Wikimedia Argentina/Propuesta anual 2018/Anexo1
Program 2: Culture & Open Knowledge[edit]
Background & Context
Since its inception, GLAM program has been the framework to all cultural projects we have carried out. This line of work is being encouraged by our Wikipedian in Residence and it will remain fundamental to the work undertaken by Wikimedia Argentina.
Likewise, in 2017, the program began to work with new cultural communities and organizations outside the classic definition of GLAM. Free culture and its positioning within the alternative/fringe cultural sector, as well as our work beyond Wikipedia, especially with projects like Wikidata, have opened new lines of work, which are helping us include new thematic communities and come closer to new local cultural trends, connected to Open Data, Open GLAM, Fact Checking and reliability, Copyright and licences, Gender and Diversity.
During 2018 we are planning to continue working along these lines which suit our context much better, with the aim of dealing with the following challenges:
- Traditional cultural institutions in Latin America are monopolized by elites, which prevents the opening and dissemination of knowledge.
- Popular culture, which has a strong presence in Argentina and the region, circulates through non-traditional channels.
- Cultural institutions, governments and societies are unaware of the meaning of free culture. This has not been institutionalized and lacks a legal framework.
For this reason we have locally redefined the name of the GLAM program to "Culture and Open Knowledge", since we need to extend the scope of the program to be functional in our context.
What do we want to do in 2018?
a) Knowledge: To release, create, improve and position Argentine and Latin American culture locally, regionally and globally.
| Objective | Result 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To release, create and improve 65,000 pages boosting our WIR’s work and involving 500 editors (active and new) regarding Argentine and Latin American culture. | 37000 on Commons
7500 created/improved in other projects. 320 editors 30% position (so far) |
50,000 pages on Commons, 45% position.
15,000 pages created on other Wikimedia projects. 500 editors 50 women. |
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| To promote the institutionalization of free culture in 10 cultural organizations which work on diverse and locally relevant themes. | 7 institutions | 200 cultural influencers trained. 80% women
70% of the trained influencers understand the importance of open culture. This means that the 30% of the organizations are starting to free -licence their heritage. |
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b) Community:To involve new cultural profiles and build new thematic communities associated with the program.
| Objective | Result 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To organize a national OpenGlam network that involves at least 5 cultural institutions so as to create new projects in the Argentine cultural arena. | New objective | Network made up of at least 10 leaders from 5 Argentine cultural institutions. |
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| To improve the reach and diversity of the program involving 200 new cultural influencers from Argentina, in projects about OpenData, Fact Checking and Diversity. | New objective | Train 200 influencers (150 women) within the framework of 3 new cultural training projects.
60% modify their perception on Wikipedia as a reliable source of information. |
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c) Cooperación regional: Impulsar una red regional de incidencia sobre políticas públicas en el marco de Iberocoop.
| Objective | Result 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To build, within Iberocoop network, a work team with local and regional influence regarding public policies connected to free knowledge. | New objective | To involve at least 3 new regional chapters in the network. |
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Outcomes
- To increase the variety of Wikimedia projects and bridge the gaps regarding content.
- To consolidate Wikipedia as a reliable source of information in Argentine society.
- To position WMAR and Iberocoop as influential organizations in free culture and open knowledge.
Other relevant questions to understand the approach of the Culture & Open Knowledge
Why are granted-metrics relevant to this program?
Diversity and quality metrics are important to the program for the following reasons:
Diversity:
The new program will allow us to work with new cultural and government institutions, thematic organizations and new local interest groups. This will increase the diversity of the knowledge created and expand and diversify our community of editors also from a gender perspective.
Quality
The program aims at continuing freeing, creating and improving knowledge, especially in relation to Argentine and Latin American culture and in relation to missing knowledge. The use of knowledge and its appropriation by society is still one of the greatest quality indicators but not the only one. This year we will focus on measuring cultural changes within organizations and society, by analysing to what extent society has appropriated “free culture” as a way of building more open and reliable knowledge
There are many cultural programs around the movement, how will the movement be able to learn?
