UK Wikimedian of the Year 2017/Nomination
There are three categories:
- UK Wikimedian of the Year – individual who has made a significant contribution to Wikimedia UK's work.
- Partnership of the Year – an organisation working with Wikimedia UK.
- Honourable Mention – recognising a person or organisation's contribution to Wikimedia in the UK.
To submit a nomination, please specify who you're nominating along with a brief description on why you think they should win the award. Please no comparisons ("Bill is so much nicer than Mary" would be better phrased "Bill is very nice"). The deadline for nominations is Friday 14 July.
Nominations
UK Wikimedian of the Year
Kelly Foster
Wikimedia relies on people to edit it, and its aims of enabling people to share knowledge in a neutral way means making sure that all sorts of different people are able to edit it. This makes trainers absolutely key as Wikimedians. As an excellent and effective trainer, Kelly Foster made an enormous contribution in training the members of our Wikipedia project, which is a huge part of why its members are now confident and frequent editors. This is just one of many training sessions she has run for groups and the quality and effectiveness of her contribution deserves this recognition.
(For some reason I'm having issues logging into my Wikimedia account and have no time right now to fix it - I'm Claire 75 on Wikipedia) Claire 75, 14 July 2017 (BST)
Ewan McAndrew
Ewan's work with Edinburgh University is hugely important for normalising the use of Wikipedia in an academic setting. Without being able to point out the great work he has done there i doubt i would have got Aberystwyth University to start taking Wikipedia seriously as a teaching tool. But the main reason for nominating Ewan is the Celtic Knot Conference. Ewan clearly worked incredibly hard on putting this event together, which by all accounts was a great success. From a Welsh perspective, a Wiki conference focused on smaller and minority languages was hugely valuable, as issues on smaller Wiki's can be very different to those on en Wiki. Jason.nlw (talk) 15:44, 11 July 2017 (BST)
- I'd like to endorse Ewan's nomination for all his valuable work in Scotland, especially the Celtic Knot Conference. --86.24.232.177 17:05, 11 July 2017 (BST)
- I wish to endorse this nomination. Ewan was a fantastic support the last time we ran a twin event together. He's developed some great training resources that will benefit all wikimedia trainers and the scope and variety of the events he has run as a wikimedian in residence are truly outstanding. Elflin (talk) 22:07, 13 July 2017 (BST)
- Ewan has done some incredible work across the whole spectrum of Wikimedia projects, but I'd particularly like to commend his efforts to bring Wikidata in the education sector. His numerous presentations, workshops and video tutorials have been invaluable in spreading awareness and giving people they need skills to start using and contributing to Wikidata. NavinoEvans (talk) 11:27, 14 July 2017 (BST)
Ritchie333
Ritchie, despite being part of a group including myself who constantly have to deal with idiots on the site has remained strong and focused on content. He deserves the award for that alone haha but the real reason is his promotion of List of London Monopoly locations to Good Article and Featured list status. He put in a massive amount of work and time to sort out those core articles and promote them which deserves recognition, they make a big difference to London topics on Wikipedia. Dr. Blofeld (talk) 15:56, 11 July 2017 (BST)
Brianboulton
I would like to nominate Brianboulton as the Wikipedian of the year. He is one of our finest FA contributors, one of only three to have written over a hundred Featured Articles and, until recently, one of the co-ordinators of the TFA process to administrate over the FA front page contribution. He has been hugely active in the Peer Review and FAC process, aiding editors constantly to ensure that the highest standards are retained for our best work.
Aside from his tireless work on content and processes, he brings a light touch of tact and diplomacy in discussions, remaining calm, even and balanced – even when discussions become fraught. He is a credit to Wikipedia and we are lucky to count him amongst us. – SchroCat (talk) 13:04, 13 July 2017 (BST)
Jason Evans
I know that Jason has nominated the National Library of Wales for Partnership of the Year but I think he also deserves recognition for his hard work and enthusiasm, which has been in no small part the driving force behind the NLW's engagement with Wikimedia. He successfully completed the Welsh Government funded Wicipop project earlier this year and will soon be managing the Wici-Health project, again in collaboration with the Welsh Government. Obviously, working with major stakeholders is challenging and requires a great deal of skill and dedication but it does result in projects that engage with the community and deliver social benefits by creating content in the medium of Welsh. The innovative use of the ArticlePlaceholder application and Wikidata lists during the Wicipop project is an excellent example for other language editions of Wikipedia to follow. Jason has been very busy during the past year running edit-a-thons to engage with new audiences and advocating Wikipedia and Wikidata during his conferences presentations but still finds time to scrape websites for metadata, answer random questions and generally support my Wikidata Visiting Scholar projects. We should be grateful to have Jason as a member of our Wikimedia community. Sic19 (talk) 09:45, 14 July 2017 (BST)
Alice White
Alice has been with us at Wellcome for just over a year, 2 days p/w, and has achieved a ridiculous amount in such a short time. She’s delivered 17 sessions: 5 for Wellcome staff and 12 for a huge range of groups way beyond Wellcome, with 156 participants, 85% of them brand new to editing. The number of partnerships she’s creating, seemingly effortlessly, is phenomenal. Her commitment to open knowledge embodies everything that’s great about Wikipedia.
