Grants:APG/Proposals/2020-2021 round 1/Wikimedia Argentina/Progress report form
Purpose of the report
editThis form is for organizations receiving Annual Plan Grants to report on their progress after completing the first 6 months of their grants. The time period covered in this form will be the first 6 months of each grant (e.g. 1 January - 30 June of the current year). This form includes four sections, addressing grant metrics, program stories, financial information, and compliance. Please contact APG/FDC staff if you have questions about this form, or concerns submitting it by the deadline. After submitting the form, organizations will also meet with APG staff to discuss their progress.
Metrics and results overview - all programs
editTotal metrics | Participants | Newly registered | Content pages | Diversity | Impact | Comments |
Education Program | 2442 | 250 | 443 | 30% of content impreved and created. | 1301 participants mentored in education and human rights capacity bulding activities. | n/a |
Culture & Open Knowledge Program | 1895 | 122 | 38908 | 40% of the institutions that released content are located outside Buenos Aires* | 6 new counterparts as a result of our cultural training program | |
Community Building Program | 907 | 139 | 3411 | 45 new women and people from historically excluded communities actively involved in our activities - at least 2. | 5 emerging communities supported at a regional scale. | 169 women participating in workshops, +200 women participating in lectures |
Total | 5244 | 511 | 42762 | n/a | n/a | n/a |
*This metric has been modified from its original since the cultural institutions receiving the Technical Support Fund for Digitization have remained closed. Instead we measure the % of content released from cultural institutions outside Buenos Aires.
Executive Summary
editUnlike 2020, where the year was one of adaptation to the new situation, 2021 is being a year of consolidation of our programs and scope.
WMAR's team
Similar to last year, the Wikimedia Argentina team continues to work remotely.
Given this situation and being in one of the longest quarantines, the team is the highest priority of the organization, as well as their physical and mental well-being. For this, we continue to work by objectives, with flexible schedules that favor disconnection when necessary and with projects that allow us to grow professionally, learn and have a good time.
An organization only goes as far as its team, so it is our first priority that the team is not only healthy but also motivated.
Strategy 2021
We have continued to drive a strategy that is very similar to that of the previous year and is based on these main aspects:
- Define a flexible, open, and adjustable strategy from which we can learn during its development.
- Incorporate the strategic mindset clearly into the workflow; strategy is the responsibility of the entire team.
- Avoid the development of long-term strategies and replace them with micro strategies that avoid complexity and allow us to adapt to the context in a simple way.
- Prioritize feasibility, continuous evaluation, and innovation.
Programs
The results of the programs - explained in this report - undoubtedly represent our response and adaptation to the context and its challenges. We have continued to work through three programs:
- Education and Human Rights: we have consolidated much of the work carried out in 2020 with teachers- such as our work with the booklets Enseñar con Wikipedia- and positioned WMAR as a key player in the Argentine education sector. Regarding our work on human rights, we began to promote the development of a regional agenda on Internet decolonization in alliance with digital rights organizations and Wikimedia communities.
- Culture & Open Knowledge: we have consolidated the line of work on capacity building, which allowed us to reach institutions and cultural leaders throughout the country, with innovative proposals such as our new virtual course on culture and open access. This has also resulted in greater access to diverse and federal cultural heritage and is allowing us to define new lines of work, especially linked to underrepresented communities.
- Cooperation & Inclusion: we have focused our efforts in consolidating local communities, increasing the diversity of our community and identify new leaders. On the other hand, we have worked more than ever with the region and have also supported initiatives of emerging communities.
Regional Cooperation
As we did last year, we have continued to work with the region by strengthening the peer to peer support, participating in activities, sharing technical resources or supporting the planning and development of communities. Our commitment to regional growth is very strong.
Involvement in the movement
We have continued to work to keep the Latin American community informed in the strategy process; we have continued to participate in decision-making spaces as well as to generate proposals on the implementation of the 2030 strategy. We have also participated in Iberocoop's discussions regarding its role in this new scenario.
Education & Human Rights Program
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Summary
In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, Argentina’s education system worked online in all its levels (Unesco, 2021). This made the Education & Human Rights program readapt its entire annual proposal in order to meet the needs of the education community and Human Rights organizations at a national scale. For this reason, and with the goal of keeping our program as a key ally of Argentina’s community of educators and Human Rights, we designed new training proposals and continued working on our long-standing projects. Also, we continued strengthening the bond and cooperation with other communities in the region.
For 2021, we established the following goals:
- Designing training proposals for educators, focusing on digital literacy and promoting mentoring spaces to expand our network of educators across the country.
- Encouraging educators and students to produce quality and locally relevant content
- Mentoring and strengthening the Wikimedia Movement’s new proposals at a regional scale.
- Promoting the role of Wikimedia projects in the Human Rights’ field, both inside and outside the Wikimedia movement.
The Education Program & pandemic context
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Digital literacy through Wikimedia Projects
editArgentina has no on-site classes since March 2020. Although our program has been implemented virtually since that date, unlike last year where we focused mainly on understanding and properly addressing the demands and needs of teachers, during 2021 our goal has been to ensure the continuity of our new and long-term proposals in order to consolidate our role as an organization within the educational ecosystem as well as to strengthen the work with strategic alliances and Wikimedia communities, both locally and regionally.
