Attending the World Literacy Summit 2023 at Baliol’s College in Oxford was a dream come true for me, and it wouldn’t have been possible without the accommodation support from Wikimedia UK. As a passionate advocate for literacy and a Wikimedian, I was thrilled to be surrounded by like-minded individuals who share the same passion for promoting literacy for all.

Throughout the conference, I had the privilege of meeting literacy ambassadors and advocates who are spearheading interesting projects and programs to make literacy accessible to everyone. I was inspired by their dedication and learned so much from their experiences.

One of the highlights of the summit was my encounter with Frank Schulenburg, the executive director of WikiEducation US & Canada. His presentation on the work of the organization and how Wikipedia fosters information literacy in higher education classrooms was truly insightful. After the presentation, we had a productive conversation over coffee where we discussed how some of the programs and initiatives could be adopted for WikiEducation projects in Nigeria.

During the summit, I had the opportunity to present my Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom project in East Room 14. It was a great feeling to share my work with the attendees and receive positive feedback. I also attended the plenary session at the Sheldonian Theater, as well as several tracks on World Literacy presentations. These sessions were highly informative and engaging, and I gained a wealth of knowledge about literacy programs and initiatives from around the world.

For me, some of the sessions that stood out were those that focused on the intersection of technology and literacy, and how we can leverage digital tools to make literacy more accessible and engaging for all. Another session that left a lasting impression on me highlighted the importance of promoting multilingual literacy and preserving endangered languages.

The World Literacy Summit 2023 was an enriching experience that reminded me of the transformative power of literacy. It reinforced my commitment to promoting literacy for all and ensuring that every person, regardless of their background, has access to the tools and resources they need to succeed.

As I return to Nigeria, I am excited to bring back the knowledge and ideas I gained from the World Literacy Summit and continue working towards free knowledge for all. I want to express my deepest gratitude to Wikimedia UK for their support throughout my stay in Oxford. I look forward to staying in touch and collaborating on future projects that will advance the cause of literacy around the world.

WikiHugs

Bukola James

User:Bukky658

The post Empowering literacy advocacy: a Wikimedian and certified trainer’s experience at the World Literacy Summit with support from Wikimedia UK appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

TtT trains volunteers who are keen to deliver Wikipedia editing events. Volunteer trainers play a key role in the delivery of Wikimedia UK programmes. They extend our work to underrepresented communities and help them be part of Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia free knowledge projects. They train new and existing editors across the country. Demand for training often outstrips staff capacity to fulfil, and we’re conscious that our existing networks do not always allow us to reach all the communities with whom we’d like to work.

This training will equip candidate trainers with the skills, experience and resources to deliver a standard ‘Introduction to Wikipedia’ editathon. We will look to discuss both online and in-person events during the training.

We will have another session on ‘Developing Community Partnerships’ focusing on establishing partnerships with new communities. This session is open to applications from accredited trainers as well. It will also be an opportunity for candidate and accredited trainers to get to know each other.

Expressions of interest are welcomed from all. However, given the current demographic mix of our training network, we are particularly interested in hearing from Black, Asian and minority groups; women; and members of LGBT+ community.

The in-person training will take place in London. We will cover travel and accommodation costs, and will provide lunch and refreshments.

Course content and key dates

• 1.12.2022 Thursday/18:00-20:30/online: Brief – mockup editathon
• 3.12.2022 Saturday/10:00-16:00/in-person: Debrief – mockup editathon & Theory of online and in-person training
• 4.12.2022 Sunday/10:00-16:00/in-person: Developing Community Partnerships

What you could expect from us

• Full training and support to deliver a standard ‘Introduction to Wikipedia’ editathon and similar events
• Access to event materials
• Ongoing support
• Volunteer expenses where appropriate
• Job references upon request

What we would expect from you

• Familiarity with, or desire to increase your knowledge of the Wikimedia Projects, particularly Wikipedia. Pre-course support can be provided if you feel that you would benefit from this in order to fully participate in the training
• Full attendance at the training course
• To lead training for a minimum of 2 events per year. This would be a mixture of third party events which we would field to you, and those you would organise yourself. Please note that we do receive requests for training to be delivered within office hours
• To be responsive to communication from Wikimedia UK staff and fellow volunteers
• To complete basic reporting, including returning sign up information
• To represent Wikimedia UK well during the time in which you are volunteering
• To adhere to our Safe Spaces policy, and the Code of Conduct

How to apply

Places are limited to make sure that each participant gets individual attention and feedback, so please apply via the following forms to express your interest. Call for interest will close on the 28th of October. You will hear from us by the 4th of November to confirm your place.

