Grants talk:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia Taiwan/2017

From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki

Eligibility[edit]

Dear Wikimedia Taiwan colleagues:

Thank you for submitting your eligibility form on 22 October 2017. After reviewing your past grants we've determined that you are eligible to apply for a Simple Process Annual Plan Grant (including funding for staff, up to 1.0 FTE). We appreciate your work on the application so far, and your engagement with us during the eligibility review phase.

Here is some of the work we looked at while evaluating your eligibility for a Simple Annual Plan Grant. Wikimedia Taiwan has been receiving grants from the Wikimedia Foundation since 2014:

Wikimedia Taiwan hosted Wikimania in 2007 and they also participated in this year’s Wikipedia Asian Month. Wikimedia Taiwan has also received several local sponsorships and fees for local projects, which is primarily how they have funded their staff until this point. They would like to continue to seek opportunities for local fundraising as they expand their work.

Wikimedia Taiwan is just now starting to develop more formal documentation of governance procedures, including board roles and responsibilities, and is working on formalizing their procedures around HR and finance; however, these systems are still not highly developed. They do have some experience managing staff, as their Secretary General has been employed fulltime during certain periods. Wikimedia Taiwan will need to do more work in this area before expanding staff significantly, which is why we have recommended they keep their current staffing request at 1.0 FTE or less and are noting that they not be eligible to request funding for staff beyond 1.0 FTE for the upcoming year (2017).

Wikimedia Taiwan’s leadership is stable and committed, and includes board members who have been with the organization since the time of Wikimania as well as active new board members. Wikimedia Taiwan has published a strategic plan outlining their longer term vision for the organization and sees a potential role for the chapter as a regional hub in East Asia.

We look forward to learning more about Wikimedia Taiwan’s work, and reviewing their application for 2017. Welcome to Simple APG!

Best regards, Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 02:14, 1 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Application postponed[edit]

Wikimedia Taiwan has decided to postpone this grant application until 2017. Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 23:31, 1 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

questions from rubin16[edit]

Hi, guys, and thank you for your long-term commitment: 10 years is a serious achievement.

I have a couple of questions regarding your grant:

  • you say that you plan to print brochures to get new editors: are printed materials really successful and have wide distribution? What do you think about distribution of online materials via social media?
  • the structure of your revenues changed: you had significant portion of external revenue before, what has changed in 2017?
  • do you have report for the 2016 financial year? I haven't found it quickly and it is essential to understand changes compared to 2016.

Best regards, rubin16 (talk) 15:08, 16 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, @Rubin16: Thank you for the question. I will give you the answer from my perspective.
  • The brochures is very useful when in the off-line meet-ups and also the outreach opportunity, such as the Wikipedia Education Program and student clubs in the universities. There are many new comers who come to us with limited tech knowledge, so this would be helpful for them to provide them physical educational materials. However, we do try not only physical brochures to help the editors, for example, to introduce some user friendly online materials and community support on-wiki or other social platform (such as the facebook group page) and try to preserve our brochures and recycle them for as many times as possible. We applied PEG grant to print about 1000 brochures in 2014, and we are still using them. It needs to be updated after 3 years usage.
  • We are still getting some external revenue, that's why part of 0.5 staff are not using the money from the Simple APG grant. There were some donation from a local foundation stop due to their change of focus, but there is also two new grants that we get from collaboration with local government and academic institution. So if you mean the total number of income it's not change much. If we only want to maintain as last two years, it's ok, but we want to support our community organizers in a more sustainable and professional way.
  • Right now there is only bookkeeping log on meta for 2016. Reke can provide further detail.
--Liang(WMTW) (talk) 00:36, 17 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Something to add, but my English is not good, I'll write in Chinese and ask Liang to translate lest misunderstanding.
  • 關於收入結構改變：2015-2016年主要外部收入是來自於跟大學合作進行的學術研究案，經費來源是大學向台灣政府單位申請、再將部分工作包給台灣分會執行。然而這個案子將在2017年的12月就將結束，不確定是否還能持續。同時，經費實際上無法供應全職人員薪資。過去兩年協會全職人員是倚賴其他收入來源以維持生活。如今協會業務已經擴展，我們希望能夠取得比較穩定的經費來源，才能持續向外爭取外部收入。
  • Translation by Liang: Regarding the change in revenue structure, the principal income source from 2015 to 2016 was from an academic research Grant collaborate with a university. The budget of this grant is that the university request money from the Taiwanese government and then outsource the project to our chapter. However, this academic research grant will be completed in December, 2017. We are not sure whether a new grant from the same university will be possible. In the mean time, our current income cannot support the salary of 1 FTE. During the past two years our full time staff was depending on other way of earning his income to support his life. As our scope has grown, we want to take the opportunity to apply a more stable way of income, so we can then go outreach for more ways of donation.
  • 關於財務報告，製作資產負債表(Blance Sheet)其實是台灣法律上規定社團組織需要執行的義務，所以我們已經在2016年12月製作完成，由理事會審核、會員大會通過。今天稍晚我會將表格補充在 Liang 提到的頁面最後一章，正如同2015年的做法一樣。
  • Translation by Liang: Regarding the financial report, actually it is our obligation to produce balance sheet as a legal entity under Taiwanese authority. So we have already produced it in December 2016 and it was approved by the chapter's member assembly and also our chapter's board. Later today I will provide it attached in the bottom of the financial report page which Liang mentions above. Just like what we've done for the financial report of 2015.
--Reke (talk) 05:14, 17 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

questions from Alleycat80[edit]

Hi, and thanks for submitting an application!

