Grants talk:Conference/WMAR/Iberoconf 2017

Dear Kacie Harold,

As we talked in the WMCON, we improved the measures of success and indicators for Iberoconf 2017. Hope that know represents what we all want to achieve! Hugs!--Anna Torres (WMAR) (talk) 19:24, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Conference Grant Committee Comments

Hi Mervat Salman and James Hare (NIOSH), would you kindly take a look at this proposal and provide any feedback, suggestions or questions you have. I feel confident that this group will be able to organize a quality conference that will meet important needs within the Iberocoop community. At the end of the comments, please indicate whether you are OK with approving the grant request. Thank you, --KHarold (WMF) (talk) 00:02, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Will have a good look tonight. Regards>>> --Mervat Salman (talk) 06:30, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

I would like to thank the team @Anna Torres (WMAR): for the well-organised proposal. As always, I support all these types of conferences that would strengthen the common work among communities with similar interests. I was wondering why would you need 4 people from Spain? I think the strong chapters should be good enough in the areas the conference will focus on (i.e. management, reporting, etc.); I think you would get more people from the emerging communities which are members is Iberocoop. Also, won't the conference be a good chance to launch more common projects, so these can be part of the success measures? for the residence and the venue, why not to make them in the same place? this way, you would save the time of participants moving between the two and some expenses as well.

Good luck. Mervat Salman (talk) 07:12, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

Hi Mervat Salman,

First of all, thank you for you kind words. Here come our answers to your questions:

1. There are 4 people form Spain coming. Two of them as representatives of Wikimedia España and other two as representatives of Wikimujeres
2. The region has major problems to get organized as chapters or user groups. We as a group have already done many different activities with great results. We do know we are continuing to organize new activities but we really feel we have to focused on professionalizing the region.
3. The venue and the hotel are very close. --Anna Torres (WMAR) (talk) 18:46, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

WMF Comments

After discussing this project with Anna at the Wikimedia Conference, I have a better understanding of the skills that members of the Iberocoop community want to focus on at this event. From our discussion, I understand that the community would like to focus on (1) Facilitation and conflict resolution (2) Project planning (3) Reporting on grants and other projects (4) Planning and managing a budget. I have gathered input from WMF staff who work with these communities who have confirmed that these are skills they think would be very valuable to the Iberocoop community. After Wikimedia Conference, I heard positive feedback from several people who attended the Iberocoop regional meetup that suggests this group is committed to using this conference as an opportunity to improve their capacity to manage their user groups and their projects. WMF staff have agreed to work with WMAR to help develop a program based on the needs assessment they carried out. Anna Torres has told me that they plan to hire external facilitators to conduct some of the trainings. I appreciate the hard work that this community has put into to communicating openly about the ways they want to support each other as a regional group. If the conference grant committee agrees, I would like to proceed with funding this event. --KHarold (WMF) (talk) 23:59, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

Hello @KHarold (WMF):: I wouldn't mind funding this event. It's pretty clear the team have set the goals clearly, wishing them all luck. Regards. --Mervat Salman (talk) 19:47, 18 April 2017 (UTC)