Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/General Support Fund/Wikimedia MKD Annual Grant 2025

statusUnder review
Wikimedia MKD Annual Grant 2025
Fluxx IDR-GS-2409-16949
start date2025-01-01
end date2025-12-31
budget (local currency)95420 EUR
amount requested (USD)103761.62 USD [note 1]
grant typeWikimedia Affiliate (chapter, thematic org., or user group)
funding regionCEECA
decision fiscal year2024-25
funding program roundRound 1
organization (if applicable)Wikimedia GMSZ MKD Skopje

This is an automatically generated Meta-Wiki page. The page was copied from Fluxx, the grantmaking web service of Wikimedia Foundation where the user has submitted their application. Please do not make any changes to this page because all changes will be removed after the next update. Use the discussion page for your feedback. The page was created by CR-FluxxBot.

Applicant information

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Organization name or Wikimedia Username for individuals. (required)
Wikimedia GMSZ MKD Skopje
Do you have any approved General Support Fund requests? (required)
Yes, I have already applied and received a General Support Fund
You are applying as a(n). (required)
Wikimedia Affiliate (chapter, thematic org., or user group)
Are your group or organization legally registered in your country? (required)
Yes
Do you have a fiscal sponsor?
No
Fiscal organization name.
N/A
Please provide links to the following documents if they are available

These documentation can be provided in your local language(s), no translations required.

  • Organizational website
  • Detailed financial reporting and/or audits
  • Documentation of the governance structure, board list, governance processes
  • Documentation of the general assembly decision on your plan
Website (Macedonian): https://wikimedia.mk/mk/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100069870774229 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wikimedia_mkd All reports for 2024 (English): https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_MKD/Reports/2024-01 Governance structure: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_MKD

Main proposal

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1. Please state the title of your proposal. This will also be a title for the Meta-Wiki page. (required)
Wikimedia MKD Annual Grant 2025
2. Do you want to apply for the multi-year base funding for 3 years? (required) (only for returning applicants)
No
2.1. Provide a brief overview of Year 2 and Year 3 of the proposed plan and how this relates to the current proposal and your strategic plan? (required)

N/A


3. Proposed start date. (required)
2025-01-01
4. Proposed end date. (required)
2025-12-31
5. Does your organization or group have an Affiliate or Organizational Annual Plan that can help us understand your proposal? If yes, please provide it. (required)
Yes
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_MKD/Annual_plan_2025
6. Does your affiliate, organization or group have a Strategic Plan that can help us understand your proposal? If yes, please provide it. (required)
Yes
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_MKD/Strategic_plan_2024-2028
7. Where will this proposal be implemented? (required)
North Macedonia
8. What are your programs, approaches, and strategies? What are the challenges that you are trying to address and how will your strategies support you in addressing these challenges? (required)

The main programs are: Education & Science, Community and GLAM & Partnerships.

Through our activities we are trying to eliminate those obstacles and offer a database available for everyone. Our proposal tries to make positive changes that will solve:

1) content gaps and disproportional representation; 2) active participation in volunteer initiatives; and 3) preservation of heritage and data.

We opine that our direction towards addressing these three challenges would contribute to the development of a sustainable knowledge-based society in which individuals could easily access and verify the veracity of the information they encounter every day.

EDUCATION

This programme aims to extend and maintain collaborations with educational and scientific institutions with the goals of promoting Wikipedia as an educational resource, getting students and academic staff involved in the Wikimedia movement and producing open educational resources.

It is divided into two sub-programmes:

Education (consists of the projects Teachers' conferences, Wiki Clubs, Editing contest for students, Wiki Camp, and Wikidata Workshops); and Science (consists of the projects Wikiexperiments and WikiLectures). As one of the key programs of the organization, Wikimedia MKD tries to achieve several key strategic education aspects. Establishing new Wiki Clubs and Wiki sections with students will get Wikipedia closer to schools and improve the content. We have 10 Wiki Clubs at the moment all over the country. The recruiting new members and contributors that are willing to improve Wikimedia Projects. Our strength in this project so far is the reputation of the Wiki Clubs. Each club has an appointed coordinator, a member of our organisation. We also train new teachers to edit and contribute and use Wikipedia in the education process. The teachers’ conferences are an excellent opportunity for improving the community as well. The third strategic aspect are the Wiki Camps. The main purpose of the Camps are to build strong connections between students’ experiences, develop skills and expanding knowledge. It is a good event for engaging new members and activists. Science as a part of Education program includes two related projects for producing free educational videos documenting scientific experiments in physics, chemistry and biology, as well as lectures with proofs of theorems and major results in mathematics and physics.

