Submissions:2014/Wikipedia Education Program: how student editors impact Wikipedia

Title of the submission

Wikipedia Education Program: how student editors impact Wikipedia

Themes (Proposal Themes - Community, Tech, Outreach, GLAM, Education)

Education

Type of submission (Presentation Types - Panel, Workshop, Presentation, etc)

Workshop

Author of the submission

Jami Mathewson

E-mail address

jami-at-wikiedfoundation.org

Username

Jami (Wiki Ed)

US state or country of origin

California

Affiliation, if any (organization, company etc.)

Wiki Education Foundation

Personal homepage or blog

Wiki Education Foundation

Abstract (at least 300 words to describe your proposal)

The Wikipedia Education Program is in its 8th term in the US, and more than 400 courses have used this type of assignment—but why? Jami Mathewson has been supporting the classroom program for more than two years, and she will also invite experienced Wikipedia Ambassadors in attendance to help facilitate this workshop. We will give an overview of instructor motivation (and how their students benefit), why courses are more successful when they have support, and how student editors positively impact the content gaps on Wikipedia.

Jami will talk about trends in instructor motivation for using Wikipedia as a teaching tool. Since we have exerted little effort in recruiting instructors to teach with Wikipedia but instead have had to stretch our resources to meet the courses’ many needs, we think it’s important to consider why instructors value this type of assignment and why the instructors and student editors are more successful when they have training and support.

Now that we are all on the same page about how student editors benefit during the assignment, let’s talk about the positive impact they have on Wikipedia. When expanding support to more instructors in the Wikipedia Education Program, we have the potential to curate our resources to disciplines with minimal coverage on Wikipedia. As experts in that field, instructors identify content gaps and assign those articles to their students to research. Jami will present metrics from past terms to review this content diversity and invite Wikipedia editors in the audience to contribute to the strategy for making the most of this opportunity.

Finally, Wikipedia Ambassadors will have the chance to explain their role in the classroom program and answer questions about why they volunteer to support Wikipedia in education. We will discuss various ways to get involved in the program and how the Wiki Education Foundation plans to move forward with our volunteer community.

Length of presentation/talk (see Presentation Types for lengths of different presentation types)

30 Minutes. This could be coupled with the Wiki Education Foundation's other 30-minute and 15-minute submissions.

Will you attend WikiConference USA if your submission is not accepted?

Yes

Slides or further information (optional)

To come

Special request as to time of presentations

Please put this session on the agenda before the “The 7 biggest mistakes the Wikipedia Education Program has made — and what we’ve learned from them” curated talk.

Interested attendees

If you are interested in attending this session, please sign with your username below. This will help reviewers to decide which sessions are of high interest. Sign with four tildes. (~~~~).

1. GastelEtzwane (talk) 15:43, 7 April 2014 (EDT)
2. Rhododendrites (talk) 21:41, 9 April 2014 (EDT)
3. Mozucat (talk) 12:17, 30 May 2014 (EDT)
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