Grants:Project/WikiSoCal/WikiWonderland Everyone Is Invited
Project idea
editWhat is the problem you're trying to solve?
editWhat problem are you trying to solve by doing this project? This problem should be small enough that you expect it to be completely or mostly resolved by the end of this project. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
We want to build more bridges when other people are building walls. Accessibility to information has grown so much over the years, but still there remains so much more “room for improvement.” Wiki improvements come from community-wide efforts, supported by volunteers from around the world. We have, especially this year, an ever more pressing need to protect and improve the quality of information available online, and to support the work of the volunteers and community members that make those improvements possible.
But the diversity of volunteers in the Wikipedia community is frightfully uninclusive and the experiences of volunteering are so often alienating that we understand retention of new volunteers can be as low as 2% per 100 of new editors. Many past and current Wikimedia volunteers do not feel that they have been well cared for, and continue in spite of the frustrations.
Beyond doing a better job of caring for the well-being of current volunteers, we need new blood. We see an incredible number of willing and able people in the world who could be helping the wiki movement in a wide variety of ways, both on and off wiki. We believe the wiki movement is facing an urgent need to engage and support more volunteers as quickly and effectively as possible. And we believe that is much easier to do by collaborating with other organizations who share so much in our missions. We can do so much more together than apart.
What is your solution?
editFor the problem you identified in the previous section, briefly describe your how you would like to address this problem. We recognize that there are many ways to solve a problem. We’d like to understand why you chose this particular solution, and why you think it is worth pursuing. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
We, as members of WikiSoCal, are creating WikiWonderland, a collection of incredible volunteer and service learning experiences. We are based in San Diego, California and have members from around the world. Our partnership organizations, expert advisors, and core team members have already donated thousands of hours and dollars to bring us to this moment when we are ready to ask you, the Wikimedia community, for this significant funding, to grow our capacity and make it possible to bring in hundreds or even thousands of new wiki volunteers.
HISTORY OF WIKISOCAL
We began hosting San Diego editathons in February of 2016. On April 28, when the Cascadia User Group had to cancel their plans to host WikiCon USA, we stepped in to help, and became the new conference organizers, with a target budget of $50,000 for 4 days of events. In May and June of 2016, we worked tirelessly on this incredible opportunity, to create an extraordinary 4-day weekend of outreach and community building activities, with a them of "Inclusivity" and efforts to make every thing we did as inviting and inclusive as possible.
Through a never ending set of logistic and programming conversations, we were able to secure
- (1) an in kind donation of space and staff time from the San Diego Downtown Library (worth more than $35,000), (2) discounted housing rates at the closest hotel and hostels (worth more than $3,500), and
- (3) a day of activities hosted at Balboa Park with special access to most museums (worth more than $5,000)
- (4) a collection of incredible expert volunteers willing to give their high value time to our cause, advising us and offering their resources to help make the events as inclusive and meaningful as possible (worth more than $30,000 in combined pro bono time).
DrMel did the majority of the partnership development work, acting as San Diego's first "Wikipedian in Residence', supported by her small social enterprise, QoL Enterprises. She backburnered all other projects, based on the mistaken understanding that others' offers to help with fundraising would be sufficient to cover our basic expenses, especially as she met other Wikipedians in Residence being paid for similar community organizing by outside organizations. Given the complexity of building 4-days of events at multiple venues, she backburnered all her other projects and made the San Diego activities her only focus.
At the end of June, DrMel went to Washington DC to meet the senior leadership of previous WikiConferences, and was able to recruit many to join the planning team. But following their trip to WikiMania in Italy, a great deal of confusion ensued and the WikiSoCal team was cut from the WikiConference planning group. All requests for help with funding for WikiSoCal expenses and activities were ignored or denied. In July we had to cancel our plans for outreach at the Pride March and Comic-Con, along with all remaining WikiSoCal meetup plans for 2016. We were crushed from having all our work subjected to a "Revert Changes" and opted to step back while the WikiConference planning continued.
But we were very pleased to see that the WikiConference North America was held October 7-10, 2016 at Balboa Park and the Downtown San Diego Library, with a theme we'd originally chosen of "Inclusivity" (though only 300 attendees were included). From our (ambiguous) understanding of who did what before and during the events, we estimate that more than 3,000 hours were donated by the complete collection of staff, volunteers and pro bono professionals. We are unclear what outcomes were achieved with the WikiConference North America, but understand it was considered a wonderful success. While we received no acknowledgement for our part in making it possible, we are still very proud of having been able to host the events here. We want to acknowledge the incredible work of all the volunteers who have helped make WikiConference North America possible, including all those involved before San Diego was part of it, and all those who took it on with only 3 months to go. It was an amazing success!
After the WikiConference North America events, we met new supporters who shared our beliefs that this wiki movement and Wikimedia's work within it are worth the effort and frustration. Even though the financial costs have been more than we had ever intended to take on, we have not wavered in our commitment to continue building WikiSoCal. We are now scaling up again, with a constantly growing team of diverse and remarkable people, in SoCal and around the world.