COMMUNITY The Community programme includes a wide variety of programmes with the goals of identifying topics of interest, filling content gaps, tackling the gender gap and improving content quality. It is divided into four sub-programmes:

Editing challenges (consists of the projects Editing days, Editing weekends, Editing competitions, CEE Spring 2024, Editing weeks, #1Lib1Ref, Edit-a-thons, and Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos); Community support (consists of the project Photohunts); Expeditions (consists of the projects Wiki-, Geo-, Archaeo-, and Veloexpeditions; and Photo contests. Wikimedia MKD tries to increase the number of involved volunteers in the movement that will actively contribute to the development of the Wikimedia Movement in Macedonia. In the next years, several public events will be organized, as well as many workshops on various topics, mostly concerned with creating new articles on mk.wikipedia. We organize at least 10 media and press interviews to introduce Wikipedia and user group work to the audience per year. Several projects, like Meet Hungary, Meet Russia, Meet Sweden, Meet Serbia, Meet Italy, were carried out in collaboration with the respective Embassies in Skopje. Negotiation for future collaborations: with the embassies of Slovenia, Slovakia and Spain.

GLAM & Partnerships: This programme includes projects based on collaborations with public institutions with the goals of liberating copyrighted content and providing better access to free knowledge.

It is divided into sub-programmes:

GLAM (consists of the project Wikipedian in Residence); Partnerships (consists of the project QRpedia).

Strengthening the collaboration with GLAM institutions in North Macedonia, as well as improving the cooperation with GLAM Institutions which already exists and signed memorandum for collaboration (such as The State Archive of Republic of North Macedonia, Museum of Macedonian struggle, Archeological Museum of North Macedonia, Museum of Natural History, Institute of Natural Science in Ohrid, National Parks, etc.). The WiR activities will try to implement Wikimedia projects within WiR work and using the available resources for enriching the contents. Establishing cooperation with new GLAM (like Macedonian Academy of Science, Museum of Contemporary Arts, National Park Mavrovo, City Libraries, Directorate for protection of cultural heritage, etc.) and getting them closer to the projects shall be one of the more important tasks to be accomplished. Workshops, tours, edit-a-thons and training will continue to be held. We have a need for new employee who will work with all GLAM institutions who are willing to collaborate, as this programme is developing very fast, so volunteers and Wikipedians in residence cannot accomplish everything we are asked to work on during the year.

The QRpedia sub-programme includes miscellaneous projects aimed at producing free knowledge through collaboration with external parties. WikiVillage project is based on QRpedia.

9. What categories are your main programs and related activities under? Please select all that apply. (required)
Category Yes/No
Education Yes
Culture, heritage or GLAM Yes
Gender and diversity Yes
Community support and engagement Yes
Participation in campaigns and contests Yes
Public policy advocacy No
Other No

Education

9.1.1. Select all your programs and activities for Education. (required)
Wiki Club, Wiki Camp, Editing Wikipedia Training, Translation, Wikidata programs, Wikimedia Commons programs, Other Wikimedia project programs
Other programs and activities if any: N/A
9.1.2. Select all relevant audience groups for Education. (required)
Secondary school students, Vocational, tertiary, or higher education, Teachers or professors, Senior citizens
Other groups if any: N/A

Culture, heritage or GLAM

9.2. Select all your programs and activities for Culture, heritage or GLAM. (required)
Documenting or incubating languages on Wikimedia projects, Introducing new approaches to underrepresented culture and heritage, e.g. decolonising or reparative work; oral and visual knowledge; outreach to communities of origin, indigenous and first nations self-determination, Supporting institutions to open up their collections, data, metadata, and research, Supporting GLAM professionals to incorporate use of Wikimedia in their work, through documentation, training, or Wikimedian in Residence programs, Partnering with institutions, professional associations, and allied organizations to raise awareness of open culture, ethical sharing, and related issues
Other programs and activities if any: N/A

