Expert outreach/Jisc Ambassador/Plan
Objectives
To demonstrate how publicly-funded research and education projects can benefit from crowdsourcing, using Wikimedia as a platform and a model. To capture this knowledge in a way that permanently changes how Jisc and the wider sector work with Wikimedia.
Logic model
| Rationale (one-paragraph summary) | Inputs | Activities | Outputs | Desired Outcomes and impact of the project (beyond the time frame of the project) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
There are enormous potential mutual gains for Jisc, Jisc-funded projects, researchers and educators in working with the Wikimedia projects in three areas:
However, this potential is held back by a lack of awareness about Wikimedia and how to engage with it, and by a paucity of concrete, documented examples of benefit. |
Ambassador staff time
Partner organisations (universities or sector bodies) providing staff, rooms and audiences for events Jisc facilities and communication channels Wikimedia UK: office facilities, communication channels and “freebies” such as brochures and badges Volunteer Wikimedians for large events (expenses paid by the project) University of Bristol: office space, printing, and financial processes Wikimedia communities: informal feedback on project outputs |
Writing, repurposing and reviewing documentation.
Disseminating through Jisc and Wikimedia’s communication channels and through other relevant bodies. Identifying academics and other professionals who are using Wikimedia projects in their work, or who are open to doing so. Workshops in universities or sector bodies Internal events in Jisc Organising, promoting, and evaluating public “editathon” events |
Reports and case studies
Documentation for PIs and project holders about working productively with Wikipedia; including a flowchart, InfoKit and Jisc Guide. A growing list of academics who have worked with Wikimedia projects or who have expressed an interest in specific activities they could do; these champions get tailored support and advice. Some content (text & digital media) added to the Wikimedia projects. Project pages on relevant Wikimedia wikis showing what has been done. |
Greater understanding within Jisc and the wider HE sector of the Wikimedia projects, their distinctive approach, and productive versus unproductive ways of engaging with them.
Greater sharing of Jisc-supported text and media content through Wikimedia. Recognition within Jisc and the wider sector of Wikimedia as a platform for educational activity and innovation. Ongoing consultation between Jisc and the Wikimedia community about the most efficient ways for cultural or educational projects to impact the widest audience |
Success criteria
- Editathons and workshops
- Measures: Number of attendees; number of attendees who sign up for further involvement; post-event evaluation by attendees; amount of content added; views and edits of content subsequent to the event.
- An online infoKit about the Wikimedia approach to crowdsourcing is built up on a Wikimedia wiki. This will illustrate the diversity of ways to engage with Wikimedia, with specific case studies and instructors on how to replicate them. The infoKit can link to resources distributed across relevant Wikimedia and Jisc sites. This infoKit is revised and improved during and beyond the life of the project.
- Measure: feedback on drafts; an internal survey in Jisc on awareness of Wikimedia (used also to identify opportunities for ongoing collaboration). Inbound links and comments.
- Relevant advice is provided to project holders and PIs about ways of using Wikimedia for impact and engagement, and it becomes routine for projects to consider specific forms of Wikimedia engagement as part of their dissemination.
- Measure: use of this project’s documentation in future guidance to project holders & PIs.
- Educational activities using Wikimedia are well-documented and regularly included alongside other innovative practices in Jisc’s showcases of best practice. Education assignments in the UK are included in Wikimedia’s education showcases.
- Measure: number & diversity of case studies available through Wikimedia/Jisc sites
- Jisc’s advisory services incorporate reliable, appropriate advice on relevant aspects of Wikimedia (e.g. Commons, Wikisource, Wikipedia Educational Assignments) into their services.
- Measure: quantity measures such as post-edit word count for documentation, attendees for events; quality feedback from internal & external review, including blog commentary.
- Research resources such as journal archives are used more by Wikipedians and an increasing number of Wikipedia citations use them.
- Measures: quantitative measures from on-wiki stats tool; sign-ups to library arrangements
- Jisc’s content and data projects will understand how and why they can share content with Wikimedia projects. During the project, some sharing agreements are announced and their impact is measured.