To this end, we have worked to:
- Strengthen teachers' digital skills by designing new educational initiatives and training opportunities.
- Continuing to adapt, consolidate and expand our educational and training opportunities.
- Accompanying the development and growth of educational proposals at the regional level
These goals have translated in the following lines of work during 2021, so far:
a) Designing new capacity building initiatives
We have developed new training proposals related to digital literacy, an essential topic to face the challenges imposed by the context. We aimed to generating continuity with last year's proposals, especially with the series of booklets Teaching with Wikipedia as well as designing proposals that allow us to continue strengthening a community of teachers throughout the country.
What have we done during 2021?
a) Teaching with Wikipedia Seminar: delving into the work with educators
With the objective of continuing disseminating the Enseñar con Wikipedia (Teaching with wikipedia) booklets, we designed a training program for educators of all educational levels as follows:
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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b) Contest: Researching on the Wikimedia in the Classrooms
In 2021, we decided to promote and mentor the development of research experiences using the Wikimedia projects in the classroom as a way to reflect and analyze teachers' educational practices. For it, we are working as follows:
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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b) Expanding our long-term educational proposals
In 2021 we decided to continue strengthening our long-standing projects, always adapting them to the needs determined by the context and aiming at the following objectives:
- Strengthening educators’ digital literacy and skills.
- Involving educators and students in the creation of high-quality and locally relevant knowledge in Argentina.
- Guaranteeing open and free access to education resources for the community of educators and families.
What have we done in 2021?
a) Adapting our long-term proposals
During 2021, we have kept adapting our long-term educational proposals:
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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b) Consolidating educational proposals
During 2021 we deepened and strengthened our work with Educ.ar, the national educational portal of the national Ministry of Education, as follows:
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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c) Fostering knowledge sharing & learning
Another important learning from 2020 was that networking is key to the sustainability of projects, in the short, medium and long-term. Bearing that in mind, in 2021 we decided to continue strengthening existing networks and extend our support and advice to new education proposals within the Wikimedia movement at a regional level.
What have we done in 2021?
a) Strengthening our collaboration with the LATAM region
During 2021, we have continued working to support and encourage the development of education programs in the region, especially in communities that are seeking to implement educational initiatives for the first time. This work and mentoring among peers allow us to:
What are we doing in 2021?
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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- Adapting the program to the needs, context and urgency of educators was key to be a relevant program at a local level. We continued developing new training and innovative proposals that were very well welcomed (+1774 participants). This is evidence of the importance of our learning opportunities focused on digital and information literacy and of the role of Wikimedia Argentina as a relevant organization in these topics.
- We strengthened our alliance with very relevant institutions in Argentina: the Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Educ.ar, la Defensoria del Publico, Oficina Regional de UNESCO, CLACSO.
- We built more support networks than ever. Most of the people who participate in our activities highlights the human bonds in our training spaces.
- We promoted the development of a program with a national outreach; our educational proposals engaged educators from all the provinces in the country.
- Generate spaces for collaboration and joint work among education programs in the region, strengthening projects from a Latin American perspective.
Main results:
Target | Last year (if applicable) | Progress (at end of Q2) | End of year | Comments |
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Number of teachers | 7270 (see comments) | 1492 | On target | Last year we carried out a series of webinars as a response to the context that involved +5000 teacher. This year strategy and as response to teacher's need has been to continue creating trainings accordingly and a more engaged community. |
Number of students | 342 | 282 | On target | Most of our activities with students will be done at the second part of the year.
This number represents students participating in Wikipedia at Universty. |
Number of articles created/improved | 881 | 401 | On target | This number represents articles created/improved in Wikipedia at University project, Education and Human Rights Contest and Wikipuentes virtual course. |
% Diverse content | 80% | 80% | On target | n/a |
Education & Human Rights
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Strengthening Human Rights approach within the Wikimedia Projects
editDuring 2021 we have continued to promote tools and experiences that address the promotion and protection of Human Rights in digital environments. Along with a great diversity of LATAM partnerships and through the Wikimedia projects, we are working in order to address human rights violations, consolidate a common work agenda among civil society organizations and human rights advocates as well as strengthen joint actions and initiatives.
In this sense, we have decided to work on the following strategic lines in 2021:
- Train and strengthen the participation of Human Rights experts and communities in the creation of socially relevant content, from a Global South perspective.
- Promote the Wikimedia movement as a strategic partner to advance digital rights' work in the region.
How did we work during 2021?
We have continued to adapt and strengthen the program to the context, as follows:
- Create online training that adjust to the realities of each community that has been historically excluded from Wikipedia, as well as its history and struggle experiences.
- Strengthen and expand our alliance with digital rights organizations and share common agendas, both locally and regionally.
- Identify, prioritize and work on urgent human rights subjects for the Wikimedia Movement.
- Build and strengthen safe spaces to promote the participation of the Human Rights community.
For this purpose, during 2021 we have carried out the following lines of work:
a) Fostering the Human Rights perspective within the Wikimedia projects As well as for the last 6 years, during 2021 we have continued to work to strengthen our Human Rights project working sustainably with civil society organizations, public bodies and international organizations at a local, regional and global scale. This work is essential for:
Which have been the most important results, so far?