2017 AND BEYOND
More than being a regional program, we at WikiSoCal are inviting people from anywhere in the world to come visit us, physically or remotely, any time of year, to be part of our service learning and volunteer programs. We have the resources around us, the beautiful locations, and incredible people to make San Diego a host for all sorts of Wiki trainings, meetups and other activities. With all the partners, advisors, students and other volunteers we already have helping and eager to do more, we are ready to put full-time effort into growing our service learning and volunteer activities. We are confident that we can engage and retain a large group of new volunteers, in activities both simpler than and beyond the complexities of wiki editing. We have an remarkable number of expert advisors, interns and volunteers working with us to help design volunteer and service learning activities for people of all ages, abilities and backgrounds. We want all our volunteers to have the resources, training and support to have fun and be successful as Wikimedia volunteers.
Important note for grant reviewers: almost all of our current paertners, advisors and volunteers have either not yet signed up for a wikipedia account, or have very few edits! The work everyone has been doing is focused on off wiki systems and planning. Given the extremely low retention rates for new volunteers in the past, we want to make sure everyone has the support they need to engage in extensive volunteering. No one has enough time to waste doing work that isn't useful or enjoyable.
By supporting this grant application, you can help us speed up the development of systems to make sure all our new volunteers have the support they need to stick around.
Invitations to our activities for 2017 are posted at www.meetup.com/wikisocal (please sign up!), and include:
- WikiConSoCal - Alicia's Adventures in WikiWonderland - October 6-9 in San Diego's Balboa Park
- Promoted monthly meetups, inclusive of all WikiFans, friends and family - with activities for all ages, abilities and backgrounds
- Weekly planning sessions with core team members, face-to-face and online
We would love to have any one reading this join in the fun! Many many different ways to help in your free time. Please email dr.mel.ganus -at- gmail for more information.
We want to dramatically improve the quality of volunteer experiences within the various wiki projects. And we want to develop our volunteer initiatives with the volunteers’ well being at the core of our designs. We are building volunteer programs within our own organizations and want our people to also be able to volunteer within the wiki projects, supported by our team, and less likely to be discouraged by the sometimes very unwelcoming communications from other volunteers. Yes, this is a very ambitious project, but we have the expertise among us to make a lot of progress.
Project goals
editWhat are your goals for this project? Your goals should describe the top two or three benefits that will come out of your project. These should be benefits to the Wikimedia projects or Wikimedia communities. They should not be benefits to you individually. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
- Research, design and test best practices for building collaborative online volunteer and service learning activities, with clear plans for intake, ongoing support, and incentivizing volunteers.
- Dramatically increase the number of active volunteers within Wikimedia projects, with new volunteers coming from across the blind and disability communities, on Wikimedia projects in English, Simple English, Spanish and other languages as we are able.
- Further develop San Diego partnerships with and hosting of wiki-related outreach and volunteer events within San Diego's Balboa Park Museums and Public Library System.
Who will you be doing outreach with?
We are working to outreach to the blind and the sighted, English and Spanish-speakers within and beyond the United States and Mexico. In the US, more than 23 million people have identified ourselves as blind or vision impaired. We also have 45 million Spanish speakers within the US, and . And millions of other people looking for opportunities to make a difference in the world. Our outreach objectives are extremely inclusive – everyone is welcome to participate in any of our activities and events, and will be given guidelines for identifying how to do what they want to do.
Get Involved
editAbout the idea creator
editWikiSoCal is a growing collection of community organizers and organizational representatives working together to develop extraordinary volunteer program and service learning activities. DrMel has been a Wikipedian since 2004, with many years of experience as a philanthropist, community organizer, volunteer program developer, learning designer, and behavior change expert. In 2016, she helped co-found WikiSoCal with a series of editathons, and became conference facilitator for WikiConference North America. Kirk Adams is president of the American Foundation for the Blind, our lead partner. Ivan Martinez and Paulina Sanchez represent Wikimedia Mexico. Phil Zimbardo's Heroic Imagination Project brings us even more volunteers who are committed to making a difference in the lives of others. We are also working with a number of San Diego's GLAM and nonprofit organizations, with a special focus on community building events and volunteer service learning activities in San Diego's Library System and Balboa Park Museum District.
Participants
editCORE PROJECT TEAM
- DrMel – Dr Melissa Ganus – Project Director, Partnership Development, Outreach & Designs
- Psanchez820 - Paulina Sanchez - Wikimedia Mexico Liaison, Program Design, Spanish Inclusivity
- TiagoGracia – Priya Dharshini – Project Coordinator, Finance, Graphic Design
- Rocco91928 – Rocco Petrongolo – IT Coordinator, Mediawiki, Programming
- EB90 – Julia Gomez – Project Developer, Learning Designs, Outreach, Assessment
ORGANIZATIONAL LIAISONS
- Kirk Adams – President of and Project Liaison for American Foundation for the Blind
- Paulina Sanchez (psanchez820) – Liaison, Wikimedia Mexico
- Lane Rasberry – Liaison, Wikimedia North America
- Erwin Managua – Liaison, San Diego Library System
- Nik Honeysett – Liaison, San Diego Balboa Park Online Collaborative
- Joaquin Ortiz – Liasion, San Diego Museum of Photographic Arts
- Lauren Meyer – Liasion, San Diego Hall of Champions
- Phil Zimbardo – Liaison, Heroic Imagination Project
ADVISORS (Partial List)
- Helaine Blumenthal – Wiki Education Foundation, Blindness, Wiki & Education
- Nedra Weinrich – Advisor, Social Change Campaign Development
- Steven Wright – Advisor, Group Facilitation, Visualizations
- Caitlan Hernandez – Advisor, Blindness and Education
- Jon Mindas – Fundraising and Nonprofit Program Development
- Stan Wilson – Event Logistics, Project Management, Financial Oversight
- Sara Kenzie – Organizational and Project Management
OTHER PARTICIPANTS - WANT TO JOIN US?