I have a few thoughts and clarifications I would like your feedback on.

community:

  • I want to know, are the 10 volunteers working across 6 communities operating in different geographic areas? Do the different plans for the different communities overlap somehow?
  • Also, how big is your existing community? (how big is the "core" active community vs. the contributor community at large?)

staffing

  • What is "tender project execution" that takes 25% of your proposed secretary role?


outreach / new editors

  • I encourage you to take a look at software developed by Wikimedia Israel - it's in Hebrew but me or my staff can show you. We got ~100 new articles written using the software, it's quite nice. (I'm mentioning this because you said you were going to invest in online tools and tutorials).
  • Do you have methodologies in place for contacting participants after events? If so, that would be a good thing to state them, and if you don't, I'd highly recommend putting such methodologies in place.

Alleycat80 (talk) 13:06, 1 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you.

  1. Are the 10 volunteers working across 6 communities operating in different geographic areas?
    • Yes. Volunteers in National Taiwan University Wiki Research & Women’s Promotion Community are live in Taipei City, Zhongshan University of Medical Sciences Wikipedia are in Taichung City. Hsinchu Wikimedia Community is in Hsinchu City & Kaohsiung Wiki Community is in Kaohsiung of course. Wiki Medical Community Project work online, so volunteers can live in everywhere with internet.
  2. Do the different plans for the different communities overlap somehow?
    • Yes. For example, National Taiwan University Wiki Research is a student club in university, they focus in education program, but they have invited organizer of Women Community to join their meetup and have a promoting speech. All communities can support each other if they find some same targets.
  3. What is "tender project execution" that takes 25% of your proposed secretary role?
    • We have two tender project. In the first one, we need cooperate with National Cheng-Chi University, to incubate some Wikipedia in languages of Taiwanese aborigines. The second one, we cooperate with Government of Chiayi County, to teach some high school students and local cultural and history workers edit Wikipedia, and help them edit some articles about history of Chiayi.
  4. Do you have methodologies in place for contacting participants after events?
    • Yes. There are many rookies join the events hold by every communities, we'll cooperate with organizers, push them use these resources to help new partners they meet.

--Reke (talk) 12:23, 4 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Question from Becksguy[edit]

I note that the WMF Program Officer has recommended 1.0 FTE (Full Time Equivalent) for the grant period 2017-2018, and you are requesting 1.0 FTE for the Secretary General position, as the part time 0.5 FTE position is funded from other sources. Are these two positions paid employees, as they appear to be? Are all the other positions or functions in the Staff Plan unpaid volunteers? I'm trying to get a clear picture of the staff structure. Thank you. - Becksguy (talk) 21:38, 28 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. There are three kinds of our positions or functions.
  1. Secretary General (1 FTE) and Operation Assistance (0.5 FTE) are paid staffs in plan.
  2. Members of board are volunteers. They can't be paid stuff by law, but they may have some allowance for traveling or food sometimes.
  3. We may need some outsourcing staffs in some program. In program "Outreach to New Editors", we ask some grant for designer to help us typesetting if volunteer couldn't do. Outsourcing staffs are paid but not established post, they are only contractors.
--Reke (talk) 06:06, 29 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Revision after WMCON17[edit]

Hi Winifred and all the Simple APG committee members,

Thank you for your suggestion and help from the Wikimedia Conference. Your contribution to our proposal really helps. I was sitting with Reke and modifying the whole proposal yesterday. We are revising the following items:

  1. The numbers of goals - We will revise partly of these numbers. Since part of the goals of numbers contains the project that we are continuing hosting without expenses. The only numbers of goals we have changed is the goals on Program 3.
  2. The numbers of budget - Reke has made a fork file from the original budget. In the new budget, he will keep the budget number as the same if the money comes from other sources (e.g. the expense for hiring the part time staff). For the changes he makes, he will change the Unit first. But if the Unit is impossible to change (may due to the budget for that option is using estimation and average, so some of the Unit cost are varied from unit to unit), then the new budget will change its cost per cells. Please refer to Reke's file (he will send to this mail string later), he is making the cells that have changed in another color, so we can see the changes more clearly. The staff expense is now 2 then the original one options, since the full time staff salary will be changed due to the cut in the month and the part-time staff salary will stay the same.
  3. The already happened expenses from January to April - We will add the existed expense from January to April, including expenses of Art+Feminism that took place in March (726 USD in total), and rent for the Wikimedia Taiwan office from January to April (1579 USD in total)

