Grants:Simple/Applications/Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda/2021

Application or grant stage: in progress

Applicant or grantee: Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda

Amount requested: 23,974.00 USD

Amount granted: 24,000 USD

Funding period: 01 January 2021 - 31 December 2021

Midpoint report due: 15 July 2021

Final report due: 30 January 2022

Application

Background

• The Usergroup will have minimal changes to the 2020 - 2021 annual plan, as most of the intended activities were either not done or did not go according to the original plan for 2019 - 2020 due to the COVID-19 global pandemic.
• An adaptation approach for this year will be to include online workshops, and limiting the number of participants at offline events.
• There will be an emphasis on retaining, and increasing contributors, and the Usergroup volunteer membership base.
• Building partnerships, with both internal and external organisations and institutions will also be explored, as the usergroup develops it's Strategic plan.
• Photographic competitions will have additional sessions for image re-use on other Wikimedia Projects.
• Diversity, content generation, and GLAM programmes will emphasise partnerships, collaboration, awareness, and volunteer outreach.
• Education programmes will engage schools and higher institutions of learning for Wikimedia awareness and content generation (including in local languages).
• The Usergroup will closely follow and take an active role in Movement Strategy discussions.
• New programs and activities to be included or expanded for this year include;
  • Wiki for Human Rights
  • Wiki4Refugees
  • Wikisoccerthons
  • Learning week
  • Wikipedia@20
  • Movement Strategy

Annual Plan

• https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tgsZi_pnaY2yLTVm28-wAXs5j-G68dxDLLVHvHxePuw/edit?usp=sharing

Budget Plan

• https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vGzID56vRZSr2PliPElbe4d54NdUERbztdq2iFyqq8o/edit?usp=sharing

Staffing Plan

• https://docs.google.com/document/d/11g0h2NDiJe4aQEXtI5k1AIpO5QtJphf0TotwQonJFEw/edit?usp=sharing

Strategic plan

• N/A
  • One of the Usergroup objectives, is to support the charitable work of the Wikimedia Foundation, to this end, the Usergroup is actively involved in the Movement Strategy discussions, and will closely refer to the recommendations as a future strategic plan (for the Usergroup) is developed.

Introduction

• The Wikimedia Community User Group in Uganda was officially recognized in 2018, having previously carried out volunteer projects as a group of individuals since 2014 through the Kumusha Takes Wiki Project, and other activities that promote free and open access to knowledge, done through the rapid grant program from 2014 - 2017. This also involved projects like; Wiki loves Monuments, other Outreach and Diversity conferences like Wiki Indaba (2017 and 2018).

• In 2018/2019, the Usergroup expanded the focus on outreach and diversity through Wiki loves women, Wiki Loves Earth, and other programs like WikiGap to bridge the content gap on Wikimedia Projects, and creating partnerships, which was made possible by the consolidated core team of volunteers who drafted an annual plan for 2019 - 2020.

• After approval of the above 2019/2020 annual plan, with the Simple annual planning grant program, the user group got further involved with the Wikimedia global Community through participating in annual Wikimedia Conferences, Movement Strategy, Wiki Indaba, and collaboration with other Wikimedia affiliates in the region and African Continent, hence broadening the work and experience in these years.

• For the 2020/2021 annual plan, the Usergroup would like to focus on diversity, content generation, outreach and collaboration, as well as creating awareness of the Wikimedia community and projects, that will retain and increase contributors.

Programs

• Required. Each program should contain only the following information:
  • Name of program
  • Brief description of overall program (about 100-500 words)
    • A comprehensive list of activities for a program is optional, and no extensive description of these activities is required.
  • Description of SMART objectives or goals for that program
  • Target metrics at the overall program level (not the activity level)
  • Brief explanation of why this program is important in relation to your organizational strategy or movement strategy (2-3 sentences).

PHOTOGRAPHIC COMPETITIONS

Annual competitions;

1. Wiki loves Africa
2. Wiki Loves Earth
3. Wiki loves Monuments

In 2020, we organised, publicised, carried out the judging process, upload sessions and gave national prizes, despite the few challenges on the change of schedules, and a ban on offline events, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, these competitions have been successfully completed, with lessons.

In 2021, we would like to adapt the approach basing on the new COVID-19 guidelines and programme learning points:

• We will prepare pre-competition training sessions, and define roles for volunteers to understand the Wikimedia community, and basic usage of Wikimedia projects, before the official start of photographic competitions.
• We will try as much as possible to get in touch with all participating local volunteers, even when they are not participating with the Usergroup, through more communication channels beyond user talk, and discussion pages.
  • We will work with one of the previous volunteers to take a leading or assistance role so that they can lead such projects in the future.
• We will document project activities, keep in touch with international photographic contest organisers, and the Wikimedia community through available public channels.

Program objectives

• No significant changes from the 2020 program objectives

Planned activities

• Pre-event training sessions
• Launch event
• Photo hunts and upload events
• Jury processes
• Prize give-aways
• Editathons (Closure and evaluation)

Why is this Important?