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b)Building a Human Rights agenda in the region During the first part of 2021 we proposed to continue strengthening our alliances with civil society organizations and Wikimedia communities to:
For it, Wikimedia Argentina participated for the first time in RightsCon 2021, leading a session on how to decolonize internet by using the Wikimedia projects, together with the Whose Knowledge. What did we do in 2020 and which were the main results?
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Which have been our biggest learnings?
- It is key to develop flexible learning experiences that adjust to the realities of the participating communities, taking into account the risks and challenges of each context. Safety is our main priority.
- The importance of mentoring and offering organizations projects that allow them to address sensitive topics related to human rights violations in a safe way and in an environment of trust.
- In contexts of strong social crisis, the Wikimedia projects are great allies to democratize access to diverse and quality information.
- It is necessary to generate strategic alliances at a regional scale in order to define collectively the challenges and practices that we can boost from our specific contexts.
- It is key to occupy spaces of influence, such as RighstCon both to promote the use of the Wikimedia projects to work on Human Rights topics and to keep positioning the organization in the leading of this discussion in the region.
Main results:
Target | Last year (if applicable) | Progress (at end of Q2) | End of year | Comments |
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# WikiDDHH edit-a-thons | 13 | 13 | On target | n/a |
# articles | 808:
718 HR Campaign 90 HR Organizations |
42 HR Organizations | On target | #WikiForHumansRights Campaign will be carried out during the second semester. |
# participants | 383 | 191 | On target | n/a |
%women confortable | 100% | 100% | On target | n/a |
Side effect: Working to engage young activists in the Wikimedia Movement During the pandemic, establishing strategic partnerships has been our main strategy to carry out projects on Human Rights. In this sense, and seeking to generate proposals that respond to the local needs of our communities, we identified the importance of creating a training program on digital rights to position the Wikimedia projects as allies in the promotion and protection of human rights online. With this emerging need during the first half of 2021 we developed together with the Wikimedia Foundation and the IDB a new project to create a new virtual training course that will be offered at the end of 2021 with the aim of training young leaders on issues related to digital citizenship, misinformation and the use of Wikimedia projects from a rights perspective. The project will be completed with an internship program that we expect to carry out with other local communities in the region in 2022. Incorporating youth as part of the Wikimedia Movement is not only important for its future sustainability but also to incorporate the movement's mission as part of youth interests and activism. This is also a priority for Wikimedia Argentina. |
What has been the greatest challenge of the context?
editWe are facing a generalized context of great uncertainty that implies a challenge in two ways: on the one hand, it is complex to plan long-term proposals due to a constantly changing reality, and on the other hand, it is necessary to adjust the proposals to each particular context because the internet connection is very low in much of the country, as well as the possibilities of access to technological devices - especially in teachers and students. We always seek to offer proposals that can be implemented in an inclusive way and that, at the same time, allow us to continue expanding the use of Wikimedia projects, paying special attention to the specific needs of the communities we work with every day. This is why, in the first part of 2021, we prioritize strengthening our partnerships, giving priority to the times and realities of each institution. Even though we believe that this is the best way to work nowadays, this has translated in lower expected results in terms of contributions to the Wikimedia projects. This tension between designing and implementing educational programs and measuring them through created content is historical and on multiple occasions we have stated that learning processes cannot be measured quantitatively. This situation sometimes makes it impossible for us to make more interesting and meaningful proposals and also limits our ability to innovate.
What's next?
edit- Continue implementing Wikipedia at the university in 8 universities that enrolled for the second four-month period and organize workshops with each of them.
- Design and implement the new Educ.ar online course which will be replicated twice: September- October and October-November.
- Mentor the design and development of the #Wikipuentes course with Wikimedia Colombia.
- Continue counseling the educators who participated in the Teaching with Wikipedia workshops in the implementation of their proposals.
- Launch a new edition contest on education and Human Rights involving the region.
- Continue mentoring each research project.
- Launch a new online training course on digital rights aimed at young people, journalists and Human Rights advocates.
- Keep boosting Wiki Derechos Humanos together with Human Rights organizations and public institutions at a national level.
- Design and coordination of regional and international meetings with project leaders on Human Rights in digital environments within the Wikimedia movement.
Culture & Open Knowledge program
editSummary
Just like in 2020, the context has a direct impact on cultural institutions in the country, which in most cases -around 70%, according to our survey- couldn’t incorporate appropriate digital services that favor access to their collections and heritage. Likewise, a recent report by Ibermuseos reveals that the main concern of museum workers are institutions being shut down since -due to the lack of in-person visits- they could become obsolete/expendable. These are constant circumstances that apply not only to museums, but also to archives, libraries and other cultural spaces.
Even though the context continues being very challenging, given the structural weaknesses regarding resources, equipment and training for teams and cultural institutions, for 2021 we designed a Culture Program that will be flexible and open to change and opportunities but -above all- better adapted and more appropriate to the needs detected in the cultural communities, so we can increase our alliances, decentralize our outreach and impact, and position ourselves as an ally and a relevant organization for Argentina’s cultural sector.
For this purpose, during the first months of 2021 we have worked with the following objectives:
- Designing and providing training resources according to the needs and demands of Argentina’s cultural communities.