Candidate trainers application form

Accredited trainers application form

Further information

The Wikimedia UK Volunteer Trainer Role description.

The post Train the Trainer 2022/23 call for interest appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Aim of the session

Wikimedia UK works on a three year strategic planning cycle, and we are now developing our new strategy for 2022 to 2025. I gave a brief overview of the process that the organisation is currently engaged in and what’s happened so far. Our schedule is aligned with our application deadline for funding from the Wikimedia Foundation, for which we’ll be applying for multi-year funding for the first time.

Introductions

As part of the introductions, everyone shared their aspirations for the meeting, with key themes being to make connections, understand Wikimedia UK’s priorities and engage with the wider community. The meeting was also another opportunity (following our AGM in July) to introduce our new Chair of Trustees, Monisha Shah. Monisha shared a little of her own background, and why access to knowledge is so important to her. She explained that she has a portfolio career focused on board roles within the arts, culture and media sectors, following high level roles at the BBC. Monisha emphasised her interest in hearing from the community. She noted that she is not active on social media but that volunteers were welcome to contact her via LinkedIn or the Wikimedia UK team. 

Blue Sky Thinking

After this introduction, we split into three breakout groups to finish the statement “wouldn’t it be fantastic if…” for what we’d like Wikimedia UK to achieve in the next three years. This generated lots of great ideas and objectives which coalesced into some key themes, as follows:

EQUITY

A high proportion of responses to the prompt question above were focused on equitable participation and representation. This ranged from diversifying the UK’s editors, administrators and membership, through to working with small language Wikipedias, delivering diaspora outreach, and supporting initiatives to repatriate knowledge as a form of decolonisation.  

CLIMATE

There were several responses focused on the climate crisis, with an aspiration for us to be able to offer wide-ranging and trusted information about the climate crisis across multiple languages. There was a question over whether Wikimedia UK should be applying pressure on the government regarding the crisis. On a practical level, it was felt that in the first instance Wikimedia UK needs to identify what we can do to support editors documenting and sharing information about climate change (including those involved with WikiProject Climate Change)

OPEN KNOWLEDGE

Many responses to the prompt statement “wouldn’t it be fantastic if” involved the opening up of knowledge and information. Under this general umbrella was an aspiration that all publicly funded institutions should commit to ethical open access as their default position; and that we are able to address copyright law to ensure that publicly funded research has to be made available under an open licence. Other responses included more partnerships with heritage organisations, local history initiatives and archives; more Wikimedians in Residence; and more work with diverse communities and collections. A number of responses were specifically about images – such as every notable structure in the UK having a photo and Wikidata item, and working with external partners to ensure an image for every UK article. 

EDUCATION

It’s clear that the Wikimedia UK community remains deeply concerned about misinformation and disinformation. There is a strong commitment to helping young people understand how knowledge is created and shared, and develop information literacy skills. There is also a clear ambition to have an impact on the school curriculum – particularly in England (following our success in Wales) – and to have more residencies in Universities. 

PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT AND AWARENESS

A number of responses were focused on the public’s understanding of Wikimedia. In particular, it was felt that there needs to be more understanding that Wikipedia is a tertiary source that can be edited by anyone, and greater awareness and use of the sister projects, such as Wikisource. It was noted that Wikimedia UK should have sufficient technical development capacity to be actively contributing to MediaWiki development for Wikimedia’s sister projects. The perennial issue of the distinction between Wikimedia UK and the Wikimedia Foundation was also raised.

COMMUNITY/MOVEMENT

Two out of the three breakout groups identified an objective to diversify Wikimedia UK’s funding base so as to be less reliant on our core grant from the Wikimedia Foundation. It was also suggested that the role of affiliates will be under more scrutiny with the creation of the Movement Charter and Global Council; and that within that context, Wikimedia UK needs to be clear about its purpose and relevance. Other comments were more focused on community engagement, with a number of responses around a theme of developing closer relationships between the affiliate and online communities, and enabling people who engage with our programmes to become more involved with the work of the organisation, contributing to the movement in broader ways.

Emerging Strategic Themes

After this very productive session, I introduced participants to the key themes which have emerged from the board and staff away days held earlier in the autumn. Once these are finalised, they will form the basis of our programme development and delivery over the next three years:

• Knowledge Equity
• Information Literacy
• Climate Crisis

A number of other areas have been identified, which we believe are essential to delivering an effective programme. These are still in draft form, but include community, advocacy, communications, equity, diversity and inclusion, and organisational resilience and sustainability.

