Grants talk:PEG/WM AM/CEE Meeting 2016

A decision has been made on this grant. Comments are still welcome on this page.

GAC members decisions

GAC members who support this request

1. --Violetova (talk) 09:40, 24 May 2016 (UTC), I will be not participant in the CEE Meeting 2016, which makes me eligible to vote.
2. let it be rubin16 (talk) 18:28, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

GAC members who abstain from voting/comment

1. --Packa (talk) 22:01, 24 May 2016 (UTC) as a possible participant.

GAC comments

Is there a report from previous years as to the costs and achievements of this event? Craig Franklin (talk) 10:33, 7 June 2016 (UTC).

Hi Craig Franklin! Last year the CEE Meeting was co-organized by Wikimedia Eesti. You can find the feedback and results of the meeting here. In 2014 the meeting was organized by Wikimedia Ukraine and you can find the report here.--David Saroyan (talk) 11:16, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Excellent, thankyou User:David Saroyan. I will review the reports and be back with further questions. Craig Franklin (talk) 11:34, 7 June 2016 (UTC).

Community comments

Scholarship requests

Hello! Thank you for the grant proposal :) How are you going to decide the distribution of the scholarships? Last year affiliates decided who was going to represent or the relevant language communities (via discussions on their Village Pumps). Am I right, Лорд Бъмбъри / Teele? --アンタナナ 15:13, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi! Thank you too. This year too, the distribution of the scholarships should be decided by affiliates because they better know their own community and I think they can effectively choose the best participants. Several affiliates have already discussed/chosen possible candidates for the scholarships. In the case when there is no affiliate or the affiliate is not done the distribution locally we will offer scholarships taking into the consideration the motivation of the applicants and their participation in the Wikimedia movement. --David Saroyan (talk) 16:55, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

アンタナナ, David, last year the participating affiliates decided for themselves who they wished to represent them. I recommend to the current and future affiliates to have a transparent vote for choosing their representatives. --Lord Bumbury (talk) 23:25, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

There is also the question of languages without a country. For instance, I was thinking about aromanians. The community there is extremely small, but they might benefit from participating in such an event (e.g. by learning about CEE Spring). How can they get scholarships to the CEE Meeting?--Strainu (talk) 11:05, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

I think that Aromanians live in several countries (also in Macedonia), but I can not tell if any Aromanian from Macedonia edit on Wikipedia, but if existed such user who contribute on Wikipedia and if he/she is interested to attend any conference (in this case: CEE Meeting), my opinion is that he/she can apply through organization/community in that country. --Ehrlich91 (talk) 11:33, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi Strainu. We include such languages in this section (not country based WM user groups). As in the case of Wikimedians of Bashkortostan User Group, they contacted WM AM expressing their interest in participating in the conference and we added a section for them. But of course, any Wikimedian user group from the CEE region is free to add their own section and state their motivation to attend the conference there. Depending on the number of offered scholarships we'll equally distribute them among interested WM communities. --David Saroyan (talk) 11:44, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the answer David. Ehrlich91, because they live in several countries I believe this is an issue which deserves specific attention (I wouldn't want you or any other country to feel your presence is "diluted"), but I'm satisfied that the organizers have taken this into account. I'll try to contact the 3-4 active users on that wiki to see if there is any interest.--Strainu (talk) 11:58, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

• one more question about this topic: how do you decide which travel expenses will be covered by this grant request and which will be funded by chapters themselves? Shouldn't we encourage chapters to take up such costs on their own? rubin16 (talk) 20:13, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi rubin16. There are chapters who have already included CEE Meeting 2016 expenses in their Annual Plan Grant or in the annual budget of their organizations. The scholarships will be given to those who has neither of them. Of course, we should encourage the chapters to find other resources to cover CEE Meeting 2016 attendance expenses but it's not easy because many of the CEE countries don't have an annual budget or any other funding.--Lilitik22 (talk) 14:44, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

WMF Comments

Hi Lilitik22 and David Saroyan, thank you for all of the hard work you have put into developing this proposal. We understand that this conference has become a valuable annual event for the CEE community and the movement as a whole, as it is frequently mentioned as the starting place for several successful projects and collaborations. It would be helpful to get a summary of the valuable outcomes from that meeting, as well as any lessons you learned that have influenced your plans for this year’s meeting.