- Promoting and positioning the debate on free culture and policies of open access within cultural institutions.
- Promoting access and preservation of underrepresented local cultural heritage.
Expanding our cultural approach
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A program better adapted to the needs of Southern cultural communities
edit2020 was a very challenging year for the Culture Program. Apart from the cultural institutions being closed -a situation that persists today-, the context brought to light the shortage of resources and structure to face virtuality in the cultural communities, as well as their needs to overcome these problems. While a challenge, this has also been an opportunity and has allowed us to:
- Design and promote a contextualized and locally relevant learning program.
- Incorporate a Human Rights and Global South perspective to the Culture Program, with greater focus on preserving, making visible and working with underrepresented communities.
- Develop a more inclusive program based on cooperation and with a national outreach.
For these purposes, we have worked in the following way:
a) Consolidating a training program
During 2021, we have worked to design and develop comprehensive and contextualized training and knowledge transfer proposals, according to the needs and demands identified in cultural communities, in particular in archives and museums. With these initiatives, we seek not only to promote the incorporation of Wikimedia projects in the agendas of cultural institutions, but also to position ourselves as allies and as a bridge between collections, heritage and Argentine society.
What have we done during 2021?
a) Training archivists with a Human Rights perspective An increasingly virtual context demands more accessible archives, permeable to the needs of their communities and with technical and human equipment prepared. This situation has allowed us to:
Which have been the most important results?
Which has been the main impact of this work? This work allows us to prepare a propitious scenario to open collections and documentary funds whose accessibility has been historically limited and/or displaced from official agendas. |
b) Training museum leaders During 2020, we worked to detect and identify the needs and demands of Argentine museums, since we hadn’t worked with these institutions before. As a result we developed training opportunities with the following objectives:
Which have been the most important results?
Which has been the main impact of this work? These activities allow us to begin to incorporate Wikimedia projects and free culture in the work processes of museums, and also to generate together new spaces for knowledge transfer in order to begin to gain access to the heritage they own. |
b) Focusing on cultural diversity, minorities and underrepresented culture
One of the greatest opportunities that 2020 brought to us was the possibility to identify the most affected and underrepresented communities. This exercise was key to begin to design a new Culture & Open Knowledge Program that breaks with the Western and hegemonic concept of culture and conforms with the reality of the Global South and allows us to strategically redefine our priorities, incorporating an approach of cultural diversity and Human Rights.
What have we done during 2021?
Expanding our program to new approaches During 2021, we have worked to open our program to new cultural approaches as it follows:
What have we done during 2021?
What was the impact of this new approach? It allowed us to produce new and more diverse alliances which are completely aligned with the 2030 strategy and are essential for the future and sustainability of the Wikimedia Movement in Argentina. |
c) The virtuality as a strategy to favor inclusion
Just like cultural organizations in the country 2020 forced us to adapt our agendas, projects and objectives to virtuality. These circumstances, that was a challenge at first, have also become a great opportunity for the Culture Program since they have made us understand and adapt to the reality of a country like Argentina: very large in extension, with a great cultural diversity and very inequitable in its distribution of resources.
What have we done during 2021?
A virtual program as a strategy Despite the difficulties, we have incorporated virtuality to the Culture Program as a strategy for the following reasons:
What have we done during 2021?
What was the impact of this new approach? We are developing a much more national-reaching, more inclusive and more equitable program participation-wise, and better adapted to the Argentine reality and its cultural institutions, regardless of their size and origin. |
What was the impact of this new cultural approach?
- We have consolidated a program with the forte of training cultural communities in the topics that are particularly relevant to promote a better access to their collections and archives.
- We have positioned ourselves as trainers of cultural leaders with an approach of cultural diversity and human rights in each of our proposals.
- We have continued promoting a less content-centric approach which to establish and strengthen our partnerships in a much more sustainable way. We have diversified our alliances (8 new partners) with institutions that house endangered heritage or from underrepresented communities.
- This new approach has allowed us to address Argentine culture in a more egalitarian way. Argentina, in all its extension, has many different social, economic and cultural contexts. Thus, by making our proposals more federal we promote cultural institutions that have been historically pushed to the background.
Main results:
Target | Last year (if applicable) | Progress (at end of Q2) | End of year (projected or actual) | Comments |
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Promote the free culture in 10 institutions | n/a | 8 | On target | New institutions that began to share part of their patrimony |
Number of organizations directly trained | 11 | 16 | On target | Mainly museums. |
# new cultural leaders involved in our cultural program | 3268 | 1260 | On target | n/a |
Training satisfaction | 90% | 91% | On target | Surveys conducted in our main training programs |
# diverse cultural communities reached | 9 | 6 | On target | Archivists, museologists, librarians, researchers, NGOS, government institutions |
Content improved/created | 12469 | 6147 | On target | n/a |
Number of editors involved | 271 | 122 | On target | n/a |
Reach | 19 countries | 15 countries | On target | n/a |
Strengthening our digitizing project
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Making Argentine culture accessible
editDue to the Covid-19 restrictions that limit access to the actual documents with which we work, plans for the digitization program had to be postponed or delayed during 2020. For this reason, during 2021 we have focused on changing the way in which we’ve been developing our regular activities in the digitization project, with the following purposes:
- Developing an appropriate work schedule with counterparts in order to minimize the impact of the setbacks caused by the lockdown.
