User:TrudiJ/EducationGreenhouseProject

Become a Wikipedia Editor

This course will be offered through the Bethlehem (NY) School District's Adult and Continuing Education program in Spring 2020. It is designed to encourage knowledgeable individuals to contribute to Wikipedia (for a start) and to build a local community of Wikipedians.

There are a large number of retired professionals in this area, as well as those who are not yet of retirement age. They may be interested in providing value to others by contributing to Wikipedia. I hope that they might also encourage others to become involved. There is not an extended mission statement for the Adult and Continuing Education program that I could find, but they do have a motto, "Work Hard, Play Hard, Learn Forever." I think this class will fit in!

How This Project Adds Value to the Community

I have had trouble identifying Wikipedians in the Albany, NY area, but believe there is great potential. There are many institutions of higher education in the area, and many retired educators who might be interested in participating. There is also a graduate program of information science, as well as an undergraduate informatics program at the local university. These students might be interested in learning more. However, outreach and the opportunity to enroll will not be limited to these audiences, so I think there could be wider engagement and learning about participation in building Wikipedia.

Problem Tree (Table)

(I abbreviate Wikimedia as W.)

Problem	Causes	Effects
Don't see self as a contributor to Wikimedia projects	Negative press about Wikipedia, or the sense that it exists to lead one to other sources, and that using the content of its entries is not a good thing to do may cause people to disassociate from it	Use Wikipedia, but guiltily
	Don't consider their knowledge in connection with W. goals, may not recognize the value that they could bring to others	Don't consider contributing
Don't understand they themselves can contribute	Lack of knowledge about who can edit, only familiar with the articles, not structures such as the history and talk pages that would show the communal editing process	Consume, do not produce
Don't know scope of W. projects beyond Wikipedia	Other projects aren't as visible	Only use Wikipedia
		Don't realize they might be valuable contributors
May be interested in contributing, but don't know where to start	Complex nature of information about contributing, range of resources can be overwhelming, no one has said, "I can get you started"	Do nothing
	Lack of opportunities to learn about editing	Do nothing

Logic Model

O
Inputs	Output Participants (need to invest resources to get participants)	Output Activities	Output Products	Outcomes	Impacts
What You Invest	What You Implement			What You Change	What You Change Long-Term
Enthusiasm of instructor	Those who enrolled in the course	Review of training materials	New editors	People who edit in Wikipedia	Increased number of at least partially confident Wikipedia editors locally who can engage others and participate in local editathons
Knowledge about teaching	Willing to pay $35 for the course	Discussions	New content	Sense of empowerment as an editor Able to share information through their knowledge	Sense of enthusiasm they may share with others
Knowledge derived from this course		Sandbox "play"	Information for revisions to future iterations of the course	Curiosity about other Wikimedia projects	Contributors to other Wiki projects
Mentorship of other Wikipedians for students		Contact between students and mentors		Understanding of the Wikipedia community
Computer classroom		Article editing		Connections with other Wikipedians

Outputs: what you do and what you create and who you reach

Outcomes: changes in learning, actions, or conditions

Monitoring Plan

Initial Monitoring Plan
Outcomes (Objectives)	Indicators	Data Collection Method	Timing	Owner
People who edit in Wikipedia	Number of people contributing to a class discussion who provide concrete details	Class Discussion	Start of Week 2	Trudii
Sense of empowerment as an editor	Number of people contributing to a class discussion indicating how they felt empowered	Class Discussion	Start of Week 3	Trudi

Evaluation Plan

Main Purpose (Why): To determine if the course as developed is effective in meeting its goals.

Stakeholders to Share With (Who): Continuing Education Coordinator, Wikimedia Community (along with other course material)

Evaluation Plan Prep Work
Outcomes (Objectives)	Indicators	Data Collection Method	Timing	Owner
People who edit in Wikipedia	Number of people who have continued editing after the course ended	Survey	1 month after course ends	Trudi
Sense of empowerment as an editor	Number of people who self-report a sense of empowerment	Survey	1 month after course ends	Trudi
Curiosity about other Wikimedia projects	Number of people who contribute to one other project	Survey	1 month after course ends	Trudi

Evaluation Plan
Logic Model	Evaluation Questions	Indicators of Success	Data Collection Method	Owner
Impact (Long Term Impact) Increased number of at least partially confident Wikipedia Editors
Objectives (sort-term and intermediate-term outcomes) People who edit in Wikipedia Sense of empowerment editing Wikipedia Share enthusiasm with others	Have you edited in Wikipedia since the course ended? Do you feel confident editing in Wikipedia (Likert scale) Have you suggested editing in Wikipedia to another person? Have you offered to teach another person how to edit in Wikipedia?	60% say yes 60% say moderately confident or confident 60% say yes 40% say yes	Survey	Trudi