Also I want to use this chance to reply some additional ideas on the questions Simple APG committee has proposed to me:

  1. Chinmayi was wondering how we can solve the issue of member's gender gap. I remember I told you there is still a dilemma on should we expand the number of boards and members or keep the member size small so we can easier to have successful general assembly. However, I do bring the concerns back to Reke, he analyzed that actually even though the members are having less female, however, the organizers in our communities has better situation on gender gap then the members proportion, I mean there are 4 out of the 10 community core members are female. We reflect that we still need to figure out how can we make the gender gap issue in our chapter can be solved, but we do see the promising potential more female to join if we can keep these organizers in a longer relationship with the chapter.
  2. About big picture, we are having the following projects going on but didn't write about them much in the SImple APG proposal, as Ido kindly mentioned we should write about what are those here are those undergoing things we are doing and how the chapter personnel is involved in:
    1. Mostly use the man power of a staff -
    2. Mostly use the man power of boards -
    3. Mostly use the man power of boards and a staff -

Hope this clarifies things and we may move to the next step. Thank you.

Very much so, thank you Liang! Alleycat80 (talk) 23:18, 13 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

--Liang(WMTW) (talk) 04:32, 8 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Adding my comments on what Liang has written about the gendergap comment. Firstly I think Wikimedia Taiwan is definitely better than most communities in terms of the gender ratios on their board. But having said that I also think that their gender ratios in their membership can be improved ( which is now 6 out of 40). My suggestions are based on the understanding of the community from what conversation I have had. The community has been very active in terms of onboarding activities and even with respect to gender gap activities. These activites gives them a perfect opportunity to lead in terms of gender ratios. I like what Liang is suggesting it could be a good start.

--Chinmayisk (talk) 05:11, 12 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

One more thing[edit]

Hi Liang, I'm just noting that metrics in the table you provided seem to not be in line with the proposal. I tried to explain that to myself, and thought that maybe this is because you include metrics for things you're not requesting direct funding for? One example would be in program #1, you state that there will be "700 participants in total, including 50 new editors and 10 active editors.", but in the spreadsheet there are 1,000 participants. The same goes to content pages - 400 vs 350 (which seems to make even less sense). Any thoughts? Alleycat80 (talk) 23:24, 13 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi@Alleycat80: Thank you for correct us the error. When Reke and I revised the proposal, we miss the google spreadsheet. Now the google spreadsheet is revised according to our new adjustment of applying date and goals too. Thank you for point that out! --Liang(WMTW) (talk) 09:47, 14 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Reke & Liang!

Simple Annual Plan Grant Committee Recommendation[edit]

Committee recommendations
Funding recommendations:

The committee recommends full funding for Wikimedia Taiwan for the 8-month grant term requested. Funding in the upcoming grant period may be a good foundation for building capacity in areas like learning and increasing diversity. This will be a chance for Wikimedia Taiwan to gain more organizational stability. For example, by paying staff consistently. It was helpful to discuss this application at the Wikimedia Conference, and so we would recommend making sure that the committee has an opportunity to meet with the applicant and clarify future proposals as well.

Strengths identified by the committee:
  • Wikimedia Taiwan has a capable and committed leadership team.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan is a community-focused organization, with a committed team of volunteers.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan has aimed for ambitious targets, and will have good impact in an important and less represented region.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan has strong partnerships within and outside the Wikimedia movement.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan has been responsive to discussions about the grant application and suggestions from committee members, during the application process.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan has been remarkably successful in funding their activities independently, especially for such a small organization with limited resources.
Concerns identified by the committee:
  • Wikimedia Taiwan needs to improve on articulating goals and learning.
  • Some aspects of this plan were unclear at first, such as the role of the chapter in volunteer-led projects, and vague line items in the budget such as community funding spending. These required clarifications from the applicants during the application process.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan may not yet have capacity in some areas where they are making big plans. For example, they are planning a large regional conference, which seems ambitious since they have not had a major event since 2007.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan should improve its understanding of and emphasis on diversity, including improving the gender balance in its membership.
  • Programs like printing brochures may have limited impact and impact may be difficult to assess.
  • Wikimedia Taiwan’s community must overcome challenges with respect to interacting with the international movement, due to language barriers. Translation is likely to be an ongoing challenge that the organization will continue to need to address.
  • While Wikimedia Taiwan has had paid staff in the past, they have not been able to pay their staff consistently. The committee hopes this grant can bring the organization more stability.
According to the committee's recommendation, this grant is approved by WMF in the amount of NT$1,217,834 for 8 months. Many thanks to the committee for this recommendation and to the WMTW team for your work on this application. Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 13:00, 30 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Retrieved from "https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grants_talk:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia_Taiwan/2017&oldid=17621070"