North American Wikimedians/Hub
In April 2026, the Grants:Programs/Hub Fund/CANCUS (Canada, Caribbean, US) Hub Proposal was approved by the Wikimedia Foundation.
This page exists to gather consultation on the name of the hub, the process and timeline for selection of the Steering Committee, and also to share more on what responsibilities it covers. Please provide feedback on the talk page.
We wish to gather suggestions from now until mid-May, and then launch on a Steering Committee process so that the initial round of members can be selected by the end of June 2026.
Rebranding process
[edit]The current provisional hub title is the CANCUS Hub (Canada, Caribbean, US). This is possibly an awkward name, and other suggestions have started coming in.
Our hub largely aligns with WikiConference North America, though we have generally decided to not use "North America" in the formal title because Wikimedia Mexico is not a participant yet.
Peer organizations are Wikimedia CEE Hub (Central and Eastern Europe) and the ESEAP Hub (East, Southeast Asia and the Pacific), though we don't necessarily have to follow that naming convention.
Steering Committee process
[edit]From the grant application:
To ensure that the Hub remains community driven, the governance model will consist of a 7-person publicly elected Steering Committee with members representing each community e.g. 1 member representing the Caribbean, 1 member representing Indigenous communities, 2 members representing the U.S., 2 members representing Canada, and 1 appointed member who has expert matter experience that will be appointed by the Steering Committee. The elections process will be fair and transparent with a candidate criteria developed by Hub staff in partnership with regional movement leaders from the WikiConference North America user group. Steering Committee members will play an advisory role helping to shape the long term vision of the Hub, supporting the regional rapid funds decision making process, and ensuring the Hub doesn’t impose a monolith over diverse regional sub-groups.
Steering Committee members may be selected by methods to be determined by this consultation, e.g,:
- Ballot sent to participants over the last 3 years of WikiConference North America
- On-wiki public voting
- Selection by affiliates and/or informal regional groups
- Consensus-driven discussion
- Some combination of the above, or alternative methods
Steering committee responsibilities
[edit]From the grant application, Steering Committee members will help develop the mission/vision and long-term planning for the work of the two staff, one based in Canada and one based in the United States:
The fiscal sponsor for the CANCUS Hub will be Wikimedia Canada and they will have oversight over the operational and financial stability of the Hub. The day to day running of the Hub will be led by two paid positions. One part time Administrative Manager at 24 hours a week who will be based in Canada and supervised by Wikimedia Canada. And one Programs Manager at 32 hours a week who will be based in the United States and supervised by Wikimedia New York City. As the Hub progresses, our vision would be to hire an additional paid staff member that would be based in the Caribbean. At present, there are no Wikimedia chapters or user groups on the ground in the Caribbean who could support the supervision and local legal and nonprofit/charity requirements of a paid staff member.
Job applications
[edit]- CANCUS Hub Admininistrative Manager (Canada-based)
- CANCUS Hub Programs Manager (US-based)