Through this program we are going to:
- Launch new online cultural trainings which could be of interest to other regional user groups and chapters. These will take place on our open code online learning platform which is ready and available to be adapted for any interested chapter or user group in the movement.
- We want to create a new regional cooperation network with the objective of furthering the debate about copyright and free licence in Latin America. Besides the group of influence in European policy, this will be the first time a regional community gets organized to work together regarding public policy. We will document all the learning achievements so that they can make up an exportable model for other communities within the movement.
- Beyond our regional work, we have been working with new cultural communities that are gradually incorporating free culture in their institutions. The situation regarding large cultural institutions is very similar at a regional level, where much of the culture is produced and built outside traditional GLAM institutions. We will work to build and record all the learning so that it can be incorporated and can also serve as a guide for other regional organization
Risk assessment
Argentina’s continuous economic and political fluctuations affect institutions’ everyday life (change of authorities, strikes, lack of motivation, etc) and make people feel that any external project which is not work-oriented will increase their workload. For that reason, we will design work plans together with the institutions, for alliances to always be considered a win-win situation.
At the same time, we will launch online and offline training courses about current topics which can meet the needs of new participants. There is a chance for priority or current topics to change and thus demand changes in our main proposals. To mitigate this risk factor, we will work in identifying key themes, together with strategic counterparts as well as in keeping an agenda which is flexible enough to assimilate these changes.
Risk assessment: medium-low
Program 1: Education Program[edit]
Background & Context
This is without doubt the most characteristic program of Wikimedia Argentina. We have created alliances at a local and national level and launched face-to-face and virtual activities which could be implemented both inside and outside the classroom, in spaces of non-formal education, where the teacher retains their leading role.
All the projects are the answer to the challenges in Argentina which are also present in the region:*
- Wikipuentes, is a remote learning course that meets the demand of teacher training across the country. This reality can be seen in the results and impact of the different editions of the course, where more than 80% of the participants come from inland provinces.
- We see the Education Program as a tool to reduce the social and digital gap and involve boys and girls equally. In this line, we launch the project “Editing Club”, which can be developed both in and outside the classroom, with or without the Internet, and whose purpose is to add value to the local historical heritage
- The debate around the future of education and the teacher’s role is a current issue in Argentina.Through “Wikipedia in your University” project not only do we involve new university editors, scholars and researchers but we also reclaim the teacher’s role as a creator of high-quality content
- In education, context is key. For this reason we launched Wiki & Rights project, focused on a socially relevant topic for the Argentine community: human rights. The project aims to involve the society in its active role as builder of its local history.
What do we want to do in 2018?
a) Knowledge: To involve teachers and students in the building of high-quality and locally relevant knowledge.
| Objective | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| We will create 1000 articles related to Argentine natural and cultural heritage and new academic themes, bringing along both students and teachers. | Around 900 articles (56%)
500 teachers 500 students |
1000 articles (70% high quality)
10 universities 800 students. 600 teachers, at least 50% women. |
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b) Community: To build a community of teachers that scale our proposals nationally.
| Objective | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Actividades 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To build a network of teachers, ambassadors of WMAR educational program at a national. | New objective | At least 35 teachers participate in the network. |
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| To involve 150 specialists in human rights to promote the creation of a thematic community. | 60 articles
176 editors (so far) |
150 new articles (70% high quality)
80% of participants regard Wikipedia as a tool for democratizing knowledge. |
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c) Regional Cooperation: To promote the development of new programs in education regionally.
| Objectivo | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Actividades 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To help setting up new Education programs in 4 countries in the region by scaling Wikipuentes and adapting Wikilesa. | New objective | 2 Wikipuentes fostered regionally.
6 Wiki & Rights - Wikilesa- in Chile, México, Uruguay, Venezuela and Argentina. |
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| To accompany and promote the deployment of one new educational program in one Wikimedia emerging community in the region. | New objective | To work with at least 60 teachers in Paraguay by strengthening our alliance with the Ministry of Paraguay official.
Carry out 1 Wikipuentes in the country |
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Outcomes
- To position the use of Wikipedia as an educational resource and expand the program's influence nationally.
