By Dr Sara Thomas, Scotland Programme Manager for Wikimedia UK and organiser of the Community Meeting
On Sunday 26th November we were delighted to host our 2023 Community Meeting. It was a chance for our community to gather online, share the work that’s taken place over the last year, recognise that work through the UK Wikimedian of the Year awards, and find out more ways to get involved.
We were welcomed by our Chief Executive Lucy Crompton-Reid, and then we launched into a series of Lightning Talks.
Lightning Talks
Dr Sarah Rogers, from the Royal College of Nursing’s History of Nursing Forum, told us about the Nurses in Red project.
Alexander – Patient Zero – told us about his journey with Wikipedia, from a young editor to one of the most active 10,000 editors on English Wikipedia.
Richard Davies told us about the work he’s been doing in the Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons coverage of the Welsh town of Wrecsam (Wrexham).
Becky Male told us about her work on the Hunger Strike Medal article, and how this led to a surprising discovery about the collection of Suffragette Pennies at the Glasgow Women’s Library.
Jonathan – WereSpielChequers – told us about the process of becoming an admin on English Wikipedia, and how the project needs more admins.
And Gill Ryan told us about the project that she ran in partnership with Perth Library this year on the Women of Perth.
In memoriam
In the last few years, we’ve sadly lost a few members of the UK Wikimedia community, and so we took some time to recognise the contributions that Lisa Lodwick, Jo Pugh, Richard Haslam, Les Barker and Richard Lawson made to the movement. They will be very much missed.
UK Wikimedian of the Year Awards
Next we announced the winners of the UK Wikimedian of the Year Awards. For the full details of who won the awards, the fantastic work they’re doing, and who received an honourable mention, you can see this blog.
UK Wikimedian of the Year: Nick Sheppard
Partnership of the Year: Royal College of Nursing’s History of Nursing Forum – Nurses in Red
Up and Coming Wikimedian: Heidi Berg
Opportunity Fair
And finally we closed with something new for us; the Opportunity Fair. Here we had a selection of projects with which we’d invite our community to get involved, as well as a range of ways that Wikimedia UK can support the community.
Protests & Suffragettes are looking for translators of articles they’ve been creating and improving about Scottish Suffrage/ttes, as well as help improving those articles – more information on their project page, or contact sara.thomas@wikimedia.org.uk.
Nadege Forde-Vidal, Historian & Community Project Developer at Sankofa London Schools is also looking for assistance, in the shape of after-school workshop leaders: www.sankofalondonschools.co.uk / nadege@sankofalondonschools.co.uk
The National Library of Scotland uploaded a large number of Scottish Chapbooks to Wikimedia Commons / Wikisource during lockdown, with staff proofreading that work. There are still a number of these to be proofread and transcribed, and they can be found here. If you’d like to know more about how to become involved, or are interested in learning more about Wikisource, please contact sara.thomas@wikimedia.org.uk.
Dr Richard Nevell, Programme Manager, talked about Wiki Loves Monuments and Wiki Loves Earth – we’re in need of assistance with Wikidata for Wiki Loves Earth, and a campaign organiser or organisers for Wiki Loves Monuments – if you’d like to know more please contact richard.nevell@wikimedia.org.uk.
Dr Lucy Hinnie told us about Let’s Connect, a peer learning group for any Wikimedian who is part of an organised group – there are regular events and a whole host of resources, and they can be found through their meta page. Lucy’s slides are here.
Karla Marte, our Programme Evaluation Coordinator, explained our Project and Volunteer Grants, and how they can support individual volunteers – there’s more information about this on our website where you can see examples of past grants, and there’s also an online application form.
Last but not least, our board member Rod Ward told us a little about the Community Development Committee, a new Board subcommittee, whose purpose is to advise the board on community and volunteer issues generally, and to consider any community-related matters that may be delegated to the Committee by the board.
Join us
If you’d like to hear about future UK community events and how you can get involved please sign up for our newsletter, or join our membership to help govern the charity.