Diversity was a strong theme for our residency and we had hoped we could have a different sort of residency here. So far, 77% of people attending our sessions are women, unusual given the Wikipedia gender gap, and something we’re hoping to continue with our future Wikipedia projects: way more than we could have hoped for.
Alice has gone above and beyond – and then some – to get us where we are today. It’s incredible to see what she has achieved so far. Her approach to Wikipedia is so refreshing: she demystifies it, has the patience of all the saints and most importantly she does it all with the most amazing humour. She’s doing things differently, and she’s doing them brilliantly.. We couldn’t have wished for a more successful residency. Nomination by Phoebe Harkins sent by email
- I would like to second Alice's nomination for UK Wikimedian of the Year 2017. I had the absolute pleasure of working with Alice for an event at [Imperial College London] where we had over 66 secondary school students from the London area directly engaged with creating, editing and updating pages for Women Chemists. Alice [channeled her joy and love of information and the history of science] to enthuse these students to make a difference, and their excitement after hearing Alice speak was palpable. I've been so impressed by Alice's conviction and passion for her work that I am now involved in at least two future Wikichem editing sessions to improve the representation of Women In Science and specifically Women Chemists. We received comments from the teachers afterwards highlighting how excited the students were about Women Scientists, which is a particular contrast when you learn that at the start of the day the students only knew 4 Women scientists! Alice is doing outstanding work and I think Phoebe's comment above reflects it perfectly - 'She's doing things differently and she'd doing them brilliantly'. --Eolaíocht (talk) 14:21, 14 July 2017 (BST)
Fabian Tompsett
Fabian helped out again this year on Queen Mary University of London's Research Methods course in the Film Department, which I convened. On this module, students work in groups editing the wikipedia page of a selected film, aiming to improve its scholarly credibility and overall content. Fabian's time in class and online monitoring is always extremely helpful for the students: he is able to answer their technical and other questions succinctly and effectively, and his passion for wikipedia and knowledge around its potential issues expand the range of discussion in the class in helpful ways. Nphjones (talk) 11:44, 14 July 2017 (BST)
Partnership of the Year
National Library of Wales
Even if i do say so myself, i think the National Library of Wales deserves a nomination for their unparalleled commitment to Wikimedia UK and the wider Wikimedia movement. The NLW are now coming to the end of a 36 month full time residency. They have released 15,000 images to commons and have helped to create 33,000 wikidata items. They have held 20 Edit-a-thons, and users attending NLW events have created 10,000 new articles since January 2015. The library has been committed to supporting Wikimedia projects and has helped other Welsh content producers share their content on Wikimedia platforms, such as CADW (27,000 wikidata items) and Sain Records (7,000 sound clips). They have agreed to open their doors to Wiki visiting scholars, and have embeded Wiki based activities into their volunteer programme. They have partnered with the Welsh Government to run projects aimed at improving Welsh language content, and they have now appointed a permanent full time Wikimedian to their staff in order to maintain and develop their partnership with Wikimedia long term. Jason.nlw (talk) 15:15, 11 July 2017 (BST)
Wellcome Library
Like Jason, I'd like to nominate the partner who I've worked with over the past year: Wellcome Library has been a fantastic partner institution. Having already uploaded 94,450 images to Commons, this year they've also hosted their first Wikimedian in Residence. As part of this, they've fully funded and catered lots of events, and helped engage other organisations (such as the Royal College of Nursing, the Institution of Engineering & Technology, CREST, and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine) in contributing to Wikimedia projects. Wellcome have been particularly strong in supporting events aimed at improving the gender gap and also working with potentially challenging topics such as mental health. Their pride in and communication of the Wiki-work happening has been priceless in bringing the possibilities of working with Wikimedia to the attention of lots of people, institutions and groups who might not have previously considered it. Zeromonk (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2017 (BST)
National Library of Scotland
I'd like to nominate NLS for their continued support for open knowledge in Scotland. Not content to have recruited Scotland's first Wikimedian in Residence Ally Crockford, back in July 2013, NLS have this year recruited Dr Susan Ross, the world's first Gaelic Wikimedian in Residence. The Library holds a significant collection of Gaelic material, and the residency is an opportunity both to engage the public with that collection, and to provide much-needed support to Uicipeid. As was shown as the recent Celtic Knot conference, minority language Wikipedias (and collaboration thereon) provide a key site for the production of cultural identity. Their support and leadership is invaluable to the sector. Lirazelf (talk) 10:39, 13 July 2017 (BST)
