Grants talk:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia District of Columbia/2016-2017

Eligibility[edit]

Hello, Wikimedia District of Columbia colleagues:

Thank you for submitting your eligibility form on 29 August. After reviewing your past grants we've determined that you are eligible to apply for a Simple Process Annual Plan Grant, once the final Art+Feminism grant report is complete (since WMUS-DC is the fiscal sponsor for this project). Thank you for your engagement so far in the eligibility process and for your exciting work in the area of institutional partnerships.

Here is some of the work we looked at while evaluating your eligibility for a Simple Annual Plan Grant. Wikimedia District of Columbia has received nine grants from the Wikimedia Foundation since 2010:

Within the institutional partnerships program, WMUS-DC is building on its past expertise in editing events and is poised to take advantage of a wealth of local opportunities for partnerships with government and cultural institutions. In 2015-2016, WMUS-DC has been building expertise in organizing editing events in collaboration with partner institutions, with more than forty events hosted in the current year. In 2015, WMUS-DC organized a meeting for government agencies specializing in research or data collection, in collaboration with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. In 2014, the organization organized its first workshop to train volunteers who are coordinating events, and WMUS-DC wishes to continue this work as part of the Training and Support program in the upcoming year. During the past year, WMUS-DC volunteers have also been coordinating with WMF’s advocacy team on copyright advocacy work, which the organization plans to continue through its Public Policy program. In the meantime, the chapter has been running a small microgrants program, as well as serving as fiscal sponsor for several grants including several grants to Wikimedia New York City and the Art+Feminism project, further demonstrating their ability to receive and manage funds. This work will be continued as part of the Grantmaking and Sponsorship program. Beyond this, WMUS-DC is launching an experimental program called Content Development, which will focus on running two editing contests in the upcoming year.

The amount of funding requested by WMUS-DC is equal to the amount required to run the Institutional Partnerships program, and the four other programs require limited financial support that will be financed through donations revenue. The bulk of the funding requested is to bring on one full time staff person to manage the Institutional Partnerships program.

Wikimedia District of Columbia has a stable and engaged board, with board members who are actively involved in the day-to-day implementation of its programs as well as several volunteers who focus on the operational aspects of running this organization. Beyond this, the chapter is supported by several key volunteers that are involved with its programs, and a new advisory group structure. Due to experience running Wikimania 2012, WMUS-DC has some HR policies in place, including hiring and termination policies, and has considered the changes that will be involved with bringing on a fulltime staff person, including payroll management and reporting structures to the board.

WMUS-DC has a fiscal year that runs from October to September, and so this grant period will be shortened by six weeks to align with WMUS-DC’s fiscal year.

We are looking forward to reviewing Wikimedia District of Columbia’s application!

Best regards, Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 03:30, 26 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Questions from Simple APG Committee Members[edit]

Questions from Ido[edit]

Hi Wikimedia DC! Thank you very much for this professoinal, concise and well documented submission! The fact that there are (almost...) no questions from SAPG members speaks for itself. I do have two distinct questions:

Mass media upload - while I do understand your aim is to get a workflow going (with Library of Congress, probably), and so the target is to mass upload 10k images, do you intend (as a consquence of this action or within future mass uploads) to also use mass uploaded images to improve existing articles? I would highly recommend you do so - it does not only benefit Wiki projects, but serves as a way to motivate LoC employees, that now know that the content uploaded is being consumed by Wikipedia readers (and with careful design you can even show them the impact!). In short, highly recommended.

Small 2,500$ Grants - I find it curious as to why this program exists, now that WMF has a rapid grant programme. It seems like a historic redundancy. I gather this is more a questions to WMF than to you, so I turn Winifred's attention to my question, as well. This especially applies to the goal of funding 3 grants outside of the DC region (the other two I can perhaps undernstand).

Thank you, and I wish you a fruitful year! Alleycat80 (talk) 04:50, 1 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Alleycat80! Thank you for the questions!

We're certainly interested in using the media files collected through mass uploads to improve articles. However, we don't currently have a good workflow in place for doing so; the mass upload itself would rely heavily on automated processing, so we would not necessarily have a significant pool of volunteers committed to the program as a whole, and recruiting volunteers specifically to add already-uploaded files to articles is likely to be challenging (as that's not really the most interesting sort of work). If you have any recommendations in this area, we'd be very grateful to hear them!

No specifically, besides the fact that I'd like to see follow up work, maybe in next year's grant that actually utilizes these images or advertises the materials uploaded, to allow them to be used. It's a key metric in analyzing ROI on such processes which take time and careful planning, in my humble opinion.

The WMDC small grants program is indeed a historical artifact of sorts; we introduced it several years ago in response to concerns that the WMF grantmaking processes (as they existed at the time) were too challenging for inexperienced applicants. We're definitely considering how the new WMF rapid grants program might affect our grantmaking priorities; however, since the program was introduced relatively late in our annual planning process last year, we didn't have an opportunity to really see whether it will cover all of the demand for our existing program. If that turns out to be the case, then we may discontinue our small grants program in the 2017-18 fiscal year and direct interested parties to the WMF one instead.

Kirill Lokshin (talk) 16:46, 1 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the detailed feedback. Appreciate your candor on the subject! Alleycat80 (talk) 11:49, 2 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Committee assessment and decision[edit]

Committee recommendations
Funding recommendations: The committee recommends funding this application at $63,827, although some committee members have concerns about the $2,500 budgeted for grants.
Strengths identified by the committee: This plan is clear, with well-defined goals, and includes a diverse portfolio of programs, including content-focused work in institutional partnerships and competitions, and exploratory work in the area of public policy. This plan is supported by committed leadership, strong partnerships, and involved volunteers. The plan includes relevant metrics and realistic targets. The committee is glad to see that WMUS-DC is engaging in long-term strategic planning, now that they are planning to bring on staff. WMUS-DC has also provided a clear staffing plan with links to policies for managing staff, a description of how staff time will be allocated to different priorities, a description of the link between staff activities and the organization’s strategic objectives, and contingency plans in case full funding is not received
Concerns identified by the committee: The committee is concerned that some of the targets provided may be low with respect to the amount of funding requested, which is significant at $63,827. While committee members were concerned with the funding devoted to the grantmaking program, which is not likely to lead to significant results, WMUS-DC’s explanation that they want more time to understand how well Rapid grants work for their community before ending their local grants program makes sense, as it is not yet clear that Rapid grants can fulfill their community’s needs. The committee suggests that WMUS-DC discuss with staff how to implement and evaluate this program in the current year.

On behalf of the Simple APG Committee, Alleycat80 (talk) 08:03, 18 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you Alleycat80 (and the rest of the SAPG committee!) for the feedback! We'll definitely keep your recommendations in mind as we execute our programs this year, as well as during our planning process for next year's programs. Kirill Lokshin (talk) 13:02, 18 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Decision from WMF
Funding decision: WMF approves this grant in the amount of $63,827. We will work with the WMUS-DC team to monitor the impact of grants spending over the course of the year, in order to reassess this area for future applications. Thanks to the committee for this recommendation, and to WMUS-DC for this high quality application. Looking forward to our work together. Best, Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 23:04, 30 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]