- Measure: quantity of content shared; pages using that content; hits on those pages
Stakeholder analysis
| Who are they? | What do they want? | What can this project give them? | Level of engagement |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jisc | To support projects that gain the same kind of sustainability that Wikipedia has;
For the research and education communities and wider public to get the benefits of open content and crowdsourcing; Knowledge to inform decisions about when to use existing platforms or not; To distinguish, among proposals for crowdsourced projects, which are more likely to be successful |
Workshop on crowdsourcing/ community design (the recipe of factors in Wikipedia that motivate contributors and create progress)
Face-to-face briefings |
High interest, high influence; |
| Jisc-funded media collections | Awareness and use of their collections, with materials being used in research and education | Commons partnerships;
Public events with a subject theme; Written documentation; Phone contact to discuss cultural partnerships |
Some interest, high influence; |
| Jisc-funded advisory or training services (e.g. Jisc Digital Media, Netskills) | Reliable information on the potential uses, strengths and weaknesses of the relevant Wikimedia projects for research and learning | Co-authored documentation or training materials.
Collaborating online to produce documentation |
Some interest, some influence; |
| Jisc-funded research resources (e.g. journals, data archives) | Awareness and use of their resources among relevant research communities. | Releasing out-of-copyright content through Wikisource;
Wikipedia Library arrangement (give experienced Wikipedians access to research resources); Editathons Documentation: Assistance via email/ phone |
Some interest, high influence; |
| Jisc-funded research projects | Research impact; research integrated into the public’s knowledge. |
|
Some interest, Some influence; |
| Jisc-funded data projects | Use in citations; links from relevant Wikipedia infoboxes and Wikidata pages; use in mashups |
|
Some interest, Some influence; |
| Jisc-funded change management projects (e.g. Changing the Learning Landscape) | Examples of the wiki way of working and of educators and researchers successfully engaging with Wikimedia. |
|
Some interest, Some influence; |
| Jisc projects promoting open education | Embedding of open educational practices in formal education, with tangible benefits for students | Presentations, documentation and case studies of Wikimedia as educational platforms. NB a lot of work is already going on in this area & Wikimedia UK has a dedicated staff member, so this project should avoid duplication. However, the existing work (such as the EduWiki Conference) will highlight potential academic champions | Varied interest, Some influence;
Contact champions for case studies Some already engaged through prior WMUK outreach work. |
| University teachers | Assignments that are engaging and rewarding for students and which can be implemented where there is pressure on staff time and resources | Provide concrete examples via case studies of Wikipedia assignments, with implementation tips (Do’s and Don’ts) that would enable them to create similar projects | Varied interest, medium influence: target champions for case studies to share |
| Researchers | Research impact; Platforms in which to crowdsource research | Training and groundwork for a project to develop papers on-wiki (see Wiki to Journal publication) | Varied interest, medium influence: target champions for case |
| Wikimedia UK | Public events; encouraging diversity of many kinds (geographical, gender, etc.) | New Wikimedia contributors;
Expert input to the projects; Ongoing relationships with researchers, with cultural and scholarly bodies and with course leaders Content for blog, public site and press releases; High-profile public events; Ongoing working relationships with scholarly or cultural projects and institutions; |
High interest, some influence;
Use blog, public site, Education Committee meetings, EduWiki conference |
| Wikipedia | Expert contributions; Learner contributions;
Access to non-open-access resources for contributors |
Editathons;
Wikipedia Library arrangement |
High interest, low influence |
| Wikidata | Authoritative data
Incorporation in other sites |
Awareness among developers/ relevant Jisc projects; Simple documentation to explain advantages | High interest, low influence |
| Wikimedia Commons | Freely available digital media;
Expert help in categorising and describing these media; Conversion to more accessible formats |
Commons partnerships (i.e. existing archives sharing material) | High interest, low influence |
| Wikisource | Copies of free source documents, in the form of scans or digital text; Greater awareness | Donations of public-domain-but-access-restricted material from archives; Simple documentation to explain advantages to relevant stakeholders | High interest, low influence |
| Wikibooks/ Wikiversity | Greater awareness; Input from experts or learners; reviews of existing material | Promotion in events and documentation | High interest, low influence |
Plan
- Evaluation notes
For the procedure for evaluating an editathon or content-sharing agreement, see Collaborate/Evaluate.