These are consistent projects that happen every year and bring together repeat editors with those specific interests. They are fun and engaging for the volunteers both new and old. Given that they are always around the same time of the year , the volunteers can plan ahead for the content and equipment needed in these competitions.This program provides continuity for community engagement

Program metrics and targets

• Number of participants to workshops: 30
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 12
• Number of pictures and videos of places uploaded to Wikimedia Commons: 600
• The number of images uploaded through photographic competitions that will be reused in other projects: 48
• Partners made through our activities: 3

Diversity and content Creation

Wikisoccerthons

In 2021, basing on the learning points from the pilot, the focus will be to closely work with the 8 regional football associations in Uganda, and a small number of volunteers from the pilot project for engagement, training, and content generation; utilising the existing Wikiprojects on (association) football on Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Wikicommons within a period of 7-8 months.

Why are we doing this?

There's usually a high rate of volunteer drop out, mis-information and burn out after some outreach programs and events by the Usergroup and other communities elsewhere, yet volunteer retention, and motivation are key required elements within the Wikimedia movement. Association football has a volunteer community, and an affiliate governance model, which linkages also exist within the Wikimedia movement, this program will explore, and make use of these linkages to achieve the desired objectives.

Wikisoccerthons will engage volunteers in both online, and offline events, that will help create and improve content about notable football players, clubs, competitions, stadiums, leagues, national teams, Women football, on selected Wikimedia projects, but at the same time making an outreach for awareness about the Wikimedia movement, projects and activities.

Program Objectives

• No significant change from last year

Planned activities

• Outreach to potential stakeholders/volunteers through the 8 regional assemblies and face to face project debrief meetings.
• Holding one monthly offline and one online editathon, translatorthon or workshop in every region.
• One monthly group photo walk and upload session in every region.
• Programme monitoring, evaluation, and feedback.

Program metrics and targets

• Total number of participants to workshops: 80
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 40
• Number of content pages improved or created: 320
• Number of images and videos uploaded to Wikimedia Commons: 3200
• Number of images uploaded that will be reused in other projects: 80
• Number of partnerships made with football associations to release public domain content: 2

Wiki4 Refugees

In 2020, the user group partnered with Platform Africa an organization working with refugees in Rhino Camp refugee settlement in North Western Uganda to carry out two edit-a-thons in February and September in which several refugees were trained on editing wikipedia and created articles for the refugee settlements in Uganda. In 2021, the same program will be extended to other refugees in 5 different refugee settlements across the country.

Program Objectives Increase the quality and diversify free knowledge through creating 50 articles on topics related about refugees in Uganda. Work with South Sudanese refugees in Uganda to start up a Wikimedia Community User Group for South Sudan. Increase the awareness and understanding of refugees in Uganda regarding open knowledge, free licences and Wikimedia projects by hosting 5 workshops in refugee settlement in Northern Uganda, Western Uganda and Kampala.

Planned activities Hosting 5 training workshops in refugee settlements in Uganda. Taking photos of refugee settlements in Uganda and uploading them to Wikimedia Commons

Why are we doing this? Uganda is one of the largest refugee-hosting nations in the world, with over 1,400,000 refugees as of February 2020. The vast influx of refugees is due to several factors in Uganda's neighboring countries, especially war and violence in South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and associated economic crisis and political instability in the region. Uganda has relatively 'friendly' policies that provide rights to the refugees, such as rights to education, work, private property, healthcare and other basic social services. The story of Uganda’s friendly refugee policy needs to be well documented on Wikipedia, and Wikimedia, by working with the refugees themselves to share their stories and what affects them on the world’s largest encyclopedia.

Program metrics and targets

• Number of participants to workshops: 100
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 80
• Number of content pages improved or created: 50
• Number of pictures and videos of places uploaded to Wikimedia Commons: 200
• Number of agreements made with GLAM institutions to release public domain content: 3
• Number of agreements made with Refugee Organizations to release public domain content: 5

Literacy Week of Activities

In 2020, the Usergroup was invited to co-host a talk about Wikipedia, its benefits, how to be an editor, how to increase visibility, etc at the FEMRITE Week of Literary Activities in October, with the Female Writers group which was trained in 2018.

Despite the fact that all activities were going to be online, the Usergroup did not honour this invitation. In 2021, we would like to have prior communication and planning with FEMRITE (Uganda Women Writers’ Association) for ways of participating in this annual event.

Program Objectives

• Increase female contributors to Wikimedia Projects
• Other objectives are in line with the diversity and content program

Planned activities

• Planning meetings.
• Training sessions.
• An editathon.
• Follow up meetings.

Why are we doing this?

• This program aligns with Women involvement in Wikimedia projects.
• The Usergroup has built a mutual relationship with Femrite that stems back from 2014, and recently in 2019.
  • We would like to make this collaboration stronger.

