Case studies

For more specific case study pages see, see GLAM/Model projects and Education/Case Studies.

Welcome to the Outreach Case Studies Portal!

The Community Programs team needs new case studies that highlight current and diverse programs whether in GLAM, Education, STEM, Gender Gap, or other programmatic areas. We have created a series of templates for creating consistent case studies, that should make it simpler for you to share your story, and make sure that the best programs get repeated throughout the Wikimedia community. Below you can find these templates.

What happens if you complete a case study?

You get a chance to be in a new brochure representing the various program areas throughout the movement! Our goal is to create case study handouts that can be easily internationalized for modeling effective programs generally across community programs, and for our two major program areas: GLAM and Education.

We will be reviewing case studies as we collect them, with the goal of creating a case studies brochure that includes a representative range of programs and projects from throughout the movement. Criteria for selection in the brochure, can be seen below.

How do I participate?

Choose a program and write a case study about it using the selection criteria outlined on this page and the prompts in the template to guide you.
Use the input box for the type of program you are submitting (Education, GLAM, or other) to find the template and submit your case study.
Contact nsaadwikimedia.org and astinsonwikimedia.org to get help refining your case study!

Selection Criteria

The following criteria will be used to evaluate case studies to be used in a new program's case studies brochure:

Complete: Every section of the case study is completed.
Instructive: The case study presents an example that others can learn from and emulate, if successful (it’s not about presenting a story of perfection, it’s about presenting learning experiences)
Unique: The project highlighted in the case study represents an approach or a best practice that hasn’t previously been well-documented in the community. If writing a case study on a tactic or project type that has some previous documentation, consider explaining how your approach and context required new or different approaches.
Representative: Represents projects, contexts (geographic or linguistic) or knowledge communities frequently not represented in the best practices for GLAM, Education or other program areas.
Appealing: Compelling visuals are included and the content is easy to navigate (sections, bullets and other organization helps folks find and evaluate the different parts)
Professional: The case study is well written (the content is in internationally accessible English and provides clarity and context for relatively inexperienced readers. For help, see revision questions below)

Write your case study!

What kind of case study do you want to share?
Choose the program type that best describes your program area GLAM, Library or other Partnerships Education Other (i.e. STEM, Gender, marginalized knowledge)

GLAM, Libraries, and Partnerships

Have you run a project with a Gallery, Library, Archive or Museum? Have you worked with other cultural heritage or research institutions? Share about your partnership with those institutions!

Education

Do you run an education program? Have you used Wikipedia in your classroom in an interesting and innovative way? Tell us about it!

Other program areas

An editathon at the National Institute of Health in the United States

Does your program not quite fit into one of the broad categories of GLAM or Education? Write your case study using this form! Other program areas might include projects focused on the Gender Gap, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math), Photography, Indigenous or marginalized knowledge or languages, etc.

Getting support

Consider partnering with someone else in your community for feedback. We have developed a handy revision guide that either you or a partner/collaborator can work help:Revision guide.

If you aren't able to get feedback: reach out to the Wikimedia Foundation team nsaadwikimedia.org and astinsonwikimedia.org.

F.A.Q.

Why are we doing this on Outreach? All my documentation lives elsewhere.

For right now, almost all of the case studies for both the Education Program and the GLAM-Wiki community live on Outreach. Integrating these materials, will help us strengthen the existing program materials in one place. We would like to, at some point, better integrate these materials with material on Meta; however, most of our audience to program resources accesses them now through outreach or their local language Wikipedia.

Why are you so focused on GLAM and Education projects?

The Wikimedia Foundation is currently staffed to support the communities working on the Education and GLAM-Wiki (including libraries) community. However, we know that communities are developing unique and different outreach strategies around the Sciences, Photography communities, Medicine, Gender, and many other topics: we want to collect those case studies too.

Do the case studies need to be in English?

Please write the case studies in any language you feel comfortable in; however, we ask that you also find a translator who can help translate the final version of the case study into English, so that we can share it with the rest of the Wikimedia Community. If you have trouble finding a translator, please contact Nsaadwikimedia.org or astinsonwikimedia.org.

How will the case studies be selected for inclusion in the highlights?

Case studies will be reviewed by a small panel of WMF staff and volunteers against the 6 criteria outlined above. The case studies that best meet the selection criteria will be selected for publication. We also are looking for case studies that represent a diverse set of examples from across emerging and well established communities and throughout different regions, cultural and linguistic contexts.

What if my program fits into more than one category?

You can choose to use the input box that is most relevant to you. Cross-cutting programs are very welcome!

Drafts

(Purge the cache of this page in case a recent draft does not yet appear here)

Education

Glam

other

Case studies/Form