Grants talk:Conference/Wikimedia Israel/GLAM-WIKI 2018/Report

Hi לסטר and all the WMIL team. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this thorough report and apologize for the long turnaround. We highly appreciate your effort in facilitating this very important platform for the GLAM community. I reviewed your report and have some comments and questions I'll be happy to clarify.

• I'm happy to see there was such a great interest in attending the conference and we are really appreciative of the fact you managed to accept more scholarship recipients, while focusing on diversity. Reaching out to emerging communities representatives, as you have done, has a huge impact on the movement development.
• When was the survey sent? Do you have a public page or further information you can share?
• We obviously encourage and care a great deal for partnerships and In-kind donations as a means of sustainability. So thank you for the hard work you are doing on this field.

Next steps

• Could you please provide more information regarding the program breakdown between 'tell' and 'show' sessions? Iv'e noticed many sessions that seems like informative sessions, but I'm not clear regarding which ones were more training or active learning oriented. Informative session are obviously needed, but when we try to evaluate the impact from this kind of events, the 'How to' sessions, come a long way in building capacity and new skills.
• I'm interested in knowing a bit about the arguments for not establishing a GLAM user group. Could you please elaborate for our learning?
• Were there any new partners for WMIL at the VIP meeting?

Learning

• Great to hear about the diverse and heterogeneous audience! Especially the scholarships % from emerging communities. Is there anything special or new you have done to achieve this?
• Was there a special program or activities for welcoming newcomers? And do you know how many newcomers attended the conference?
• Thank you for sharing your inputs on working with the WMF team. Could you please specify what kind of WMF support would you benefited from regarding the visa and refunds protocol you mentioned? Do you mean more guidance about the way to do so, or do you mean more 'hands on' support in managing the Visa process? I'm sorry to hear your current experience lacked the support you were hoping for. For further events, I can tell you that we now have a new team, the Events team, dedicated to provide more support to the community in cases like this.
• Regarding last minute cancellations from scholarship recipients, this is defiantly an issue to address and I'm sorry for the time, money and efforts spent. We already implemented some steps to minimize the risk for our next conferences. Thank you for letting us know. We reached out to all the participants listed as no-shows.

Financial documentation

• What was done with the video documentation? Please share links if you have any.
• You mentioned 'NO' on the remaining fund question, but also said you have ₪80,131.96 remaining, so I guess that was by mistake, right? If not, please clarify.

Thank you again for your hard work, and hope to hear back from you soon so we can learn a bit more from your experience in hosting the GLAM Wiki conference and so we can finalize the grant. All the best, CAlmog (WMF) (talk) 11:07, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

Grants talk:Conference/Wikimedia Israel/GLAM-WIKI 2018/Report/ WMIL response

Hi CAlmog (WMF) ,

Thank you for reviewing our Glam-Wiki report. We read your comments and questions and answer all of it below:

When was the survey sent? Do you have a public page or further information you can share?

The survey was sent per email with a link to a google form - in Hebrew for the Israeli participants and English for the other attendees. The results were not made public, link to the Feedback Questionnaire –GLAM-WIKI Conference 2018.

Could you please provide more information regarding the program breakdown between 'tell' and 'show' sessions?

Full program - all sessions in the right-hand column (under Workshops) were practical “how to” sessions. The other sessions were lectures (“tell”) but also include panels and discussions.

I'm interested in knowing a bit about the arguments for not establishing a GLAM user group. Could you please elaborate for our learning?

During the discussions regarding a GLAM user group it became clear that there are very big gaps in the kind of GLAM projects that interest and are feasible to participants in different countries. Besides the technical difficulties of setting up a global GLAM user group, the discussions indicated that it would be unlikely that such a group would be able to support and promote the diverging needs of its participants, and the idea was, for now, dropped.

Were there any new partners for WMIL at the VIP meeting?

Most of the VIPs were new to both the Wikimedia movement and projects and even the concept of GLAM.

Great to hear about the diverse and heterogeneous audience! Especially the scholarships % from emerging communities. Is there anything special or new you have done to achieve this?

YES! The scholarship committee gave preferential treatment (in the form of bonus points in evaluating submissions) to members of emerging communities (EC). This also required applying for an additional budget as the scholarships for these participants are significantly more expensive because their flights are more costly. Furthermore, such affirmative action also requires a greater effort in dealing with bureaucracy and with the authorities to allow EC participants entry to the country.

Was there a special program or activities for welcoming newcomers? And do you know how many newcomers attended the conference?

Only, and most of, the Israeli participants were new to the Wikimedia movement. Although we didn’t have a special program for newcomers, there was a special session for Israeli librarians with Kate Zwaard, and Israeli museum workers met with Loic Tallon.

Could you please specify what kind of WMF support would you benefited from regarding the visa and refunds protocol you mentioned? Do you mean more guidance about the way to do so, or do you mean more 'hands on' support in managing the Visa process?

There are several points to be regarded in this context: There need to be clearer information and better management of expectations regarding scholarships, visa and refunds, both for participants and conference organizers. From our experience we have learned that instructions, guidelines and protocols are often written from a western point of view and do not take into account the perspective of EC, causing misunderstandings, confusion and unpleasantness. Both WMF and organizers need to have better and clearer information explaining the scope of the scholarship, and to take into account cultural and geographical differences. For example, the refund for acquiring a visa is included in a scholarship. For an EC participants this may involve not just the cost of applying for a visa but also a 2 day trip to an embassy, overnighting, and other expenses. Another example is travelling to the conference - while we did book the international flights for all scholars, travel to and from the airport would be refunded. However, for some EC countries this included internal flights, or long journeys which significantly increased their travel expenses. Consequently, the refunds that organizers need to pay out during the conference may involve paying large amounts in cash. Paying such amounts in local currency may mean that participants are unable to use that money on their short stay and will need to exchange their refund, which in essence means they lose part of their refund. Moreover for organisers these refunds are hard to budget in advance.

What was done with the video documentation? Please share links if you have any.

GLAM Wiki Conference 2018 Wikimedia Israel Video

You mentioned 'NO' on the remaining fund question, but also said you have ₪80,131.96 remaining, so I guess that was by mistake, right? If not, please clarify.

WMF grant was fully used - mostly for the scholarships and some of catering provided From the other grants and sources of income which constituted the budget for the rest of the expenses there was a small amount that remained.

Thank you and the WMF team for all of your support, --Gitit- WMIL (talk) 14:03, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Grant report approved

Hi לסטר, Gitit- WMIL and all the WMIL team.

Congratulations on completing your grant!

Your complete grant report has been reviewed and accepted, and documentation of expenses has been received. Thank you for your engagement with the reporting review process, and with your work throughout the grants process. We appreciate the outcomes from your project, and what you learned with WMF and the community. We also very much appreciate your experience and comments on WMF support and the need for a more cultural awareness point of view while defining protocols and guidelines. This will be taken into consideration in the future.

We also warmly welcome any updates you would like to provide us about your completed project. We thank you for your work for the movement, and offer you our best wishes for your future work.

Thank you! All the best, CAlmog (WMF) (talk) 15:10, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Documentation of expenditures has been received by WMF.