Program metrics and targets

• Total number of participants to workshops: 10
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 4
• Number of content pages improved or created: 8
• Number of images and videos uploaded to Wikimedia Commons: 16
• Number of images uploaded that will be reused in other projects:4
• Number of partnerships: 1

Wikipedia@20

Wikipedia will be making 20 years in 2021!!

• There will be global events on Wikipedia’s 20th birthday, and the Usergroup will plan activities around this day.

Movement Strategy discussions

By 2030, Wikimedia will become the essential infrastructure of the ecosystem of free knowledge, and anyone who shares our vision will be able to join us.

• The 10 Movement Strategy recommendations are here, and prioritisation events are happening for implementation in 2021, the Usergroup will develop activities in 2021 basing on results from these prioritisatioin events in 2020

Education

Open education resources

The Education Program will initiate the use of open education resources i.e wikimedia projects in the education sector. This will be through the collaboration with University Departments and secondary schools. In the past we have targeted the luganda wikipedia and wikisource projects but this year we would like to expand our scope to all wikimedia projects depending on the educational needs of the department or the school.

Due to the pandemic in the year 2020, Schools and Universities in Uganda were closed . These institutions did not have online platforms to continue with studies which created a halt to the project. We decided to train and work with individual teachers to create content versus partnering with an institution.

As schools are set to be reopened in the year 2021, we will continue to train teachers in wikimedia contribution but through partnering with institutions .

Program Objectives

• Increase digital literacy through the use of Wikimedia projects for participating students and teachers.
• Create awareness on the use of Wikipedia projects in the selected schools.
• Conduct advocacy meetings for the adoption of Wikipedia projects as an education resource in Uganda schools.
• Increased content on wikipedia projects

Planned activities

• Introduce wikimedia projects to a selected University Department and secondary school
• On-line workshops to train teachers on content creation and utilisation in classrooms
• Webinars with educators and education activists
• Online edit-a- thons for students

Why are we doing this?

This project seeks to introduce open education tools and in turn encourage the use of these tools in the education sector. This will improve digital literacy within schools but also enable students to learn to create and share knowledge.

Program metrics and targets

• Number of participants to workshops: 100
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 30
• Number of content pages improved or created: 100
• Number of partnerships made: 2

GLAM

Unfortunately the COVID-19 pandemic meant that a number of our activities had to be shifted online which negatively affected the numbers of people we could reach as well as the activities we could organise.

In addition, according to a survey carried out by AfLIA in October 2020, it was revealed that over 56% of librarians were not aware of the existence of their local Wikimedia communities. We can leverage this to create outreach programs within that community and cater for knowledge transfer as we have only a few GLAM professionals involved and they may be occupied with other activities. Also as previously mentioned Even our online activities were hampered because both parties were not really aware of what the other did and how they fit into each other’s agenda The nature of work in GLAM makes them familiar with the mission of the Wikimedia Movement Their positions place them in a very strategic position to access and allow other users access to the kind of information that we may be lacking in order to produce quality content (for example access to online and other subscription-based electronic resources for reference)

In respect for the Wikimedia Foundations for offline meetings as well as the Government of Uganda’s guidelines and recommendations for public gatherings, we may have to delay physical meetings with potential partners though.

Goals

Considering that most of our planned activities were disrupted by the situation presented by COVID-19, we will maintain the same goals that we had for 2020.

In addition to our previous activities, we plan to diversify our interaction with the Ugandan GLAM community by supporting/facilitating more GLAM-professionals in the Wikipedia in Libraries Project. We will also host training for those that may not have been selected for the program

Planned activities

• Recruitment and local support for local librarians to participate in the 2 learning cohorts of the continental Wikipedia in African Libraries Project
• 1Lib1Ref campaign (bi-annually)
• Community outreach and Introductory sessions for various GLAM institutions through their collective associations eg ULIA (Uganda Libraries Association),UgCLIA (Uganda Community Libraries Association), CUUL (Consortium of Uganda University Libraries)
• Introduction and edit-a-thons for Wikimedia Projects particularly WikiData, Wikipedia and Commons

Program Objectives

• Diversify the set of suitable and/or appealing proposals of activities and initiatives that can be performed with/in/by libraries and/or museums
• Create awareness of WMUGU GLAM-related activities in Uganda as well as others within the continent in addition to respect and
• Collaborate with at least 2 GLAM institutions to fill content gaps through thematic engagement
• Engage and recruit from the GLAM community further
• Collaboration with GLAM institutions and their umbrella organisations
• Increase support and awareness for Open Knowledge / Free Content movement
• Increase contributions by and from the GLAM community using the collections they have access to
• Increase accuracy and/or detail of contributions
• Increase visibility and respect for Wikimedia projects within the GLAM communities

Program metrics and targets

• Number of participants to workshops: 30
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 15
• Number of content pages improved or created: 40
• Number of partnerships made: 2
• Report on activities in Uganda on the GLAM newsletter at least 5 times in the course of the year

Grant Metrics Reporting

Required. Metrics, targets and results: grants metrics worksheet here.