- Analyzing and identifying future projects with institutions, in order to strategically distribute resources during this year with restrictions.
- Offering collaboration and counseling to institutions and organizations that wish to release content in Wikimedia Commons
For these purposes, we have worked in the following way: What have we done during 2021?
a) Establishing long-term plans with our counterparts Similar to 2020, we have continued working and promoting the digitization project, mainly with our long-standing counterparts: the Academy of Letters, the Academy of History and Buenos Aires’ Public Libraries, which so far have been the only ones to be able to do a minimum of three assignments since March 2020 and with whom we have outlined future priorities. Along this line, we have worked with the following objectives:
What have we done during 2021?
Which were the main results?
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b) Expanding & federalizing the project Thanks to the first edition of the Technical Support Fund in 2020 we incorporated new partners from outside Buenos Aires. Even though so far the context have prevented us from establishing continuous work flows in terms of digitization, this approach and federal outreach is allowing us to:
What have we done during 2021?
Which were the main results?
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Which was the most important impact of our project?
- Unlike 2020 where the context was completely new, we have defined and work plans in advance that have allow us to continue our work in a relatively normal way.
- Decentralize the digitization project and access underrepresented heritage representative of Argentine history.
- Consolidation of the role of our WIR, beyond the release of content and based on training, technical resources and advising.
- Strengthen our role in mentoring cultural institutions, which has resulted in an increase of 80% of new counterparts.
Main results:
Target | Last year (if applicable) | Progress (at end of Q2) | End of year (projected or actual) | Comments |
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Number of new partners | 4 | 4 | 5 | Two institutions throught the technical fond, and two in general. |
Content improved/created: | 148 books (23.501 pages uploaded to commons)
208 items in Wikidata. 1651 in Wikisource 48 Wikipedia. |
126 books (32.776 pages uploaded to commons)
180 items in Wikidata & Wikipedia |
n/a | Institutions are slowly opening, yet the biggest one have no plans until september. |
Wikipedia page views | 13.119.648 | 5.292.138 | n/a | n/a |
Commons page views | 118.209 | 45.949 | n/a | n/a |
What has been the greatest challenge of the context?
editDuring 2021 we faced two major challenges in the culture program:
- Diversifying our program: one of our greatest challenges has been to diversify our proposals, since virtuality allowed us to approach a large number of heterogeneous cultural communities. The Argentine territory is culturally diverse, and so is the access to economic, technological and human resources. Therefore, it has been and still is a challenge to be able to adapt to each specific situation, either by working side by side with the different professionals in personalized virtual trainings, or by designing open events with experts from different parts of the country that face very different cultural realities. However, although this is sometime challenging has also allowed us to find richness in diversity and proof of this is not only the high participation of people outside Buenos Aires in our proposals, but also the desire to establish collaborative and federal networks of professionals with common concerns and projects.
- The closure of cultural institutions: Argentina's cultural institutions have been closed since March 2020, as well as their agendas. This situation continues to be very challenging but unlike 2021, this year we planned ahead which has allowed us to maintain stable workflows with our historical partners, something that has been much more difficult with our new alliances.
Despite these challenges, we will continue working to incorporate more diversity, federalize our proposals and ensure that access to knowledge in Argentina represents local cultural diversity, by identifying and aligning our objectives with the needs of the institutions with whom we want to work and build win-win partnerships.
What's next?
edit- We will continue releasing diverse and underrepresented content. We will launch the 2nd Edition of the Technical Support Fund focused on institutions outside Gran Buenos Aires that safeguard endangered heritage. At the same time, we will continue working side by side with diverse cultural institutions like the Indigenous Documentation Center to promote the visibility and accessibility of their collections and knowledge.
- We will train cultural professionals not only on Wikimedia Projects but also in areas like heritage conservation or cataloguing, to achieve a more independent work with allied institutions. We will involve different experts from our partnerships to develop training sessions that will allow us to have a more fluid work processes.
- We will develop several learning materials for museum's professionals, who have been trained in Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons on the first part of the year. We aim to continue strengthening our impact on this community. For this purpose, we will involve some museum's cultural leaders on the production of this booklets.
- On the same line, we will launch an online collaborative platform of useful resources on open access and free culture aimed at improving the work of cultural professionals within their institutions. Moreover, we pretend to create a network for museologists, archivists, librarians, etc. who are enthusiastic about opening collections and making content accessible.
- Now that we have reached important public bodies such as the National Museums' Administration or the National General Archive, we expect to define together long-term open access policies and learning programs.
Cooperation & Inclusion Program
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Summary
Even though we were better prepared to face another year of virtual activities due to the pandemic, 2021 also brought new challenges, among which are: general exhaustion of online activities and, as a result, a greater need of disconnection from the computer, social inequality regarding access to technology, general angst which has meant a decrease of enthusiasm and lack of time given that unlike last year many work spaces reopened, so many people that participated in our activities had to go back to work and had less available time.
In this sense, during 2021 the program focused on the following objectives:
- Identifying, work and generate proposals on topics related to the interests of our community and underrepresented in Wikimedia projects.