Stakeholders

Internal Stakeholders

Continuing education program coordinator
Experienced Wikipedia editors (to serve as mentors)
Potential students/enrolled students

External Stakeholders

Others in the community who might be interested in learning to be a Wikipedia editor
Those running local institutions/programs that might become the subject of Wikipedia articles (and not necessarily only local)
Members of enrolled students' families who are curious about what the person is doing
Librarians at the local public library, who may get more requests for reference assistance
Others in the Wikimedia Education environment who might be interested in the outcome of such a course, and possibly using the material developed or borrowed

Stakeholder Engagement Plan


Stakeholder	Type	Contact	Interest/ Power	Strategy	Mediums of Communication	Concrete Action
Continuing Ed Coordinator	Public sector, individual	Direct	Promoter: without her agreement, this course will not exist	Engage	Email	Contact her in the middle of the course to report on how it is going, update her at the end. Goal is to make her receptive to adding it to the schedule again
Experienced Wikipedia Editors	Individuals	Will need to use group mechanisms to recruit. Possibly ask in the Teahouse	Potential defenders if I frame it well, otherwise apathetics	Engage	Messages via forums on Wikipedia	Once course is listed with dates, post in forums learned about in this Greenhouse course to explain project and request experienced editors who are willing to assist. Ask for their advice to keep them engaged.
Potential Students	Individuals	Indirect, this is a large group of people and the more that can be reached, the better	Latent: If they become interested, they will enroll and allow the course to run	Engage	Possible article in regional and local newspapers/on regional newspaper's blog	First, once the course is approved by the Continuing Ed Coordinator, ask her if it is ok to promote. If it is, contact the two papers to explore options. Once the course flyer is mailed, try to activate those options. On 1/26, sent to: https://www.spotlightnews.com/thespot/calendar/
Librarians at the local public library	Organization	Direct to either director of the library or the head of reference	Potential defenders: with their interest in information for all	Communicate, then Engage if there is an opening to do so	Email, offer of phone call	Once the course is listed and the flyer is mailed, reach out regarding possible reference questions, see if there is a way to promote the class (bulletin board? other?)
Representatives of local Institutions that might be subjects	Organizations	Direct	Latents (heads of organizations) or apathetics (PR folks)	Communicate as needed, possibly engage (editathon at their orgaization)?)	Phone call or email	Depends on topics students in the course are working on

Email to public library (item 4 above, sent 1/26/20) [no response received]

I am a librarian at the University at Albany (and a Slingerlands resident), and I have a BCSD Continuing Education course being offered this spring, "Start Contributing to Wikipedia" (https://www.bethlehemschools.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/69614-BCSD-Cont-Ed-Spring-2020.pdf page 8). If there is sufficient enrollment, it will begin April 21. I am writing for two reasons:

1. While this is being offered by the School District and not the Library, I wonder if there might be any way to promote the class through the Library? Library users would be excellent potential Wikipedia contributors. Is there a bulletin board where I might post information? Are there any other ways to promote it there?

2. If the course gets sufficient enrollment to proceed, there might be queries connected to the Wikipedia article research learners will be doing in the course, and I thought I would give a heads-up about this. The class is limited to 15 students, and runs for just three weeks.

Thank you, and I hope to hear from the appropriate person on your staff. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me. My home phone is xxx and my office phone is xxx.

Trudi Jacobson

Budget

Course runs for 3 weeks in April, 2020: 1 meeting of 90 minutes/week

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TTTXNpva75pGdKQ03Kp6zbYP-lm1OehavmLNbev7POk/edit?usp=sharing

	Items	Cost	In-kind Contribution	Funding Needed
Planning
	Mentors	$0	$0	$0
	Training Materials	$25	$25	$0
	Promotion
	Neighborhood Listserv	$0		$0
	Flyers	$25	$25	$0
	Newspaper Blog	$0		$0

Implementation
	Space	$75	$75	$0
	Computers		provided	$0
	Wifi		provided	$0
	Contact Local Organizations	$10	$10	$0

Evaluation
	Report Writing	$75	$75	$0
	Assessment Survey
	Software	$0		$0
	Development	$150	$150	$0

Totals		$360	$360	$0

Advocacy Messge

Advocacy Message Audience for this message: Range of people from the local community