• 2021 grant metrics against targets
  • https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_qZxJ7B9U_Eo6pMG55ox-zCHppM9-lubQm0jKI2tn6g/edit#gid=522042207

Needs Request

Optional. The Community Resources team would like understand the best way to support the success of your programs and organization in general. If you have any requests or needs you have related to your programs, organizational operations, or other needs below under the appropriate section, please describe them here. You may instead e-mail simplewikimedia.org to reach your program officer if you prefer.

Suggestions for Simple APG Application process

• ...

Requests for programmatic support

For example, requesting guidance or expertise from Wikimedia Foundation staff on GLAM- or Education-related areas.

1. In 2020, we reached out to the Wikimedia Foundation partnerships department for guidance on the best way to manage (long and short term) partnerships out of a potential list of 7 partners.
   1. We would like to proceed with this request for guidance on building lasting partnerships since we have 9 potential partnerships for 2021
2. We would also like to have occasional contact with the Wikimedia Education Team since we have a running project on Education with an outreach to schools and institutions.
   1. In 2020 we had already initiated a conversation with the Education Team through an office hours' request, about advocacy resources, and approaches for Education projects.
3. As the Usergroup will be developing it's strategic plan, and is involved in supporting the charitable work of the Wikimedia Foundation, including Movement Strategy discussions, we will request for guidance from the Movement Strategy support team about implementation of the top recommendations.

Requests for operational support

For example, requesting guidance or expertise from Wikimedia Foundation staff on public communications, financial practices, or hiring procedures.

1. Rather than outsourcing, the Usergroup will request for guidance and mentorship for staff, hiring procedures, finance, accounting, administration and program management.
2. We will also need guidance on branding and public communications on the best way to present the organisation, and it's affiliation to potential partners including communications on blog posts, television or radio broadcasts.
3. Legal department support: As an affiliate, the Usergroup will need guidance from the WMF legal team about NGO registration or incorporation outside Uganda.
4. Support from the WMF Events team, since the Usergroup is scheduled to host Wiki Indaba (November 2021)

Other requests

• Trust and Safety and/or Community Resilience & Sustainability team's support to manage the safety of the Usergroup's online and offline communities when incidents happen, and can not be resolved immediately or internally.
  • The trust and safety team can also guide the usergroup on best practices on how to avoid similar occurrences now or in the future in an open, friendly and transparent environment, as we plan to grow and sustain our volunteer community.
• The Usergroup has requested for a moderate annual local insurance package for 10 people to ensure the health, inclusion and safety of staff and volunteers who will travel to the 5 Refugee settlements, or across the country.
• The Usergroup has requested to confirm other names for staff roles before the end of January 2021.

No requests needed

If you have no specific requests, please confirm this here.

• ...

Midterm report

Program story

Optional. Please tell or link to one program story that showcases your organization's achievements during the reporting period. This can be another meta page, a blog post or any other source that tells your program story.

Program Progress

Photographic Competitions

ACTIVITIES PROGRESS

• Wiki Loves Africa 2021 Project page on commons

Description

• The project page describes Wiki Loves Earth schedules, participants, and sample results.

challenges

• The competition has not yet been concluded at the targeted timeline due to the delay in the jury process

learning points

• It's best to start engaging the jury members earlier in the competition, rather than when the competition is about to end.

Adaptation

• Keeping in constant communication with the jury to identify and work around challenges
• Engaging the jury early enough for future photographic competitions.

Diversity and Content Creation

ACTIVITIES PROGRESS

Wiki Gap

This year, the Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda, in partnership with the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, represented through the Swedish embassy to Uganda organized a WikiGap Contest from on 8th March to 8th April 2021 with four regional events in Kampala (Embassy of Sweden), Mbarara (Mbarara University of Science and Technology), Tororo (Busitema University) ,and Gulu (Gulu University) as well as an online event with an aim of bridging the content gap about the African woman on Wikipedia.

With a total of 42 editors, we created 250 articles, 363 articles edited, 2.7k total edits,238k words added, 1.18k references added, 41.1k articles reviews, and 87 commons uploaded.

• Link to WikiGap Meta Page.
• Link to WikiGap Outreach dashboard.

Challenges

• We had to follow the COVID-19 SOPs and limited the participants for each event to 10 people each.
• The dashboard which was the preferred tool for tracking participants contributions was on and off and was not reliable

Learning points

• The regional events in different parts of the country helped us to have Geographical diversity in terms of participants, previously we only engaged participants from Kampala the capital city.
• The partnership with the Embassy of Sweden helped us reach more people, where they covered some of the costs for travel and the internet.

Wiki For Human Rights

From April 15 to May 15, 2021 we organized the #WikiForHumanRights campaign in Uganda with the theme "Right to a healthy environment" aimed at writing about human rights, environmental health, and diverse communities impacted by environmental issues around the world. The purpose was also to celebrate Earth Day.

