for copying Kiwix (the anti-viral treatment messed up the Kiwix program). That drasticaly reduced the number of new installations. In general (in Europe or in Senegal), users are reluctant to copy programs from a USB key for fear of getting infected, but they will easily share movies, music and games. The teachers I talked to said that they continued to use Kiwix as a reference and were very happy to get a new version in 2016.

In 2015, I had met with the principle ("proviseur") of the Djilor High school, and showed him the Kiwix program, and gave him an external Hard drive as well as a USB flash drive. When I went to Djilor in 2016, I found out that the hardware had remained dormant in a desk drawer in his office. The second time around, I mad a presentation to the director as well as all of the senior staff and representatives of the teachers and the parent's association. The Kiwix program is still widely used by the teachers who have been able to keep their devices virus-free, and I have received request for updates to the encyclopedia.

The US Peace Corps did not really adopt the Kiwix program in 2015, I was a lot more successful in 2016 and was able to do a quick half-day presentation. But there again, the Peace Corps must be steeped in the African oral culture as I did not get any written feedback from them.

1.b) Regarding the 2016 project, you write that ...

The subject is a very sensitive subject, and I was not able to go in person and discuss exam results with the school principals. I do not think that they would communicate that type of results by email, especially not to some person from another country. I did not even try.

I did send out a short questionnaire in July 2017, and I got back 7 answers (from 6 persons). I am willing to share the form and results with your team, but I will not post them here on Meta.

These schools were in areas with poor internet access to start with (or none at all), and that got sometimes more complicated like one of the respondees wrote: « Bonsoir Gabriel, Je m'excuse du retard lié au vol des cables téléphoniques de notre quartier » translated as « Good evening Gabriel, I am sorry about the delay due to the theft of telephone cables in our district ».

1.c) It seems one of the main challenges of the project was "getting reports/survey responses because of the oral nature of culture."...

Two local wikipedians (trainers) will be tasked with obtaining feed back from the trainees and the schools they visited.

1.d) In your Empowering African schools with Kiwix Rapid Grant report you write that you were able to establish a reporting procedure for 2016-2017...

Like I answered above, this is a very sensitive subject, and I did not want to discuss school performance by email. And like I said, I can share the results with your team, but I will not post them here on Meta.

1.e) The Rapid Grant report also mentions that the workshop trainings will be documented...

I have assembled my notes and translated them to English. Next step will be translating back to French.

I also use a very hands-on approach to teacher training, and give very few hand-outs or take-aways.

Kiwix and offline Wikipedia Workshop lesson plan

1.f) It is important for us to understand the outcomes of the previous projects...

The project being proposed will not cover schools I reached out to in 2014, 2015 and 2016. I will certainly visit them to say hello the next time I am in that part of Senegal, but they are not targeted this time. My 2015 trip was shorter that I originally planned, so I was not able to go to the Djilor school. I went to Mbour to meet with the principal, gave him the kiwix hardware for his school and expected him to share it with his teachers. That did not happen, but I was able to go to Djilor in 2016 and hold a Kiwix workshop. I learned a few important lessons from this particular incident, and I do things differenty. In short:

Meet with the school principal and make sure that he is supportive of the project. I found that a small 8 Gb USB key with a few smaller offline Wikipedias (Vikidia for Kids, Wikivoyage, ...) is a perfect gift that will allow the principal to try out the Kiwix program.
Have a meeting at the school with the director and the senior staff and teacher representatives. This is usually a relatively formal meeting during which USB sticks, external hard drives and other devices are officially given to the school, under the responsability of the principal. The staff and the teachers know where the devices are, how many they are, and for what reason the school has recieved them. An agreement can also be signed at that time.
The actual Worshop can now take place.

The 2019 project will use young "Kiwix Ambassadors" who will be running the training workshops in different schools. These schools will mostly be located outside Thiès, in area with very poor or inexistant phone coverage. A few schools will be located in Thiès, in parts of town where the lack of internet access is due to the high cost of data.

The first meetings with the principals will be done by Mouha.ibs and I will attend by phone. We will make it clear that the Workshop itself will be run by the "Kiwix embassadors" and that it is part of their training which is why we are not asking them to pay. We also expect to receive feedback from the schools and we will ask them to participate in follow-up surveys. The principal will then sign an agreement with Mouha.ibs, the senegalese partner in this project.