Our primary concern with the request is that the cost of the event has more than doubled from the previous year, without much of an increase in expected participation of representatives from CEE groups. We understand that costs for travel account for a majority of the increase in cost, as well as the addition of an extra day for the conference, however, it is not sustainable to have this kind of increase in cost each year. Given the significant increase in cost it would be helpful to get a better understanding of what the priorities are for the CEE community, and how plans can be adapted to bring down costs while still meeting community needs. Below are some suggestions for ways to lower the costs:

• We understand that in the past local Wikimedians from the host country have participated in the conference, however with the rising cost of the event it may not be feasible to continue this practice. We suggest that you consider hosting a welcome or farewell dinner in Yerevan with local Wikimedians to allow the groups to socialize, or limit participation of local Wikimedians to just one day of the conference.
• Reduce the number of nights spent at the conference venue, by either shortening the conference program or starting the conference on Friday afternoon instead of sightseeing. By making the changes below, the budget could be lowered to $44,000 USD. This calculation was made estimating 63 people staying at the hotel in Dijilan (58 international, 5 Armenian organizers). This is just a suggestion for one way to bring down the cost of the event while still including local Wikimedians in some events. We can discuss other options and ideas.

Thursday: International participants arrive; museum visits or social event with local Wikimedians. Overnight in Yerevan.

Friday: Leave for Dijilan in the morning, begin conference after lunch. Overnight in Dijilan.

Saturday:Conference. Overnight in Dijilan.

Sunday: Conference ends in the mid afternoon, return to Yerevan. Farewell dinner with local Wikimedians. Overnight in Yerevan.

Monday: Editathon for locals/CEE representatives in Yerevan, with participants departing for the airport through the day.

• Lower the budget for materials, exclude pens, notebooks, folders, t-shirts.

We would be happy to set up a call to discuss any questions or concerns you have, as well as how you would like WMF staff to be involved in the event this year. It is wonderful to see so many different communities and affiliates collaborate to plan this event, and we look forward to learning more about the topics that you will focus on in the program this year.--KHarold (WMF) (talk) 00:09, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

Dear KHarold (WMF), thank you very much for your comment and recommendations. We re-evaluated the budget in view of your suggestions and at some points we agree that some of the expences can be reduced. Let me first mention the savings that we think we can make so far:

• The tours to Etchmiadzin Cathedral and Zvartnots can be removed, instead we can start the conference one day earlier and by doing so we will need 1 less night in Dilijan hotel and save $3,402 in total (but we have to check with the hotel if changing the dates is still possible).
• The venue kindly agreed to cover a part of the coffee break expenses. Thus we can save $1,644.3
• As we start the conference one day earlier, there'll be no need of the Yerevan supper because it'll be replaced by the Welcome dinner and we can save $277.
• We can remove most of the printing expenses and save $627. We would like however to keep the T-shirts as they are very effective in enhancing a community spirit and teambuilding.

Expectedly travel expenses can be lowered as well as it is likely that the participants from abroad who will be offered a scholarship will be less than 58. We can also keep the price of tickets $460 if we start the registration very soon since ticket prices rise daily in the summer. So please, if it is possible, allow us to start the registration now.

Finally, we would like to keep the budget for 30 local participants and let me explain why we think it is absolutely worth it. It is part of our team's vision that we need to augment the impact of any Wikimedia to include a wider circle of Wikimedians in the movement rather than reduce it to a gathering of a closed society. There are many enthusiastic and motivated Wikimedians and volunteers in Armenia and the region who would be happy to expand their involvement in the global Wikimedia or local chapters, but only a handful of them had the chance to participate in international or regional events. The CEE meeting is thus a unique opportunity to bring them closer to the global movement and community, to share ideas, experience and inspiration.

We have mentioned 30 participants from Armenia, including 12 people who participate as organizers or volunteers and 20 highly motivated and committed local Wikimedians that we will choose after the registration phase. We also want to have 4 attendees instead of 2 from the neighboring country Georgia as they will arrive not by plane and the travel cost is about 20 USD for each participant.