- Developing flexible and short term training activities to expand, consolidate and diversify our local community and its current and future leaders.
- Developing the resources and support needed to strengthen and grow regional cooperation and communities.
Local community
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Working towards a more resilient community
editContrary to what happened in 2020, our main challenge this year is the general exhaustion of our local community and the excessive offer of online activities. This has made us adapt and adjust our initiatives more than ever to the interests, demands and schedules of our community, with the main objective of continuing strengthening the role of WMAR as a socially and locally relevant organization.
For this purpose, we have designed our proposal based on the following strategy:
- Short periods of connection: the activities we designed lasted a maximum of 2 hours, in order to respect the participants’ right to disconnection
- Communication flow: We kept multiple communication channels open and also conducted targeted communication taking into account the interests of each participant and partner, to invite them to those activities that we know are in their areas of interest.
- Recognition and appreciation: We recognized the work of our volunteers and counterparts more than ever, positioning our community's leadership more than ever.
- Avoid excessive offer of activities: We have focused the program on clear and specific activities, with the aim of carrying out activities with significant learnings for the current and future community and not overloading it.
- Thematic lines of work: We have identified and defined thematic lines of work that provide a framework to our activities, so we can bring more identity to the program.
In this sense, during the first half of 2021 we worked in the following way:
a) Strengthening and diversifying the community through learning opportunities During 2021, we have designed a program that’s more and better focused on proposals that favor training, learning and skill transfer, in order to:
How are we working during 2021?
What was the impact?
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b) A program focused on relevant social issues: gender, biodiversity and activism Argentina has a strong tradition of activism on issues that society deems important. In this sense, we have worked to identify and develop initiatives that invite our community to "edit with purpose" to position the local context within the Wikimedia projects. This strategy is also helping us to focus our work on themes of interest for the society and the community, with the following objectives:
How are we working during 2021?
What was the impact?
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What has been the main results of this approach?
- Designing open virtual proposals allowed us to reach new audiences and federalize participation.
- To establish stable, long-lasting and inclusive bonds by generating spaces for regular and friendly meetings to share experiences, doubts and help each other.
- We learned more than ever to exercise empathy with our community and we have also accompanied them personally, beyond WMAR's work.
- We are defining a more strategic program: establishing lines of work on specific topics based on the survey of our community's interests allowed us to focus on activities with greater impact and community commitment.
Main results:
Target | Last year (if applicable) | Progress | End of year (projected or actual) | Comments |
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Engaged volunteers. | 51 | 30 | n/a | |
New women involved | 94 | 45 | n/a | 45 new women and people from historically excluded communities actively involved in our activities; 169 women participating in workshops, +200 women participating in lectures |
Improved/created articles | 8517 | 3411 | n/a | |
% of satisfation | 95% | 98% | n/a | |
New aliances | 8 | 5 | n/a |
Highlight: Building a sustainable new community Since 2020, Wikimedia Argentina has worked together with el Museo de la Plata, creating training spaces for their scientists. At the end of 2020, their own Wikiproject was launched along with a sustainable training and community engagement program that has consolidated the community more than ever during 2021. What have they done in 2021?
Despite these content results, the community achieved:
While we have accompanied the community in all its initiatives, we have worked to forge and support the development of internal leadership in order to build a sustainable and autonomous community with its own identity. We hope to replicate this format in future communities during the second half of the year. |
Regional cooperation
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Reinforcing regional cooperation
editBeyond the difficulties that the pandemic imposed to every community, at a regional scale, a new path for cooperation and reinforcement of bonds among communities appeared as a result of territorial barriers being erased by compulsory virtuality. This opportunity, allowed us to consolidate stable lines of joint work that we also strengthened in 2021. In this sense, we delved into work in pursuit of:
- Strengthening bonds and mentoring the Latin American Spanish-speaking community.
- Distributing resources for the reinforcement of communities and the development of regional projects.
- Assisting and transferring knowledge and expertise to other regional communities.
How have we worked with the region?
During 2021 we are working following this strategy:
- Identify the needs of emerging groups
- Joint planning of work proposals
- Boost the networking
- Consolidate channels of communication & support
What have we done during 2021?
Learning, support & collaboration During this year, we have continued to work to share learning, support each other and collaborate more than ever in the region. How are we working and which have been the main results, so far?
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What has been the impact of this approach?
- We are able to consolidate common projects, share learnings, and provide support when needed.
- We strengthened our bonds and work with most LATAM affiliates and we are starting to approach users from countries without established communities.
- We were able to support proposals beyond the Argentinean borders in a comprehensive way and allocate technical, human and financial resources accordingly.
- We continued promoting the development and incorporation of a Latin American perspective to the 2030 strategy, and the incorporation of the groups in global conversations.