- To position Wikipedia as a tool of social influence.
- To build new communities and diverse communities of editors (teachers, students, human rights influencers etc.)
- To expand and promote new education programs in Latin America.
Other relevant questions to understand the approach of the Education Program
Why are granted-metrics relevant to this program?
Diversity and quality metrics are important to the program for the following reasons:
Diversity
As regards diversity, educational spaces gives us a unique opportunity to start to bridge the gender gap in Wikipedia. In Argentina gender parity within educational spaces, schools in particular, is practically 50%. To empower girls to write in Wikipedia and to learn about their experience and relationship with the community is fundamental to keep on working in building healthy and inclusive communities.
Quality
Quality will be measure in two different ways. We will keep on applying the quality guide which we designed last year and which is also a guide for teachers in the classrooms. On the other hand, this year we want to emphasize on the perception of the use of Wikipedia in the classroom.Working with Wikipedia as an educational tool produces changes in both teachers and students’ basic skills and we would like to analyse how theses changes are addressed within the classroom.Likewise we continue broadening the reach of education by involving the civil society as actively responsible for democratizing knowledge.
Wikimedia Argentina is already present at schools, why is it so important to build a teachers’ community?
The classic WMAR community is not made up of teachers. This has not stopped us -and will not stop us- from getting to the classrooms and achieving good results; we will keep on fostering the Editing Club and Wikipedia at University in new schools and universities. But to date, these projects have depended -and continue to depend- a lot on the presence of WMAR for their coordination, precisely because of the lack of teachers’ community empowered enough to make the program grow within their institutions. So far our projects have had a short-term impact. They start and finish and last for a certain length of time. Although more and more teachers are repeating the experience, building a teachers’ network of national reach is the project we think necessary to have a long-term impact. We want Wikipedia to be part of the curricula and, to this effect, we need to work with a network of strategic teachers, who can not only implement the projects but act as ambassadors of the program.
Risk assessment
- Salary issues related to inflation affect the normal development of the school calendar (classes start later because of claims, strikes, etc). To deal with this situation, in 2017 we could adapt our agenda to this reality thanks to the virtual training course and the flexibility of all our projects as they can be implemented inside and outside the classroom, with or without Internet etc. This adaptability to the context makes the program stable and less prone to risks.
- Regionally we will scale Wiki & Rights and Wikipuentes during 2018, as we have agreed with the chapters and user groups involved, although the local contexts may try to influence in their development. A specially sensitive case is Venezuela but we have the technical and institutional resources to support the execution of the projects -even to help them financially to develop any activity- and Wikimedia Venezuela counts with a strong local community.
- We want to launch new educational projects in emerging communities. We still defining our work for next year and there are resources that have been allocated to introduce a new education program in Paraguay.
Risk assessment: medium-low
Program 3: Community Building[edit]
Background & Context
After 2 years since the Community Support program was set up, we can say that the local community does not fit the classic definition of “a great community of volunteers leading projects”. WMAR is the result of a multiplicity of communities -wikimedians and non-wikimedians- who include editors, participants and counterparts who collaborate boosting our programs.
Currently, our community can be defines as follows:
- Argentine society has a strong tradition in collective participation around topics seen as socially relevant. We have proved that enabling the encounter between volunteers with interests in common and accompanying them in the building of thematic communities promotes their loyalty to WMAR.
- We have proved that enthusiasm raises when our calls imply editing with a purpose. For that reason, our activities have to be presented and designed to cover compelling themes, relevant to the local community.
- Position our historical community in a role of mentors that accompany, support and encourage the participation of new participants, increase and expand the WMAR's community of volunteers.
At a regional level we will keep strengthening and fostering the impact of Iberocoop as a network. We will continue encouraging projects together, but we will work to establish the network as a mentoring space, to identify and support new emerging communities regionally.
At an international level, we will keep working to foster the construction of new global thematic communities within the movement. In 2017 we have worked to help to start establishing gender and educational communities. We want to continue working to strengthen the movement from our expertise by sharing learnings and knowledge and supporting the definition of global support networks.