Gender and diversity

9.3. Select all your programs and activities for Gender and diversity.
Bringing in women and/or gender diverse participants and editors, Focusing on creating content about women and/or gender diverse groups, including biographies, intersectional topic areas and/or adding images, Focusing on creating content about marginalized (underrepresented) communities and their knowledge, Focusing on knowledge equity by bringing in contributors from underrepresented communities, Fomenting female leadership within the movement (either staff, members or boards)
Other programs and activities if any: N/A

Community support and engagement

9.4. Select all your programs and activities for Community support and engagement.
Off-wiki training of community members, Organizing meetups, conferences, and community events, Supporting community members' participation in events and conferences, Offering microgrants and other financial support to community members , Offering non financial support and services to community members (equipment, space, books, etc.)
Other programs and activities if any: N/A

Participation in campaigns and contests

9.5. Select all campaigns that apply. (required)
1Lib1Ref, Art+Feminism, CEE Spring, Feminism and Folklore, WikiForHumanRights, WikiGap, Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos, Wikipedia Birthday or Anniversary
Other programs and activities if any: N/A
10. Please include a link to or upload a timeline (operational calendar) for your programs and activities. (required)
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_MKD/Timeline_2025
11. Describe your team. (required)

Nikolche Stojanoski, user:MacedonianBoy, president and board member, creating and submitting grant proposal, WMF liaison, responsible for overall projects planning; Kiril Simeonovski, user:Kiril Simeonovski, board member, creating and submitting grant proposal, WMF liaison; Valentina Trajkoska, user:Vale Trajkoska, board member; Lili Arsova, user:Lili Arsova, board member, coordinator of education in Veles: responsible for creating events, maintain projects and work with volunteers in Veles; Nino Bogdanovski, user:Полупрофесионален Шофер, board member, participant in expeditions; Dean Lazarevski, user:Деан Лазаревски, board member, participant in expeditions; Toni Ristovski , user:Ehrlich91, participant in expeditions; Nataša Nedanoska, user:NatasaNedanoska, coordinator of Wiki Club Ohrid: coordinator of volunteers in Ohrid, responsible for projects maintain in Ohrid; Stojna Arsovska-Donevska, user:Stojnaa, coordinator of Wiki Club Staro Nagoricane, coordinator of volunteers in St. Nagoricane, responsible for projects maintain in St. Nagoricane; Irena Trajkovska, coordinator of education in the High School Josip Broz Tito: responsible for projects and volunteers coming from that high school; Ana Vishinova, user:Vishinova, GLAM coordinator as a volunteer position: GLAM liaison, responsible for planning and maintain GLAM events in collaboration with other Wikipedians; Koki Nikola, user:SirGoldenBlade, Wikipedian in Residence, responsible for some of the GLAM projects; Nataša Stardelova, user:Natasa Stardelova, Wikipedian in Residence, coordinator of Wiki Club Dracevo, coordinator of volunteers in Dracevo; Deni Ingilizovski (film producer and editor); and many members of the core community.

The staff includes the following members: Snezhana Shtrkovska, user:Violetova (Executive Director): creating and submitting grant proposals, budget planning, WMF liaison, administration coordinator, overall projects coordinator;  Boyan Velkovski. user:Velkovski.b (Communication Manager): responsible for maintain all reports and publishing news on Instagram, Facebook, website, meta reports, in media, etc; Jovan Tasevski, user:Jtasevski123 (Community and Logistics Manager): responsible for all contacts with the broad Macedonian community, special calls for editing days and weeks, all kind of contests, Photohunt, etc.; Bosa Filipovic, user:BosaFi (Education Project Manager): responsible for all education projects, coordinator of all EDU coordinators, Wiki Clubs, educational activities such as workshops, Seminars for teachers, planning of Wiki Camp, etc. Manager of GLAM programme (new position, we would like to recruit a person after Seminar for GLAMers will be accomplished): responsible for all contacts with GLAM institutions, coordinator of all Wikipedian in residence, and all volunteers involved in GLAM projects. Our new employee for GLAM programme will have to work tightly with GLAM coordinator who is volunteer, also will have to teach GLAMers on how to enrich Wikipedia using books, photos and documents from GLAM institutions. Among other tasks, this person will have to deal with the increased number of calls from GLAM institutions to work with free content and copyright free files and books.