Every human being should have a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment to live in. Fortunately, the right to a healthy environment is partly recognized in one way or another in more than 150 countries worldwide. For #WikiForHumanRights, we encouraged Wikimedia's and advocates to document on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia platforms the story of these rights which enable safe and stable climate, healthy ecosystems, and a non-toxic environment: we can increase knowledge about the healthy natural systems upon which all people rely for the water they drink, the air they breathe, the food they eat and the resources they need.

Fulfilling the human right to a healthy environment empowers those most affected by environmental harms such as pollution, climate change, and biodiversity loss to defending the environment, participate in decision-making, and access justice. Like COVID-19, environmental degradation disproportionately affects different communities: including persons, groups, and peoples in vulnerable situations. Better knowledge about human rights and the environment, helps society recover from COVID-19: understanding the knowledge related to these will help communities around the world decision making at all levels will ultimately lead to more effective and greener crisis response and recovery.

With about 17 editors, we were able to create 33 articles including on Wikipedia and Wikidata, 39 articled edited, 1.12k total edits,23.3k words added, 188 references added, 4.09k article reviewed, and 400 commons upload.

1. Link to WikiForHumanRights meta page
2. Link to WikiForHumanRights outreach dashboard
3. Link to articles translated to Luganda

Challenges

• There are limited credible citations available on Human Rights and environmental health activists in Uganda.
• COVID-19 restrictions limited the attendance of in-person participants during the editathon.
• Limited internet data support for participants to continue editing remotely after the editathon.

Learning points

• Human Rights are dependent on the number of people fighting for them.
• People define human rights based on what they go through in life.
• Participants learned about Human Rights and Environmental Health and the connections that exist about the topic.

Program Metrics and Target

• Number of Participants to Workshops: 17
• Number of newly registered users during Workshops: 5
• Number of Content Pages improved or created: 21 new WikiData items, edited 2 existing WikiData items, 12 new Wikipedia articles, and improved 4 existing articles on Human rights activists and organizations.
• Number of Partnership made: 0
• Report on Activities in Uganda: 1 blogpost

Wiki For Refugees

For the second year running, we conducted the Wiki For Refugees training and editathon in partnership with Platform Africa. The editathon this year was held from May 15, 2021, to June 15, 2021, at Rhino Camp Refugee Settlement. The program involved Intensive training on how to update/ edit and add articles to Wikipedia, Edit-a-thon aimed at improving stub articles and creating new entries about critical topics, underrepresented groups, initiatives and putting up-to-date figures about refugees, and creating content for upload on Wikimedia Commons including videos, audios, and videos to document the life of refugees in Uganda.

With a total of 18 editors, 39 articles were created, 86 articles edited, 317 total edits, 31k words added, 149 references added, 5.35M articles reviews, and 10 commons uploads.

1. Link to WikiForRefugees Meta Page.
2. Link to WikiForRefugees outreach dashboard.
3. Link to WikiForRefugees May 2021 YouTube Video.

Challenges

• The restrictions on public transport made the transport to reach the refugee settlement more expensive
• Only 5 of the 15 participants who participated in last year's event were able to return, meaning we had to work with a new set of volunteers
• Still not enough computers for all participants
• Participants accounts were blocked because we were all using the same internet source, and new accounts couldnt be created.

Learning points

• Partnering with Platform Africa which runs an ICT centre with solar power, a flat screen and a good internet connectivity helped worked out for us.

Wikisoccerthons 2021 (Not started yet)

Description

• The project has been extended twice within the year due to FUFA elections, and the national COVID-19 Lockdown

Challenges

• Uncertainity of the target audience to collaborate with due to internal elections for new leadership.
• National lockdown of the country due to the global COVID-19 pandemic, including sports activities.

learning points

• It's helpful to be aware about the internal operations of target participants in a project.

Adaptation

• Flexibility with schedules and timelines
• Considering the virtual option of engaging participants

EDUCATION

ACTIVITIES PROGRESS

The Education Program was supposed to be a collaboration with University Departments and secondary schools. But the COVID-19 pandemic led to the closure of these institutions. Many of these institutions do not have online platforms to continue with studies which created a halt to the project. We decided to train and work with individual teachers to create content versus partnering with an institution. Our focus was to increase the content on Luganda Wikipedia. The theme for this year is politics.

Challenges

·       The closure of schools meant that we could not undertake some of the activities to the scale we had hoped to

·       COVID-19 restrictions affected planned in person attendance for editathons that can spur better collaboration between participants.

·       Switching off the internet and blocking social media hampered communication and work .

Learning points

·       On-line workshops are an avenue to train different teachers on content creation and can solve the problem of travel inconvenience.

·       Webinars with educators and education activists can help to bring other people on board from different locations

Program metrics and targets

·       Number of participants to workshops: 100

·       Number of newly registered users during workshops: 30

·       Number of content pages improved or created: 100

·       Number of partnerships made: 2

Link to Luganda Wikipedia

GLAM

Activities progresss

Despite the situation presented by COVID-19, we have been able to successfully hold 2 in-person events that attracted mostly new participants specifically from the GLAM sector- the Wikipedia in African Libraries Uganda Meet-up on 10 April and Wikipedia for Museums in Uganda between 21- 22 May 2021. Both activities were hosted at venues for which we were able to cultivate space partnerships - the National Library of Uganda and the Uganda Society Library respectively.

