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Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library/Professional Interns/Curriculum

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Timeline

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Below is a timeline with best practices for orienting yourself to the Wikipedia community and learning how to complete your Library internship. This timeline was designed for a student taking the internship in addition to a course-load during the same semester. These are only best practices, feel free to mix and match different parts of the timeline and/or the alternative assignments to create an effective plan for your internship to meet both student learning outcomes (as described on our resource page) and organizational requirements.

Each step in the resource includes "Interns Will Be Able To" statements, or IWBATs, that define why the subsequent possible activities and useful resources are included in that section. IWBATs help establish larger goals for interns to be able to achieve during the course of that period. Moreover, we also provide assessment questions to help supervisors and students assess whether students have met those goals.

Weeks 1: Establishing expectations and Wikipedia Basics

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Interns Will Be Able To (IWBAT)

  • Establish an understanding of their expectations of the semester with their supervisor.
  • Understand the basic elements of editing Wikipedia.
  • Begin editing Wikipedia!

Activities

  • Create a Wikipedia account by following the links at Special:UserLogin
    Before you create an account - one important part of creating an account is that the account cannot be shared with other people within your organization (see WP:ROLE) or be named after an organization (see WP:ORGNAME). Unlike other social media, Wikipedia does not allow for institutional accounts; accounts should be used by one user and named to identify that individual user.
  • Join our class page: our token for the class is "libraries" without the quotations.
  • Review the resources available to you on this page and at WP:TWL/I.
  • Meet with your supervisor, and outline their expectations and what you want to learn during the course of the semester. In that meeting pay attention to the following:
    • Internships are more than working for an organization, they are an opportunity for you to develop and practice skills that can make you a more well rounded professional. Make sure that you are both helping the organization, and meeting your own learning and educational goals. For some example learning objectives, see Wikipedia:TWL/I#Educational outcomes.
    • Make sure that the expectations laid out by your supervisor can meet the requirements of the institution providing you credit for the internship (such as an Academic Department).
      Note: If your sponsoring department require more out comes from the semester than written research, chose additional assignments from those outlined below or from your supervisor's repertoire of activities. Make sure assignment will help supervisors assess your learning and you meet these goals.
    • Think about how your internship might be reported to interested parties, such as Wikipedians, your supervisor and other members of the organization. For best practices on reporting, see Wikipedia:TWL/I#Reporting activities
  • Do one (or both) of the following tutorials (both emphasize slightly different parts of the community, and are complementary to each other):
    • Complete the online student orientation. During this training, you will create an account, make edits in a sandbox, and learn the basic rules of Wikipedia. This tutorial is less interactive and will take a short period of time, but won't give you as much hands-on experience as The Wikipedia Adventure. If you like to have information presented to you before practice, this is the editorial for you!
    • Complete the Wikipedia Adventure. This training is more detailed and interactive than the student orientation, providing a deeper practical environment for testing your Wikipedia editing skills. If you learn best with hands-on activities, this is the tutorial for you (it also includes a really fun Avatar that will show you the way!)
  • Identify some of your libraries' or archives' most used resources, and identify a few pages where users might benefit from links: add several references to those pages that will help verify content.

Secondary activities

  • Create your user page, if you haven't done so already through one of the tutorials.
  • Make a few edits based on the information presented to you in the tutorials.

Resources

Assessment questions

  • Do you have a basic understanding of what the requirements are for the semester?
  • Do you understand how to contribute to Wikipedia?
  • Do you have a basic understanding of the key policies of Wikipedia, including WP:SPAM, WP:COI, WP:V, and WP:N? (Remember, even experienced contributors don't fully understand these policies, so don't feel like you need to master them).
  • Have you made at least 10-20 edits to several different pages?
  • Are you ready to Be Bold?

Weeks 2-4: Warming up to Wikipedia!

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Interns Will Be Able To (IWBAT)

  • Get a better sense of the materials available to them through their library or archive
  • Practice Wikipedia editing skills.

Activities

  • Meet with other parties that understand what digital resources are available at your library or archive; find out which ones are under used or could be better profiled on Wikipedia.
  • Explore Wikipedia and create a list of articles that you plan to edit as part of the internship. Create a list that pairs up underused digital resources from your institution with pages on Wikipedia that could benefit most from their information or where public readers might want to find the information in your resource.
  • Share the list of Wikipedia pages and resources with your supervisor, and make sure that you understand the best strategy for adding content to Wikipedia.
  • Practice small editing activities on pages related to collection. Small edits might include:
    • adding references to pages that are well developed, but don't link to your collection. Add a link in the external links section or as a reference. Make sure that you use the "Cite" tool in the source editor or the reference tool in the Visual Editor. See Wikipedia:The_Wikipedia_Library/Archivists for ideas and best practices.
    • Adding paragraphs based on secondary sources provided by your institution's digital resources, such as finding aids, digital collections, or other digital resources.
    • Be bold in your edits, but make sure edits meet the expectations laid out by Wikipedia:TWL/I#Avoiding COI and SPAM and that you use WP:Edit summaries.
  • Ask questions at the WP:Teahouse to get help from users who focus on helping new users.
  • Beginning research on other topics of interest on your list: What can't be expanded through what you have on your institution's website? What other research material might you need to create successful articles?
    Note: Wikipedia articles endure through community processes best when they have multiple references to editorially controlled sources outside of libraries and archives (i.e. newspaper articles, scholarly journal articles, etc.).
  • Introduce yourself at this page's talk page and interact with other interns on that talk page.