12. Will you be working with any internal (Wikimedia) or external partners? Describe the characteristics of these partnerships and bring a few examples of the most significant partnerships. (required)

We plan to work on implementing this annual plan primarily with the Macedonian Wikipedia community. All projects whose goal is to enrich this language edition and which target editors who are active there will be documented in separate project pages created on the Macedonian Wikipedia. Additionally, target editors will be notified about the projects through other communication channels such as emailing services and social media. Our external partners are the partner institutions we already worked with, and the new ones we are collaborating with in the meantime: Directorate for protection of Cultural Heritage, The State Archives,  Museum of Macedonian Struggle in Skopje, Archeological Museum in Skopje, Association of writers, Universities in Stip and Skopje, Municipalities of Karposh, Demir Hisar and Veles, Embassies of foreign countries in Skopje (Hungarian, Italian, Sweden, Serbian etc.), Goethe Institute, as with 22 secondary and high schools all over Macedonia, and many NGOs. Every institution we collaborate with is the significant partnership for us.

13. In what ways do you think your proposal most contributes to the Movement Strategy 2030 recommendations. Select all that apply. (required)
Increase the Sustainability of Our Movement, Improve User Experience, Provide for Safety and Inclusion, Invest in Skills and Leadership Development, Manage Internal Knowledge, Identify Topics for Impact, Evaluate, Iterate, and Adapt

Metrics

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Wikimedia Metrics

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14. Please select and fill out Wikimedia Metrics for your proposal. (recommended)
14.1. Number of participants, editors, and organizers.

All metrics provided are optional, please fill them out if they are aligned with your programs and activities.

Participants, editors, and organizers
Metrics name Target Description
Number of all participants 1172 Number of all participants: Existing and new participants involved in activities funded by the grant. It includes people that participate in events, training, campaigns, etc. It includes people that edit as well as those that participate in other ways.
Number of all editors 215 New and active editors on Wikimedia projects involved in Wikimedia MKD projects.

For ex. In 2024, number of Wiki Club's members is 133 at the moment this proposal is written (https://outreachdashboard.wmflabs.org/courses/Wikimedia_MKD/Wiki_Clubs_2024 ) and we have this year 50 Wiki Senior editors ( https://outreachdashboard.wmflabs.org/courses/Wikimedia_MKD/Wiki_Senior_2024 )

Number of new editors 70
Number of retained editors 45
Number of all organizers 35 Number of people involved in organizing edit-a-thons, competitions, meet-ups, and all other community events.
Number of new organizers 15
14.2. Number of new content contributions to Wikimedia projects. (recommended)
Contributions to Wikimedia projects
Wikimedia project Created Edited or improved
Wikipedia 6000 2000
Wikimedia Commons 3000 330
Wikidata 4000 4000
Wiktionary
Wikisource 1100 35
Wikimedia Incubator
Translatewiki
MediaWiki
Wikiquote
Wikivoyage
Wikibooks
Wikiversity
Wikinews
Wikispecies
Wikifunctions / Abstract Wikipedia
Description for Wikimedia projects contributions metrics. (optional)

We have a lot of editing contests throughout the year, and we usually ask participants for new created articles, better than to edit existing ones. The number of new articles created on mk.wikipedia is much bigger at the end of the year, because the articles created out of the Wikimedia MKD projects are not counted here. Also, editing existing ones is happening all the time by all editors, which is not always connected with the Wikimedia MKD projects.

Number of books created on Wikisource is calculated as 5 books, because at least 5 books among other duties will be uploaded by the new GLAM employee. If we put the number of pages, the overall number will at least 1000 pages, plus 100 pages of other kind of texts. For ex. last year we had Wikipedian in residence who added on Wikisource texts of 70 Macedonian folk songs.

