Grants talk:Project/Rapid/Open Data Conference Lagos 2017

Questions from I JethroBT (WMF)

Hi adisa471, thanks for your proposal for this open data conference. It's great to see some steps being taken to build on prior successes with earlier events your organization has hosted. I have a few questions regarding the proposal:

• You mentioned in your report that you had some involvement in a prior OpenCon Satellite event in December 2016. What was your role during that conference, and what sort of tasks were you responsible for? Do you have some background with event planning?
• One the goals you mentioned was to increase skills for existing editors. What specific skills are these, and how are you planning to teach or train interested participants at the conference?
• One of your other goals is to encourage open practices in regards to knowledge sharing amongst students, researchers and early career professionals. I think this is likely to happen, but I would consider thinking about some ways to follow-up with conference participants to see if they have adopted any open practices they learned about at the conference and what successes and difficulties they may have encountered. Would that be possible to do?

Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 22:33, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

Thanks I JethroBT (WMF) . Regarding your questions:

• I was the host of OpenCon 2016 satellite event in lagos. I put together a team of volunteers who assisted me in organising the event. We have since hosted two successful conferences in two tetiary institutions in Lagos. I also maintained contact with opencon Washington DC to ensure the event had the desired outcomes. Other roles i played during the event include: Engaging the attendees during a "call to action" speech on how they can be advocates and join our international open-communites as well as our local community where we have regualar forums on the Whatsapp App.

• Secondly, How do we plan to train editors?

We have sheduled a workshop training session that will we taken by a Wikimedia Nigeria Alumni or Fellow. This session would educate attendees on the importance of improving the quality of online data and articles and equip them with practical knowledge on how to create articles, edit and contribute to Wiki articles. There would also be an on screen presentation on tips to improve your editing skills. These tips would also be in our printed material which would be handed as take-home to all attendees during the event.

• Lastly, regarding the follow up on the participants :

I totally agree with you. I believe it is an important yardstick in measuring our impact. We always ensure to get and compile an email directory of all attendees and we stay in touch. Currently, for a more efficient and responsive feedback system, we use our local community platform on the Whatsapp application for advocates and researchers who are taking on open projects and would like to share and get feedback. We recently considered moving to the Slack platform due to our increase in population, however, i would value any suggestion on how we can better achieve this.

Once again, thanks for your input. We hope to host a one of a kind event. adisa 471 (talk), 31 May 2017

@Adisa471: Thanks for your responses! I'm glad to see you have a strong background with this kind of event planning, and that you have some systems in place to follow-up with conference participants using Whatsapp. In terms your question about using Slack as an alternative, I would generally try to use whatever software participants find convenient and easy to participate with. Historically, I've seen Slack used with small teams organizing projects, but not as a way to gather feedback. That said, it could be interesting to try out if you think your audience is accustomed to using it.

I had one other question regarding the training; have you identified individuals to lead this training session, and do they have sufficient editing experience? Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 19:20, 1 June 2017 (UTC)

Hi adisa471, just pinging you to respond to my last question before I make a decision on the proposal. Thanks, I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 19:22, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks I JethroBT (WMF) and i am sorry for late reply, somehow i missed the notification. I appreciate your advice that its better to use an app that more people are used to. After thinking it through, I think we are going to stick to WhatsApp, Slack might not be convinient for many. About your question, I have reached out to a number of trainers i know personally and i am confident they will deliver, which includes Sam Oye (Jamie Tubers), Shola Olaniyan and Isaac Olalekan (wikiology). I ensured a number of the speakers are Wikimedians who have been involved in trainings like this in the past. I will also recieve a copy of their presentation materials days before the event. Thanks again, i look foward to hearing back from you.