Resources

Assessment questions

  • Do you better understand the resources provided by your library's digital collection?
  • Do you have a strong understanding of where you can focus your energies during the internships?
  • Have you communicated your concerns with contributing to Wikipedia? Do you feel that you have satisfactory responses to those concerns?

The middle of the semester: Contributing in volume

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Interns Will Be Able To (IWBAT)

  • Confidently improve content on Wikipedia
  • Communicate with other Wikipedians and Supervisors

Activities By this point in the semester, you should have accomplished a fair bit, we recommend diversifying your activity so that you get more experience developing Wikipedia, beyond just adding references per the Wikipedia Library's recommendations for Cultural Professionals. Here are a few activities that can help you further your engagement with Wikipedia:

  • Significantly expand articles
    • Focus on filling in gaps that can be referenced to the secondary materials that your institution has in holdings or in their digital resources
    • Make sure that you cite your sources effectively. We recommend using the "Cite" tool in the "edit source" window or the equivalent in the Visual Editor.
  • Create new articles
    • If you are starting a new article, write a 3–4 paragraph summary version of your article—with citations—in your Wikipedia sandbox. If you are improving an existing article, write a summary version reflecting the content the article will have after it's been improved, and post this along with a brief description of your plans on the article's talk page. Once articles are in a decent draft shape (longer than 3 paragraphs, but usually no longer than 6-7), go ahead and move the content to main space (see How to move a page).
    • Though the Articles for creation process works and is a great way to get feedback on your first couple Wikipedia articles, we recommend using the method described above, because reviewers at AFC are best trained to handle articles written by users without the academic resources and the Wikipedia training you received.
    • Don't be afraid to move partial articles! Remember, Wikipedia is a Work in Progress: just make sure you have a few references to prove to other editors that the item is notable.
    • If you need help working on articles, make sure to reach out here or at WP:Teahouse
    • Don't be afraid to make mistakes as you create new articles! Even the most experienced Wikipedia editors do! Just Be Bold!!!!!
  • Give feedback on the work of other interns enrolled in this class page.
    • Or you can solicit feedback from other interns or editors.
  • Work on additional assignments required by your internship supervisors or credit-giving organization
  • Meet regularly (every week or two) with your Supervisor and other interested parties in your organization to keep them informed. Make sure to come to meetings ready to talk about:
    • Recent activities on Wikipedia
    • Questions or concerns you have about your contributions.
    • Questions, concerns, problems or suggestions that you have for the Library's website team; your internship provides an excellent opportunity to provide feedback based on your intimate knowledge of digital resources, without having been involved in their design.
  • Practice effective documentation through processes described at the section about reporting activities at the main resource page
  • Do more activities that expand beyond the basic editing process, and are described at Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library/Library interns#Activities and community values.

Resources'

See also: Wikipedia:Training/For students/Resources

Assessment questions

  • Have you gained confidence on understanding what to include in Wikipedia?
  • Have you created quality content that will stay on Wikipedia for the foreseeable future?
  • Can you communicate the purpose for your editing activities and how those activities will connect to the sponsoring organization?

The Last Three Weeks: Polishing and Reporting

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Interns Will Be Able To (IWBAT)

  • Report what they did over the course of the semester to sponsoring and credit-giving organizations
  • Feel confident about their legacy in the Wikipedia community
  • Give feedback to supervisors for improving the overall impact of future interns

Activities

  • Add final touches to any major projects you have embarked on or off Wikipedia.
  • Write a reflective essay on your internship for reporting to your credit giving organization. Reports should include the following:
  • Assess whether you need any more reporting with you supervisor and create documentation based on their requirements of the sponsoring organization. Consider the metrics and reporting tools described at Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library/Library interns#Reporting activities
  • Present your project to interested parties within the sponsoring organization so that they understand a) What you did? b) Why you did it? and c) how it benefits the interested parties?

Additional assignments

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This section includes ideas for additional assignments, if your supervisors or credit-giving organization requires some type of additional activity. Don't feel like you need to do these: they often require and investment of time, that could diminish your hands-on learning experience.

  • Complete a review of news or popular representations of Wikipedia.
    • Here are a couple of controversies or events in Wikipedia history that are very useful for learning about the communities quirks:
    • Questions to consider when assessing the stories:
      • What is the controversy in the eyes of the public? How does the press represent the issue?
      • How are Wikipedia editors responding to the issue? What does the Signpost say about the issue?
      • What are the impacts of Wikipedia's policies and the public's perceptions on Wikipedia? On public knowledge?
      • What ethical concerns can we apply to information and the
  • Review academic articles discussing social media and librarianship or Wikipedia and the student's academic field (published studies on Wikipedia library internships can be found at our main resource page, also most recent scholarship on Wikipedia is often covered in The Wikimedia Research Report)


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