Other Metrics

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15. Do you have other quantitative and qualitative targets for your project (other metrics)? (required)
Yes
Other Metrics Description Target
Usage of the uploaded images Usage of the uploaded images in articles. The number could seems small, but a lot of the images uploaded through the year are from Wikiexpeditions, and a lot of them are not used in the article, but could be accessed via template: Wikimedia Commons has media related to...

We discuss to organize a challenge for other language Wikipedias to use the uploaded images from Wikiexpeditions in their language articles, which could increase the number of used images.

350
Involved institutions Involved institutions in all Wikimedia MKD projects. 45
' N/A
N/A N/A N/A
N/A N/A N/A

Budget

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16. Will you have any other revenue sources when implementing this proposal (e.g. other funding, membership contributions, donations)? (required)
No
16.1. List other revenue sources. (required)

N/A

16.2. Approximately how much revenue will you have from other sources in your local currency? (required)
N/A
17. Your local currency. (required)
EUR
18. What is the total requested amount in your local currency? (required)
95420 EUR
Multi-year funding request summary
Year Amount (local currency)
Year 1 N/A EUR
Year 2 N/A EUR
Year 3 N/A EUR
Requested amount in USD
103761.62 USD [note 1]
Multi-year funding request summary in USD
Year Amount USD [note 1]
Year 1 N/A USD
Year 2 N/A USD
Year 3 N/A USD
  1. a b c The following amount in US dollars was calculated by Wikimedia Foundation staff using the fixed currency rates. This amount is approximate and may not reflect the actual currency exchange rates on the day of submission or distribution. If the application is funded, the funding will be sent in the recipient’s local currency.
19. Does this proposal include compensation for staff or contractors? (required)
Yes
19.1. How many paid staff members do you plan to have? (required)

Include the number of staff and contractors during the proposal period. If you have short-term contractors or staff, please include them separately and mention their terms.

5
19.2. How many FTEs (full-time equivalents) in total? (required)

Include the total FTE of staff and contractors during the proposal period. If you have short-term contractors or staff, please include their FTEs with the terms separately.

0.5 FTA per person will be covered with this General Support Fund
19.3. Describe any staff or contractor changes compared to the current year / ongoing General Support Fund if any. (required only for returning grantees)
N/A
20. Please provide an overview of your overall budget categories in your local currency. The budget breakdown should include only the amount requested with this General Support Fund (required).
Budget category Amount in local currency
Staff and contractor costs 56970 EUR
Operational costs 6350 EUR
Programmatic costs 32100 EUR
21. Please upload your budget for this proposal or indicate the link to it. (required)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1UjrjyqIxJY5Xb_txWsa3_Aql-b8ntaKV9d7z0_mLgBg/edit?gid=752773674#gid=752773674


Additional information

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22. In this optional space you can add any other additional information about your proposal or organization that you think can help us when reviewing your proposal. (optional)

Several notes and explanations: Last year we asked budget to be wired in MKD, but we received US dollars instead, which is the worst option for Macedonian banks: here the exchange rate of the US dollar is going up and down every 2 hours. That is why will be better to receive funds in euros, as euro rates are stable in Macedonia.

About the office expenses we had them in 2024: we are in negotiation with the City Council of Skopje to get for the next year office for meetings for free, because we work with youth, and there is Youth Cultural Center in the city, owned by the City Council. It is still in negotiation, but we hope we will get the office as talked with the Mayor.

We need a new employee for GLAM programme as the volunteers and Wikipedians in residence cannot accomplish growing and increasing number of calls for collaboration with GLAM institutions.

We are aware that the requested increase in our budget is above the percentage increasing for the region. That is because some lines are a little higher due to higher prices in Macedonia, and the novelty is: salary for a new employee, as well as Wiki team building event, which we consider to be something very useful for the organization itself: an event where employees, coordinators and volunteers can listen lectures about how to collaborate successfully, how to recognize conflict before it's too late, and so on. We didn't know what to cut from the budget, as everything seems very important to have.



By submitting your proposal/funding request you agree that you are in agreement with the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and the Universal Code of Conduct.

We/I have read the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and Universal Code of Conduct.

Yes

Feedback

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