What do we want to do in 2018?
a) Knowledge: Support and promote the appearance of new thematic communities organized under the objective of editing with a purpose.
| Objective | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| To strengthen the 2 existing thematic communities and promote the creation of 3 new ones within WMAR so as to increase and improve the contents in Wikimedia projects. | 2 new thematic communities. | 30 involved active and new members (10 women)
To improve at least 800 content pages within Wikimedia projects. |
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b) Community: Strengthen and broaden the WMAR community, working towards making it the reflection of the local community.
| Objective | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Support 10 community projects by introducing a program of mentoring and knowledge transfer so as to broaden the WMAR community. | New objective | To actively involved 10 active volunteers as mentors.
4 skill-transfer workshops. |
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| To diversify the profile of the community engaging 20 new active volunteers from outside WMAR. | New objective | 20 new volunteers coming from counterparts (journalists, activists, etc)
Involve 400 participants (50 women) in 22 offline meetings. |
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c) Cooperation: Accompany and mentor the appearance of new emerging communities in the region and within the movement
| Objective | Results 2017 (expected) | Metrics 2018 | Activities 2018 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Promote Iberocoop as a mentoring space by supporting and accompanying regional emerging communities. | New objective | Mentor 2 new emerging communities in Latin America. |
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| To share our experiences and learnings to promote thematic communities within the movement. | New objective | Support the growth and strengthening the educational and gender community within the Wikimedia movement. |
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Outcomes
- WMAR is an inclusive and diverse organization built around communities with multiple spaces for participation.
- To expand and build a loyal and motivated community as part of WMAR.
- The movement reflects the sum of knowledge of a plural and diverse community.
Other relevant questions to understand the approach of the Education Program
Why are granted-metrics relevant to this program?
Diversity and quality metrics are important to the program for the following reasons:
Diversity
Including women as an active part within the movement is one of the main objectives both in the movement and in WMAR community. To this effect, we will continue strengthening our gender community and we will identify women mentors who will accompany possible women volunteers, so that these get involved in different roles as part of the WMAR community.
Quality
Measuring quality in the Building Communities Program makes real sense. None project or idea we would like to carry out could ever be done without communities. In fact, that is the reason why it is a cross cutting axis in the other two programs as well. In a quality level, not only are we interested in building diverse thematic communities but also in making members who take part feel comfortable and at ease and that they regard WMAR as an open organization which offers spaces where everyone (every man and woman) can participate.
Is WMAR focusing on building communities rather than strengthening its local community?
No, it is not. WMAR will keep supporting its community in the same way and with the same effort. The problem is our community achieves better results when it is built around thematic communities. Argentine reality impacts on our community in two concrete ways: firstly, our volunteers have little free time and, secondly, we are a country which organizes itself through associations naturally ; we prefer to work in groups/partners rather than on our own. This, which is also present in Wikimedia’s values, makes it essential for us to build our community around thematic communities or by implementing mentoring programs, that can engage people to participate. These strategies, which also makes active community interact with new community, helps strike a balance within spaces of participation, where the new participant does not feel lonely and lost, and the active member can share, train and design proposals that foster the group’s objectives.
Risk assessment
What risk factors which can affect the plan do you identify and how are you planning to solve them?
- During 2017 we have been able to respond successfully to a challenge we had been facing for years: motivating the historical community and integrating new members as active. In 2018, we hope to be able to maintain and expand the interest. We hope that by building an organization that addresses multiple issues and where our projects are a means to express the plurality of interests of our community, we will keep and engage new members as part of Wikimedia Argentina.
- At the regional level, we understand that we must start working with emerging communities if we want this movement to be truly global. For 2 years we have been supporting activities in Latin American countries, mainly related to gender gap, but to establish a local community depends on many other things that go far beyond our capacities. That why in 2018 we only expect to develop a network of support and mentorship, for any emerging organization or community interested in carrying out activities locally to at least start positioning the Wikimedia projects. For this, financial resources have been considered.
Risk assessment: medium