Learning story: Working with indigenous peoples Since June 2020, together with Wikimedia Venezuela we have worked on the creation of an “Indigenous languages in Wikipedia” website. The website has the following objectives:
However, this work has not been without its challenges and lessons learned, such as the following:
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What has been the greatest challenge of the context?
editDuring the first half of 2021, the program faced two major challenges:
- Fatigue: the fatigue of our community and in general of the Argentine society to participate in online activities has been much more evident during 2021; the levels of participation in 2020 of our training spaces were higher. This has forced us more than ever to carry out activities that respond to the interests of society, to define clear lines of work that provide identity and clarity to the program and to innovate in new, more flexible proposals that allow learning according to the availability of the participants. Stopping to think and strategically analyze this situation is fundamental for the program; from fatigue to disengagement is a very small step, so it is important to continue strengthening the consolidation and diversity of the local community.
- Civil society organizations: although we already had this problem during 2020 and should have foreseen it better, we had hoped that NGO agendas would be more stable in 2021 to restart work more consistently this year. This is a consequence of several challenges such as how uncertainty has led to delays in the agendas or how civil society organizations and volunteers are overwhelmed with their own schedules or cannot be asked for more volunteer time. In order to meet this challenge, we are mapping the organizations with whom we want to work in advance, both by theme and by innovative proposal, to generate alliances in time, according to their capabilities and develop appealing activities for our community.
What's next?
edit- Deep in our work on gender gap and launching our new virtual course on this topic.
- Continue strengthening our main three lines of work in order to incorporate new and diverse community members and accompany the growth of new local communities.
- Carry out a community research to understand their challenges, needs and obstacles that prevent our community to growth faster.
- Continue supporting and boosting training and knowledge transfer as a key aspect of our program. We will launch a new training program with regional scope on cybersecurity and internet governance issues for Wikimedia communities, along with Wikimedia México.
- Continue sharing resources, training spaces and support initiatives for and with the region.
Communication, Advocacy & Sustainability
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Communication, advocacy & organizational sustainability
editDuring 2021 we have continued to strengthen our communication, advocacy and organizational sustainability with the following goals:
- Strengthen Wikimedia Argentina's brand and programs among our audiences and build loyalty among new ones.
- To adequately respond to advocacy challenges and get involved in public policies at the local level
- Start working to diversify WMAR's funds and foster its sustainability.
For these purposes, we worked in the following way:
a) Communication strategy
We have designed a communication strategy with the following results so far:
- We had 52 press mentions throughout 2021, spotlighting the programs.
- On social media we focused on featuring key projects from our programs. Compared to 2020, we seem to have reached a plateau in terms of followers this year. To this end, we are exploring new formats to further strengthen our audience with better reach and impact. In this sense, we increased our followers by 359 new accounts (33% decrease) on Twitter and got 704 new followers on Instagram (21.3% increase).
- We have continued to foster two of our main projects: the Community resources page and the Open Educational platform. Both have been visited by 44,571 and 20,144 unique users respectively so far.
- We increased the number of followers in Youtube by 19.8%, which translates to 398 new followers. We produced 22 videos so far, which had 22,210 visualizations, and finished June 2020 with a total of 2400 people following our channel, who spent 3243 hours watching our videos.
b) Advocacy strategy
We have continued working to address advocacy challenges at the local level, the following way:
- We have continued monitoring legislative initiatives on intermediary liability in Argentina and kept WMAR up to date with relevant articles and debates held by different actors. There have been no updates on an intermediary liability bill until this date. However, Maia Levy - our policy consultant- will continue her work throughout this year to monitor any developments and, if necessary, continue working on and present WMAR’s position.
- Over the last few months, various media articles have been published, including a few that have stated that Wikipedia is biased. To address this issue, we have developed a short and very specific guide on how Wikipedia works and its main challenges intended to engage lawmakers, policymakers, journalists, and the general public. The guide highlights the ten more relevant facts about Wikipedia, and it also describes the main challenges Wikipedia has been facing and relevant initiatives created to overcome them.
- Our policy consultant has also been working on WMAR’s “Decolonizing the Internet” project. She participated in different meetings with WMAR to discuss the best structure and approach, has provide inputs for the proposal and is currently collaborating in the development of the report on the issue.
c) Organizational Sustainability
We have begun to design our fund development strategy in order to diversify our funding sources and improve the sustainability of the organization. To this end, we are working as follows:
- The emphasis has initially been placed on international cooperation. To this aim, we have been working on the identification and analysis of programs' priorities and the search for grant opportunities that respond to those priorities, submitting project proposals to different international calls.
- We have started to design WMAR's strategy in the medium and long term. This work has a significant impact on strengthening our different work areas and for designing new project proposals that also respond to funding opportunities.
- We began analyzing the opportunities of the context in terms of individual donors with a view to explore the possibility of developing a donation campaign for next year.
Involvement in the Wikimedia movement
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Supporting the strategy process
As since 2017 we have continued to support the development and implementation of the 2030 strategy, as it follows:
- Promote fluid communication about the process with the rest of the regional communities.
- We organized several meetings to discuss the next steps of the 2030 strategy in LATAM, especially focused on Iberocoop's role and our position in decision-making spaces.
- We work at the international level to create proposals that drive the implementation of the strategy and in particular the movement's charter and the decentralization of the Wikimedia movement.
Throughout the process we have always tried not only to bring the Latin American perspective to the decision-making spaces but also to communicate the development of the process to our colleagues in the region.
We are committed to continue promoting the region's involvement in the strategy phase. However, it is necessary to allocate the necessary resources to guarantee the involvement of movement's diverse communities.
