Wikipedia:Wikipedia Fellows

Wikipedia Fellows

Wikipedia Fellows is an interdisciplinary pilot to help subject-matter experts contribute to Wikipedia.

This page is an overview of the Wikipedia Fellows pilot, running from January through April 2018.

Background

The Wikipedia community has long understood the potential for subject-matter experts to be valuable contributors to the encyclopedia. Academics, professionals, and other experts have a broad understanding of literature in their field, and thus are well positioned to evaluate the reliability of sources, organize complex concepts, or identify aspects of a subject that are missing, underrepresented, or overemphasized. It's for some of these reasons that thousands of articles are tagged as needing expert attention.

Academics and other experts are passionate about sharing knowledge, a core trait among Wikipedians. However, Wikipedia is a unique writing environment that can be jarring and difficult to adapt to. Hard work can be undone, thoughtful composition can be changed, verifiability is typically prioritized over "truth", original research is not allowed, citations are required for just about everything, and expertise itself does not guarantee authority or deference. These characteristics and their underlying justifications are easy for the editing community to take for granted, but require effort to adapt to, especially coming from a culture that in many ways is just the opposite.

Pilot description

For several years, Wiki Education has supported students as they navigate Wikipedia norms and processes through classroom assignments. We regularly talk to academics, eager to contribute, asking for a similar support infrastructure to help them participate. Our new pilot, Wikipedia Fellows, provides just that.

In Fall 2017 Wiki Education worked with three of our partner associations, the American Sociological Association, Midwest Political Science Association, and National Women's Studies Association, to recruit their members to collaborate in the Wikipedia Fellows pilot. In total, we received about 90 applications for the 9-person pilot cohort.

From January through April 2018, participants will learn how to contribute neutral, well-sourced content to Wikipedia and, by the end, make a substantial improvement to at least two articles. Long-time Wikipedians on Wiki Education's staff will provide training and guidance throughout the process.

Training and contribution processes

Wikipedia Fellows will take advantage of Wiki Education's support infrastructure, adapted for the purpose of this pilot. Participants will follow a structured training schedule, including a series of milestones leading up to a more substantial contribution. They will use Wiki Education's interactive training system, and will discuss trainings and milestones at regularly scheduled group meetings with Wiki Education staff. Metrics about their work will be visible through the Dashboard. In addition to being available for additional one-on-one communication, staff will monitor participants' edits and provide feedback and guidance throughout the process.

Participants will learn:

• The technical basics of editing Wikipedia.
• Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. For example:
  • WP:NPOV, including the concept of WP:WEIGHT, dealing with controversial subjects, and using an impartial tone.
  • WP:NOR, particularly contrasting other forms of writing participants may be used to.
  • WP:CONSENSUS, and how decisions are made and disputes resolved.
  • WP:RS, in general and tailored to participants' subject areas.
• How to use article and user talk pages to engage with the community.
• How Wikipedia pages are structured, and relevant stylistic guidelines.
• Best practices for collaboration, such as what to do if contributions are removed or challenged, and norms like WP:BRD.

Working most closely with participants at Wiki Education are Community Engagement Manager User:Ryan (Wiki Ed) and Content Experts User:Ian (Wiki Ed) and User:Shalor (Wiki Ed). If you have questions or comments about the pilot, please leave a message at User talk:Ryan (Wiki Ed) or email wikipediafellowswikiedu.org

Pilot cohort

From the American Sociological Association

Sine Anahita is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. She sees Wikipedia as a potentially powerful tool to share sociological research with the public. Sine would like to improve articles about structures of masculinity, the alt-right and gender, working class men’s friendship patterns, rural lesbians, lesbian land movement, women’s sexualities, LGBT sexualities, and anything related to Alaska.

Bradley Zopf is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Carthage College. He plans to improve content related to contemporary and historical understandings of race, racism, prejudice, discrimination, and inequality, with a focus on the experiences of Arab and Muslim Americans in the United States. Bradley is participating as a Wikipedia Fellow to contribute to the accuracy of public knowledge in his areas of expertise, and because of the extent to which students rely on the site for learning about the world around them.

Michael Ramirez is Associate Professor of Sociology at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. His area of specialization is race, class, and gender stratification, and he is looking forward to Wikipedia Fellows as an exercise in public sociology, contributing to public knowledge of relevant social issues.

From the Midwest Political Science Association

Royal G. Cravens, III is a Lecturer in the Department of Political Science at Bowling Green State University. He is participating in this pilot to help improve the accuracy and inclusiveness of Wikipedia as an open educational resource – one which has the potential to open new data streams for the study of marginalized people at the same time as it acts as a resource for marginalized scholars. In particular, he plans to improve articles related to LGBT politics in the United States.

Madeline Gottlieb is a fourth year doctoral student in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at the University of California, Davis. She will improve articles about environmental issues, being sure to adequately capture the social science aspects of each issue, with particular attention to her research focus, fracking. One of her goals as an academic is to use her research to help improve access to information for people across the socioeconomic spectrum rather than in publications most people cannot access.

Nicole Kalaf-Hughes is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Bowling Green University. As Wikipedia Fellow, she will improve Wikipedia articles in her primary field of study, American political institutions. She is participating in this pilot to help improve the public’s ability to accurately filter and process current events by ensuring the quality of information available about the history and function of our institutions.

From the National Women’s Studies Association

Jenn Brandt is the Director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and an Assistant Professor of English at High Point University. Her interest in Wikipedia Fellows stems from her integration of Wikipedia into her teaching and her research interests in digital media. She will be contributing to articles on feminist media studies, feminist literary criticism, and contemporary women writers.

Michelle Gohr is First Year Experience Librarian at Arizona State University. She is looking forward to using her training as a librarian to contribute to the free and accurate distribution of knowledge globally, especially in topic areas like women and gender studies, LGBTQIA+ studies and history, American studies, American popular culture studies, sex and sexuality studies, speculative fiction, science fiction, and in particular the aspects of these subjects relevant to race, class, and gender.

Maria Velazquez is a Postdoctoral Researcher with the Department of African American and African Studies Department at The Ohio State University. She is interested to improve public understanding of current political events, placing them in the context of global conversations. In her classes, she uses Wikipedia talk pages to help students to understand discourse on controversial topics, and would like to use her time as a Wikipedia Fellow to give back to the community.

External links

• Wikipedia Fellows Dashboard
• Wikipedia Fellows on Wikiedu.org
• November 2017 announcement and call for applications on Wikiedu.org
• January 2018 announcement of pilot cohort on Wikiedu.org