I would like to endorse this nomination. From the very beginning of Ally's residency, NLS have embraced Wikimedia and worked hard on an organisational level to look at how they can make their resources more accessible on Wikipedia. Elflin (talk) 22:02, 13 July 2017 (BST)
Honourable Mention
Dundee Dental School
The Dental School launched the Dundee Dental Wikipedia Editing Project in January 2016, with the aim of updating and expanding dental Wikipedia with high quality, evidence-based information. We work closely with the Cochrane Collaboration to disseminate information. The Project is lead by myself. Our organizing committee consists of students and the work is very much supported by staff. We have taught students to edit and utilize scientific evidence for citation on dental Wikipedia articles. Thus far we have raised our own funds to hold events and expand the Project and have worked extremely hard to promote the expansion and improvement of dental Wikipedia. Our work caught the interest of other dental schools and in February of 2017 we initiated the Wikipedia Collaboration of Dental Schools which now includes Glasgow, Aberdeen and Manchester dental schools as well as Harvard, Tufts and NYU dental schools in the USA. In addition to this, training was provided to the University of Dundee Cairo (Egypt) Branch and they are currently working on both English and Arabic dental articles.
Dundee is providing all schools who join the Collaboration with the training in order for them to set up their own committees. We are providing live support during the launch event each school will be holding in September in order to recruit their students to join the Editing Groups being set up at their own schools. Throughout the coming year, we will continue to promote the Project and hopefully expand the Collaboration to include more dental schools from the UK and North America.
You can read a bit more about our work here: https://blog.wikimedia.org.uk/2017/06/wikipedia-collaboration-of-dental-schools/ NGeres
User:Sic19
Simon Cobb (Sic19) has worked incredibly hard this year developing cultural Wikidata. As the Wikidata visiting scholar with National Library of Wales he has created over 10,000 Wikidata items and showcased the benefits of creating open linked data using visualisations, and by writing blogs. He ran a successful session at LODLAM 2017 aimed at developing collaborative Wikidata projects across the sector. In his role at the Leeds University Library he has also run several Wikipedia sessions and has been a strong advocate for Wikimedia within that institution. Jason.nlw (talk) 15:29, 11 July 2017 (BST)
- I endorse, over 10,000 items is incredible, he's doing a lot of great work for Wikimedia.Dr. Blofeld (talk) 16:08, 11 July 2017 (BST)
- +1 from me, his work as the Wikidata visiting scholar at NLW has set an outstanding example for other GLAMS to follow. Great work! NavinoEvans (talk) 11:28, 14 July 2017 (BST)
- I endorse, over 10,000 items is incredible, he's doing a lot of great work for Wikimedia.Dr. Blofeld (talk) 16:08, 11 July 2017 (BST)
User:Jesswade88
Jess Wade has only been editing since October 2016, but in that short time she's been fantastic at promoting Wikipedia editing and at planning and executing Wikipedia learning events. She's done a fantastic job of highlighting to scientific and acaedemic communities how they can improve Wikipedia and be involved in editing, and perhaps most importantly she planned, secured funding and external speakers for, and hosted two huge sessions for school students (more to follow!). The focus on women in STEM meant that her work has been excellent for highlighting gender gap issues and working to improve them too. For more details of her work, see the Wellcome Residency Reports. Zeromonk (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2017 (BST)
User:Andrew Davidson
Andrew D. has been a tireless supporter of editors, editathons, and general-wikiness. He's attended a great many events over the past year and done a stellar job of helping new editors to find their feet. He's particularly briliant at putting new pages through DYK so that they find a wider audience. Events such as the huge school session at Imperial would have been impossible without his support. Zeromonk (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2017 (BST)
- I would support this nomination, Andrew has been excellently supportive to the Women's Classical Committee Wikipedia project. (for some reason I'm having issues logging in and have no time right now to fix it - I'm Claire 75 on Wikipedia) Claire 75, 14 July 2017 (BST)
London Wikimedians
I know this is probably too broad to be acceptable as an entry, but I would like to recognise the support provided by London Wikimedians who attend the regular Meetups. They have been so welcoming and generous with their time and ideas for how to run events (many of which London Wikimedians have come and helped with too). Zeromonk (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2017 (BST)