Revenues received during this six-month period
editPlease use the exchange rate in your APG proposal.
- Important note
- the anticipated column may list revenues anticipated for the whole year instead of only the 6 months. Please make sure that this the time period clear in the table.
- In the explanation column, always mention relevant information about the numbers: what period they refer to etc.
Revenue source | Currency | Anticipated | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 | Q4 | Cumulative | Anticipated ($US)* | Cumulative ($US)* |
FDC grant | ARS | ARS 17,320,025 | USD 193,628 | - | - | - | ARS 17,320,025 | USD 276,611 | USD 193,628 |
Membership fees | USD | USD 500 | ARS 2,850 | ARS 8,342 | - | - | ARS 11,192 | USD 125 | USD 500 |
In-kind donations | ARS | ARS 304,800 | ARS 107,340 | ARS 0 | - | - | ARS 107,340 | USD 1,200 | USD 3,000 |
Spending during this six-month period
editPlease use the exchange rate in your APG proposal.
- Important note
- Budget can be the budget for the whole year (and thus the percentage will reflect the half year and should be around 50%, or the half year, in which case the % should be around 100%. Please make that clear in the table.
- In the explanation column, always mention relevant information about the numbers: what period they refer to.
Expense | Currency | Budgeted | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 | Q4 | Cumulative | Budgeted ($US)* | Cumulative ($US)* | Percentage spent to date | Explanation of variances from plan |
General Administration | ARS | ARS 3,144,644 | ARS 583,786 | ARS 827,936 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 1,411,722 | USD 30,951 | USD 15,783 | 45% | n/a |
Staff Expenses | ARS | ARS 12,410,998 | ARS 2,525,703 | ARS 3,581,999 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 6,107,701 | USD 122,155 | USD 68,283 | 49% | n/a |
Organitational Sustainability | ARS | ARS 1,141,200 | ARS 180,000 | ARS 210,000 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 390,000 | USD 11,232 | USD 4,360 | 34% | n/a |
Communication & new audiences | ARS | ARS 661,848 | ARS 22,562 | ARS 137,810 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 160,372 | USD 6,514 | USD 1,793 | 24% | n/a |
Education & Rights | ARS | ARS 3,126,610 | ARS 315,570 | ARS 644,378 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 959,948 | USD 30,774 | USD 10,732 | 31% | n/a |
Culture & Open Knowledge | ARS | ARS 3,796,525 | ARS 264,828 | ARS 1,570,971 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 1,835,799 | USD 37,367 | USD 20,524 | 48% | n/a |
Cooperation & Inclusion | ARS | ARS 3,321,894 | ARS 224,994 | ARS 976,905 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 1,201,899 | USD 32,696 | USD 13,437 | 36% | n/a |
International Relations & Strategy | ARS | ARS 500,000 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | USD 4,921 | USD 0 | 0% | Planned for the next semester |
TOTAL | ARS | ARS 28,103,719 | ARS 4,117,443 | ARS 7,949,999 | ARS 0 | ARS 0 | ARS 12,067,442 | USD 276,610 | USD 134,912 | 43% |
*The average exchange rate for 1st semester of 2021 was 1 USD= 89,45 ARS
Compliance
editIs your organization compliant with the terms outlined in the grant agreement?
editAs required in the grant agreement, please report any deviations from your grant proposal here. Note that, among other things, any changes must be consistent with our WMF mission, must be for charitable purposes as defined in the grant agreement, and must otherwise comply with the grant agreement.
Are you in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations as outlined in the grant agreement? Please answer "Yes" or "No".
YES
Are you in compliance with provisions of the United States Internal Revenue Code (“Code”), and with relevant tax laws and regulations restricting the use of the Grant funds as outlined in the grant agreement? Please answer "Yes" or "No".
YES
Signature
edit- Once complete, please sign below with the usual four tildes.
- Anna Torres (WMAR) (talk) 19:54, 3 August 2021 (UTC)
Resources
editResources to plan for measurement
edit- Global metrics are an important starting point for grantees when it comes to measuring programmatic impact (Learning Patterns and Tutorial) but don’t stop there.
- Logic Models provide a framework for mapping your pathway to impact through the cause and effect chain from inputs to outputs to outcomes. Develop a logic model to map out your theory of change and determine the metrics and measures for your programs.
- Importantly, both qualitative and quantitative measures are important so consider both as you determine measures for your evaluation and be sure to ask the right questions to be sure to capture your program stories.
Resources for storytelling
edit- WMF storytelling series and toolkit (DRAFT)
- Online workshop on Storytelling. By Frameworks institute
- The origin of storytelling
- Story frames, with a focus on news-worthiness.
- Reading guide: Storytelling and Social change. By Working Narratives
- The uses of the story.
- Case studies.
- Blog: 3 Tips on telling stories that move people to action. By Paul VanDeCarr (Working Narratives), on Philanthropy.com
- Building bridges using narrative techniques. By Sparknow.net
- Differences between a report and a story
- Question guides and exercises.
- Guide: Tools for Knowledge and Learning. By Overseas Development Institute (UK).
- Developing a strategy
- Collaboration mechanisms
- Knowledge sharing and learning
- Capturing and storing knowledge.