By the way, it is with the same vision that we want to keep the edit-a-thon event on the last day of the conference as well as the meeting with international school students of the venue, which will give us another opportunity to introduce wiki movement to a wider audience. It is these "side-effects" that make our team especially excited about the CEE meeting and we hope can keep them.

Kind regards. --David Saroyan (talk) 13:28, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi David Saroyan, thank you for working quickly to change the reservations for the accommodations and event space, as well as the other efforts you have made to lower the budget. Even with these adjustment the total budget of $49,150 is still nearly two times the cost of the conference last year, and that this kind of budget growth is not sustainable. We will begin a new conference grant application process starting in August of 2016 that will ask conference organizers to submit an estimated budget six months before proposed conferences so that we can work together from an early stage to make changes to budgets if necessary, in order to ensure sustainable growth and equitable distribution of conference budgets across the movement.

• We have noticed that several groups have not posted comments in the Questions and Needs section of the conference planner. Please remind prospective CEE Meeting 2016 participants to complete their sections within 2 weeks (by July 8) so that you can plan an effective program. Groups who have not posted their responses on the Questions and Needs page by July 8th should not be given travel scholarships. I understand that ticket prices are rising fast and that you may want to book travel sooner. Please feel free to set the deadline for response sooner if necessary.
• In order to approve this funding request, we need you to reply to our question (which to be fair was not clearly stated as a question in my earlier remarks) about the outcomes and lessons learned from the CEE Meeting 2015. Primarily, we want to know how the feedback and lessons learned from that event have influenced the plans for this year's meeting, and also if there are any important outcomes that you have observed in the year that has followed the last CEE Meeting. You can refer to the CEE Meeting 2015 Feedback page for analysis of the feedback survey that was done after the meeting.
• Please let us know who will be responsible for booking travel so that we can begin planning regular checkins with them. Scholarship travel must be approved by WMF staff before booking. All scholarships are contingent on their respective community having filled out the needs and questions section by June 30th at the absolute latest. If they do not respond by that date, they will not receive a scholarship.

Once you have responded to the points above, we can move forward with the approval process, which we would prefer to complete before June 30th. Please let me know if you have any questions, or need me to clarify any of the above information. Thank you again for all of your hard work. Cheers, --KHarold (WMF) (talk) 09:28, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi KHarold (WMF), thank you very much for your comments. I understand that the budget was doubled but the main reason of it is the high travel prices and we can do little to lower it. In addition, it would be great to see your new conference grant application process. I guess it will be helpful for the grantmakers too, to plan the conference earlier having your support in organizing it.

• We again asked groups to fill the Question and Needs form for their community and got some new inputs. The Wikimania CEE meetup was very much helpful because community members were informed about the need to have an input in that form and also about the WMF's decision to not offer scholarships to those communities who have not posted their responses by July 8th.
• Community members and especially Kaarel Vaidla from WM EE worked hard on the feedbacks and outcomes of the CEE Meeting 2015. Lilit and I selected and worked on the lessons learned which influenced the organizing of the CEE Meeting 2016. We created a subpage of the grant application with these lessons learned.
• As you request, we'll let you know about the scholarship travel and have your approval. Responsible persons for booking will be Lilit Tarkhanyan and Mher Bekaryan from Wikimedia Armenia. In your first comment, you said that groups should fill the Question and Needs by July 8th in order to have the possibility to get scholarships. But here I see another date - 30th June. Could you please explain the reason of this controversion?

Best regards. --David Saroyan (talk) 17:55, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

Grant approved

Hi David Saroyan. Thanks so much for the responses, pushing participants to complete the Questions and Needs sections, and creating the Lessons Learned page. Reading the feedback from last year, there is a lot of good information relevant to organizing this year's conference in terms of both logistics and programming. It sounds like people really want sessions that focus on collaboration and next steps, instead of reflecting on what has already happened. It would be great to have even more information from participants about their "needs" and "questions" since that seems to be the most important information to understand. Kacie is currently on vacation so I cannot ask her about the above discrepancy in terms of dates. I assume the deadline should be July 8th. Looking forward to this year's conference! Cheers, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 17:14, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Report extension

We have approved a request to extend the report deadline to December 15th. --KHarold (WMF) (talk) 18:14, 18 November 2016 (UTC)