Hi GastelEtzwane. Thank you for this first round of responses. It would be great to get the rest of the responses by Monday as we are preparing staff recommendations for our final committee call next weekend. You can also email any sensitive information from the outcomes of the previous projects to projectgrants"at"wikimedia"dot"org. Thank you, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 18:41, 8 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Alex Wang (WMF), I will answer the rest of the questions tomorrow, Best regards GastelEtzwane (talk) 00:03, 11 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

2. Our understanding is that the goals of the project are focused on awareness building, training...

I remain convinced that improving the quantity and quality of resource material available for teachers will improve the effectiveness of the courses they prepare. I have been implicated in the production of OER (Open Educational Resources) since the 1990s, sharing math resources along with the French Sésamath association ((French) https://fr.flossmanuals.net/sesamath-mode-demploi/a-propos/) association in the 2000s, and started started promoting Wikipedia in Education in 2006.

In French I would say that it is my « intime conviction » (one could say « firm conviction ») that making more educational resources available will increase the quality of the courses given, and that will better the students knowledge and understanding of the course material. But I have not been able to assess this mainly because I have not been able to go back to Senegal a few years later, track down the teachers and interview them.

I will try to find a teacher trainer in Senegal who will volunteer to help me with this long term assessment. It is not easy to find local volunteers in Africa. And to answer your last question, yes I welcome the support of the education team in working out a way to evaluate the long-term benefits of giving school teachers access to off-line Wikipedia in situations where the teachers are more or less « off the grid ».

3. In the proposal, you write that you hope this project can serve as a train-the-trainers pilot...

We will produce ready-to-use « lesson plans » for thes workshops, both for the workshops held in schools and for the « train the trainers » sessions. I will seek to organize these training workshops in a similar fashion to how we introduce Kiwix in the teacher training programs run in Bénin by the « Zédaga » association (http://zedaga.ch/nos-partenaires/soutiens-individuels/).

4. As you know from past grant proposals, we typically do not fund hardware except for ...

I will be presenting this project at the next General Assembly of the Zédaga Association here in Geneva. That will make it easier to secure funding from other foundations in Switzerland who will only fund hardware (https://www.swissfoundations.ch/). If Zédaga does not agree, I will set up an association to handle the fundraising (It is very easy to create an association in Switzerland Wikimedia Chapters Association/Place of registration/Geneva)

I have been working with different education related associations (Zédaga, Enseignants sans frontières, Sésamath, etc.) and have convinced them that they can add the Kiwix Offline Wikipedia to the digital educational resources pack they provide. Those that are active in development aid know that it is very difficult to obtain local government funding for this type of project. These associations do their fund raising in Switzerland, and the partnerships that are worked out usually have the African partners providing manpower and basic commodities while the Swiss associations bring the hardware and the finances. I do not envisage that we will be able to secure funding from Senegal, the fund-raising will be done in Switzerland and France.

5. Related to the above question, you write that "This project aims to be self-sustaining and financially independent...

This project is still in the planning stage, and schools will be contacted once the financing is secured. Senegalese schools are often very poorly funded and it will take some convincing before they allocate part of their financial resources for off line Wikipedia. This project should be able to showcase the use of off line Wikipedia and encourage other schools to find a way to help finance the continuation of the project.

One promising possibility is obtaining financial support from the different Sengalese expat communities in France (and elsewhere in Europe) who send a lot of money back to their respective home villages and towns. Those who I have talked to are ready to help finance the continuation of the project once they know that we have started (for example: https://sites.google.com/site/agdiaspora/home).

6. Please provide more details on the roles and responsibilities of each of the project managers...

Project manager Switzerland

Responsibilities :

Research and write up workshop lesson plans
Help with writing up press releases and other communication material
Research and establish contacts with Swiss and European associations (fund raising)
Liaise with other European teacher trainers active in Africa (Zédaga, Enseignants sans frontières, ...)
Coordinate with Wikimedia entities and kiwix.org
English/French translation

Project manager Senegal

Responsibilities :

Identification of target schools and contact with the principals
Visiting the target schools
Press contacts with local newspapers, radio stations and TVs
Recruitment of the « Kiwix ambassadors »
Coordination of voluteers
Coordination of local support staff (snacks and meals during workshops, food & lodgingof the European trainer, …)
Wolof/French translation

Aggregated feedback from the committee for Offline Wikipedia in Senegal Schools[edit]