- Project manager Committed to continuing the development of WikiSoCal volunteer programs and outreach activities. DrMel (talk) 04:05, 20 February 2017 (UTC)
- Advisor Committed to working on ideas to include the Spanish speaking community into WikiSoCal activities. Psanchez820
Endorsements
editExpand your idea
editWould a grant from the Wikimedia Foundation help make your idea happen? You can expand this idea into a grant proposal.
No funding needed?
editDoes your idea not require funding, but you're not sure about what to do next? Not sure how to start a proposal on your local project that needs consensus? Contact Chris Schilling on-wiki at I JethroBT (WMF) (talk · contribs) or via e-mail at cschilling
wikimedia.org for help!
Project goals
editDesign, test and share best practices and methods for volunteer recruitment, training and ongoing engagement. Collaborate with organizations and experts internationally to improve volunteer opportunities across all wikimedia projects, inclusive of people of all ages, abilities, interests, and cultural backgrounds.
Project plan
editActivities
editContinuing and expanding on our current activities:
- develop at least 12 collaborative partnerships with other like-minded organizations and expert advisors
- design, test and share at least 12 training and engagement activities for new volunteers
- host at least 12 WikiMeetups to bring in new volunteers and keep them engaged
- bring in at least 1,000 new volunteers from diverse backgrounds, and keep at least 50 engaged and actively contributing in the months that follow
Budget
editTotal Requested: $100,000 Budget breakdown:
- $42,000 - Event budget for Public Outreach throughout year, including monthly meetups, weekly planning meetings, and 4-days of WikiConSoCal new outreach and training events in Balboa Park, October 6-9
- $24,000 - project and event management, including contract negotiation, partnership development and additional fundraising (2000 hours @ $20/hr)
- $12,000 - Travel and planning meeting expenses ($1,000 per month)
- $2,000 - WikiSoCal-dedicated laptop (need a Mac - our libraries don't have any)
- $5,000 - financial management and reporting (5% of grant)
- $15,000 - contingency funds for unanticipated expenses (15% of grant)
In calculating our budget proposals, weve done a careful analysis of past proposals, objectives and budgets, within and outside Wikimedia. On average, the cost per participant averages $100/per person per day. Examples: 300 Wikipedians for 4-days in San Diego 2016 cost $120,000 ($50k from WMF & $70k from SD orgs) = $100/pp/day. WikiCon USA 2014 was 250 Wikipedians for 3-days in NYC ($35k from WMF & $40k from NY orgs). Our volunteer and service activities through the year and in our 4-day October conference will include more than 1,000 participants.
Community engagement
editThrough our extensive network of collaborative organizations, in our region, nationally and internationally, we will be able to invite and include anyone who is interested in being part of the wiki movement. Our project will include strategic plans for social media and live outreach materials and scripts for events and other opportunities.
Project team
editCORE PROJECT TEAM
- DrMel – Dr Melissa Ganus – Project Director, Partnership Development, Outreach & Designs
- TiagoGracia – Priya Dharshini – Project Coordinator, Finance, Designs
- Rocco91928 – Rocco Petrongolo – IT Coordinator, Mediawiki, Programming
- EB90 – Julia Gomez – Project Developer, Learning Designs, Outreach, Assessment
- Jon Mindas – Volunteer Coordinator, Program Development
- Stan Wilson – Event Logistics, Project Management, Financial Oversight
- Sara Kenzie – Project Management
ORGANIZATIONAL LIAISONS
- Kirk Adams – President of and Project Liaison for American Foundation for the Blind
- Bryan Bashin - Liaison, San Francisco Lighthouse for the Blind
- Paulina Sanchez (psanchez820) – Liaison, Wikimedia Mexico
- Lane Rasberry – Liaison, Wikimedia North America
- Erwin Managua – Liaison, San Diego Library System
- Nik Honeysett – Liaison, San Diego Balboa Park Online Collaborative
- Joaquin Ortiz – Liasion, San Diego Museum of Photographic Arts
- Lauren Meyer – Liasion, San Diego Hall of Champions
- Phil Zimbardo – Liaison, Heroic Imagination Project
ADVISORS (Partial List)
- Nedra Weinrich – Advisor, Social Change Campaign Development
- Steven Wright – Advisor, Group Facilitation, Visualizations
- Caitlan Hernandez – Advisor, Blindness and Education
Community notification
editPlease paste links below to where relevant communities have been notified of your proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions. Need notification tips?