Grants talk:Project/UG BG/Wikimedia CEE Spring 2017

comments from Thepwnco

@Лорд Бъмбъри: Hi and thanks for this proposal - it demonstrates that you've given a lot of thought to planning (I particularly like the risk matrix). It's also very impressive what this project was able to accomplish last year so it's nice to see that the proposal builds on some lessons learned there.

I have a few comments and questions for you as outlined below. Thanks for your time and consideration.

• Could you elaborate on what kind of prizes will be distributed? I see that previously CEE Spring prizes have been books or other knowledge sources - will this be the case this year?
• I notice you first identified the risk associated with organizer burnout or departure in your PEG report. I assume this is why you recommend that the organizing work be split among a group of people (so that a single individual does not feel overwhelmed). Seeing as your budget only accounts for the cost of prizes, do you think it would be useful to budget for volunteer coordinator time now or in future years? Or do you feel that operations are sustainable as they are now?

Cheers. -Thepwnco (talk) 17:54, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Hi, Thepwnco, the answers are not only mine, although I write this message, but are in the spirit of what the organising team thinks and discussed, as we always do, on a day-to-day basis.

Books and other reference materials were compulsory last year, because of the specific needs of Wikimedia Polska. Local participants are free to continue that practice, but also can have gift vouchers or other prizes as e.g. during Europeana Art History Challenge or other prizes, as they wish, because we consider flexibility important in order to provide the best for each community.

No, we do not need budget for volunteer coordinator time, because paying a coordinator is not a guaranteed prevention of the burnout of the volunteers. We understand "burnout" so: when a person is so eager to do something that efforts of all the other people seem insultingly insignificant and so any eagerness to continue working fades out; this is not preventable by money but only by segregation of duties, which we think we are doing well in this international organising team so far. --Nikola (talk) 15:28, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

Question from Ruslik0

I am generally supportive of this project but have a few questions:

1. In the present proposal you decided not to include employee costs (Wikimedia Austria) in the budget and you also do not mention other sources of revenue. What has changed since the last year?
2. In 'Rules on international level' section there are far fewer rules than in the year before. I think the reimbursement rules (4-9) from the previous year were much more clear than one rule in the present proposal: "presents to Wikimedia Austria originals or scanned copies of the invoices, for which they get reimbursed or provide an account in an online shop with a full shopping basket, so that only the payment details need be added by the payment processor. The shop must be capable of providing an invoice." which I do not fully understand.
3. I do not understand why coordinators from participants must reveal their personal bank account numbers. This seems to be necessary only in some cases. As I understand reimbursements for prizes will be sent to the participating organizations provided that they are incorporated. Personal accounts can be useful only when a participant is a not-established user group and in this case the income tax can be an issue.

Ruslik (talk) 13:47, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Dear Ruslik,

we do not have other sources of revenue. The employees of Wikimedia Austria, Wikimedia Poland and Wikimedia Ukraine get paid from their chapters, but they decided not to list it as a part of the budget.

The reimbursement rules this year are simplified. Wikimedia Poland wished that only books and other reference materials be used as prizes. This year's fiscal sponsor, Wikimedia Austria, is much more flexible and can award other prizes, too. We are having a discussion among the local organisers on the mailing list of the local organisers and up to now among the ideas for new prizes are certificates for book shops (as used by Wikimedia Ukraine last year) and vouchers for Amazon (as done during the Europeana Challenge, mentioned in the grant proposal), which both produce less bureaucracy.

Those coordinators, who wish to be reimbursed have to disclose their bank information. For participants for which Wikimedia Austria buys the prizes online no such details will be needed. The APG funded chapters do not take part at this grant. For all other chapters and incorporated organisations the bank accounts of the organisations will be used. For all user groups or not-established user groups without an incorporated organisation, the personal bank accounts of the organisers will be used. Last year income tax was not an issue in any of the countries where reimbursed participants lived.

Best regards, --Nikola (talk) 18:53, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Round 1 2017 decision

Congratulations! Your proposal has been selected for a Project Grant.

The committee has recommended this proposal and WMF has approved funding for the full amount of your request, 11,250 EUR

Comments regarding this decision:
The committee is pleased to support another year of CEE Spring. We are happy to see a continued effort to be inclusive of more languages and support gender diversity. We also appreciate the team's efforts to improve the contest year-over-year, with an increased focus on quality over quantity. We are excited to see the results of this year's contest!

Next steps:

1. You will be contacted to sign a grant agreement and setup a monthly check-in schedule.
2. Review the information for grantees.
3. Use the new buttons on your original proposal to create your project pages.
4. Start work on your project!

Upcoming changes to Wikimedia Foundation Grants

Over the last year, the Wikimedia Foundation has been undergoing a community consultation process to launch a new grants strategy. Our proposed programs are posted on Meta here: Grants Strategy Relaunch 2020-2021. If you have suggestions about how we can improve our programs in the future, you can find information about how to give feedback here: Get involved. We are also currently seeking candidates to serve on regional grants committees and we'd appreciate it if you could help us spread the word to strong candidates--you can find out more here. We will launch our new programs in July 2021. If you are interested in submitting future proposals for funding, stay tuned to learn more about our future programs.

Thanks, Alex! We're a bit confused about the the navbar at the top of the grant page - does the model of filling out a midpoint report plus a learning pattern and then a final report with another learning pattern really make sense for recurring projects like this one? And according to one email, also monthly updates? Is this not quite a lot of bureaucracy for a tried and trusted project? Best, Braveheart (talk) 13:08, 10 March 2017 (UTC)

@AWang (WMF):, just in case our questions got overlooked :-) Braveheart (talk) 10:41, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

The awards

Hello. I was participant at the Macedonian edition of CEE Spring 2017 and I want to ask when are the prizes going to be delivered? The points were given two weeks ago and I still haven't received the coupon. Thanks for the feedback.--Retrohead (talk) 06:53, 9 July 2017 (UTC)

Hi Retrohead! That's a question for User:Ehrlich91. Best, Braveheart (talk) 07:09, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

@Braveheart: User Retrohead, along with two members, were notified from me, that prizes will be this week, after I received mail from Wikimedia Austria that they have some problems with payment. --Ehrlich91 (talk) 17:59, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

The question was for the Austrian Wikipedians, but whatever, I hope it will be quickly solved.--Retrohead (talk) 05:41, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Hi Retrohead - usually we do this via the local organisers, but in case any problems arise, you can also contact User:Annemarie Buchmann (WMAT) :-) Best, Braveheart (talk) 11:32, 11 July 2017 (UTC)