In a support and training role as a local host community, we have been able to realise the numbers below :

• Number of participants =
• Number of new participants =
• Pages/ articles created =
• Partnerships realised = 02
• Reports on GLAM newsletter = 2/5

Challenges

• There are long-standing negative perceptions of Wikipedia especially with information workers which makes outreach, recruitment , training and retention a challenge.
• GLAM work by nature demands physical interaction so the lock down slowed our progress considering we had physical events planned.
• Depending on the skill and experience of an individual, virtual events for GLAM in our case were really not giving value for money.

Learning points

• Partnerships do not necessarily have to be about
• Increased involvement with GLAM gives us the opportunity to design programs and training that is GLAM-specific which is an efficient use of resources.a
• GLAM organisations/bodies have theme days which present a good opportunity for partnerships especially now that they have to rethink on delivery. Most of the theme days we partnered on actually had an emphasis on partnership with the free knowledge movement

Spending update Midterm

Please link to a detailed financial report for your spending during the first half of your grant period. This should be in the same format as your detailed budget from your Simple APG application.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E0B3Kg7ToCvdGIO_JLId6VJ_vjnaCo2nhmdZiRaoDJ8/edit?usp=sharing

Please include the total amount of Simple APG funds you spent during the grant period:

• 10,000USD

Grant Metrics Reporting Midterm

Metrics, targets and results: grants metrics worksheet here.

Final report

Program story

Optional. Please tell or link to one program story that showcases your organization's achievements during the reporting period. This can be another meta page, a blog post or any other source that tells your program story.

Learning story

Optional. Please link to one learning story that shows how your organization documents lessons learned and adapts its programs accordingly.

Programs Impact

DIVERISTY AND CONTENT GENERATION

Wikisoccerthons

Activities

• Outreach to seven, out of the 8 target regions in Uganda.

Impact

• 100% positive reception, and anticipation of Wikimedia training activities in the seven visited target regions.

Description

• This was the first phase of the project, which aimed at creating awareness of project activities, and seeking for participation from potential stakeholders/volunteers through the 8 regional associations.

Challenges

• The postponement, and change of schedules meant initially planned activities had to be done during the festive season: one of the target regions had gone on the festive season break.
• As a result of the above postponement, there was an overlap between key usergroup activities like WikiIndaba, which did not provide enough time to complete all the Wikisoccerthon project phases.

Learning points

• Once there's project buy-in, stakeholders can be willing to share costs involved in implementing a project.
• Having an adequate number of volunteers for a project can help it's successful execution.
• There's a great interest for community members to have content created on Wikimedia projects especially Wikipedia

Adaptation

• Project phases that were not completed in 2021, will be pushed to 2022.

Wiki For Human Rights

Description

From April 15 to May 15, 2021 we organized the #WikiForHumanRights campaign in Uganda with the theme "Right to a healthy environment" aimed at writing about human rights, environmental health, and diverse communities impacted by environmental issues around the world. The purpose was also to celebrate Earth Day.

Every human being should have a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment to live in. Fortunately, the right to a healthy environment is partly recognized in one way or another in more than 150 countries worldwide. For #WikiForHumanRights, we encouraged Wikimedia's and advocates to document on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia platforms the story of these rights which enable safe and stable climate, healthy ecosystems, and a non-toxic environment: we can increase knowledge about the healthy natural systems upon which all people rely for the water they drink, the air they breathe, the food they eat and the resources they need.

Fulfilling the human right to a healthy environment empowers those most affected by environmental harms such as pollution, climate change, and biodiversity loss to defending the environment, participate in decision-making, and access justice. Like COVID-19, environmental degradation disproportionately affects different communities: including persons, groups, and peoples in vulnerable situations. Better knowledge about human rights and the environment, helps society recover from COVID-19: understanding the knowledge related to these will help communities around the world decision making at all levels will ultimately lead to more effective and greener crisis response and recovery.

Impact

• With about 17 editors, we were able to create 33 articles including on Wikipedia and Wikidata, 39 articled edited, 1.12k total edits,23.3k words added, 188 references added, 4.09k article reviewed, and 400 commons upload.

• Link to WikiForHumanRights meta page[[1]]
• Link to WikiForHumanRights outreach dashboard[[2]]
• Link to articles translated to Luganda[[3]]

Challenges

• There are limited credible citations available on Human Rights and environmental health activists in Uganda.
• COVID-19 restrictions limited the attendance of in-person participants during the editathon.
• Limited internet data support for participants to continue editing remotely after the editathon.

Learning points

• Human Rights are dependent on the number of people fighting for them.
• People define human rights based on what they go through in life.
• Participants learned about Human Rights and -Environmental Health and the connections that exist about the topic.