It was encouraging to see the extent of the overlap between the themes that emerged from the board and staff away days, and the priorities identified through this community session. 

Engaging Volunteers

At this point I handed over to Daria Cybulska, Wikimedia UK’s Director of Programmes and Evaluation, to lead the final session of the meeting. This was focused explicitly on community, and asked participants to respond to the following questions, in a plenary discussion:

1. As a community member, where do you see an opportunity to get involved in the emerging strategy, and what would you need from WMUK to support that?
2. How could the Wikimedia UK community deliver the ideas generated so far?

These prompted a wide range of responses, contributions and further questions. I’ve summarised the key discussion areas below, all of which have given the team food for thought in terms of volunteer engagement and support:

• Do we have communities of interest or communities of place? Do volunteers see themselves as aligned with a particular project – e.g. English Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons – or the chapter? And does this matter?
• People’s journey into Wikipedia is often through competitions such as Wiki Loves Monuments. How can we use this knowledge to galvanise more participation? Other entry points are vandalism and correcting typos. How can we use this knowledge to support editor recruitment? There’s something important about small, accessible tasks as a way to start. It could be correcting typos, or adding categories and references to articles.
• This led to an interesting discussion about the use of the word ‘editathon’ which might suggest something that’s a slog, requiring stamina and discipline. Should we change the language to focus more on words like workshops, training, introductory sessions etc. It was noted that increasingly, work lists for online editing events have tasks across a broad range of activities, reflecting different levels of digital confidence and time constraints.

Wrapping up and next steps

I wrapped up the session by explaining that I would be sharing the draft strategic framework for 2022 – 2025 later this month (November) and welcome feedback on it. Please watch this space for that! And thanks again to everyone who attended. It was wonderful to see people (even if it was over Zoom) and to hear from our community about what’s important to them in the creation of Wikimedia UK’s next three year strategy. 

The post Talking strategy with Wikimedia UK’s community appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

On 16th March 2020, the UK Prime Minister asked the nation to stop non-essential contact and travel; a week before the start of what we now know to be a series of ‘lockdowns’ designed to contain Covid-19. I was working from home that day and immediately called my colleague Davina Johnson, Director of Finance and Operations for Wikimedia UK, to discuss bringing forward the closure of the office. As she works part-time and was therefore not in the office either, we decided that we would both go in the next day – along with any other staff who wanted to do so – to gather files, equipment and other things that we thought we might need if we were working remotely for a few weeks or months. 

Of course, it has turned out to be a lot longer than a few weeks. Writing this blog post at the end of September 2021, I have been in the London office a total of four times since March last year. Whilst some staff have been in the office more regularly (notably Davina, along with a new Operations Coordinator who joined the team in July this year), most have been working at home throughout the pandemic. This has brought some unique challenges, as many of you reading this will be familiar with, but it has also brought some unexpected benefits. Programme Coordinators based in Scotland and Wales noted how, with everyone working from home, they felt more connected to the rest of the team. More effort has been made to share information online, and to find new ways of engaging with each other away from the office; and remote staff were not, as in former times, half forgotten as we all trudged into the meeting room and handed around biscuits and cups of tea while someone tried to make the AV work for a hybrid staff meeting. 

Maintaining this feeling of parity and a shared organisational culture regardless of where staff are based is only going to become more important to Wikimedia UK. For one thing, our team has grown over the past year, and we now have five staff who are fully remote, while ten are notionally based in our London office. As we emerge from the pandemic, we are also moving to a hybrid model of working, in which staff will only be expected to work in the office on agreed days and for specific purposes. 

Earlier this year, the Board of Trustees considered the options for future working, looking at what it might mean for the organisation to become wholly virtual, to return to office-based working, or to embrace more flexible working. They all agreed that as a small charity working within the socio-technological space, we have the opportunity to create a work culture and environment that combines the best of home working with intentional moments of in person gatherings across our staff, board and wider community for strategising, creative exploration and social connection.

In practice, we are moving to hybrid working whilst the country still grapples with Covid-19. Although all staff are now fully vaccinated, case numbers continue to be high and include ‘breakthrough’ infections in people who have had the vaccine. We have therefore put in place a series of measures to try to reduce the risk to staff and guests, and to make a gradual return to using the office as safe as we can for everyone. These include a requirement for a negative lateral flow test for any staff, board member or visitor to the office. For the time being we are also restricting the number of people in the office at any one time to a maximum of six. Alongside this, we are consulting with all staff individually to determine what their working pattern might look like within this hybrid model. 