For institutional workshops, evaluation will be based on 1) attendees, 2) attitude change as measured by evaluation forms, and 3) the number of academics who agree to stay in touch to develop an assignment.
All events will have evaluation forms and sign-up forms for further interest. See Evaluation of training.
- Ongoing through the project
- Respond to queries and support Jisc staff or project holders in engaging.
- Planning and reporting: Document activity on Wikimedia UK public wiki and the various affected Wikimedia sites.
- By end August 2013
- infoKit: Prepare guidance for projects (which will eventually be a component in the infoKit)
- infoKit: 2000 words on crowdsourcing
- Documentation: Write up Southall case study
- Within Jisc: Initial contact made with a wide range of potential individuals and units within Jisc-funded activities
- Planning and reporting: Fully-developed project plan
- By end September
- Public events: Publicity and booking form for WikiVet/Wikipedia editathon (co-ordinated with Nick Short and Chris Trace of WikiVet: see the comms plan for that event)
- Public events: Publicity and booking form for Women In Science editathon (co-ordinated with Katharine Lindsay of Oxford IT Services and Elizabeth McCarthy of the Bodleian Library: see the comms plan for that event)
- Academic events: Send out first wave of requests for opportunities to deliver education/impact workshop
- infoKit: Publish initial draft. Seek advice and input from Jisc staff.
- Documentation: Publish Southall case study: disseminate through Learning & Teaching Experts Group and similar to elicit similar case studies
- Documentation: Release Wikisource brochure, with feedback from the Wikisource community.
- Within Jisc: Arrange intra-Jisc webinar
- By end October
- Public events: Deliver Women In Science editathon at Oxford University
- Academic events: Deliver education/research impact workshop at Oxford University
- Content partnerships: Identify potential partners
- Within Jisc: Deliver Jisc webinar on overlaps between Jisc and Wikimedia (date to be confirmed)
- By end November
- Public events: Deliver and evaluate Wikipedia/WikiVet editathon and write up case study
- Public events: Fix date and venue for third editathon
- Academic events: Deliver sessions at EduWiki conference
- Content partnerships: Meetings with content partners and support them (in person or by audio) with uploading process.
- Within Jisc: Present to Jisc Innovation Group on non-obvious ways of working with Wikimedia (J2W, W2J, non-Wikipedia projects)
- By end December
- Public events: Start publicity and booking for third editathon
- Academic events: Deliver education/research impact workshop at Newcastle University and two other institutions to be determined.
- infoKit: Further work in light of feedback
- Within Jisc: Identify a handful of key people/activities and discuss with them how their work could benefit from working with Wikimedia projects. Prepare draft of intra-Jisc survey
- By mid January
- Public events: Follow up on work created in first two editathons and evaluate their impact
- infoKit: Have draft ready for publishing
- By end January
- Public events: Deliver third editathon (subject and location TBD) Write up as case study
- Academic events: Deliver education/research impact workshop in three institutions.
- Documentation: Write up case studies of collaborative work done so far.
- Content partnerships: Write case study of a content partnership and publicise through Jisc channels to elicit interest from similar projects
- Within Jisc: Administer intra-Jisc online survey
- By end February
- Academic events: Follow up on contacts made at events. Report on new contacts made and new educational activities, to inform WMUK’s and Jisc’s outreach work.
- Academic events: Deliver a workshop as part of a Netskills event or course
- infoKit: Launch and dissemination. Use Jisc’s and WMUK’s media/ social media channels to raise profile
- Documentation: Publish advice document for Jisc Digital Media
- Within Jisc: Deliver an event within Jisc based on the infoKit, in conjunction with Netskills
- Planning and reporting: Assemble outline of final report
- By end March
- Public events: Follow up and evaluate third editathon
- Documentation: Write final case study (TBD)
- Content partnerships: Write evaluation report. How much content was uploaded, how was it used and how much impact did it have?
- Within Jisc: Run an interactive session related to Wikimedia at Jisc Digital Festival in Birmingham
- Planning and reporting: Write project report and a plan for handling queries beyond the project.
| This page has been created as part of the 2013-14 partnership between Jisc and Wikimedia UK |
 
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