Program Metrics and Target

• Number of Participants to Workshops: 17
• Number of newly registered users during Workshops: 5
• Number of Content Pages improved or created: 21 new WikiData items, edited 2 existing WikiData items, 12 new Wikipedia articles, and improved 4 existing articles on Human rights activists and organizations.
• Number of Partnership made: 0

Report on Activities in Uganda: 1 blogpost

Wiki For Refugees

Description

For the second year running, we conducted the Wiki For Refugees training and editathon in partnership with Platform Africa. The editathon this year was held from May 15, 2021, to June 15, 2021, at Rhino Camp Refugee Settlement. The program involved Intensive training on how to update/ edit and add articles to Wikipedia, Edit-a-thon aimed at improving stub articles and creating new entries about critical topics, underrepresented groups, initiatives and putting up-to-date figures about refugees, and creating content for upload on Wikimedia Commons including videos, audios, and videos to document the life of refugees in Uganda.

Impact With a total of 18 editors, 39 articles were created, 86 articles edited, 317 total edits, 31k words added, 149 references added, 5.35M articles reviews, and 10 commons uploads.

• Link to WikiForRefugees Meta Page. [[4]]
• Link to WikiForRefugees outreach dashboard.[[5]]
• Link to WikiForRefugees May 2021 YouTube Video.[[6]]

Challenges

• The restrictions on public transport made the transport to reach the refugee settlement more expensive.
• Only 5 of the 15 participants who participated in last year's event were able to return, meaning we had to work with a new set of volunteers.
• Still not enough computers for all participants.
• Participants' accounts were blocked because we were all using the same internet source, and new accounts couldn't be created.

Learning points

• Partnering with Platform Africa which runs an ICT centre with solar power, a flat-screen, and good internet connectivity helped worked out for us.

Wiki Gap

Description This year, the Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda[[7]], in partnership with the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, represented through the Swedish embassy to Uganda organized a WikiGap Contest from on 8th March to 8th April 2021 with four regional events in Kampala (Embassy of Sweden), Mbarara (Mbarara University of Science and Technology), Tororo (Busitema University), and Gulu (Gulu University) as well as an online event with an aim of bridging the content gap about the African woman on Wikipedia.

Impact With a total of 42 editors, we created 250 articles, 363 articles edited, 2.7k total edits,238k words added, 1.18k references added, 41.1k articles reviews, and 87 commons uploaded.

• Link to WikiGap Meta Page.[[8]]
• Link to WikiGap Outreach dashboard.[[9]]

Challenges

• We had to follow the COVID-19 SOPs and limited the participants for each event to 10 people each.
• The dashboard which was the preferred tool for tracking participants' contributions was on and off and was not reliable.

Learning points

• The regional events in different parts of the country helped us to have Geographical diversity in terms of participants, previously we only engaged participants from Kampala the capital city.
• The partnership with the Embassy of Sweden helped us reach more people, where they covered some of the costs for travel and the internet.

EDUCATION

ACTIVITIES PROGRESS

The Education Program was supposed to be a collaboration with University Departments and secondary schools. But the COVID-19 pandemic led to the closure of these institutions. Many of these institutions do not have online platforms to continue with studies which led us to broaden the scope of the project.

• Train the trainer
• *Training six editors with backgrounds of education and journalism.
• *Initial One month training about Wikipedia, editing, citation and notability
• *Uploading of imagery on wikimedia commons
• Edit-a-thons
• *The selected trainer under went a series of edit-a-thons to improve editing skills
• *These included ; gender, politics and monuments
• Evaluation
• *We had evaluation and planning meeting for the next years activities

Challenges

• The closure of schools meant that we could not undertake some of the activities to the scale we had hoped to
• COVID-19 restrictions affected planned in person attendance for editathons that can spur better collaboration between participants.
• Switching off the internet and blocking social media hampered communication and work .
• Lack of computers for some participants to join in online activities

Learning points

• On-line workshops are an avenue to train different teachers on content creation and can solve the problem of travel inconvenience.
• Webinars with educators and education activists can help to bring other people on board from different locations.
• Initially focusing on complete training versus a greater focus on editing created better content creators

Program metrics and targets

• Number of participants to workshops: 6
• Number of newly registered users during workshops: 1
• Number of content pages improved or created: 70
• Number of partnerships made: 2

Link to Luganda Wikipedia

GLAM

Description

GLAM Wiki in Uganda deals with increasing Ugandan-GLAM related content on various Wikimedia projects through training, outreach activities and commemoration of GLAM-themed days. It also aims at creating relationships with GLAM institutions so that they understand and participate in the Wikimedia Movement. It also looks at training and supporting information workers in Uganda on how to participate in the Wikimedia Movement.