As a small organisation, we have the luxury of creating something that works for everyone, and takes individual preferences into account. But we will almost certainly make mistakes along the way. Over the next six months – or perhaps even longer – we will need to codify our expectations for how often staff will be in the office, and within what parameters they will be required to attend external meetings and events. We also want to consult with members and volunteers about their needs, and the shape of future community-focused activities. For anyone trying to reach us, email is probably still the best route. Whilst staff are now starting to return to the office, we can’t guarantee that there will always be someone there to answer the phones. It will probably be some months before we can be really clear with our stakeholders and the wider general public about how ‘open’ our London office really is; and I hope you will bear with us as we navigate this new reality. For now though, I’m just pleased to be able to meet up with staff and board members in person for the first time in 18 months. It’s been a long haul.

The post Wikimedia UK returns to the office, but trials a new way of working appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

The previous 12 months has seen all of us challenged like never before. Collectively and
individually we have faced new ways of living and changes to how we work and volunteer.

As a staff and Trustee team we are sending our appreciation and thanks to each one of you for your dedication, commitment, passion and belief that time volunteered on open knowledge is time well spent.

Thank You!

The post Thank You To Each and Every Amazing Volunteer! appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

We’ll be using Zoom, with a conference link sent to all Eventbrite sign ups, so claim your free ticket here. If you’re not sure how to use Zoom, you can watch instructions on this support page, or contact us with any queries. While the AGM is an opportunity for our members to vote on essential governance of the charity, we also encourage participation from volunteers, partners, supporters, and anyone else who’s interested in the Wikimedia community in the UK.

Agenda

11am Welcome and introduction, including technical onboarding

11.15am Keynote talk from Gavin Wilshaw, Mass Digitisation Manager at the National Library of Scotland, on the Wikisource project that the library has been delivering since the March shutdown

11.35am Q&A with Gavin, and contributions from other participants about their work on Wikimedia during and in response to the pandemic

12noon BREAK

12.15pm A global movement – short updates on Wikimedia 2030, the rebranding project, and the Universal Code of Conduct

12.30pm Lightning talks

1pm BREAK (+ social networking)

2pm Start of the formal AGM: reports, questions and announcement of voting results for the Resolutions and Elections

3pm Wikimedian of the Year and Honorary Member Awards

3.30pm Thanks and close

Proxy voting

All voting for this year’s AGM will happen by proxy. Our current Articles of Association require members to be present in person at the AGM to vote on the day, something we’re not able to facilitate this year. This means all votes must be submitted by the proxy deadline which is 2pm on Thursday 16th July. You can find the director candidate statements here, ask them questions here, and read through the resolutions we’ll be voting on here.

Voting packs have been sent to all members by email, but if you haven’t received one and you think you should have, please do get in touch with Katie at membership@wikimedia.org.uk.

Sign up

You must register for the AGM on Eventbrite rather than on wiki as we need your full name, not Wikimedia user name, and we’ll be sending out video conference links to all attendees registered through Eventbrite closer to the date.

If you have any questions or more general comments, please do get in touch with Katie at membership@wikimedia.org.uk.

We look forward to seeing you next Saturday!

If you’d like to join Wikimedia UK as a member or renew your current membership, you can do so here. To support free access to knowledge through our programmes, you can support us here.

The post Just one week left to sign up for our 2020 AGM! appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

The results of the volunteer survey were published recently, and if you haven’t seen them yet they show that Wikimedia UK is moving in the right direction and we are doing our best to support our volunteers. The feedback included some useful suggestions from the community, and we will be doing our best to continue improving.

So thank you from everyone at Wikimedia UK for your help!

We are holding a train the trainers workshop in Edinburgh in July. You can find out more and sign up on the event page. 

The post Thank you to everyone who volunteers for Wikimedia UK appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Every year thousands of people from across take part in the world’s largest photography competition. After a hiatus in 2015, the UK took part in this year’s competition. The winners were outstanding, and if you haven’t seen them yet you can do so on our blog.

For the UK, 266 people uploaded more than 6,270 photos. This brings us one step closer to our ultimate goal which is to have an image of every historic site in the country. An impressive 3,911 of these came from three people, and altogether eight people added more than 100 photos to the competition. Some of these people are veteran editors who dive into the competition, some have taken part in our previous competitions, and at least one person created their account during the competition. The competition motivates people to go out and photograph their surroundings.