Scoring rubric	Score
(A) Impact potential Does it have the potential to increase gender diversity in Wikimedia projects, either in terms of content, contributors, or both? Does it have the potential for online impact? Can it be sustained, scaled, or adapted elsewhere after the grant ends?	7.4
(B) Community engagement Does it have a specific target community and plan to engage it often? Does it have community support?	5.6
(C) Ability to execute Can the scope be accomplished in the proposed timeframe? Is the budget realistic/efficient ? Do the participants have the necessary skills/experience?	6.8
(D) Measures of success Are there both quantitative and qualitative measures of success? Are they realistic? Can they be measured?	5.8
Additional comments from the Committee: The project fits with Wikimedia's strategic priorities and has a potential for online impact in the form of new readers/editors. It can be (at least theoretically) sustained and scaled after the grant ends. I am very happy to see concrete proposals for the spread of the Wikipedias spirit in Senegal! Unfortunately, a large part of people still do not have access to the Internet and all the positive opportunities that Wikipedia provides.Fortunately, there are tools that enable us to overcome this problem - thanks to offline Wikipedia! The approach is innovative. The potential impact is sizable but there exists a risk that this strategy does not work and propagation of knowledge fizzles at some stage. The impact can be hard to measure but the surveys will help. Despite the fact that the project is interesting, we have too little information in many segments, which does not give us a clear picture of the maximum potential of this project. Except for the part about the budget, other sections of the proposal could include more detail, so I strongly support the proposer that in the future for the following applications be more detailed in writing. Metrics should be expanded. the goal of the project should not be to hold seminars but to implement the use of Wikipedia. Seminar is just a tool for it. I would like to see metrics that will show how much was done in achieving the goal / solving the problem described in proposal, or how much offline wikipedia was really used by teachers/students I hope the grantee can sign an MOU with those school to make sure let we know they have sufficient willing to work together with the grantee. Besides, based on CRC, I think the grantee may have to create a solution to listen to the voice from children to understand and review how the proposal affects the children and sent some updates to the committee later. Because I think how we can make some changes for the children is the most important things in this proposal. I am not sure about the project duration as the second surveys is planned 16 months after the projects starts. This exceeds the allowed project duration of 12 months. The budget looks realistic although administrative expanses ($5,000) should be described in more detail. Whether participants have necessary skills is difficult to judge. This should be clarified during interviews. the budget is very clear, transparent and somewhat large for the expected results. 1. Some of the budgets may need to be reduced. For example, the grantees would like to use $ 620 to get the 20 SD cards (64GB), but in my country, it only needs about $ 300. 2. I worry about the grantees. Mouha.ibs experience is not ready to help another one, because he only has made 120 edits in the Wikipedia website before. There have not been any community engagement so far but it is planned at the beginning of the project. the project has a clear target group supporting the community and the need to be realized I personally know the submitter and he has the capacity and the coinnections to realize this project. In a pedagogical point of view is an interesting project and important to learn "skills for life". I am willing to support this project as it seems interesting enough. However the project duration should be changed to be within the guidelines. The budget should provide more details about the administrative expanses. The ability of participant to carry the project out should be clarified during the interviews. Yes because significant efforts must be made to provide access to knowledge to all. I give support and I strongly encourage the proposers to take advantage of all the possibilities of the seminars and available resources to implement their idea, which is to open wiki door to people of Senegal.

This proposal has been recommended for due diligence review.

The Project Grants Committee has conducted a preliminary assessment of your proposal and recommended it for due diligence review. This means that a majority of the committee reviewers favorably assessed this proposal and have requested further investigation by Wikimedia Foundation staff.

Next steps:

Aggregated committee comments from the committee are posted above. Note that these comments may vary, or even contradict each other, since they reflect the conclusions of multiple individual committee members who independently reviewed this proposal. We recommend that you review all the feedback and post any responses, clarifications or questions on this talk page.
Following due diligence review, a final funding decision will be announced on March 1st, 2019.

Questions? Contact us.