Activities and impact

• We had 3 in-person activities (Wikipedia in African Libraries Uganda Meet-up April 2022; Wikipedia in African Libraries Uganda Meetup September 2022) and for the first time we were able to coordinate and commemorate World Museum Day as a collective.
• We trained and supported at least 30 individuals over the year through mentorship.
• We were able to generate content related to information institutions in Uganda on various projects - at least 18 articles on Wikipedia, 30 on Wikidata and 20 images on Wikimedia Commons.
• Due to mentorship and local support, at least 8 information workers were able to successfully apply and receive scholarships to participate in international events like Wikimania and regional events like WikiIndaba.
• We were also able to involve more information workers in the administrative and budget processes of the user-group with at at least 2 attending our AGM.
• We were able to benefit from 2 partnerships as we had projected - one with the National Library of Uganda and with the Uganda Society Library.

Challenges

• A big number of the target audience reside up-country and a government lock-down we could not meet for Outreach and learning activities
• Where support for data could be provided, some participants lived in areas with very poor internet connectivity
• A number of the target audience were not really conversant with online meeting platforms like Zoom and Google Meet so we needed to design in-person programs for them.
• Formal GLAM institutions were hesitant to enter partnerships with us because of bureaucracy

Learning points

• Volunteers come with different skills and interests which we need to identify early on so that resources are used in the right direction for example some are better administrators than content creators and we could use these skills.
• Continuous engagement in not only GLAM activities is important in helping volunteers find themselves in the Wiki-world

Adaptation for next year

• Develop a local curriculum that will address technical and wiki literacy in order to build basic skills
• Engage in and support activities that utilise the participants interest and skills
• Identify and make use of GLAM themed days and holidays as partners are willing to work with us as part of activities to commemorate such events
• Facilitate competitive events to motivate contributors

PHOTOGRAPHIC COMPETITIONS

Wiki Loves Africa

Activities

• Events, Photo hunts, and uploads to Wikimedia commons, with the theme for 2021 as Health and Wellness.

Impact

• Uganda was in the top 6 out of 47 participating countries with a total of 509 content pages created, 58 uploaders and 19 images used in other wikis.

Description

• The competition was carried out by a total of 13 participants/volunteers directly facilitated by the usergroup.
• Other participants probably took part through indirect outreach, and social media channels.

Challenges

• It's very hard to track winners who do not have a direct contact with the Usergroup.

Learning points

• There's need for training of volunteers soft editing skills like creating a talk page.
• Jury members might also need some prizes to show appreciation for their jury efforts.

Adaptation

• Engage jury members early and also prepare a stand-by volunteers incase any of the jury members can not make it.

Wiki Loves Earth

Activities

• See project page
• Events, Photo safari, and uploads to Wikimedia commons.

Impact

• 267 image uploads from 31 up-loaders.

Description

• The competition involved a photo safari which was specifically aimed at acquiring quality images from famous tourist destinations in Western Uganda .
• The activities were carried out during the national lock down, the Tourism sector was among the essential departments allowed to operate. Participants who were not able to join the safari took part remotely.

Challenges

• The national COVID-19 Lockdown was a limitation to most of the volunteers who wanted to take part in the competition.
• Limited time at the photo safaris, made it impossible for volunteers to upload all their images.
• It's not easy to track, and train best practises to all contributors, which affects the quality of contributions.

Learning points

• Photo safaris are good avenues to get quality images.
• Whenever possible, it's advisable to upload images while still on the photo safari, rather than assuming that volunteers will upload these at the end of the safari.

Adaptation

• It's a good practise to have Photosafaris with experienced photographers to help volunteers acquire quality photo shooting skills.
• The Usergroup is planning community engagement sessions where contributors will be sensitized about upcoming events

Wiki Loves Monuments

Descpription

• Wiki Loves Monuments 2021 was the fourth time to organize the contest in Uganda.
• We were able to organize photo hunts in Kampala and upcountry in the northern region of the country that we had never reached since 2017.
• 15 people participated in the contest this year, uploading 335 photos to commons and 55(16%) of those have been used on wikis.
• The winners of the contest received shopping vouchers as prizes.

Challenges

• The main challenge this year was the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted us to do some activities and also put partipants at risk when participating in activities
• Low quality of photos, because of this, its hard for Ugandan photos to win the international competition

Learning points

• Each partipant received a simple prize, a Wiki Loves Monument branded mug, which was a good thank you to all the 18 participants including he jury.

Adpatation for next year

• Conduct photography classes for the participants so as to improved the quality of photos

Spending update Final

Please link to a detailed financial report for your spending during the grant period. This should be in the same format as your detailed budget from your Simple APG application.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E0B3Kg7ToCvdGIO_JLId6VJ_vjnaCo2nhmdZiRaoDJ8/edit?usp=sharing

Please include the total amount of Simple APG funds you spent during the grant period:

• Amount Spent: 73,725,495 UGX
• Amount not spent: 13,771,974

Part of the underspend is to be used for the 2021 annual financial audit, which is estimated to cost around 6,000,000 UGX

Grant Metrics Reporting Final

Metrics, targets and results: grants metrics worksheet here.