All the images sit on Wikimedia Commons, the image database that underpins Wikipedia and its sister sites. A proportion of these will end up in Wikipedia articles, on Wikidata, WikiVoyage, or even WikiBooks, about 15.4% as of writing from the UK entries across the three editions. The rest build a valuable free resource of visual media that can be used for journalism, graphic design or many other disciplines in which creators need open licensed images. Ending up on Wikipedia is not the be all and end all (there are only so many images that will fit on a page!) but does reach a huge audience.

So we want to give a big thank you to everyone who took part in the competition this year! We would especially like to thank top contributors Edwardx, Philafrenzy and Mike Peel.

And finally, congratulations to Colin and Richard J Smith whose photos of the interior of the Royal Albert Hall and Perch Rock Lighthouse respectively placed second and third in the international competition.

The post Wiki Loves Monuments 2016: follow up and thank you! appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Legacy and sustainability were two of the biggest issues York Museums Trust (YMT) grappled with when running two Wikimedian in Residence programmes with Wikimedia UK.

During these residencies we made real progress and learnt a lot about what success can actually mean when attempting to share knowledge freely and openly.

And I have begun to realise – rather belatedly – two very important things:

1. That the enrichment of individuals’ lives is as important as reaching new audiences and racking up page views for collections objects.
2. Free and open knowledge is a platform from which these truly meaningful connections with individuals can be made and then shared.

Now don’t get me wrong. When Andrew Woods, YMT’s curator of numismatics, came up with the idea of populating the biography pages of Roman emperors – and later medieval kings – with coinage depicting them; a project that would put a nationally-recognised collection in front of 600,000+ people a month; I was impressed. In fact it got me the gig at the Wellcome Trust this October.

But there was something bigger happening here.

What sounds like a very straightforward Commons upload project was actually the culmination of a couple of years work. But the time spent getting to this point doesn’t diminish the impact of the outcome – especially if you look beyond the numbers and museum catalogue improvements.

This was the first legacy project at YMT since our highly-skilled Wikimedian in Residence Pat Hadley had left for pastures new. A legacy project based around a model that could be sustained for other collections.

It was the first time a Wikipedia project at YMT had been run without any real direct input from the Digital Team.

Joan Pritchard – Andy’s amazing volunteer – was taught to handle and photograph museum collections, how to edit Wikipedia and use Commons, how to use a collections management system and how to map data to templates for uploading.

What amazed me most, however, was the inspiring, self-led learning that comes with working directly with a collection. Handling museum objects affords you time to think, ask questions and develop knowledge. By the end of the project Joan could identify badly-corroded coins with ease and had developed a real connection with the things she was digitising for Commons.

She also became aware of the power good imagery can have when exploring and interpreting a ‘difficult’ collection. The photography was the ‘most valued part’ of the project for Joan and provided a good counterbalance to upload template creation. Couple this intimacy with collections with the fact that your work ends up in front of hundreds of thousands of people with either a direct or indirect interest in the subject matter and you have a heady cocktail. This shows the power of digital engagement when it is based on sharing and openness through and through – not just the open licensing of the end product.

The post Wikimedia projects aren’t built in a day – Roman coinage on Commons appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

When you spend time on one of the busiest websites in the world it’s amazing what patterns emerge.

A few weeks ago I was leafing through a borrowed copy of The Historian. It had been passed on to me because there was a piece about castles. As I leafed through its immaculately presented pages I was stopped by an eerily familiar photo. There was Rochester Castle on a beautiful sunny day, a sky blue backdrop, and the medieval cathedral peeking out behind.

That stopping power was important. For me at least, a good photograph makes me want to learn more, especially on Wikipedia where a plethora of links can drag you into a maze full of interesting twists and turns.

I knew where that snapshot came from. It was unmistakably the main photo on the Wikipedia article about the castle. I was also lucky enough to have met the man responsible for it. The photographer is Clem Rutter who has more than a decade’s experience of writing for Wikipedia, and apparently a decent photographer to boot.

It was an exciting moment of recognition, mixed with a bit of pride that The Historian was happy to use the picture. I decided to send Clem the magazine so he could see how good it looked in print, where it illustrated a piece by a professor of history. But this blog isn’t about the magazine. I want to say thank you Clem for taking that photo.

I hope you admire the picture as much as I do.

Have you been inspired to emulate Clem? Wiki Loves Monuments 2014 starts on 1 September, but you can take pictures in advance so go out and get snapping!

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