I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 16:40, 6 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Responses to feedback[edit]

(Note: I have moved these responses from GastelEtzwane to here from the above section so it is clear what comments represent feedback from the committee.) I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 06:50, 12 February 2019 (UTC)))[reply]

The approach is innovative. The potential impact is sizable but there exists a risk that this strategy does not work and propagation of knowledge fizzles at some stage. The impact can be hard to measure but the surveys will help.
From what I observed in Senegal, the main risk is having the person who is entrusted with a device locks it away in a cupboard or loans it to an extended family member who has gone off to university to study. I think that formal ceremonies will give a certain status to the program and will proclaim the public nature of these devices. They are not given to individuals, they are given to a school. This will hopefully ensure that the Kiwix program will be shared among all the teachers.
Despite the fact that the project is interesting, we have too little information in many segments, which does not give us a clear picture of the maximum potential of this project. Except for the part about the budget, other sections of the proposal could include more detail, so I strongly support the proposer that in the future for the following applications be more detailed in writing. Metrics should be expanded. the goal of the project should not be to hold seminars but to implement the use of Wikipedia. Seminar is just a tool for it. I would like to see metrics that will show how much was done in achieving the goal / solving the problem described in proposal, or how much offline wikipedia was really used by teachers/students
Yes I agree with this comment. I am finding it very difficult to obtain metrics and am looking forward to working with the education team (this desire is in fact independent of the approval of this grant).
I hope the grantee can sign an MOU with those school to make sure let we know they have sufficient willing to work together with the grantee. Besides, based on CRC, I think the grantee may have to create a solution to listen to the voice from children to understand and review how the proposal affects the children and sent some updates to the committee later. Because I think how we can make some changes for the children is the most important things in this proposal.
This project is aimed a training a cadre of Kiwix ambassadors who will go out to schools where they will demonstrate and share the Kiwix program with the teachers. The Kiwix ambassadors will have no contact with the children, they will only be presenting to the teachers. We do not aim to cram 2 years of pedagogical training into a one-day workshop, for this reason I would think it unwise to ask that these Kiwix ambassadors interact directly with school children.
I am not sure about the project duration as the second surveys is planned 16 months after the projects starts. This exceeds the allowed project duration of 12 months. The budget looks realistic although administrative expanses ($5,000) should be described in more detail. Whether participants have necessary skills is difficult to judge. This should be clarified during interviews.
The administrative expenses are project management expenses which will all be itemized and accounted for. Excess funds will be reimbursed. The project duration has been defined more precisely: September 2019 to July 2020.
the budget is very clear, transparent and somewhat large for the expected results.
We will, of course, do our best to stay under budget. I much prefer handing back excess funds or investing them in another project rather than having to beg for an extension.
1. Some of the budgets may need to be reduced. For example, the grantees would like to use $ 620 to get the 20 SD cards (64GB), but in my country, it only needs about $ 300. 2. I worry about the grantees. Mouha.ibs experience is not ready to help another one, because he only has made 120 edits in the Wikipedia website before.
1. You are right about the hardware costs, they have come down a bit. The Internet-in-a-Box device is now cheaper as well. If the project grant is accepted, we should go over these hardware expenses since we know they will be lower. 2. Mouha.ibs operates mostly in off-line environments, as an instructor in a naval academy or at sea. When on leave, data costs are relatively high.
There have not been any community engagement so far but it is planned at the beginning of the project.
We are building a local community in Senegal, focusing for the moment on the Wiki Loves Africa competition. Mouha.ibs is in charge of the Senegal contest. Right now, things are getting a bit complicated with the elections coming up.

Round 2 2018 decision[edit]

Congratulations! Your proposal has been selected for a Project Grant.

The committee has recommended this proposal and WMF has approved funding for the full amount of your request, $12,000 USD

Comments regarding this decision:
The committee is pleased to support this effort to introduce and encourage engagement with Wikipedia to Senegalese schools using a train the trainers model. The committee has asked that funding be contingent on the following condition:

That the grantees work closely with the Education and New Readers teams at the Wikimedia Foundation on developing appropriate metrics related to project goals, a program evaluation plan, and reporting practices.

Next steps:

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

Upcoming changes to Wikimedia Foundation Grants

Over the last year, the Wikimedia Foundation has been undergoing a community consultation process to launch a new grants strategy. Our proposed programs are posted on Meta here: Grants Strategy Relaunch 2020-2021. If you have suggestions about how we can improve our programs in the future, you can find information about how to give feedback here: Get involved. We are also currently seeking candidates to serve on regional grants committees and we'd appreciate it if you could help us spread the word to strong candidates--you can find out more here. We will launch our new programs in July 2021. If you are interested in submitting future proposals for funding, stay tuned to learn more about our future programs.

On behalf of the Project Grants Committee, KCVelaga (talk) 05:03, 1 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]