Grants talk:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Wikimedia Nederland work program 2022-2023

Feedback and questions

Thank you for submitting this application. Thank you for your time, energy and effort. After the first review step, We have some remarks, recommendations and questions that we'd like to get more clarity on, please find them below :

• There is no mention of photo competitions such as Wiki Loves Monuments in this proposal - why is that?
• Which organisations would you be working with in Suriname?
• You mention 'Limited interest among young Wikimedians' - can you clarify whether you mean new editors or editors with a young age? How do you plan to tackle this issue?
• You talk about a 'knowledge platform', could you provide more information on this and who has access to it, please?
• You mention that 20 people participate in 'Equity in decision making' - is this including attendance of the general assembly? How do you plan to increase this?
• Your budget includes €20k for online communications, in addition to 850 staff hours worth €40k. Please could you provide more information on these expenses?
• You are requesting two years of funding, but the plans for the second year are not clear. Do you have a draft annual plan for 2023 or expect it to be very similar to the 2022 plan? Do you have expected metrics for 2023?
• Please could you elaborate on the increase in funding for this plan compared to previous years?

Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 18:20, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for reviewing our application, Mike Peel. Below you will find our answers:

There is no mention of photo competitions such as Wiki Loves Monuments in this proposal - why is that?

In the past, WMNL has organised national competitions for WikiLovesMonuments and WikiLovesEarth in the Netherlands. Especially the WLM campaigns have been very successful, and contributed valuable content to Wikimedia Commons. After several years, the energy and enthusiasm among organising volunteers started to run low, and the activity became very dependent on the input by office staff. Also, the added value of the campaigns in terms of quality/impactful content generated, diminished over the years. In the past few years, we have indicated in our annual plans that the office is able to support at least one major photo competition per year, provided there is a group of volunteers willing to take the lead. No volunteers have come forward.

Which organisations would you be working with in Suriname?

We are in contact with the Internet Society Suriname about cooperation. Furthermore, we will use the approach we took when first developing activities in the Caribbean: we will connect to existing partnerships that some of our GLAM and education partners in the Netherlands have with counterparts in Suriname, and link to grassroots organisations of the Surinam community in the Netherlands. Also we will reach out to organisations of which staff took part in our 2021 master classes on sharing colonial heritage.

You mention 'Limited interest among young Wikimedians' - can you clarify whether you mean new editors or editors with a young age? How do you plan to tackle this issue?

We mean editors with a young age (<25). Average age of WMNL staff is 40+, of the board 50+, so we do not feel best placed to develop activities that will appeal to a younger audience.. We want to establish a group of young Wikimedians and let them take the lead on this.

You talk about a 'knowledge platform', could you provide more information on this and who has access to it, please?

The knowledge platform is an externally funded activity, which is part of our GLAM-programme. The aim of the platform is to provide online guidance and tools for staff of Dutch heritage organisations on Wikimedia. The number of heritage institutions approaching us for support has been growing steadily in recent years. However, our capacity for support remains limited. That is why we will set up a knowledge platform with documentation, manuals, tools and instructional videos that allows heritage organisations to contribute to the Wikimedia projects independently. Staff members can learn at their own pace, with minimal help from Wikimedia Nederland - or completely independently - how to make their collections and knowledge available through the Wikimedia projects and how to collaborate optimally with the volunteer community. The platform could be developed thanks to financial support from the Digital Heritage Network. It will be launched later this month. Although it is designed for staff of GLAM and education partners, it will be accessible to anyone.

You mention that 20 people participate in 'Equity in decision making' - is this including attendance of the general assembly? How do you plan to increase this?

This is a very good point! We did not include the participants in the general assembly in this metric - apologies for that.. Usually, we have some 30-35 participants. The metric of 20 participants refers to people who will actively take part in discussions about WMNL policy development.

Your budget includes €20k for online communications, in addition to 850 staff hours worth €40k. Please could you provide more information on these expenses?

This includes hosting and maintenance of the website, including server costs. The staff costs relate to all online communications: website, WMNL-wiki & social media

You are requesting two years of funding, but the plans for the second year are not clear. Do you have a draft annual plan for 2023 or expect it to be very similar to the 2022 plan? Do you have expected metrics for 2023?

On the advice of WMF, we did not elaborate our plans for year 2 in detail. We expect it to be similar in approach and scope as our plan for 2022. The multiyear plan will provide the overall framework for our planning.

Please could you elaborate on the increase in funding for this plan compared to previous years?

In 2021, we received a grant of € 352,000. We are now requesting € 360,000, an increase of € 8,000 (2.2%). This is to meet inflation and annual increase of salary costs.

Sandra Rientjes (talk) 13:55, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

Recommendation

Congratulations! We are happy to recommend your grant for approval for the full amount and for multiple years, with 360,000 EUR for the first year, and a total period of 1 January 2022 until 31 December 2023.

The committee would like to thank you for proposing this application, which is a very clear and well structured proposal. We particularly like the focus on getting younger people involved in Wikimedia activities in NL and with WMNL itself.

We would have liked to have seen much more detail about your plans for the second year of the grant, but understand that this will come with the reports and metrics as this grant progresses.

Thank you again for your proposal and for your involvement and we wish you all the possible successes for your work over the next few years!

On behalf of the NWE regional committee — Mike Peel (talk) 17:17, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi Mike,

On behalf of Wikimedia Nederland we want to thank you and the regional committee for your recommendation to approve our grant. As you know we have tried to tie all our goals and activities to the broader goals of the movement as a whole and are grateful that we were able to write our first succesful annual grant proposal using this approach.

We would also like to thank you for giving us room to fill in the specifics of the second year of our grant, which allows us to apply lessons learned in the first year in order to make us more effective in the second year. Please do not underestimate the importance of multiyear financing which is a strong foundation for us both as a partner for external parties and as an employer for our staff members.

Thank you for the faith you have in us, and we are enthousiastic about being able to contribute to our common mission and the movement in the coming years!

Jan-Bart de Vreede, Chair Wikimedia Nederland Jan-Bart (talk) 18:57, 12 January 2022 (UTC)